chapter 1

Why supercharge your team?

Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.

Helen Keller (1880–1968)

Once there was a group of people who had a unique opportunity to change how the world worked together, for the better. That time is now, and we are those people. We are living in a time of unprecedented change, when all teams have to perform at the very edge of their capabilities. Teams and teamwork are being tested and challenged at every level. Today ‘good enough’ is no longer enough. We have a rare chance to use this period of disruption and innovation to evolve how we work. For every single team in the world, now is the time to supercharge. If not now, when?

Over the last two decades, I’ve worked with thousands of teams around the world, from small local charities to huge global corporations. I’ve experienced a range of team dynamics, from the truly excellent to the very dysfunctional. As a team member I’ve been inspired by the clever, creative people I’ve worked with, and I’ve been disillusioned by the bullies and bad behaviour that inevitably emerge in any human situation.

As a lifetime psychology student and a committed people watcher, I have always been fascinated by how people behave in groups. In my work as a consultant, I am invited into teams as an independent facilitator, and can observe with an outsider’s perspective. I’ve seen similar patterns of behaviours across all the teams I’ve met, no matter what the culture, company or size, and if you have ever worked in a team, I suspect we share similar experiences.

Supercharged teams operate on a different level, way above average. They are driven by the energy of a powerful vision, an urgent sense of purpose, and the motivation to work well together because they know that is the only way they will achieve, even exceed, their goals. Today, every team in the world has to solve complex problems and create new opportunities to do their best work, whether for clients, customers, consumers or each other. The difference between going through the motions and truly performing with momentum is making a deliberate choice to supercharge.

Teams solve more problems and create more opportunities than any one person could achieve alone. High-performing teams can overcome challenges and achieve real impact together. Being part of a brilliant team can be an overwhelmingly positive experience and great teams don’t only feel good, they also achieve more. On the complex issues we need to solve, like the environment, social inequality, economic disruption, immigration and refugees, we need true collaboration and incredible teamwork more than ever.

However, good teamwork doesn’t come naturally. Because of different priorities and personality types, people don’t automatically manage to work well together. True collaboration is always difficult because we all carry our own working styles, preconceptions and expectations into any team. Poor-performing teams aren’t just inefficient, they stifle the intelligence and purpose of the people in them, leaving them less capable and unmotivated.

Teams are like families. We share a common experience and build relationships, habits and behaviours together over time, but even if we love and trust each other, we don’t give the same amount of respect or effort to each other that we would to strangers. In pressured situations, or when things change, we fall back on old ways of doing things, some of which may not be effective in the new situation. The better a team knows each other and the longer they have worked together, the worse the potential for dysfunction is.

I believe we assign people to teams far too readily and we need to work in fewer teams for more effective work. I need to confess that I sometimes wish I didn’t have to work in teams. It is sometimes easier to avoid all the difficulty of collaborating. However, there’s no escaping it, and the research proves time and again that teams achieve more than individuals working alone, particularly in today’s rapidly evolving world. The problem is that the way we work today has changed, but the way we work in teams has not, and it needs to.

Great things in business are never done by one person; they’re done by a team of people.

Steve Jobs (1955–2011)

Why do we need supercharged teams?

Being in a team used to be a lot simpler. Team meetings were an efficient use of time because they allowed for quality thinking and considered decision-making. A regular meeting helped teams to stay aligned and protected our time outside of the meeting for actions. Between meetings, we had one-to-one conversations and shared this information with the whole team when we got together. It’s no surprise that work felt less pressured, as our working patterns were more predictable, communication was at a manageable pace, information was limited, and the time between working and meetings was distinct.

How the world has changed. Markets are being disrupted by technology and innovation, and the way we serve our consumers, customers and clients has shifted remarkably. What we are working on has changed – we have more information for decision-making than ever before. Our work is more complex, across different platforms and via new channels. It is almost impossible to be an expert on everything, so knowledge needs to be shared between different specialists.

How we work has also changed. Technology has helped us to collaborate faster, but it has also reduced our attention, time and focus on our work. We are less likely to work face to face, and remote and flexible working are already both commonplace and causing huge challenges to the way we work in teams.

Around the world, even before COVID-19, 70% of full-time professionals worked remotely at least one day a week. In the UK, the gig economy has more than doubled in the last three years and now accounts for more than 4.7 million workers.¹ Between 2008 and 2016 the number of freelancers in the UK increased by 36%,² and in the coming years, 79% of executives expect that contingent and freelance workers will substantially replace full-time employees.³ A 2019 study commissioned by Timewise found that the number of highly paid jobs offered part-time or with flexible hours has trebled in the past four years, as workers turn their back on the nine-to-five.⁴

Against this background of change, isn’t it crazy that we are all trying to work in the same way that we always did, only faster? We continue to create and join teams blindly, using inherited team cultures and processes, without considering how teams need to work to perform well today. We don’t invest in teamwork or nurture our teams, and we are less likely to see examples of great teamwork to inspire us. We are at risk today of doing worse teamwork than ever before.

