Many times I will look at a business that claims to have teams or even claims to be a high performance organization only to find employees that do not understand what they are expected to do.  You may wonder, what are they doing all day?   Well they are being reactive, These people are not working on or from a plan, they are completely reactive.  They do not know how they fit into the big picture and many do not even realize that they are part of a team. Nobody has communicated clear expectations related to any business goals or vision.  What they get are expectations related to technical skills. Kind of like do not make any mistakes writing this letter. That is OK, but they have no idea why they are writing the letter.  This sounds like a simple flaw to fix but it is not.  I find this in almsot every business I evaluate.   I suspect that the reason for this is that the leadership is really focused on the old management model and not really focused on teams or high performance.   They never see the full benefits of a well coordinated team.  They lack trust of the team concept. They are so focused on the day to day activities that that nice strategic plan they did or the nice speech they made about going to high performance teams have been forgotten. The end result is they claim that a team approach just will not work for them.  It is kind of a self fulfilling prophecy.

There are many theories and class on how to be a leader, manager or even a skilled employee.  I have found books and classes on how to do strategic planning.  There is even a book dedicated to Execution theory (Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done by Larry Bossidy , Ram Charan , and Charles Burck). 

 

The question you need to ask is, "do you have any strategic plans that have not been implemented?"  Well of course you do.  To implement any new idea you have to address three areas; people, strategy and operations. Basically, who will do the job, what is the real vision of this project, and how does this project support the overall strategic plan.

 

So we can define what a leader is and write a great strategic plan but until we have an honest discussion about the project and reality, the plan never gets implemented.

I often wonder why some businesses have such trouble implementing a High Performance team. Over time the meetings start to be canceled in preference to real time task resolutions.  Sometime between eight and twelve months the project is stalled.   The group refuses to get out of there comfort zone.  What they are used to, is starting their day with a to-do list and tackling task. There is no vision, no excitement, and no passion.  Thoughts of a high performance team are put on the back burner.

Here is an example of one group that really wanted to become a high performance organization but just could not get over the first hurdle.  Within the first three months we went through the definition of a high performance organization, completed self mastery training, and started work on their strategic plan.  Around month four or five, the strategic plan is ready for implementation.  We deliver the plan to the full team, start leadership training, define teams and assign missions.  In short order we discover the teams getting stalled and implementation being challenged or canceled.  The strategic plan is never approved by the full team and they want to quit.  What happened?

When we completed a full review we discovered that they still did not have a common vision, a clear purpose or even one mission that was linked to the vision.   All these things were discussed and documented but never really agreed to.  There was a breakdown in leadership.  Within the first six months we had failed to develop a passion within the group.  We go into recovery mode and start looking at training and team development.

So, I have this big question - Why didn't the teams take off?  They buy into the concept but it seems to me that the day to day focus on deliverables shuts them down.  They do not want to give up control to a team.  It is a matter of trust.  Many times people have said that they know it would be faster and more efficient using a team but they just did not trust that the team would deliver.  All the performance reviews we looked at were focused on individual deliverables. There status reports for the business were many times focused on a single financial metric instead of being balanced.   When I am asked I would say that the business was focused on traditional management instead of high performance leadership.

There is no one answer to this question. I would like to hear what you think a solution would be.  This does not happen often, but when it does it is frustrating. 

A high performance organization has a well defined purpose, vision and missions that are agreed to.  These three elements are understood by the leadership and the leadership team is passionate about them. The principle behind a high performance organization is having a purpose that you are passionate about.  This is not a marketing gimmick or concept, but a guiding principle. The purpose drives the business and is the fundamental reason for existence.  Purpose and values have been identified as key ingredients for success of a high performance organization.  There is also this idea that you give up control to the team and you rely on leadership skills instead of management skills.

The core to every successful team is the individual however it is the willingness of the individual to subordinate their individual goals to those of the team's that will bring the greatest accomplishments. Today's competitive business environment demands increased productivity, better quality, shortened response time, and lower costs. A business can achieved greater success by replacing the hierarchical boss-subordinate relationship with that of an empowered work team. In a team environment, people are not managed or controlled; they are driven by the organization's purpose and goals.

When we first get a call to work with a business we generally find a group that is task focused.  Best case they are organized under a traditional management structure and worst case no organization at all.  What they want to do is become a high performance organization.  This is a business model that replaces top management with leaders ( or trains the existing management team in high performance principles).  Over time the meetings start to be canceled in preference to real time task resolutions.  Sometime between eight and twelve months the project is stalled.   The group refuses to get out of there comfort zone.  What they are used to is starting their day with a to-do list and tackling task. There is no vision, no excitement, and no passion.