In today’s business environment, few things are stressed more than increasing collaboration and team usage. Many studies have shown that effectively working as a team can drastically increase the productivity of the group when compared to the output of the individuals within it (Denning 2011). Team collaboration can be broken down into 4 different types of teams – work groups, teams, communities, and networks. Work groups are the traditional subunits within divisions that entail people working on the same subject in the same place (Denning 2011). Teams are groups of interdependent people with shard common goals that coordinate activities to accomplish the task at hand (Denning 2011). Communities are people that share common interests and practices but might not share the same geographic location (Denning 2011). Networks are similar to communities except that people within networks stay connected to each other due to a perceived benefit in doing so (Denning 2011). I have had great experiences with teams that I would definitely call high performance. I was on a special task group to look at how training was conducted on a specific topic with several other JOs. Being that we all had the same background (from a naval standpoint) and we all wanted a change in the current system, we all worked hard and produced an outstanding product that it used today in the fleet. With that being said, I am not really sure that communities are the best method of applying teamwork due to no true organization amongst the members. Based on the readings, it appears to me that communities are more a collection of like minded individuals – that is great for discussing things that do not have a time line.
Even though there are differences between these different subcategories, they all share common traits in order for them to be considered high-performance teams. First, high performance teams tend to exceed expectations by actively shaping the group the project is for (Denning 2011). For example, a high performance team might tell the customer to expect the product in 72 hours when they know it will probably take less. This falls under the old adage of “it is better to under promise and over achieve than the opposite”. Secondly, a high performance team is capable of rapidly adjusting the team response to emergent issues within the project (Denning 2011). There is another adage associated with this statement – “a battle plan is good only until the first shot is fired”. In other words, you can plan on how you think things will go as much as you want however what makes people great is the ability to rapidly adjust to meet the current situation. Thirdly, high performance teams grow stronger as time progresses due to members learning the strengths and weakness of each other (Denning 2011). I have said it many times in this course – if you aren’t actively learning you are falling behind, and this is just as applicable to people. Another trait about high performance teams is that they all grow as individuals (Denning 2011). Again, you must constantly be bettering yourself or else you are doing yourself a disfavor. Next, high performance teams self motivate due to the developing interpersonal relationships (Denning 2011). In other words, you push yourself harder because you do not want to let your team mates down. Finally, high performance teams carry out their work with a shared passion (Denning 2011). I think this final one is very important – it is hard to achieve much excitement about anything without having passion. Without passion you will not put in as much effort into your effort; as a result it is hard for the first 5 traits to exist without the final trait.
Denning, S. (2011). The leader\'s guide to storytelling. (2 ed.). San Fransisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
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