Harvard on TEAMS

1. Overview. HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Teams. The Harvard BusiessReview has gathered some of its best articles on teams into one convenient book. Authors and scholars like Hackman, Pentland and Katzenbach, Eisenhardt, and Amabile fill this volume with rich content for leaders seeking research-based guidance. For example, using high-end sensors, Sandy Pentland and his MIT colleagues describe accurately how great teams behave based on massive data tracking. Theresa Amabile uses hundreds of daily work diaries to help us understand that people just want to make progress toward a meaningful goal every day—the “progress principle.” And Kathleen Eisenhardt and colleagues teach us how to engage in constructive conflict to produce excellent results while preserving relationships. Here is a summary of several of the best articles in this volume.

2. The New Science of Building Great Teams (by Alex “Sandy” Pentland). What separates average from great teams? MIT researchers equipped over 2,500 people with sensor badges (like those ID badges people wear at work). MIT’s special high-tech badges collected copious interactive communication data, such as voice tone, position of speakers relative to each other, time spent talking and listening to each other—but not recording conversation. From this communication data, highly reliable patterns emerged that allowed researchers to make reliable predictions about effective team behavior. “Those communication patterns were as significant as all other factors—intelligence, personality, talent—combined.” The three key communication factors that impact on performance are energy, engagement, and exploration. Thus, in the best teams, members of the team: 

a. Talk about the same amount of time and in short bursts—no speeches!

b. Face each other and energetically gesture.

c. Connect with the team and each other individually. 

d. Carry on back-channel discussions within the team. 

e. Explore outside the team (conferences and meetings) and bring back new info to the team.  

3. Why Teams Don’t Work (Richard Hackman interview). Teams often underperform due to issues with coordination, competition, and motivation. Even excellent leaders often don’t produce great teams. To increase the chance of a great team:

a. Appoint and protect a deviant. A devil’s advocate (deviant) helps to keep the team from agreeing too much—becoming too homogeneous—a real danger to innovation. The deviant says what others might be thinking, but no one has the willingness to say. S/he must be protected and allowed to tell the truth to power and the team.

b. Keep the number of team members low. Hackman suggests no double digits, even no more than six members. Become ruthless about whom you allow on the team. ONLY the necessary few should be allowed. Don’t let politics or lack of courage of the leader get in the way of key selections. 

c. Set a compelling direction and purpose. People need to know the strategic direction—the why—of what they’re doing to have any chance at being aligned and successful. A compelling purpose with a single agenda needs to be the rule. 

d. Focus on group process. Forget guiding and correcting individual behavior. Rather, use a coach-approach and group process. Leaders need to know how to launch and assess team progress and outcomes.

e. Stabilize teams. Data shows that stable teams win more often—whether flying planes, conducting surgery, or running companies. Regular turnover destabilizes teams.

f. Engage a team coach. Leaders who receive executive coaching are not as effective as the entire team getting coaching—especially at the beginning, midpoint and end of a team project. 

4. The Power of Small Wins (Amabile and Kramer). When people make progress toward a meaningful goal every day, they stay engaged. These authors reviewed the daily work diaries of hundreds of knowledge workers and found that a positive inner work life made the difference between average and high-performing, engaged workers. And engaged employees and teams produce measurably more than others. The finding of this research is that when leaders help people make regular progress toward a goal, people feel empowered and motivated. The authors call this finding “the Progress Principle”—the single greatest motivator a leader can offer. In these diaries, best days were described with the word “progress” and on worst days, the word “setback” showed up.

5. How Management Teams Can Have a Good Fight (Eisenhardt, Kahwajy, Bourgeois) Leaders want differences to be debated without having personal attacks. Thus, separating personalities from issues is critical. Constructive conflict in a high-speed economy will be critical in the future. So how to do it? Vigorous debate on the issues but little time name-calling and politicking. These steps will help: Focus on facts. Develop alternatives. Agree upon goals, not solutions. Inject humor. Maintain a balance of power. Resolve issues without demanding consensus.  

