Leadership - The three Cs - action focus part 1
The three Cs - action focus part 1
Organisation
One aspect of chaos, confusion and complexity is the management of uncertainty.
There are many tools and techniques that you can use to help manage uncertainty.
This is a big topic and many technique are covered in ‘The Complete Risk management package’.
Team building
Bruce Tuckman
One of the key team building techniques developed in 1965 by Bruce Tucker was summarised by the memorable phrase Forming, Storming, Norming and Performing.
In its simplest form it is characterised by a 4 stage model.
Stage 1 - FormingThere is high dependence on a leader for guidance and direction.
There is little agreement on team aims other than received from leader.
Individual roles and responsibilities are unclear. The leader must be prepared to answer lots of questions about the team's purpose, objectives and external relationships. Processes are often ignored. Members test the tolerance of the system and the leader.
Team members have some initial discomfort with each other but nothing comes out in the open.
They are insecure about their role and position with respect to the team.
Basically, the leader directs. This may be known as the 'Telling' mode.
Stage 2 - StormingThe team do not make decisions easily. Team members jostle for position with other team members and the leader, as they attempt to establish themselves. Clarity of purpose increases but plenty of uncertainties persist.
Cliques and factions form and there may be power struggles. Goal orientation is required to focus on its goals to avoid becoming distracted by relationships and emotional issues. Compromises may be required to enable progress.
The team members start arguing heatedly and differences and insecurities come out in the open.
The leader uses a coaching style. This may be known as the 'Selling' mode.
Stage 3 - NormingThe team starts to gain agreement and consensus, they respond well to facilitation by the leader.
Roles and responsibilities are clear and accepted.
Important decisions are made by group agreement. Smaller decisions may be delegated to individuals or small teams within the group.
Commitment and unity is strong. The team may engage in fun and social activities.
The team discusses and develops its processes and working style.
There is general respect for the leader and some of the leadership is shared by the team.
The team members lay out rules and guidelines for interaction that help define the roles and responsibilities of each person.
The leader facilitates and enables. This may be known as the 'Participating' mode.
Stage 4 – PerformingThe team now thinks in a more strategic manner. The team is happy with its direction and clear about its goals.
The team has a shared vision and is able to stand on its own feet with no interference or participation from the leader.
The team makes most of the decisions against criteria agreed with the leader.
The team has a high degree of autonomy.
Disagreements occur but now they are resolved within the team positively and necessary changes to processes and structure are made by the team.
The team is able to work towards achieving the goal, and also to attend to relationship, style and process issues along the way.
team members look after each other. The team requires delegated tasks and projects from the leader.
The team does not need to be instructed or assisted.
Team members might ask for assistance from the leader with personal and interpersonal development.
The team finally starts working as a cohesive whole.
The leader delegates and oversees. This may be known as the 'Delegating' mode.
In this model the confusion, chaos and complexity phase lies in Stage 2 – Storming.
Morgan Scott-Peck
From 1990 Morgan Scott-Beck took these ideas a step further in his book ‘A Different Drum: Community Making and Peace’ by considering team dynamics in a spiritual manner.
He considers the group as a ‘community’ rather than as a traditional ‘team’.
He says that community has three essential ingredients:
- Inclusivity
- Commitment
- Consensus
Based on his experience with community building workshops, Scott Peck says that community building typically goes through 4 stages:
Stage 1 - PseudocommunityThis is a stage where the team members pretend to have a good relationship with one another, and cover up their differences, by acting as if the differences do not exist. Pseudocommunity can never directly lead to community, and it is the job of the person guiding the community building process to shorten this period as much as possible.
Often marked by polite pleasantries.
When Pseudocommunity fails to work, the members start falling upon each other, giving vent to their mutual disagreements and differences.
This is a period of chaos. It is a time when the people in the community realize that differences cannot simply be ignored.
Chaos looks counterproductive but it is the first genuine step towards community building.
Strong and weak personalities emerge.
After chaos comes emptiness. At this stage, the people learn to empty themselves of those ego related factors that are preventing their entry into community. Emptiness is a tough step because it involves the death of a part of the individual.
But, Scott Peck argues, this death paves the way for the birth of a new creature, the ‘Community’.
Having worked through emptiness, the people in community are in complete empathy with one another.
There is a great level of tacit understanding.
People are able to relate to each other's feelings.
Discussions, even when heated, never get sour, and motives are not questioned.
The four stages of community formation are closely related to the above model of Forming, Storming, Norming and Performing.
It is in this third stage that Scott Peck's community building methods differ in principle from team development.
While teams in business organizations need to develop explicit rules, guidelines and protocols during the ‘Norming’ stage, the ‘emptiness' stage of community building is characterized, not by laying down the rules explicitly, but by shedding the resistance within the minds of the individuals.
Scott Peck has started the ‘Foundation for Community Encouragement’ to promote the formation of communities, which, he argues, are a first step towards uniting humanity and saving us from self destruction.
The overall aim is to achieve ‘synergy’ which results in the ‘energy’ of the whole being greater than the sum of the parts.
The ‘emptiness’ stage allows people to give more of themselves to the aims of the group. There is less resistance.
Most people will arrive at work giving only 50 or 60% of their potential.
If everyone in a team did that the overall efficiency of the team would be very low.
The team may never arrive at a stage of full ‘community’ but it will improve dramatically.
ProblemsOnce you are in the ‘chaos’ stage there may be a tendency to revert to a more organised state and go back to Pseudocommunity.
Here conflict avoidance can be seen in the polite approach of keeping everyone happy. This can fluctuate back and forth.
There is a need to recognise the differences in individuals, for example, race, religion, age, gender, education etc, before you can move on to the next stage of acceptance that will free your energies to move forward.
It is a good idea to consider your team’s approach to the individual stages of development in both the Tuckman model and the Scott-Peck model.
It is good to familiarise your team with both models and encourage not only the processes for task completion but the importance of interpersonal relationships.
Team elements
Within every team there are three key elements.
These are:
- The task. That the team has to perform.
- The team itself as a group.
- The individual within the team.