Maintaining Team Performance
Kanaga, Browning
- 31 pages
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
Maintaining Team Performance
Kanaga, Browning
About This Book
Between the time a team is launched and the time it delivers results, managers need to know that the team is on course. Whether they have launched a team to achieve a business objective or have inherited a team, they need to monitor effectiveness on an ongoing basis and make course corrections that keep small problems from becoming major disasters. Monitoring and maintaining team performance is a key element of leading a team. You can provide that leadership by paying attention to four important dimensions: team member effort, team member knowledge and skills, team tactics, and group dynamics. By focusing on those four areas, you can assess your team's performance, zero in on areas of weakness, and take the corrective measures necessary to ensure peak performance and to deliver expected results.
Frequently asked questions
Information
Foot dragging and boredom. When part of the teamâs task becomes mundane, repetitive, or unclear, motivation drops off. Look for a lack of effort by team members, such as lateness to meetings, less discussion during meetings, and a less dynamic approach to problems. | |
Duplicate skill sets. When too many members have the same competencies and expertise, those skills may be overemphasized and the direction of the team will shift. Look for a lack of creative problem solving or the reliance on the same solutions for every challenge. | |
Convoluted tactics. Complicated, confusing, disjointed ways of getting things done are often a sign that the team is unclear about its purpose. Look for tactics that donât align with the task or that donât suggest a greater strategic purpose. | |
Low trust levels. When the teamâs agenda is not crystal clear, members may perceive each other as having hidden, personal agendas. People struggling to make their work purposeful may not trust others to help them in that struggle. |
Help the team set challenging goals for itself that are clearly tied to its purpose, and that will require ingenuity and renewed effort to achieve. Setting a stretch goal is an excellent way to sharpen a teamâs focus because it forces members to move beyond where they are comfortable and leave behind familiar thought processes and methods. They have to use everything they know, and seek new knowledge, insights, and experience to reach the goal. They have to depend on their own abilities and strengths, and also on the skills and expertise of the others on the team. Challenging goals keep the teamâs purpose vivid and compelling. |
Frustration about roles. Undefined, missing, and duplicate roles are all sources of team frustration and flagging effort. | |
âCanât doâ attitude. The lack of a key skill and the inability to acquire that competency â through training or by adding a member with that skill â can cause your team to stumble or even fail. | |
Rigid structure or lack of structure. Teams need a certain amount of definition and form to function well. They can be hampered by having too many tactics or having problems solved for them, which can stifle energy and initiative. Teams can also suffer from too little structure, which may leave people floundering, not knowing how to proceed. |
Roles, responsibilities, norms, and procedures (as well as other components of your teamâs structure) are likely to change or may need to change as the team adapts to shifting demands. Often in the midst of these changes tensions arise between members because they donât have a shared understanding of what is expected of one another â theyâre not on the same page. By occasionally setting aside time at team meetings to discuss roles and responsibilities, you... |