Here’s a Rule to pick up where the last one left off. We established that it’s not helpful if you all think alike and agree with each other most of the time. So it follows that the most useful group is one that thinks differently and whose members often disagree with each other.

You can see the risk here. If you convene a group of people who keep disagreeing with each other, what’s to stop every session descending into acrimony, name-calling, sulking, animosity and – ironically, given the reason for it – dysfunctional lack of progress.

So avoid groups where everyone agrees, and avoid groups where you all disagree. What does that leave? Not so fast … I didn’t say you mustn’t argue with each other. You just have to argue productively. The group has to find a way to express disagreement without it becoming a problem.

The single most important way to achieve this is for everyone in the group to understand that it’s their job to say if they disagree, and that it’s necessary to ensure the group collectively thinks at its very best. Once you know people are briefed to challenge your thinking, and that you’re likewise expected to question theirs, it becomes much easier to take. It de-personalises it.

There have to be rules within the team – often it helps to spell them out from the start and reiterate them from time to time. You might customise the rules but essentially they should include these:

• No personal comments.
• Disagree with the thought, not the person expressing it.
• Don’t raise your voice.
• Let everyone’s view be heard.
• It’s not a competition (for whose idea ‘wins’).
• Don’t become emotionally involved.

This last rule is much easier to follow if the previous ones are respected. Indeed, respect is the key word here – you don’t all have to like each other, but you must respect each other.

Positive conflict – and no, that’s not a contradiction in terms – is what you need. It makes a strong team even better. Being challenged stretches you. Having your ideas questioned makes you work harder to justify them, or to acknowledge that they have flaws. Remember you’re a hive – the whole team succeeds or fails together, because the whole team approves or rejects any idea or course of action. It’s not important who first came up with the idea. Oh OK, if it was you, you can permit yourself a little private pat on the back, but only when you’re sure no one is looking.

If you’re part of a group where, even after setting out the rules, it is impossible for everyone to work effectively together, things have to be shaken up. Either the people within the group have to change, someone has to leave, or the group might as well be disbanded if it can’t work productively.