Use these techniques to build a high-performing team

High-performing teams are a magical, but rare, convergence of the right people, processes, and environment. They work much more effectively and have a much higher productivity rate than most teams. Best of all, they are extremely fun and motivating to work on.

There are some common characteristics of high-performing teams. Knowing these characteristics can help you move your team down this path.

Set common objectives. Teams cannot perform at a high level unless all of its members are striving toward a common set of objectives. Even if members of your team do different jobs, you can usually write a set of objectives that will encompass all of them. If possible, the team should also be rewarded based on achieving this common set of objectives.

Establish good internal work processes. You can’t build consistently good products or deliver good services with poor work processes. The high-performing team has a set of internal processes that guide how members act and react in particular circumstances. For instance, if problems arise, they know how to invoke problem-solving techniques. If a customer makes a request for a change to specifications, they know to invoke scope change procedures.

Instill good work ethic. This probably goes without saying. High-performing teams rarely form in an environment where people complain about their workload or where team members complain about the work habits of other team members. High-performing teams find the challenges associated with their work and work hard to complete their assignments within expectations.

Keep everyone focused. The high-performance team is focused on the objectives and the deliverables, and understands how to achieve them. They don’t get sidetracked by rumors or politics. They don’t get absorbed in gossip. They don’t spend more time complaining than working. They know what is expected of them and do the best they can to meet those expectations.

Strive toward a balanced set of key skills. A high-performance team has all the skills needed to complete the work on its plate. Team members have the skills needed from a technical standpoint, as well as the right set of role-based skills. For instance, it’s hard to be a high-performance team when everyone wants to be the Team Leader. If some of these “leaders” are asked to build deliverables instead, they may not have the right skills or the right motivation for the team to be successful. In a high-performing team, people understand their strengths and weaknesses, but they’re also willing to work outside their comfort area when needed.

Foster mutual respect. Members of high-performance teams typically get along with each other and like each other. They have respect for each other and trust that the others are working as hard as they are. They assist other team members when they’re in need and understand that team members will do the same for them if needed.

What causes a great performer to go sour?

A lot - maybe most - of my work for companies has to do with “remedial” coaching. In HR-speak, this translates to something like, ” He/she was really good for a while; but now they just aren’t performing at the level we need. If they can’t get back in the game, we probably won’t be able to keep them. We want you to help them to get re-engaged.”

Occasionally, I am also asked to work with stellar performers to help them move up the ladder more quickly. But those situations are few and far between. I think this simple fact says a lot about most organizations and their management styles. And what it says is important…..

See if this next sound bite sounds familiar - you may have had it said to you; or you may have said it to a member of your own team:

” (Insert name here), you’re doing a great job! We’re very impressed with the way you get things done; and to show you that we think you’ve got real potential, we’re going to let you take over a bigger responsibility. You’ve shown us you have the skill, talent and dedication to move forward in this organization and we like that. So, here you go - more people working under you (or more job scope, or more dollars in a bigger budget, or more whatever). We’re going to keep an eye on you (insert name again) and if you perform like we think you’re gonna; we’ll keep giving you more responsibility. Everyone will see that you are a key player.”

In most cases, the person who was given this new extra responsibility is very happy with the verbal pat on the head and moves into her or his new role with great enthusiasm.

Often, they continue to excel and the boss sees this. And then to show appreciation, the boss gives the high performing person another level of responsibility or a promotion. And both sides feel good again. But this is where things may get a little sour.

Some people refer to what happens next as The Peter Principle in action. If you’re not familiar with the term it’s from Dr. Laurence Peter, who said back in 1968 that “..every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.” Peter intended it to explain the upward, downward, and lateral movement of personnel within a hierarchically organized system of ranks. You have probably seen this occur - may have had it in your own career. This is when the HR department calls on a success coach to help “fix” the situation.

I don’t think Peter’s concept was exactly sound however because it contends that the team player was responsible for the poor outcome. I believe that the manager is the one responsible for the situation when the team member started to fail.

Many managers do this when they should do precisely the opposite. They take their great players and burden them, little by little, until they finally go sour. They use the great ones to offset the weaknesses of other team members, picking up more work while the slackers or incompetents get away with doing less. Often what occurs is that the great ones end up working 10 or 12-hour days and the weak links in the chain get to work 8 or 9 hours because they have less to do.

Inadvertently, the stars get penalized for being stars!

What to do?

