5 Rituals to Transform your Design Team
For me, creativity is all about dreaming and faith. For the last couple of months, I’ve worked day-in, day-out on several design challenges in different teams. In the last month my eyes have been opened to the power of a well-adjusted design team.
Efficiently functioning groups spend about 60 percent of the time allotted actually working
In this read I explain to you why and share some effective rituals to transform your design team.
Team is Everything
Invest as much time as possible in setting up a team culture. This investment in time will eventually pay-off in a more productive and efficient team. “Efficiently functioning groups spend about 60 percent of the time allotted actually working” Susan Wheelan stated in her book. These kind of groups tend to produce better work than workaholic groups.
I compare projects often with rollercoaster rides. It always starts with a sense of group spirit and the first meters are always harmonious. But once the car is up and about to drop into the ‘unknown’ every team member reacts in a different way.
Some are excited about the ride, others reluctant. It is from great importance that you get to know each other before you step in to that rollercoaster ride. Try to learn as much as you can about before you start working. Your team is your family during the project.
1 — Have Team Breakfast/Lunch
In my previous project we organized a team lunch to get to know each other better and to share experiences from different projects. This last topic was valuable because it allowed us to reflect and share learnings. This activity forms a great starting point for your team culture.
2 — Create a Team Canvas
After opening-up and sharing pains, gains and obstacles from the past, it’s time to look at the future.
We did this in my previous project by using the team canvas framework. This canvas is an effective framework to design the ‘soul’ of your team: Why are we doing this, how are we doing this and what do we do?
While filling in this canvas, we discussed our goals, needs & expectations, values and purpose as team. It resulted in a better understanding of each other.
At the end, the real benefit of this team canvas is not the filled-in team canvas, but the process of creating it. The discussions, questions and comments are really insightful and reveals much about each personality you have in your team.
We all signed the team canvas we’ve agreed upon in the end. The process of signing is important, it symbolizes ownership and makes everyone accountable of sustaining it.
3 — Reflect & Give feedback
Yes, there will be a few bumps on the road. Along the journey things will happen and situations may occur where team members feel unhappy about some proceedings. Having reflection- and feedback sessions as fixed ritual during the design process, you create valuable moments at which team members can reflect on situations that affected them and motivate people to give feedback to on another. This mechanism avoids the chance of getting huge conflicts. By having these conversations once or twice a week you can monitor the spirit of your team.
4 — Check-in/Check-out
That leads me to the fourth ritual: checking-in and -out. Our team checked-in and -out every day and it helped us immensely. It’s almost like a weather check. Is it gonna rain today or will it be sunny and hot?
Here’s how you check-in/check-out in steps:
Step 1: gather around in a circle.
Step 2: one person drops a question to direct it a bit
Example
Facilitator: Ok, team, check-in how you feeling this morning?
Team member: I’m checking in happy because I had a good night sleep and feel energized.
Step 3: wait until everyone finished their check-in.
Step 4: When everyone’s finished, yell, clap, do something funny and start with your first group activity.
The check-out process is the same as above but with, possibly, different themes.
Here are some check-in/out themes to sparkle your creativity:
- Check-in/out as a super hero.
- Check-in/out as a weather type.
- Check-in/out as an animal.
- Check-in/out as an actor.
- Check-in/out with a dream you like to come true.
- Check-in/out with something you need from your team.
- Check-in/out with a behavior you want to avoid today.
5 — Work with Energizers
Forget the regular structured working day! To be creative, is to be dynamic. Instead on deciding when you will have lunch or stop working, define a few common goals you’d like to achieve on that particular day!
Example:
Goals for today:
1. Finish the discussion guide for the next two interviews.
2. Recruit one or two participants for next week.
3. Create one or two activities for during the interview.
During the day, take as many breaks as possible and mostly, work with energizers. Energizers are short activities that gives the team energy again (no shit, Einstein) and raises the team spirit. But most important it’s fun to do! Hyper Island has a lot of energizers in their online toolbox.
My favorites are: Dance, Dance, Dance, Sync Claps and Shake Down
Discover the Hyper Island energizers and pick your own favorites!
Ambiguity Sparks Creativity
As I stated in the beginning of this read: for me, creativity is about dreaming and faith. As designers we often find ourselves in odd places, foggy places where nobody knows what the solution on the design challenge is. I believe it is our duty to be comfortable with futuristic scenario’s that hold a lot of ambiguity. Hereby, a common ground and belief as design team is beneficial for the proceedings of the creative journey. It creates faith. Faith in the cause and faith in the ability of the team. Because in the end:
Great players win matches, great teams win championships
