The Tuckman’s model for team is overrated. Here’s why.
The Tuckman model is often used to describe the 4 stages a team goes through:
- Forming: people just formed the team, they get to know each others. The leader must facilitate this phase
- Storming: as they start working together, some conflicts arise. People stretch themselves and some tension needs to be solved by the leader
- Norming: people understand each other better, they learn to deal with their differences. They start delivering good results. The leader encourages and motivates the team to keep moving
- Performing: now the team is performing at high levels. The leader can focus on the team members development, letting them ‘run’ the work that needs to get done
A lot of people seem to give advice to struggling team leaders without questioning it (the model literally sounds logical, doesn’t it?).
Just type “Tuckman model” on Google and you will see what I mean.
While it’s an intellectually interesting model, I didn’t find it very practical when it comes to leading teams.
Let’s check the source and consider why Tuckman’s model is actually probably overrated.
1. Bruce Tuckman didn’t base his work on real teams. Instead, he developed the model by reviewing the research literature available to him
Check this source and you will see the author’s notes right in the beginning of the paper: his boss gave him a stack of 50 articles to review and analyze.
In his own words:
The collection contained 50 articles, many of which were psychoanalytic studies of therapy or groups.
I don’t know about you, but if my boss came to me and said “Trust me, I read a lot about this before, I know it works. Just do it.” I would be pretty doubtful.
I would be much more convinced if s/he said “Trust me, I did this before. I also observed others doing it, and coached them so they could do it better. I know it works. Just do it.”
2. The group analyzed were mainly therapy groups, not teams trying to achieve something
In other words, if you’re not facilitating a therapy group, you might be using the wrong tool for your team problem…
Again, in the author’s own words (the “natural-group” is the group that is trying to achieve something together — i.e. a team):
The literature that has been reviewed can be criticized on a number of grounds. First, it may be pointed out that this literature cannot be considered truly representative of small-group developmental processes, since certain settings have been over-represented, primarily the therapy-group setting, and others under-represented, primarily the natural-group and laboratory-group settings.
3. The paper was primarily aimed at helping group facilitators, not group leaders
From the editor of the paper:
As group facilitators we are often concerned about the development of the groups with which we work. […] the memorability and popularity of Tuckman’s model make this article required reading for every group facilitator.
I believe facilitator and leader are quite different roles.
A facilitator is brought into a group to help the group sort something out. Once it’s done, the facilitator moves on to another group.
In contrast, a leader is brought into a team to lead.
Her job is not just to sort things out, but also to inspire people, give them a sense of direction, develop them and help them reach a certain goal / target.
S/he is not supposed to ‘move to another group’ until the job is done.
In other words, facilitation happens in time-boxed sessions. Leading happens every single minute and doesn’t really stop.
The Forming-Storming-Norming-Performing model is intellectually interesting. Life just doesn’t happen in such a perfect way.
Here’s a real-life scenario.
As a team leader, you are parachuted in a new team where most members don’t know you.
The team is already in the ‘norming’ phase, ready to perform at higher levels, but their former team leader unexpectedly left. That’s why you were asked to take over.
Are you supposed to do what Tuckman is advocating — i.e. encourage and motivate the team to keep doing a good job?
In theory, yes — the team is already ‘norming’.
In practice, no — they have other questions on their mind.
Who are you? Why are you qualified to lead them? Why should they trust you? Do you actually understand what they are doing?
In other words, the first thing you will have to do is to earn everyone’s trust.
In fact, your great challenge will be to start building your credibility as a leader from scratch without slowing the team down too much.
Which is too imperfect to fit into a framework (you are literally ‘storming’ but the team is already ‘norming’ — oops).
No matter where your team is at in Tuckman’s model, if you become the leader of the group, your first task will always be the same: to earn people’s trust.
But why is Tuckman’s model so popular then?
Here’s the author’s answer:
[…] I coined the terms: forming, storming, norming, and performing-terms that would come to be used to describe developing groups for the next 20 years and which probably account for the paper’s popularity.
There you have it. Easy to remember, therefore remembered.
Seems like Bruce Tuckman was an academic, but also a great marketer.
If building trust is always the first step as a team leader, how do you build trust?
Glad you asked.
Indeed, the first question that should now come to your mind if you’re a team leader isn’t “At which stage is my team at?” but rather “Do people trust me as a a leader?”.
In our next post, we’ll talk about the practical things you can do to earn people’s trust .
This time, it will be based from real experience, not from researching and analyzing papers.