1. Re-think your use of talent. When you’ve got a great one under you; use them to help you run a better group.
2. Rather than job enlargement - go for job enrichment. Give them juicy-but-challenging special projects that will help develop new skills.
3. Or let them have the luxury of time to help you by studying and examining processes or tasks to determine how they can be improved.
4. Let them see that you value them by treating them special. They’ll perform with continually renewed enthusiasm which helps make you shine at the same time.
5. And when they need some help that you or others can’t provide, bring in others from the organization or even outsiders to mentor and coach them to help them grow even more quickly.

Your organization will gain a reputation as a place where people want to work. You will attract and retain the best available.

Three tricks for dealing with the holidays as a consulting project manager

Travel costs have skyrocketed. No one is available to finish off those last ugly bits of work before the budgets run out. Everyone seems to want to hang out with their families, generally in inaccessible places, rather than burn the midnight oil finishing off our wildly out of scope project work.

It’s got to be holiday season again. The time of cheer. The time of eggnog and happy children. The time when nothing gets done because everyone would rather be somewhere else. Don’t get me wrong — I like the holidays as much as everyone else. But enough is enough already.

As a project manager tasked with cleaning up loose ends during the holidays, I tend to utilize three tricks to keep things moving.

First up: Pare it down
The simplest thing to do is use the constrained resources, limited budgets, and dwindling time to finally get people to prioritize project activities. As laid back as things seem, there are still a few items of very important work to be done. Now that we only have a few weeks left, we can sometimes find out what they are.

This is, to be honest, probably the one and only time I use time-boxing as a client facing tool. I show a simple grid with the weeks down one side and the resources across the top. Each box contains five days (or two or three, depending on the holiday week) of available work time. I then give the client a list of the open items and ask for help fitting things in.

No one likes the results but we all end up with a clearer picture of what we want to spend money on. That is, I guess, the point.

Next up: Shore it up
The hardest thing for an introvert to do is get out there and mingle. However, this is the one time of year during which a traveling team might possibly come together. Even a static team of IT professionals, one which does not travel much, will start to come out of their cubes as the holidays reach their inevitable ‘nog-hazed climax.

As the project manager, its our job to reinforce the social as well as activity-focused roles in the team. We need to talk, talk, talk, introduce topics of conversation, and guide the discussions which occur spontaneously away from work topics.

“Away from work topics?” Yes. There will be plenty of time for people to thrash out all the problems of the last year and 366 days with next year’s issues. Got to love leap years.

Finally: Twist it around
Everyone expects the project manager to arrange for a wing’s luncheon and at least one early day off to go drink some beer. We need to do these things, but we should also spend a few minutes to come up with something creative. Better yet, if there’s an extrovert on the team, make him come up with something creative to do.

The only rule here is to throw out the predictable. No team-building exercises, leadership seminars, or “development opportunities.” Probably my best received event was the time I scheduled a full week of vendor presentations. We learned a bit about upcoming technologies, had a great time chatting between and through meetings, and got some nice lunches out of it. All, naturally, in the name of project progress.

Don't give up on team morale problems

Takeaway: Project managers should keep their eyes open for morale problems and look for ways to turn things around. Here are some suggestions.

Have you been the project manager for a team that had poor morale? I'm not referring to one malcontent. I'm talking about a team that has a pervasive morale problem. You may see symptoms of poor morale in the way team members respond to you, their lack of enthusiasm, or if they get angry at small matters, etc. The thing about poor morale is that people don't like to keep it to themselves. If one team member has poor morale, he wants to spread that fact so that others will come over to his side. As they say, "Misery loves company."

Morale problems don't happen overnight, and they can't be resolved overnight. Sometimes the morale problems are caused by the project itself. Other times the causes are out of your control. This could be the case when a company has lower revenue or staff cutbacks. However, even if the causes are not in your control (and remember many times they are) you have to take action. Here are some examples of how to address morale problems.

• Be a good listener. You'll find that the simple act of listening will help people's morale. It shows that you at least recognize the problems and are concerned.
• Say "thank you" for good contributions. If team members feel that the project manager recognizes their contributions, it will go a long way toward helping them feel better about their situation.
• Assign more challenging work. This is a tough one because, in most cases, the work is the work and you can't change the basic nature of that work. However, there are some things you can do to introduce new challenges. For instance, you can rotate people into new roles. If two people have done the same job for a long time, switch them. This gives each person an opportunity to learn new skills and new areas of expertise, while also giving you more backup coverage. You can also give people more responsibility. This might include letting new people manage the budget for the team, putting people in charge of subteams, and assigning new people to manage the work of contractors.
• Provide opportunities to learn new technologies. You can try to rotate people into new technologies, switch responsibilities to allow people to learn new skills, and increase the training opportunities.
• Make sure people know what's expected of them. You should make sure people are clear on what their job responsibilities are, what their current work activities are, and how their contributions help the entire project to be successful.
• Offer more flexibility. Allowing people more control over their jobs and lives can help morale. Offer flextime options or some form of telecommuting.
• Get the right equipment. Make sure people have the right hardware and software they need to do their jobs. It's especially frustrating for people to work on slow equipment, especially when hardware is so cheap.
• Look for opportunities to have fun. Let’s not forget this one. Look for an opportunity for a social events, pizza parties, birthday cakes, etc.
• Solicit opinions and ideas from employees. The project manager should encourage team members to become involved and offer their insights on assignments. If team members feel like their opinions and ideas are valuable, they will feel better about their situation.

Project managers should keep their eyes open for morale problems and look for ways to turn things around. Regardless of the limitations of your role, there are always some things that are within your control.

Is stress impacting your team?

It is generally understood that stress can be both good and bad. Positive or good stress can help make life interesting and helps us do a good job. Stress can be a source of positive motivation to succeed or it can be a dark cloud that hinders morale, relationships and performance. The latter is what I call bad stress. Bad stress can ultimately be destructive to a person’s body. This type of stress will impact the productivity-and in the end, the success-of your team. Here are some techniques that I have learned for identifying the stress signals and managing the impact to your team. First, let’s get a better understanding of stress.

What is Stress?

Stress is a natural response to the challenges, changes and pressures of life. Bad stress is the negative and unpleasant condition which may be experienced when a person perceives that they are unable to meet the demands and pressures placed upon them. This type of stress may be associated with a wide range of ill health effects, both psychological and physical. It can have a significant impact on your team’s ability to be successful if not managed properly. Its affect can seriously impact a person’s concentration, energy level, health, mood and productivity.

What are some of the causes of negative stress?

Virtually every company today is trying to do more with less. Unfortunately, the “less” usually means less people. In the past, work that was done by two or three people is performed by one today. This situation can be coupled with corporate downsizing; an increase in merger activity; increased business travel; negative impacts on company financials; a significant increase in regulatory requirements; in increase in company security requirements; and, of course, hundreds of emails a day. These are just some of the work stressors. This list does not take into account the stressors that individuals experience outside of the work environment.

How is stress impacting your ability to succeed?

The first thing to keep in mind is that stress is inevitable. Times are changing and the power of negative stress is not going away. The second thing to remember is that significant increases in stress will cost both you and your company. Finally, the impacts of negative stress are not restricted to a profession, type of company, industry or geographical location. There are studies that have indicated that approximately sixty percent of absenteeism is related to stress. Many of these absences progress into short and long term disability leaves. It is difficult to get things done when the people are not available to do the work. The opposite situation is what some health officials call presenteeism. These are the people who are experiencing increased stress levels yet come to work. These individuals will generally demonstrate reduced productivity and energy levels.

What are some of the common signs?

It is easy for a manager to overlook the signs of stress that can ultimately impact their ability to get the job done. There are a number of signs that can indicate that stress levels are going to impact your team. Some are physical, some are not. One sign that is generally easy to recognize is when people who are your top performers seem to produce less even though nothing in the environment appeared to have changed. A number of health organizations have outlined a few of the more common signs. They are frequent complaints of headaches (migraines), backaches, shoulder and neck aches; cracked voice and dry mouth; complaints of indigestion problems and excessive episodes of acid reflux; rapid or excessive weight loss (for no apparent reason); feeling helpless and depressed; and defensive. In addition, the person can easily get upset or angered; they will tend to withdraw from others; and they may experience frequent emotional outbursts. This is just a sample. Many health organizations indicate that these signs may appear where they were not demonstrated by these individuals in the past. You should contact a reputable health services organization and get a more exhaustive list of things to observe. For example, HELPGUIDE.org has a fairly complete list on their website.

What can you do?

First, you must recognize that some people thrive on stressful environments. These people operate at their peak performance when faced with a stressful situation. Therefore, you should be aware of the normal behavior patterns of your team members so that a change in that pattern is obvious. When you observe a change that could affect the health of your team member, you should consider transferring the employee to less stressful work assignment; give the individual assistance to do the work; or give the individual a ‘buddy’ to encourage confidence. In addition, consider the following:

• Ensure team members take time off to avoid too many long days on the job.
• Make certain individuals are aware of your company’s employee assistance program (EAP). This organization can work with them on stress-related or personal problems.
• Ensure opportunities for them to pursue skill-development and professional-development programs.
• Encourage them to participate in stress-reduction workshops that may be available.
• Work with team members on their workload management skills and assist them in assessing their priorities.