6. Virtuoso Teams (Fischer and Boynton). Successful virtuoso teams consist of top performers; intimate and intense relationships; strong communication systems, collaboration and conflict; assumptions that consumers are smart. The temptation is to settle for OK teams. The authors’ advice: DON’T. Ordinary teams produce ordinary results. With the right strategies, virtuoso teams produce high-end results. So, 1) Assemble stars. It’s an investment worth doing; 2) Build the group ego, not individual egos; 3) Make work a contact sport. Cause face to face contact/conflict that’s managed.;4) Respect the customer’s intelligence; 5. Herd the cats. Respect individualism and keep the team focus.  

HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Teams by Harvard Business Press, 2013, reviewed by Steve Gladis, June 2018.

ACT Before You Think!?

Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader by Herminia Ibarra (HBR Press, 2015), reviewed by Steve Gladis

Overview:  Act before you think!  Not exactly the advice we might give our kids, but sage advice that the author, Herminia Ibarra, offers her readers based on her myth-shattering research about career transition. Leaders need to act—experiment their way into leadership—and not overthink it. Social science research shows us that people change their minds only after changing their

behavior. We think of ourselves as writers, runners, lovers only after we’ve acted—written, run and loved. And becoming a leader from the outside in helps generate the author’s slogan: Outsight comes from action—by redefining your job, your network, yourself. Regarding leadership, we act like a leader when we offer new ideas, network with new people to reach goals, and make contributions beyond our expertise. To become a better lder, we must stretch. And, when we’re in transition, reflection should always follow action, not the other way around. By contrast, too much insight reflects on internal knowledge, past experience and thought—too much of which can get you stuck in the past. Rather, advancing your leadership emerges from your acts first, then your thoughts and reflections.

1.      The “Outsight Principle.” A rapidly changing world calls for an adaptive, do-it-yourself (DIY) transition. Not waiting for your organization to step up, but taking charge of your own leadership development makes sense. Called the “outsight principle,” the author’s revelation says that we need to act against habit and follow a three-pronged strategy: 1. Work on your job—try new ways at work; 2. Work on your network—meet new people; and, 3. Work on yourself--connect and engage with people in new ways.

2.      Redefine Your Job. We tend to stick with what we’re good at because it feels good—and we’re also lazy! Nearly 60% of leaders spend time in meetings—getting bogged down. Shifting from driving day-to-day results to becoming more strategic is how leaders advance.  But that shift isn’t easy, and we like easy—staying with who and what we know. Getting off the “dance floor” and onto the “balcony” forces managers to see their job in a more strategic way. To evolve, leaders must act as bridges between diverse groups, envision new ideas, engage with people and embody/become the change they want to see. To do these things, leaders need to get more involved in outside projects, carve out more time for strategic work, and communicate their purpose—their “why.”

3.      Network Across and Out. Getting strategic things done demands that leaders become better networked with stakeholders (both lateral and vertical) to sell ideas, identify trends, and compete for resources. To develop, leaders also need to know how to do new things (get new tasks done), which often requires help—coaching, mentoring, encouragement. Thus, expanding networks to more strategic levels and well beyond their current tactical levels makes sense.  In one study, managers rated external training (outside networking) as far more valuable than their boss in developing them as a leader—reinforcing the do-it-yourself (DIY) model of transition. Leaders need three kinds of networks: Personal (to develop yourself); operational (to get things done); and strategic (to get to the next level). And, leveraging between networks leads to synergy. Critical components of a good network are breadth (diverse), connectivity (links between groups), and dynamic (evolving).  But we tend to network with people who are like ourselves—an evolutionary instinct. In fact, at the beginning of any job interview, finding something in common with the interviewer dramatically increases the chances of getting to the next level. Thus, the more diverse, dynamic and wide a network, the better.

4.      Be More Playful with Your Self. Talk to any successful person and they’ve either felt or are feeling like a fraud. So common is this phenomenon that it’s been called “the imposter syndrome.” Often, we get trapped into this situation because when you step up to leadership, the position feels new, weird. Experimenting with new behaviors helps us role play as we adapt to new identities—which can feel less authentic. However, who we were in the past is not who we might become. Three ways to play/experiment:  draw from other leaders, focus on learning, and rewrite your story.