Research consistently shows that teams underperform, despite all the extra resources they have.

J Richard Hackman⁵

It is no longer enough to join a team and assume it will achieve something. Whether you belong to a team or lead one, you can be the catalyst that resets your team to high performance, with the right tools.

What is a team?

A team is a group of people who work together to achieve a common goal, and it consists of more than one person. Teamwork is the ability of a group of people to work together effectively to achieve that goal. Team members:

• • each have relevant expertise
• • work effectively together
• • achieve more than they would working separately
• • work towards an agreed goal
• • have a defined deadline
• • are accountable for the decisions they make
• • have the influence to deliver the team objective

Over the last decade, scientists at MIT have worked to understand and measure ‘collective intelligence’.⁶ Similar to an IQ test, it determines how well groups solve problems together. Their research has proved time and again that teams can create more successful results than the most intelligent person in that team could create alone.

Businesses have recognised this – the amount of teamwork we do is definitely increasing. The Harvard Business Review found that in the last two decades, time spent in collaboration activities has increased by 50%.⁷ This is because collaboration is the only way to solve the complex business problems we now face, but it has also led to ‘collaborative overload’. We are called on to join more and more teams and our time and attention, and therefore our effectiveness, are diluted.

How do supercharged teams do it?

When we join a team it’s tempting to focus on how often we’ll meet and what the meeting agenda will be, without considering who is on the team with us: are they the right people; do they have the time; will this work be motivating to them? We also need to consider whether we have the right ambition in mind and how we will make sure to work together well. We cannot ignore who our stakeholders are, how our leaders can support us, and how the culture we work in will affect our team. Successful teams consider all of these.

According to MIT,⁸ a successful team has the following factors:

• • A shared understanding of the team’s mission
• • A commitment to the team’s goals
• • Clearly defined roles and responsibilities
• • Agreed-upon ground rules
• • An established decision-making model
• • Effective ways of working together

You may have heard of approaches to teamwork like Agile Teams or Scrums – these are the kinds of teams that work well today. No matter the name, what these have in common is a shared purpose based on a clear, defined task, with a diverse group of experts who come together efficiently to achieve something in a set timeframe, working with momentum to overcome the challenges they face because they have set themselves up to do so.

Types of high-performing team

No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.

Reid Hoffman⁹

So, what is the difference between being a good enough team versus a high-performing one? High-performing teams deliberately and consciously agree on the right mindset, pace and approach they will use to work well together, based on the task at hand. They don’t have the same team, or ways of working, or timing or regular meetings on every project, they reset them for each specific project.

When you are training to be a pilot, you learn about the Eastern Air Lines Flight 401, an aviation accident that happened in 1972. The crew had become so fixated on a burnt-out landing gear light that they didn’t notice that the autopilot had become disengaged and the flight was descending, ultimately crashing into the Florida Everglades.¹⁰ Learning from this accident led to the creation of CRM, standard procedures used by the aviation industry worldwide ever since to help crews work better together, effectively and safely, in any situation they find themselves in.¹¹

In 2008, the World Health Organisation found that more than 60% of patients worldwide had key safety measures missed during surgery.¹² Atul Gawande, a doctor and surgeon, helped to create a simple one-page surgical checklist for surgery teams to go through to improve the way surgery teams worked together, which resulted in substantial reductions in complications and deaths and is now used worldwide.¹³

In both aviation and medicine, technology continues to advance, but the difference between failure and success is whether the people using it work well together as a team. Successful teams use simple tools like CRM and the surgical checklist to give them a structure that helps them collaborate better. Whether you are a member of a team, or its leader, the best way you can make sure a team achieves its goals is to consciously check in with your team, resetting it for effective delivery, using a clear framework of tools. This book gives you the tools you need to supercharge your team.

How to use the 30 tools of great teamwork

The 30 tools of great teamwork are organised across 12 chapters. Some tools will work better than others depending on your specific challenges, so choose those that make the most sense to your team. All of the tools can be used by any team, whether they work in the same building or remotely in different time zones.

You may choose to work through each tool in order as you begin a new team or reset an existing one, or you may choose to go straight to the chapter or tool that your team would most benefit from. Each tool will work as a stand-alone exercise, and they can be used in any order.

Each chapter begins with a ‘What you will learn in this chapter’ summary, and has ‘Key take outs’ at the end. In the final chapter there are some workshop outlines that will help you apply the relevant tools to your team. Here is an overview of the chapters and tools for you to choose from:

Chapter 2: Choose your team

We need strong teams more than ever before, and today’s working environment cries out for better teamwork. However, being in a team can be a default assumption instead of a conscious decision. Some tasks are great for teams to work on, but others are better done by individuals. Use these tools to assess the task, decide if a team is required, and choose the right team.

Tool 1: To team or not to team – do you really need a team?

Tool 2: Turning a group into a team – make a group of people into a team

Tool 3: Choose, avoid or separate – choose the right team members for your team

Chapter 3: Find more time

Being too busy is common at work, but having the time to participate properly in a team is key. Prioritising what your team spends time on is crucial to success. These tools will create more time and impact for your team.

