Simple Steps to Creating Successful Groups
Starting out at the beginning of the year, building new teams and working groups can be fun and energizing. However, how can you keep this enthusiasm going and not fall into difficult times with the group?
First of all, know that groups have a logical way of developing. Forming, Norming, Storming, Performing and Adjourning. If you are joining a new group, you can ask yourself the following questions for each stage of the group’s life cycle.
Thirdly, as part of the sound procedures building block, you will need some agreements or a team charter that clarifies how you are going to work together not just about what the work is about.
Be sure to develop a set of agreements that make up a team agreement of how the team will work together, or a team charter if you will. The items in the agreements are focussed on how people work together, not what they are working on. That is a project plan or similar. Your agreements for working together will include descriptive behaviours and clear expectations. It is important is that the group creates the set of agreements as soon as possible when it is formed and is reviewed every time a new team member joins the group. Sometimes it is helpful to ask someone from outside the group to facilitate this discussion.
“Because we are diverse in
many ways, we cannot make assumptions that we all think the same way or respond to situations in a way that makes sense to others.”
The next step is often the one that a lot of teams break down in: maintaining and working to the agreements. A tool that can help here is the Ladder of Accountability. Once the team has agreed to how they will work together and they have agreed to use the ladder of accountability, they need the skills to raise concerns with others if there has been a perceived breach of the teams agreements. Some teams do this by providing coffee cards. A card communicates that we have something to talk about off line and it may not be easy. Others provide upskilling workshops in the art of managing difficult conversations. However you do it, the recognition we give each other, both positive and corrective, will help the team function at its best.