Most of all ensure that you provide leadership support to those individuals.

Stress does not have to impact your team’s ability to succeed. However, it is important to be aware of the signs and manage the stress levels that can hinder you and your team’s success.

May I Ask You one question :

Have the stress levels changed in your company?

1. Stress has increased
2. Stress has decreased
3. No, stress level remains the same

What is your answer let me know???

Is stress impacting your team?

It is generally understood that stress can be both good and bad. Positive or good stress can help make life interesting and helps us do a good job. Stress can be a source of positive motivation to succeed or it can be a dark cloud that hinders morale, relationships and performance. The latter is what I call bad stress. Bad stress can ultimately be destructive to a person’s body. This type of stress will impact the productivity-and in the end, the success-of your team. Here are some techniques that I have learned for identifying the stress signals and managing the impact to your team. First, let’s get a better understanding of stress.

What is Stress?

Stress is a natural response to the challenges, changes and pressures of life. Bad stress is the negative and unpleasant condition which may be experienced when a person perceives that they are unable to meet the demands and pressures placed upon them. This type of stress may be associated with a wide range of ill health effects, both psychological and physical. It can have a significant impact on your team’s ability to be successful if not managed properly. Its affect can seriously impact a person’s concentration, energy level, health, mood and productivity.

What are some of the causes of negative stress?

Virtually every company today is trying to do more with less. Unfortunately, the “less” usually means less people. In the past, work that was done by two or three people is performed by one today. This situation can be coupled with corporate downsizing; an increase in merger activity; increased business travel; negative impacts on company financials; a significant increase in regulatory requirements; in increase in company security requirements; and, of course, hundreds of emails a day. These are just some of the work stressors. This list does not take into account the stressors that individuals experience outside of the work environment.

How is stress impacting your ability to succeed?

The first thing to keep in mind is that stress is inevitable. Times are changing and the power of negative stress is not going away. The second thing to remember is that significant increases in stress will cost both you and your company. Finally, the impacts of negative stress are not restricted to a profession, type of company, industry or geographical location. There are studies that have indicated that approximately sixty percent of absenteeism is related to stress. Many of these absences progress into short and long term disability leaves. It is difficult to get things done when the people are not available to do the work. The opposite situation is what some health officials call presenteeism. These are the people who are experiencing increased stress levels yet come to work. These individuals will generally demonstrate reduced productivity and energy levels.

What are some of the common signs?

It is easy for a manager to overlook the signs of stress that can ultimately impact their ability to get the job done. There are a number of signs that can indicate that stress levels are going to impact your team. Some are physical, some are not. One sign that is generally easy to recognize is when people who are your top performers seem to produce less even though nothing in the environment appeared to have changed. A number of health organizations have outlined a few of the more common signs. They are frequent complaints of headaches (migraines), backaches, shoulder and neck aches; cracked voice and dry mouth; complaints of indigestion problems and excessive episodes of acid reflux; rapid or excessive weight loss (for no apparent reason); feeling helpless and depressed; and defensive. In addition, the person can easily get upset or angered; they will tend to withdraw from others; and they may experience frequent emotional outbursts. This is just a sample. Many health organizations indicate that these signs may appear where they were not demonstrated by these individuals in the past. You should contact a reputable health services organization and get a more exhaustive list of things to observe. For example, HELPGUIDE.org has a fairly complete list on their website.

What can you do?

First, you must recognize that some people thrive on stressful environments. These people operate at their peak performance when faced with a stressful situation. Therefore, you should be aware of the normal behavior patterns of your team members so that a change in that pattern is obvious. When you observe a change that could affect the health of your team member, you should consider transferring the employee to less stressful work assignment; give the individual assistance to do the work; or give the individual a ‘buddy’ to encourage confidence. In addition, consider the following:

• Ensure team members take time off to avoid too many long days on the job.
• Make certain individuals are aware of your company’s employee assistance program (EAP). This organization can work with them on stress-related or personal problems.
• Ensure opportunities for them to pursue skill-development and professional-development programs.
• Encourage them to participate in stress-reduction workshops that may be available.
• Work with team members on their workload management skills and assist them in assessing their priorities.

Most of all ensure that you provide leadership support to those individuals.

Stress does not have to impact your team’s ability to succeed. However, it is important to be aware of the signs and manage the stress levels that can hinder you and your team’s success.

Have the stress levels changed in your company?

