Team building is the process of building a good team - ie: one that performs well together.
In order to decide the best way to embark on a team building programme, you should first be able to see the difference between a group, a team and a good team. If you do proper team building with groups it can be counterproductive, sacrificing individual performance for no real collective benefit.
You can test your ability to see these differences by looking at the following terms that are associated with team building. Only one of these defines what a team is, can you spot it?
| A group of people | Synergy | Sharing one aim |
| Whole > Sum | Co-operation | Flexibility |
| Working together | Reporting to one boss | Serving one customer |
Most of these terms are features of good teams. For example, the expression 'whole > sum' is used when they are working well together. But this isn't true of a bad team, where collective performance sometimes falls short of what you might expect given the quality of individuals.
The Apollo Syndrome is a good example of this - where highly intelligent people often perform worse when working together than 'less able' members. The Apollo Syndrome is just one of sixteen team complexes that can inhibit collective performance.
The important phrase in the above table is "sharing one aim". It is having a shared goal that distinguishes a group from a team, and without understanding and commitment to that goal, all other attempts at building better performance will have limited value. It is therefore of the highest priority to have a firm foundation of:
- there being a common goal for which everyone has shared responsibility
- everyone understanding that goal and feeling committed to it
Membership
It is also important to be clear about who the members are. People often look at the organisational structure to provide guidance on who is 'in' and who is 'out'. But consider the example of the sales force in a financial services company, selling pensions. Who contributes to that goal? There are many people:
| Sales people | Sell to clients |
| Sales Manager | Ensures the Sales People are equipped to sell properly |
| Marketing Manager | Designs a product is attractive to potential buyers |
| Accountants | Control the costs of the product to keep it competitively priced |
| Investment Analysts | Maximise the return on the client's investment, making the product more attractive to buy |
| Administrators | Process the applications quickly so that the client does not lose patience and move to a competitor company |
| Personnel | Recruit high performing sales people, and provide training to maximise sales |
| Stationery suppliers | Provide attractive marketing literature |
| Cleaning staff | Keep sales offices looking attractive |
"Selling pensions" is therefore not something that is limited to the sales force. There are many people who have a role to play. In fact, the whole company is working towards the common goal of selling pensions.
Summary
A team is a group of people who are jointly responsible for achieving a shared goal. If one member fails then it can hinder the achievement of the collective goal. Even if the members fulfil their individual roles but they don't work synergistically, then they may not fulfil their potential or achieve as much as they could.
The most important foundation you can lay, when building better collective performance, is that of common understanding and commitment to the shared goal.
We'll now look at four types of team building in the second part of this article: