Different leaders have different approaches in leadership. However I believe that leadership involves working in and with a team. Without the ability to unite and work with a group of people in the organization, one cannot brag of being a leader. Uniting a team for a common goal poses a great threat to majority of leaders and therefore becomes a very significant issue, worth the discussion while analyzing my leadership style.
I believe that an organization’s key competitive advantage is teamwork and no amount of capital, technology, finance or strategy would make any organization to be so outstanding. However, since teamwork is made of imperfect human beings, teamwork in most cases remains inherently dysfunctional. However, it is worth noting that a fractured team is just as a fixing a broken leg or arm, that is painful and sometimes, it might be considered appropriate to rebreak the leg or arm in order to have it heal correctly. A good team ensures a good revenue growth, profitability, customer retention and satisfaction.
In order to ensure an appropriate leadership, a leader should practice some sense of trust and build trust on one another within the organization. According to the survey conducted, majority of the respondents agreed that the absence of trust is a major dysfunction of a team. Trust according to them was the foundation of a real team work. Every team member should therefore understand the vital role trust plays in the success of the organization in order to achieve results. Trust allows a good team to air their dirty linen to one another as the team members admit their weaknesses and mistakes without fear of reprisal thereby forming a good team on foundation of trust hence achieving results.
However, when lack of trust is experienced in a team, it hinders the capability of growth in the team. I believe in my leadership style that lack of trust allows for fear of conflict among the employees. It is evident that all institutions require productive conflict in order to grow. Since conflict is considered dangerous to any team, most people in high management positions spend numerous hours trying to engage people and avoid any form of debates that are viewed as confronting. However, these debates are useful for the growth of a team when they are productive ideology conflict rather than the destructive interpersonal conflict.
Teams that engage in productive ideology conflict have in mind that the only purpose is to provide a solution in the shortest period possible. Issues are discussed quickly and resolutions made faster in a heated debate that bears no ill feelings but the eagerness and readiness to discuss important issues. When teams avoid ideological conflict while attempting to avoid hurting team members’ feelings, tension is brewed, and little resolutions arrived at. Therefore, in order to ensure a healthy conflict, team members have to understand that the conflict is productive and thus should not be avoided. In a meeting situation, teams with conflict often engage in lively interesting meetings as they exploit idea of all team members thereby solving the problems quickly. Constructive conflicts minimize politics and ensure critical topics are raised for discussion.
Therefore as a leader especially when tasked with a responsibility promoting a healthy conflict, you should be able to protect member of the team from harm. Leaders should practice restraint when members of their team engage in a conflict while allowing a natural resolution. A team leader should therefore encourage positive conflict among the team members.
While team members engage into a productive conflict, they are able to tap into each member’s ideas and viewpoints hence harnessing their opinions that can be useful to others especially when the team understands that the opinion is their own. This allows members of the team to buy and commit to the decisions made to the team. It therefore filters down to the third dysfunction of a team: lack of commitment. Commitment is necessary in a team effort. Each member of the team considers teams great when they make clear decisions and move forward with the ability to buy in the decision. Lack of commitment may result from desire for consensus and need of certainty.
It is important to have the entire team buy into a specific idea. For this reason, it is challenging to ensure that every member of the team reach at a complete commitment to an opinion consensually. However, great teams ensure that every member’s opinion is considered. In this case, it is important to the team in helping members understand that they do not need to have everyone’s’ support on an opinion but the fact that their opinions are considered in the decision makes a united team.
Likewise, teams work great when they are certain and assured that the decision arrived at was because of commitment by them. Clarity around objectives and priorities ensures the team moves on with great commitment while developing abilities to learn from their mistakes thereby moving forward with little hesitation. In addition, when a team is committed, it changes direction easily without hesitation or any form of guilt. However, commitment remains one of the major concerns in building up a team.
In order to overcome lack of commitment as a dysfunction of a team arising from lack of proper communication, in case people are not on the same page after a meeting, they should clarify the issues before putting them into an action just so the information remains clearly comprehensive. Likewise, in order to ensure commitment, deadlines should be real and honored. As a team leader, one should not be fearful of making decisions that at one time would be considered wrong. Leaders should also be ready to push for closure on issues that have been set with the team to ensure schedules are followed and adhered to. However, a team leader should not push for consensus or certainty.
Team mates often call on each other for their actions to ensure a clear sense of outcome and expectation. In order to have the perception of the expectations, team mates should be held accountable for anything not brought to light on the first instance. Anything that would hinder growth of the team and entire organization should be raised and ever individual affected held accountable. However, when teams avoid accountability, performances that might hurt the team can be realized. Avoidance of accountability is a dysfunction of a team and it results from team members’ unwillingness to tolerate interpersonal discomfort that might results from difficult conversations. A great team improves individuals’ relationships by holding one another accountable. This is a demonstration of respect to one another and an expectation for high performance. Despite the lack of adequate information on curbing the problem of lack of commitment, the decisions arrived at by the team enabled swift transition in the organization thereby enhancing the performance of the organization.
Loafing in a team situation can be associated with lack of vision and goals in a team. Teams need to publicly clarify what they need to achieve, what needs to be delivered and by who and how every member of the team needs to behave. Likewise, team members should communicate with one another about their feelings on anything performed contrary to the expected standards and objectives. In addition, when a team rewards an individual performance to a team effort, the team develops a culture of accountability. Through these efforts, the team can overcome avoidance of accountability.
In order to promote accountability, leaders should encourage team to serve as the primary source of accountability mechanisms. With the team as a primary source of accountability, the leader should serve as a primary disciplinary member of the team by ensuring arbitration.
In a situation where team members are not accountably held for their own actions, individuals have a tendency of turning their actions into their own achievements and ignoring the team effort. Lack of accountability promotes team members to shift their attention to personal achievements and ignoring the group achievements. The goals and objectives of a team would be an example of the results a team would strive to achieve just as the corporate world struggles to make profits. Therefore, the team should publicly commit to achieve results. Leaders should highly value results than anything in a team. When a leader shows their interest in results, the team members are challenged and highly motivated to achieve group goals through their individual contributions.
Works cited
Giesen, Bernhard. 2006. “Performing the Sacred: A Durkheimian Perspective on the Performative Turn in the Social Sciences”, pp. 325-367 in J. Alexander, B. Giesen, and J. Mast, Eds., Social Performance: Symbolic Action, Cultural Pragmatics, and Ritual. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Patrick, Lencioni (2008) Five Dysfunctions of a team