5.      Stepping Up. Evolving into the next-level leader is not a single event but a process over time.  Transition is never a linear, straightforward process—more a bunch of false starts and readjustments. It’s a lot like going to buy a pair of running shoes. You try them on, test drive them on a treadmill or around the store first. Who you are as a leader isn’t preconceived but conceived of testing, failing and trying again. According to Daniel Levinson, we go through transition (3 years) and stability periods (7 years). We tend to incrementally change in stability periods and make bigger changes in our transition phases. There are five stages when stepping into transition as a leader: 1. Disconfirmation—a gap between where you are and want to be; 2. Simple Addition—adding and testing out new roles and behaviors; 3. Complication—setbacks that happen along the transition; 4. Course Correction—reflection on new endeavors and impact; 5. Internalization—confirming your new identity and sticking with changes. Bottom Line: To become a leader, act first, then think and reflect on it. Change how you work, who you hang around with and how you express yourself. In his commencement speech at Stanford, Steve Jobs said: “You can’t connect the dots going forward; you can only connect them looking backward.” So, stepping out and trying/acting into leadership may not immediately make perfect sense, but one day it will form a coherent narrative if we stay true to our quest to become a better leader.

6.      More Good Stuff Inside: Check out these nuggets: The Outsight Graphic (p. 11); Is Your Work Environment Telling You It’s Time to Change (p.19); A Network Audit (p. 73); What’s Wrong with Your Network (p.102); The Big Questions (p. 102); Are you in a Career-Building Period or in a Career-Transitioning Period? (p. 179).

How Awake and Present are You - Even after Your Morning Coffee?

Fully Present: The Science, Art, and Practice of Mindfulness by Susan Smalley, PhD, and Diana Winston (DeCapo Press), reviewed by Steve Gladis.

Overview: This is a book about the science and art of mindfulness written by a scientist and an artist, of sorts. The authors are colleagues at UCLA’s Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC) www.marc.ucla.ed.  Early on, the authors give a definition, “Mindfulness may be thought of as a state of consciousness, one characterized by attention to the present experience with a stance of open curiosity.”  Mindful Awareness Practices (MAP) describe meditation and relaxation techniques in this book. “Mindfulness changes your relationship with life.” How? In this book, the authors describe what mindfulness does and why it works (the science) and how to do it (the art). For example, science has demonstrated that mindfulness reduces stress and chronic pain; it fortifies our ability to cope with painful events, fear, greed and anger; it improves attention and positive emotions (like happiness and compassion); and it improves interpersonal skills, creativity, and performance at work, school, and play.

1. What is Mindfulness? Mindfulness is like the seat belt of mental health protecting us from anxiety, depression and pain. Research demonstrates that mindfulness changes our brain—our immune system (toward healing), our brain activity (toward calming), our emotions (toward lessening depression and anxiety and toward happiness). Neuroplasticity means that the brain changes, and mindfulness practice affects neuroplasticity. Mindfulness helps quell “reactivity” or knee-jerk responses to stimuli that produce stress. Instead, mindfulness helps you respond with a “kind attitude” and compassion toward yourself, others and the present experience.

2. Getting Started: Change is difficult, but mindful meditation helps. Habits are ingrained and automatic. Four steps to change habits (like starting to meditate): 1. Take simple steps—make it easy; 2. Create a supportive environment—hang out with supporters, not naysayers; 3. Motivate people with evidence and practice positive self-talk; 4. Repeat, repeat, repeat! Mindfulness increases attention in just 5 days with 20 minutes a day. Postures for mindful meditation include lying down, sitting in a chair, sitting on the floor or on a cushion. Free meditations: www.marc.ucla.edu. Meditative breathing helps asthma and heart patients, lowers blood pressure, and reduces anxiety. Indeed, breath is the foundation for calming the mind.  Focusing on an anchor spot—like the nostrils, abdomen, or chest—helps you concentrate on your breathing. As you breathe, the mind wanders. Bringing your mind back to the breath is the fundamental practice of meditation.

3. Mindful Movement: Becoming more attuned to your body can help heal it and prevent disease by strengthening the immune system. Mindfulness and weight loss studies show reductions in binge eating. Furthermore, trying to suppress thoughts about eating or attempting to avoid certain foods only increases our engagement with them.  However, with mindfulness, you note its presence and then let it go. Faster rates of healing and resistance to disease were found to correlate with meditation. Moving meditations like t’ai chi, walking, and yoga increase self-awareness. “The body is the doorway to mindfulness.”

