Do you want to be a more effective leader? Start by diagnosing your team.
Configuring teams with the right mix of complementary skills and traits is essential to an organization's success. Today's leaders need to think more strategically about designing effective teams.
"Today more than ever, teams are the keystone of any organization,
explains Professor Homa Bahrami, Senior Lecturer at the Haas School of Business and Faculty Director of the Boot Camp for Experienced Leaders.
Dr. Bahrami's perspective has been shaped by decades of research and consulting for Silicon Valley and international companies. For over 30 years, she has witnessed a shift in organizational design strategy from top-down organization charts to team networks. The reason for this change? A fast-changing, technology-driven and globalized world, requiring fluid skills and flexible, geographically dispersed teams.
"No single individual has the knowledge or ability to drive major activities," says Bahrami. "Today, we need to see teams as the essential driving force behind the organization's success."
However, many managers are still attached to the notion of a formal, individualized top-down organizational structure. But even well-established or older organizations can benefit from a more fluid approach to configuring their teams to ensure adaptive success in the VUCA* world. Individual skills remain important, but, notes Bahrami, the unique dynamics within teams are also essential to ultimate success.
"When you look at a team, you have to think of it as a living entity," she says. "That's why you can't think about the success of your organization without thinking about the configuration of your teams, the evolution of your teams, the continuous monitoring of the team's vital signs of health."
Prof. Bahrami emphasizes that there is no singular "magic formula" for teams, and that leaders' energies are best spent as diagnosticians who regularly assess their team's health and effectiveness.
To support team managers in their role as "diagnosticians", INSPIRACTION uses a unique tool, enabling managers and members to regularly assess their team's vital signs of health.
Every time the 'A-Ha!' moment comes, when they see the gap between what their assessment of the team's health is and the assessment of their team members, I can't contain my smile. It's like, during an annual visit to the doctor they discover that their blood sugar has really gone up and say, "Wow. I had no idea. I thought I was eating right, I had my cholesterol under control."
If you too are a team leader who would like to assess the health of your leadership and team, contact me. You're not immune to unexpected discoveries.
*VUCA stands for Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity, so there are 4 types of problem to be solved.