The Illusion and Promise of Self-Organizing Teams webinar

I just listened to the PMI IS CoP webinar called The Illusion and Promise of Self-Organizing Teams. Points the presenter made:

• What we have is a spectrum with on one end the manager-lead team and at the other end the self-governed team (no manager).  The self-organizing team lies in the middle.
• Pitfalls:
  • Lack of management support at every level
  • Avoidance of team responsibility.  Responsibility has to be part of the package.
  • Death of empowerment.  If they self-organize they have to have the power (and the responsibility that comes with it)
  • Distrust.  I think this is a pitfall in every environment self-organizing, self-governed or manager-lead
  • Disrespect.  Goes hand in hand with distrust; you don’t trust people you don’t respect.
  • Not nurturing collaboration.  Otherwise it is not a team.
  • Impatience with continuous processes.  Things do not appear fully formed, they evolve.
  • Not cultivating a culture of learning.  Again, you have to evolve.
  • Lack of purpose and vision.  People have to know why they are doing something.  Money, passing time, etc., are not good reasons
• Pros:
  • Create a compelling purpose and vision.  Set the goal in a way that everybody is on board; what does this project solve, who/what benefits from the project.
  • Nourish passion.  The purpose and the vision is a team activity (otherwise it is manager-led, no?). Spoke about the 5-why technique (Ideo started this I believe) as a way to drill down on purpose and vision.
  • Define project success.  Some think this means a project that ends on time and on budget; that is simplistic.  For example, a project ends on time and on budget but delivers an outcome that does not benefit anyone.
  • Develop cross-functional teams.  Broadens the horizons; it works  but it can’t be maintained, most people give up before reaching the end of a purchase (for example)
  • Empower.  I personally hate the term but I take it as remove the road block a command and control approach can create.  A leader doesn’t need to take EVERY decision and probably isn’t the best person to take EVERY decision.
  • Get the team to accept the responsibility and accountability.  Help members along because leadership starts with individual leadership.
  • Acknowledge contributions, results, and performance.  I reversed the speaker’s order because sometimes the flow of the project may mean that a contribution ends up on the cutting room’s floor.  Celebrating results and performance are strong motivators

Pretty good webinar that speak about a number of reason why Agile teams sometimes are Agile just in name and how to walk the walk.  I love that the speaker did not picture Agile and self-organizing teams as panaceas but rather an alternative that can work you if you really try.

What do you think? As always questions and comments are welcome.

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Comments

[Shim Marom]

Pat, I wonder if there's a real research out there that could help us understand the likelihood of a team becoming a self organasing one. What does it really take to reduce the risk of a team not turning into a self organising team and what to do when it simply doesn't.

[Patrick Richard]

Shim,

I don’t know that there is such research. Given that we are working with humans, even if an organization did everything to foster self-organizing teams, I don’t think we could predict the outcome.

If one (or more) team member is not respectable/ trustworthy, not respectful/trusting, not a team player, will not be held responsible, etc. the team will never be self-organizing. A bit like a team getting stuck in storming or norming.

If it is just one individual I guess it is parting time but otherwise it looks like a culture problem.