The Hidden Cost of Hesitation: A Proven Test to Strengthen Your Team

How healthy is your team's culture? Here’s how you can measure it in just a few minutes!

Let me start by sharing a lesson I learned from Patrick Lencioni:

One of the strongest indicators of a team's culture is the amount of time between when team members identify a need to discuss an issue and when they actually discuss it.

The longer the wait, the less healthy the culture.

You don't have to be an organizational psychologist to understand why this makes sense.

Think about a healthy and trusting relationship in your life. When something comes up that you need to discuss with that person, no matter how contentious it might be, you’re likely to call or stop by without hesitation to discuss it, right? Without apprehension, issues are resolved quickly and effectively.

Now, think of a person you consider unapproachable, someone you’ve had a hard time connecting with. Maybe they’ve been defensive in response to your feedback. Maybe they always think they’re right or don't seem to be interested in listening to other points of view. Chances are that you’d hesitate to talk to them even if you knew you had to. You would probably spend a lot of time coming up with different ways you could approach them. You would probably try to anticipate what they might say and how you would respond. You might even start brainstorming ways to get around the issue without having to engage with that person at all.

This latter relationship, in addition to being a source of stress, involves constant hesitation and avoidance which ensures that issues consistently take longer to resolve than they should—and many go unresolved completely!

The exact same dynamic plays out in organizations. A team whose members are hesitant to talk to each other has little to no chance of creating synergy. While there may be an appearance of harmony on the surface, commitment and accountability on the team erode as results and morale inevitably suffer.

I have found this simple measure—time between issue identification and communication about it—to be extremely effective in gauging the health of leadership teams when I’m working with organizations to help them create more cohesive teams.

A simple exercise that I conduct with teams, which only takes a few minutes, to gather this data is as follows: I ask them to look around the room and privately rate each of their teammates on a scale of 1-7, 7 being the person they find most approachable and 1 being the person they would avoid at all cost.

Of course, this is only effective if done anonymously, especially if the team's culture is not particularly healthy. So, I have each person write their responses on a piece of paper, and then I tally the ratings and calculate the average each person received. I then plot the numbers on a spider chart for everyone to see. Depending on the team's situation, I may leave the names off the chart so that everyone can see the scores without putting anyone on the spot.

When we do use names, however, I also like to plot the minimum and the maximum scores that each person received by putting red and green dots, respectively, on the spider chart. That way, everyone knows their average score as well as the range of scores they received.

After a little discussion of the results, I assign some basic homework. I ask everyone to be intentional about taking action to be more proactive with people that they rated 5 or lower. I also ask those who received a lower average rating to pay attention to their receptivity to feedback and take steps on changing their behavior to signal more openness to discussion.

It’s always important to keep in mind that the scores given depend not only on whether the receiver of the feedback is approachable, but also on how timid or courageous the rater is. Therefore, in more sophisticated exercises, I also ask everyone to calculate the average of all the ratings they give others and I plot those on a different chart pad, anonymously. This enables everyone to see where they stand relative to others in their willingness to approach other team members. Anyone with a low rating in this exercise is encouraged to acknowledge that they are contributing to the situation and work on becoming more comfortable with approaching others.

We often do these exercises at the beginning of a one-day offsite and then go through a series of trust-building exercises and repeat the exercise at the end of the day. Let me tell you, I have seen miraculous increases in rating after just a few hours of team members getting to know each other better, discussion of communication style preferences, and so on. It’s a simple solution, yes, but a very effective one.

I’ll save the details of the other exercises I do and the homework I assign to close the gaps for another article. However, even if the above exercise is the only thing you try, I believe just seeing these results will make a huge impact on your team's awareness, creating a solid foundation on which to build better cohesion, morale, and results.

Further Resources

If you’d like to learn more about topics covered in this week’s newsletter article, check out the related resources I’ve included below.

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Clients and audience members at my talks frequently tell me:

• "I felt like you were talking specifically to me!"
• "Your perspective is so real and practical!"
• "Are you sure you don't work at my company? Because you were talking about exactly what we’re dealing with!"

I love hearing this feedback because my intent is always to make a real difference in your team's mindset and behaviors, which ultimately shape the culture, results, and fulfillment in your workplace.

The top problems we solve for clients with our coaching, speaking, and consulting services are:

• People working in silos and lack of collaboration toward a shared vision.
• Functional experts in leadership roles who aren’t equipped with the right skills and mindset to lead effectively
• People in the middle or frontlines of an organization failing to take initiative and be accountable.

If you’re experiencing any of these issues—or other challenges you would like to get some expert guidance on—get in touch with me and let me know your situation. I’ll get back to you very shortly with my thoughts on what you can do to start making progress.

Alternatively, click here to schedule a free discovery call to discuss your situation in more detail and to explore if and how The Ghannad Group can partner with you to transform your culture and results. During our conversation, I’ll share practical ideas and insights relative to your situation and we can jointly determine whether we can support you going forward.

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