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The Ingredients for a High Performing Team

We are regularly asked to work with senior teams with a view to improving their cohesion and their effectiveness. As a rule, we do not go in for the typical outdoor team building activities – using oil drums and planks of wood to cross a stream – but instead rely on a process of interviews and facilitated group discussion to ensure that the ingredients for successful team-working exist. Naturally, over the years we have formed a view of what those ingredients are, but first we ought perhaps to define what we think a high performing team is.

What does high performing mean?

A high performing team is one that achieves things that other, similar teams can’t achieve; things that are both challenging and worthwhile in the eyes of the team - and of other stakeholders. For example, suppose the players and manager of England agree amongst themselves that a successful season was to beat Germany without necessarily winning the World Cup. Compared to any football team not in the World Cup that would be ‘high performance’ (I'm struggling here to believe it myself... the wound's still open) but would it be in the eyes of England’s army of fans, or the Press, or its shareholders?

The first ingredient – a clear purpose

From this definition also emerges the first key ingredient for success. The team must have challenging goals. And in our experience this is far from straightforward. When we question team members about the team’s goals we invariably get different responses. So we suggest an important first step is for the team to agree clear goals and to make sure that all team members have a consistent view about what they are and what they mean in practice.

The goals should be defined in terms of outcomes and the team’s key deliverables. But at this stage it is probably not necessary to go any further. Provided there is a consensus on what the team is going to deliver and that the ‘ingredients’ for trusting relationships exist (see below), we can rely on the team to work out what else is needed as it goes along. In other words, with clear aims and effective working relationships the team will derive plans, adjust them in the light of progress and deal with unforeseen events along the way.

We mentioned ‘consensus’ above. Those who read our previous article on consensus will know what this means. Whilst there may not be unanimous agreement, everybody in the team can live with the outcome of a discussion and, most importantly, agrees to support it wholeheartedly. In this case the whole team must support the attainment of the goals.

Complementary skills and resources

The second ingredient is that within the team there is a complete set of the required skills, and access to the necessary resources, to achieve the goals. To return to our football theme, Harpenden Town might like to win the Premiership (and their fans would be ecstatic) but to be honest they just don’t have what it takes. In a corporate context, a management team running a company typically needs knowledge and skills in finance, marketing, IT, HR etc. and at a level appropriate to the league in which they wish to play.

Some of the knowledge and skills the team draws on can of course be sourced externally. But clearly, a team with a gap in its delivery capability cannot be high performing.

Trusting relationships

In our work we’ve identified three factors that make for constructive, trusting relationships at work.

• Competence - a combination of capability and reliability on the part of each individual to deliver what they promise. (Are their team mates able to depend on them?)
• Honesty - open and honest communication, together with a willingness to raise and discuss issues without rancour. (Are individual team members open when the piece of the work they are responsible for isn’t going well?)
• Connectedness - the ability to understand each other as individuals. This is not the same as liking each other (which isn’t necessary) but it is necessary for there to be some rapport between the team members.

Clearly, the glue that holds this triangle together is communication. Team members should be capable of open and honest communication, including the ability to listen without judging. Team mates need to be able to question, challenge and probe each other in a spirit of cooperation and of serving a joint purpose.

So, for a team to be truly high performing it needs clear purpose, a complete set of complementary skills and trust between members. This combination of qualities is not common and is not achieved by chance. It requires an effort by the team and preparedness on the part of all of its members to take risks – especially the leader. But it is what differentiates the high performing team from the average.

We have developed a number of techniques to help teams understand and then develop these winning qualities. A particular challenge is to ‘undo’ the impact on existing relationships of years of working together without the ingredients of the trust triangle. This can be a fraught process, often quite emotional, but it is invariably rewarding for both the facilitator and the team. They discover things they never knew about each other; develop a new connectedness and create a sense of shared purpose they’ve never had before.

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