Confusion, Conflict & Chaos - And there's more!

I learned very early on in my team leadership journey that there were a number of essential team performance 'basics' that a team should pay attention to and make sure that they cover each area because if they don't then it can cause challenges for the team in their quest to achieve their goals and fulfil their purpose. Let's look at the eight areas of my PARTNERS process and see what can potentially happen if each area in turn is ignored and not developed.

No Purpose: If a team has no purpose or even in not all the members fully understand what the team purpose is, then that team can totally lack direction. Team members will simply focus on their own individual tasks and as long as these are carried out then they are not concerned about whether the team hits it purpose or even the overall goals. Simply put you have an individualistic bunch of individuals doing their own 'thing'.

No Understanding of the Aims of Goals: if the aims or goals are unclear then you get a situation similar to the one above and in addition to not having any proper direction, the team and its members will lack total focus, with the result that team members may actually be doing tasks that don't relate to at all to the team purpose and goals!

No Clear Roles or Understanding of Roles: When this occurs you will get confusion and demotivation. Team members may decide to create their own roles and do what they either think is desired from them or what they would prefer to do. This not only causes confusion in the mind of the individual team member but can cause conflict with other team members.

No Team Development Plan: There's a lot to teamwork and it is important that a team looks to develop its processes, behaviours, skills and knowledge. Without this development there will be no growth, and thus no increase in performance.

No Team Charter or Contract: In any team, the team members need to work closely and interdependently. There needs to be an awareness of each others' styles, strengths, needs and expectations. The more clear these are, then the more harmoniously a team will work together. A team charter or contract is a formal collection and agreement as to how best the team will work together. Without this formal charter, misunderstandings, judgements, inappropriate behaviours and unmet expectations can conflict right across the team.

No Reward or Incentives: Rewards can be as simple as saying 'well done' and 'thank you'. Many teams will not have access to monetary rewards other than their basic salaries, so in this instance the simple rewards are essential. Recognising effort as well as success is important and ensuring that team members are supported and listened to vital. Other wise, demotivation, can be a huge challenge, as this can negatively 'ripple' through the team. make sure effort and success is recognised and if there are reward schemes (such as bonus) then ensure that every team members fully understands what has to be achieved to receive these rewards.

No Review: if your team is on the constant 'hamster wheel' of task and busyness then make sure they get off it! Review is vital and teams should be reviewing their performance against their goals, their team development plan and their team charter. Without review, the team will potentially 'burn out' and completely miss their goals and be in complete chaos. Stop - review and ensure that the reviews are productive!

No Stakeholder Engagement: Many teams do not actively identify their key stakeholders and do not agree how best they are going to engage with senior people in order that the team gets the extra support it needs to hits its goals. In many cases this aspect of dealing with senior people is simply left to the team manager. Big mistake. Stakeholder engagement is an important exercise and without actively engaging stakeholders, the team could risk not gaining important support in attempting to reach its goals.

So, you can see, that by not paying attention to even one of the key performance basics it can make life difficult for the team, and in fact, what you tend to find is that a negative ripple effect can occur across many, if not all of the other performance areas. These basic performance areas also underpin the building of trust, accountability, commitment and resilience, so not developing these areas is a potential recipe for team 'disaster'!

There are a number of very cost-effective Team Manager developmental resources now available to support you in your quest to truly be that ‘Successful Team Manager.’?You can view and access these at:

?TEAM-XL online Team Assessment – Allows the team to feedback on strengths and development areas and gets them discussing their development towards high performance. TEAM-XL | PARTNERS Team Dev (partnersteamdevelopment.com)

The PARTNERS ‘Action Plan’ for Team Managers – A DIY Guide to getting your team performing. https://www.partnersteamdevelopment.com/product-page/partners-team-manager-action-plan

The book, ‘Team Champion - Taking Teamwork Seriously” - https://www.partnersteamdevelopment.com/teamchampion

The Online PARTNERS Team Development Course – A healthy blend of video lectures and questions to get you thinking. https://www.partnersteamdevelopment.com/online