Tool 4: The timetable – measure where you spend your time and stop wasting it

Tool 5: Meeting sharpeners – make meetings shorter and sharper

Tool 6: Email agreement – set email etiquette to reduce time on email

Chapter 4: What goals do you want to achieve?

Success means different things to different people. A crucial stage in setting team ambition is to define what a successful outcome is early on. These tools will help to create a powerful vision of what success looks like, reframe and clarify project outcomes, and align your team with a clear direction from the start.

Tool 7: Five futures – define a successful vision of your project

Tool 8: Reframe your aim – make your team’s objective more inspiring and ambitious

Tool 9: Project navigator – align your team on a project scope from the beginning

Chapter 5: Find your motivation

Working in a team can be hard and tiring, and sometimes it’s hard to find the motivation to keep going. However, if the work gives us a sense of purpose and helps us achieve a personal ambition beyond the project, it makes us motivated to achieve more together. Use these tools to enhance the meaning of your work for you and for the team.

Tool 10: Define team purpose – why are you doing what you’re doing?

Tool 11: Why our work matters – create awareness of the positive impact of your work

Tool 12: Personal motivators – how can you benefit from your team’s work?

Chapter 6: Agree what you will deliver, and when

Agreeing on what the team will deliver, by when, is a first step in any team. Rather than making assumptions or accepting a directive without question, these tools help you to interrogate your task, project and journey early to make the best use of your team’s time.

Tool 13: The journey plan – create a roadmap to your goal that includes the challenges you may face and milestones to track your progress

Tool 14: Accelerate and reflect – create a timeline that prioritises actions and includes time for reflection and refinement

Tool 15: Measuring success checklist – plan to measure the success of your project outcomes, outputs and journey

Chapter 7: Ways to work together

The way a team works together should be conscious and agreed, not based on habit. When a team commits to specific behaviours and ways of working, they can hold each other to account and get the most from each other. Use these tools to agree how to work together and safely reset any ineffective team behaviours.

Tool 16: Three-point check-in – build trust and develop empathy between team members

Tool 17: Our team rules – deliberately choose the team’s rules of engagement

Tool 18: Distance culture code – set up the best ways of working if your team is in different locations

Chapter 8: Dealing with conflict

Relationships between team members can be difficult, and teams will inevitably face conflict. These tools help you to set roles and expectations to avoid conflict, manage it when it does arise, restore harmony, and deal with difficult behaviours in your team.

Tool 19: Opinions and instincts – identify disagreement and misalignment early on

Tool 20: Conflict predictor – predict the conflicts that might arise and avoid them

Tool 21: Six reasons why – learn from recent issues and prevent them from reoccurring

Tool 22: Individual intervention – address conflict with an individual in your team

Chapter 9: Get support from leaders

The environment the team works in makes a big difference to how effective the team is. If the team is not sponsored by decision-makers and key influencers, or does not support the organisation’s direction of travel, the efforts of the team can be wasted. These tools help you get the support you need from the leaders who can support your teamwork.

Tool 23: Direction of travel – understand your leaders’ targets so you know if you’re going in the right direction

Tool 24: Leader listening tool – really listen to your leader to develop true connection and understanding between you

Tool 25: Customer quiz – connect leaders with their customers

Chapter 10: Engage your stakeholders

Every team works on behalf of a wider group, and keeping those stakeholders updated can be difficult. If you give them too much information, you can get thrown off track if they interfere, but if you keep information back, you risk not getting support or approval at later stages. Use these tools to give your stakeholders regular, useful and constructive updates that don’t hold your teamwork back.

Tool 26: Secret stakeholder survey – understand what your stakeholders think

Tool 27: Building session – get your stakeholders to build on the team’s work

Tool 28: Start well, end well – start and end stakeholder meetings constructively

Chapter 11: Build a new culture

Any successful team needs to understand the culture they are wor­king in. Whether understanding customers in a new way, or adopting new ideas, or working differently, teams often need to help people to change what they do. These tools give you some simple ways to help your project outcomes succeed rather than be rejected.

Tool 29: Code your culture – understand what shapes the culture, and why this is the case

Tool 30: Create your culture – begin culture change with your team

Chapter 12: What do teams look like in the future?

Our working worlds will continue to change and the technology, social, employment and economic trends of today will continue to grow. Successful teams will learn and adapt ever more frequently to stay effective. The ability to supercharge our teams is crucial to our teamwork now and will be even more important in future.

Chapter 13: Using Supercharged Teams and 30 tools in your team

Use the 30 tools of great teamwork to reset your team, with three different workshop approaches. Whether you are working in a small or large team, face to face, in the same building or across the world from each other, this set of tools will help you as a team member or leader to reset your ways of working and achieve your goals.

We now have the responsibility and the permission to supercharge our teams, and we can do this by deliberately resetting how our team works together, using these tools.