Teamership: The experience of teams matters
Creating an environment that supports a positive experience is central to teams functioning well. Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash
When I refer to the experience of teams, I do not mean the tenure or years of expertise possessed by its members. These are important to consider - and usually reflected in a team’s capability or cohesion. When I refer to the experience in the context of a team, I mean the individual and collective perceptions of members about what it is like to be a part of that team.
The subjective experience of a team's members matters.
It matters for many reasons. These reasons all centre around discretionary effort. There is a huge difference between any of us turning up to work with the intent to do enough to not get fired and turning up with the intent to do our best possible work.
These extremes exist on a continuum, and most of the time, most people operate somewhere along that spectrum. There is plenty of evidence to suggest - from engagement surveys and the like - that far more people are towards the end that is avoiding punishment as opposed to pursuing excellence.
The impact of an individual operating at the lower end vs. the upper end of that spectrum presents a stark contrast. In their book, Time, Talent and Energy, Michael Mankins and Eric Garton suggest that:
"The more energy people bring to the workplace, the higher the quality of output they produce."
It is difficult to argue with that, so let’s assume it is true.
That being the case, the more that we can create an environment where people choose to bring their best work, the better for individuals, teams and organisations.
Research suggests that 95% of people are on multiple teams and 75% of those teams are not on the org chart. This means that most people are juggling multiple demands on their energy, attention and time. Quite often, they need to make a choice between which team gets the most or best of these valuable commodities.
It is for this reason that the subjective experience in teams matters.
Most people are being pulled in a number of directions for different teams and most of those teams can't rely simply on the authority of hierarchy to drive compliance or effort. People will tend to choose (consciously or subconsciously) to prioritise the teams in which their experience is best.
Creating an environment that supports a positive experience is central to teams functioning well. By positive, I don't mean toxically positive. A positive environment is often one that includes a lot of challenging work in demanding circumstances. By positive, I mean an environment that supports discretionary effort. To connect this with Self Determination Theory, it is more likely that people will be more motivated to give their discretionary effort when the team experience meets three basic needs:
Autonomy - the need to engage in interesting, valued activities with a full sense of choice
Relatedness - the need to feel close and well connected to significant others
Competence - the need to feel a sense of effectiveness and mastery
For leaders this can sound intimidating. It doesn't need to be. The fact is that no team is perfect and the experience of any team will vary from day to day or week to week. However, as is so often the case when leading teams, paying deliberate attention to and putting effort into creating the experience that you want in your team will set your team apart.
A few questions for you to consider this week:
What is your current experience across the teams that you are a part of?
Which team experiences tend to lead you to choose to commit your best energy, attention and time?
How might you better support the levels of autonomy, relatedness and competence experienced in your teams?