Growing team efficiency

In my previous post I was advocating the power of the "Collective Kaisen" to gradually improve a team performance.

I tend to consider a team as a kind of multi-brained living organism, because it demonstrates patterns of behavior when pursuing a goal and dealing with unforeseen difficulties. Even more, this organism is intelligent: it can learn from past experience, reflect on its behaviors, project itself in the future... as a human being.

As a matter of fact, these capabilities can be demonstrated only by strong, heathy teams. How could we strengthen a team to that level? Is there a kind of recipe?

I will try here to list some basic ingredients that I think could allow a group of average workers to change into an organized, efficient and thinking organism. I am certainly missing many others, but these are the first coming to my mind.

1/ Mission

First and foremost, we have to agree on a mission; what are our roles in the organisation? Can we decide on a set of responsabilities that will bring a maximal value with the same amount of effort? Shouldn't we ask for a separate department for basic user support? Why not brainstorming 1 or 2 hours when one feels responsabilities aren't very clear or too much scattered?
Answers to these matters will sooner or later provide some guidance in planning the daily activities. For instance: "Shouldn't we focus on delivering a more intuitive HMI instead of struggling like a mad man for documenting in depth the steps through that lousy interface?"

2/ Open Kimono

A team is almost a kind of tribe: anyone should feel secure when sharing her doubts or fears about a given feature or issue.
Everytime I discuss with teamates about a technical subject that I simply have no experience with, I immediately make it clear to them. I don't loose time hidding my weaknesses, but prefer demonstrate trust in "experts" opinions. I expect my teamates to be mature enough to then let me know when I should bring my own experience and help them on other matters.
The Open Kimono principle has first been presented in the excellent book Peopleware from Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister.

3/ Discipline

Sadly enough, fully auto-organised teams whose members truly share a common vision and always work in synergy are often a myth, but it is undoubtely a worthy objective.
The XP coach and the manager have here a great challenge: adapting the practices to fit some immutable eccentricities of the surrounding organisation, so that the team can grow in maturity and approach that goal.
I have recently listened to an interview with David Allen (author of the best-seller GTD), where he explained that a strong discipline is first necessary for any desired behavior to become a standard habit. For example, a child does not usually want to brush his teeth every evening; after months (sometimes years) of obligations, he becomes so used to it that he doesn't even imagine letting two days without brushing his teeth! It's become a standard!
Kaisen and discipline are the keys. It is up to the manager and the coach to gradually enforce a discipline and convince people it helps being better at work!

4/ Enthusiasm

The level of commitment and enthusiasm of members determines the consistency of the team spirit.
From my past experience, I would say that the presence (or emergence) of a charismatic leader is very helpful to drive a vision, resolve never-ending conflicts, and call a lazy member back to work.
However I think this leadership has to be implicitly approved by the team : an "appointed leader" set by the organisation and not recognized by the team will certainly meet much more difficulties to change the team mindset.
Among many others, I think about two feelings every good leader should communicate to the team: optimism and enthusiasm about the work to be done and the outcome of the project. They work for a great deal in the confidence and the commitment of every single member.

Be positive! Think Big! ;o)