4. Working with Physical Pain: In biology, pain indicates danger and makes us retreat from it for self-preservation. We don’t feel pain when we’re unconscious—as with anesthesia. We feel pain through 3 systems: sensory, response, and evaluation systems. We sense pain somewhere in the body which gets referred to the spinal column, then to the brain—which then triggers a defense mechanism to inhibit pain. Jon Kabat-Zinn suggests that we become solely an ‘observer’ of the pain, which separates the pain from any story we might attach to it. This “delinking” separates the sensation from the story. “Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional.” Some techniques: Breathe into the pain, practice mindful distraction, use kindness and compassion toward caring for the pain.

5. Feeling Bad: Emotions (fear, anxiety, sadness, happiness, joy) are biological reactions to danger and competition.  Our emotional brain circuits are much older than our rational brain and so override our thinking many times. Mindfulness develops the pause between emotion and action. The fear response is evolutionary and protects us from threats. Anxiety is fear when no reasonable threat exists—the amygdala is on overdrive. Mindful breathing helps to put the brakes on the amygdala—which can act as the gas pedal for our brain. For the anxious person both cognitive reappraisal and suppression work. Reappraisal works best. Assume the best and move on is a good philosophy. “Mindfulness can be a key to learning how to relate to emotions in healthy and useful ways.”  Use RAIN to control the emotions: Recognition (cognitive labeling)—Acceptance—Investigation (explore the emotion)—Non-Identification (my emotions are not me).

6. Feeling Good and Finding Happiness: We catch happiness from others, and it arises from the fulfillment of living a meaningful life—one with purpose, values, efficacy, and self-worth. Mindfulness increases our feelings of well-being and happiness and opens up our capacity for intuition and problem solving. The brain does this through “coherence” or pulling parts of the brain together (synchronicity) like a symphony conductor. Self-compassion leads to happiness and has 3 components: kindness, mindfulness, and awareness of our connection to humanity.

7. Paying Attention and Stressful Thinking:  Our time and attention are the best things we can give another person. There are three kinds of attention: alerting (preparing to react); orientating (directing attention to someone or something); and conflict attention (paying attention when distractions interfere). Conflict attention is critical to self-regulation. Concentration and mindfulness go hand in hand, whether focusing on your breath or on an object. Often, we worry about many things that never happen. Symbolic language developed 77,000 years ago and with it the prefrontal cortex (PFC) grew to accommodate abstract thinking. The PFC is the master architect—shifting attention, adjusting, and suppressing. The PFC functions to move us toward our goals—to plan, organize, and execute. Mindfulness allows us to see things in their conceptual bareness—as they are, not with our stories attached that can narrow them with a kind of prejudice. Meditation keeps us from getting on the train of cascading thoughts (often negative ones) by focusing and staying in the moment. Don’t Believe Everything You Think! Focus on the body, not the story the mind is telling you.
8.   Mindfulness in Action: Mindful communication leads to better decision making.  Mindful dyads seek information, have a positive perspective, see multiple perspectives, can describe their thoughts and feelings, acknowledge partner’s communication, use participative language, and demonstrate turn-taking (Jackie Krieger, Western Michigan University). “Better than/less than” thinking is the source for evil in society. Note the Stanford Prison Study where “guards” treated “prisoners” cruelly due to this kind of thinking. Mindfulness helps us overcome this bias. Mindfulness in Schools:  Studies in schools in India, Britain, and the US (New York, Arizona, California) demonstrate that more mindful students perform, test and behave better in class, and exhibit less anxiety and stress. Teaching mindful practices to students from kindergarten through college enhances well-being. 

Team of Teams: Post #1--Overview

Overview. General Stanley McChrystal and his author team tell us that to beat an agile foe
in an uncertain environment, an efficient team is never as effective as an adaptive one. Restructuring the Joint Special Operations Command from a classic command-and-control military management style to a more team-based, team of teams, McChrystal was far better able to fight the allusive al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) under the notorious leadership of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Forsaking the Frederick Taylor reductionist paradigm of always being efficient and effective, at the expense of being adaptive, even entrepreneurial,  McChrystal remade his command into a team of teams—adaptive, trustful and with common purpose—one that communicated well, asked questions, and figured out how to be successful in an uncertain environment.

Team of Teams: New Rules of Engagement for a Complex World by General Stanley McChrystal, Tantum Collins, David Silverman, Chris Fussell (Kindle Edition, Penguin, 2015), Reviewed by Steve Gladis, August 2015).