Five dysfunctions

When every member in the team is rowing in the same direction, then you’re unstoppable. No one can surpass you. So, of all the things that make a company, such as IP, valuation, business strategy, market dominance etc, the one thing which becomes an insurmountable moat is a well-oiled, high-intentioned team. In my current team, my product director was once referring to an adjacent team that has been shipping constantly with great intentions, and it’s been hard for him to really know what makes that team different. Sure, the team has members with complementary skill sets, a clear objective, etc and all the necessary ingredients, but he was not able to decipher why they were so distinct from others.

I’ve been reading the book, Five dysfunctions of leadership and have taken some notes around some of the topics around the “science of teams”. And the crux of this book can be written in the form of a pyramid:

• the bottom of the pyramid: absence of trust. teams break up without a sense of trust. the definition of trust here is more towards having more vulnerability, and this is different from the other definition of trust usually referred to reliability in completing tasks etc. especially the team leader should lead with vulnerability, and ensure that pattern repeats across, to every team member.. and if things break up.. it leads to..
• lack of conflict. healthy conflict is no longer the case, teams just keep mum even on things they disagree with. This primarily starts from an absence of trust, and can be viewed as an escalation.. it’s important to confront in situations, everyone is different and have a perspective on things, and by dissing out confrontations, these perspectives are not brought forth. Without good discourse, it leads to bad quality decisions and the team fractures from within..
• lack of commitment. you have leaders making decisions, but then there is no buy-in.. so even though decision making is faster, without that commitment, you see those disagreements coming up again and again. the key foundational maxim is “disagree but commit”. good decisions are seldom made when it’s through a popular vote. Populism doesn’t always work. And in certain cases, “a decision” is better than no decision.. atleast you take a decision, make mistakes, move on and learn from mistakes. If you’re constantly engaged in decision analysis paralysis, there is no progress, and nothing moves forward. especially when situations reach stasis, it’s important for the leaders to make it more forward and pave the direction. And in certain situations, the leader can draw a line, and establish the decision. Lack of commitment can also happen when teams lack clarity in defining what the next steps should be.
• lack of accountability. Even in cases you have people committing to decisions, you don’t stick up to it, and ensure it delivers on the promised.
• inattention to results. All these would be meaningless if everyone is focussed on the self, and not prioritise the team’s outcomes over their own personal development. When a pattern emerges that decisions are being made, and there is no accountability, everyone starts prioritising the self, as there is no “healthy peer pressure”.. so the team’s goals such as OKRs, and objectives get deprioritised. It also happens when you have too many goals, and there is no sense of focus provided by the leadership board. in such cases, it’s important to have one clear “overarching goal” for helping teams get more clarity.

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