Thoughts from Patrick Lencioni’s The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

My Takeaways

Healthy teams have built trust with one another enough to engage in philosophical conflict.

They are able commit to a solution knowing there are trade-offs.

Mutual peer accountability is far more effective than authoritarian accountability. It’s about holding one another to a high standard of achieving what the team is capable.

A healthy team pays attention to their results. Whether they surpass the goal or miss the mark. Rather than glossing over a bad quarter or term, they engage in uncovering what needs to change in order to correct course.

In short, a healthy team:

• Trusts one Another
• Can Engage in Conflict
• Embraces Commitment
• Encourages Accountability
• Takes Ownership of the Results

Team members must know that they exist as a part of a unit that is greater than their individual efforts. Together the team will accomplish far more than individual ideas or preferences.

Each team member has their own strengths and expertise. And each offers a unique perspective for the challenges or solutions the team is creating.

Do not confuse a challenging of your ideas as someone demeaning you personally.

You are not your ideas.

Conflict is the fastest way to a solution. Avoiding it, usually means a lack of decisiveness and stalling. Or, if a decision is made without the expressed opinions of the team, it creates a lack of buy in.

Team members don’t have to fully agree with the decision that is made to commit, they just need to know that their opinions were heard and considered.

Building trust is a process of seeing one another as more human, instead of just another co-worker.

Trust allows us to see one another as individuals who have interests, face challenges, and carry desires. When a foundation of trust is present, we are able to engage one another without the guarded questions of, does this person really care about who I am or my good?

Trust is foundational to team engagement and collaboration. It is the building block which all effective teams function.

Teams should feel a loyalty and comrade. Knowing that the team has their back and they don’t have to go it alone.

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team was an easy quick read in the form of a fictional narrative.

Shoot me your thoughts if you have read or decide to give it a read: isaac@blancmedia.org