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The current economic climate is forcing many organizations to achieve more with less resources.  One of the keys to this is effective team leadership – the ability to manage the talent of individual team members while blending individual skills sets to achieve a collective goal. 

Teams are organizational groups composed of members who are interdependent, who share common goals, and who need to coordinate their activities to accomplish these goals (Kogler-Hill & Northouse, 2001).  The task of the leader is to focus on two distinct but related areas:

Team Performance – helping the group accomplish its task (task functions)
Team Development – keeping the group maintained and functioning (maintenance function)

This is a complex process requiring leaders to monitor the progress of team work, determine when to take action, and work out when it is most appropriate to focus on internal group issues or external concerns.    In Peter Northouse’s Leadership: Theory and Practice, Susan E. Kogler Hill highlights some specific team principles which can be used to help leaders manage this complex process.  These are derived from research into the critical discriminators between successful and unsuccessful teams carried out by Larson and Lafasto (1989) and include:

A clear elevating goal – Teams often fail because their objectives are unclear and they get pulled into non-value added activities such as firefighting or pursuing personal agendas.  The most effective way to ensure this does not happen is to agree a clear, motivating goal in which everyone in the team is invested.  

Results-driven structure – Different teams have different functions, and they need to find the optimal structure to achieve their goals.  For example, problem resolution teams need to emphasize trust so that people are willing to contribute; creative teams need to be structured to emphasize autonomy; project teams need to emphasize clarity so that everyone knows what to do and when.  Alongside this attention to the function and structure, it is critical that clear roles, good communications and methods to manage individuals are in place. 

Competent team members – This is about having the right number and mix of people to achieve the goals of the group. Team members need to be provided with adequate information and training to be effective in their roles.  As well as technical skills, individuals need to develop so-called ‘soft skills’.  These include interpersonal skills and an ability to collaborate and communicate effectively with one another. 

Unified commitment – This is about fostering a positive team spirit.  Effective teams share a common sense of purpose, are united by shared values and identify themselves as part of the team. 

Collaborative climate – An effective work environment is one where people can be open with one another, where they listen to and respect one another’s views, feel free to take risks and are willing to compensate for one another.   Kogler Hill highlights the importance of honesty, openness, consistency and respect in building this collaborative climate in the team. 

Standards of excellence – It is important that the team itself sets a clear standard to which all members are expected to perform.  This creates a degree of peer pressure which exerts a positive influence on individual effort and performance. 

External support and recognition – Kogler Hill points out that a common mistake is to give a team challenging objectives, and then fail to back this up with adequate organizational support.  Even with clear goals in which all are invested and the most competent team members, a team will fail if the following are not in place: clear direction, adequate information, resources, rewards and training.  

Principled leadership – The team leader can undermine the effectiveness of the team by failing to tackle poor performance.  Another barrier that leaders often inadvertently put in place involves setting too many priorities.  According to Kogler Hill, principled leadership is about coaching the team to work collaboratively and to share knowledge and skills throughout the team.  The leader’s role is also to focus the team on their unified goals, to encourage autonomy and to motivate team members.  

These factors provide the building blocks for effective team performance.  Getting the most out of individual contributors and blending these skills to produce a quality team product can help ensure business leaders get the most out of the people they lead in these tough times.    

Martin

Northouse, P.G. (2006).  Leadership: Theory and Practice.  Sage Publications Inc, Thousand Oaks, California.