• Stress has increased
  
• Stress has decreased
  
• No, stress level remains the same

Some thoughts on passing as an extrovert

A lot of professional project management consultants choose to pass rather than reveal their true colors. We choose to pretend to welcome people to our cubes, to speak up during the unending roll of meetings, and to actually leave our space in order to find out what is going on. In other words, we choose to pass as extroverts rather than the introverts we truly are. In some cases this transformation is so extreme that our friends and family would not recognize us inside the business environment.

It gets worse. Almost all of the business advice is written by extroverts for extroverts. The structure of business emphasizes the skills of extroverts (e.g. willingness to communicate trivial details, ability to endure the company of a number of people for hours on end) rather than the talents introverts bring to the table. So, where is the reference for the rest of us?

So, what is a dedicated project manager who also happens to be an introvert to do? I don’t mean in terms of passing. I mean what do we do in terms of genuinely aligning our personal preferences with the needs of our project teams? How do we stop pretending and start really getting involved?

First, we have to accept that an introvert who leads does not do so in the same way that an extrovert does. An extrovert leads by using his charisma and ability to connect to draw others into his circle. It’s kind of like encountering a jamming field inside of which the target’s mind doesn’t work quite right. An introvert leads by understanding and assisting others in understanding what needs to be done.

Second, we have to toss the PMBOK in the circular file. Yes, I know it’s popular with project management wonks and introverts of all descriptions. It gives us a handy reference and the ability to create hundreds of useless documents to hide behind. At it’s worst, we can use the thing as a “cookbook”, a step-by-step guide to miserable failure.

The seductive allure of process, any process, needs to be discarded in favor of honest self-reflection and analysis. Most processes serve to record information for extroverts, who have memories like mayflies anyway. What we need is to focus our attention on understanding what is happening, why it is occurring, and how we can get our teams to act in a way that will restore blessed silence as quickly as possible.

To do this we need data. Lots of data. Fortunately most modern introverts are class-A infovores, and we have access to wellsprings of information exceeding our ancestors’ fondest dreams. While the extroverts go out and glad-hand, we have the ability to figure out what’s really going on. Don’t let your lack of knowledge regarding “accounting” or “technology” or “fruit-juice” stop you either; it’s all data and it all obeys structured rules regarding its analysis. Learn the rules, sort the data into models, and work it out.

Finally, get out of the front lines. We are introverts, not extroverts. It’s not necessary for us to speak with everyone, all the time, everyday. Find an extrovert on the team, appoint him “team leader” or some such nonsense, and let him speak up and field questions. This kind of front-office/back-office approach to project management (whether done with a team leader or two project managers) can produce impressive results.

Good luck, my fellow introverts, and remember: it is no longer considered ok to growl at the person who comes into your cube for the fifteenth time that day to discuss his potted plants.

Why are managers afraid to manage

John McKee discusses the reasons many IT managers are reluctant to deal with personnel issues. Having been a personnel manager for a number of years, I wanted to stand up and applaud his words.

And I have to tell you, now being just another employee in the crowd, I want to stand up and applaud them even more. Here’s why.

Nothing demoralizes employees more than working with a co-worker who is a problem that no one will deal with, either because doing so would be “uncomfortable” or the happiness of the team is just not a big priority. Basically, it ends up with the crappy employee holding everyone emotionally hostage.

I learned a long time ago that, although it’s never pleasant to deliver criticism, the burden should never outweigh the need. If someone is a personnel problem, he or she has to be responsible for the consequences. I’m not suggesting the criticism should be blunt and loud, by any means. It can be finessed. But a manager should never be apologetic for having to criticism the work performance of a team member. If Employee A exhibits behaviors that negatively impact the rest of the staff, then Employee A needs to be made aware that it won’t be tolerated.

If not, what’s the message to the rest of the team? I can show up late, push my work off on others, be intimidating, be toxic, and watch YouTube videos all day at work. Who’s going to say anything? And the other message is that I am not important enough to straighten things out for.

Much of the time, a manager will turn a blind eye to a bad employee even though all the signs are there. Then they’ll wait until a co-worker comes in to complain. At that point, the manager gives the “You should talk to her and explain how that makes you feel” speech. First of all, and I know I’m going to get creamed with feedback on this, we can try to be all kum-ba-ya about it, but nine times out of ten, such a “talk” will result in one employee being directly in the “hate radar” of another. Most unbearably unpleasant people also happen to be defensive about their unpleasantness.

Second, isn’t that what the manager gets the extra bucks for…managing?

source @TechRepublic