By Dr Audrey Tang
The thing about teams is while you don’t have to be best friends, you do need to work together, and neutrality of feeling, if not friendship can make this easier and more pleasant.
There is a difference between teams who do not get on because of personality clashes, and those which are dysfunctional. In 2002 Patrick Lencioni published The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team – these are:
- Absence of trust
- Fear of conflict
- Lack of commitment
- Avoidance of team accountability
- Inattention to team objectives
…and they will all affect performance.
In 2010, Robinson identified 3 types of pathologies that could define toxic organisational characteristics:
- Mad: angry organisations where the systems are dysfunctional, employees are stressed, and managerial decisions could even be called self-destructive.
- Bad: the organisation has the potential to do much, but seems to be trapped in low-value behaviours, such as inconsistency, confusion and mixed messages, and the output is erratic at best.
- Sad: organisations which seem to have an over-reliance on duty-compliance and a limited capability for introspection – they think they are doing ok.
In essence for Robinson, the mad firm is where day-to-day practices are experienced as negative, or lacking values and integrity; the bad firm one where its practices could be very effective, but are inconsistent; and sad is when a firm is unable to respond effectively to the needs of its teams and its clients.
It is possible that a fundamental characteristic as identified by Robinson can result in the behaviours as proposed by Lencioni.
With regard to effective intervention, the leader needs to respond much like a counsellor or coach (which brings its own pressures), first uncovering the cause which in turn can lead to a solution. However, leaders must also be mindful, because it may even be their own behaviour that is causing the problems!
Here are 3 fundamental principles that will help with resolution:
If you are going to ask what’s wrong – listen (and process) the responses
Workplace coach Julie Starr outlines 4 levels of listening – Hearing (where we are thinking about something else – very little goes in); Listening (where we can probably repeat a few words but may not understand the true meaning of what was conveyed); Active listening (where we interact with the information – and thus can take in much more); Deep listening (almost like listening between the lines and we may get a very full sense of what is happening in doing so…this level is usually reserved for professionals such as coaches or teachers or the medical and legal professions.)
Further, there are 3 key mistakes we make when listening – try to avoid those:
i) Rehearsing what you are going to say rather than listening. In this case, try to listen and see if you can then springboard off where the other person stops rather than bringing it back around to you if you thought of your response early on in the story
ii) Evaluating – listening only to critique the speaker. This can include fault-finding which is listening in order to catch the speaker out. Ask yourself why you are needing to be critical and what that might be doing to the relationship. If you are only spending time with that person to wind them up, is it really the best use of your energies?
iii) Derailing – making it about you – either by “topping” their experience with your own or making a big deal about if YOU were in that situation, or a “what about me” approach. Again, this might need some soul-searching to think about why you need that validation in someone else’s experience, as well as why you are reluctant to let others have their moment.
Leaders must practice ACTIVE LISTENING. This is where you interact with what is being said by asking open questions, writing things down, or paraphrasing back to the speaker what they said, just to make sure you have received the information accurately. If asking questions, ask open questions to learn more – those which begin with Who, What, Why, Where, When or How. These elicit more detail than close questions which often only need a one-word answer eg:
OPEN: How are you?
CLOSED: Are you well?
Empower teams to find solutions
In the same way as when an action suggestion comes from a client it is more likely to be implemented, empower your teams to find solutions. Rather than hearing the issues and then jumping into problem solving mode, extend the discussion with questions such as:
- How would you like me to help you
- What do you think is best for me to do
- What would be of most help to you at this time?
- What have you tried/What has worked or not worked previously?
This ensures co-responsibility to define the problem and a workable solution, but will also give leaders more information to better shape interventions.
Take on feedback: Reflect on and correct areas of weakness when issues are raised
Any issue is an opportunity to improve – appreciate that your teams gave you the chance by coming to you. You may yourself have identified certain areas in which your response was sluggish or affected company morale and trust. Be aware of what happened, through asking Toyota’s “5 whys” (asking “why” 5 times to get to the root cause of the problem).
About the author
Dr Audrey Tang is a psychologist, leadership coach, TEDx performer/speaker and founder of the CLICK Arts Foundation
