Business WARFIGHTING Practices for Great Teams
Business
warfighting practices are used by organizations to build great working teams.
But, as some begin to explore the concept of building a team and how an organization
can use them to achieve their desired outcomes, it is first important for the
leaders responsible for making the decisions to be fully aware that teams are
NOT what they used to be. The nature of teams has changed significantly because
of the transitional factors, internally and externally of the organization, and
the nature of the work the organization is responsible to perform.
Organizations
have become more distributed across geography and across industries.
Relationships between people inside and out (customers, suppliers, managers of
collaborating organizations, other stakeholders) have become significantly more
critical to the success of the organization. Leaders must be willing to discover
the value of collaborative work. There is a new perspective and more defined emphasis
placed on knowledge management that requires leaders to harvest the learning and
experiences of their associates to ensure that the information is available to
the whole organization. All these changes in organizations have changed how
teams are formed and how they operate.
A great
example of an organization that is successful harvesting the learning and
experiences of their associates to achieve high levels of success is the United
States Marine Corps' Special Operations Teams. These are teams who work
diligently to execute every mission with precise focus to center its outcomes
on the team's shared values. Without shared values peak performance is not
possible. Without peak performance, mission success cannot be achieved. Team
values must align with an organization's purpose, mission, actions and desired
effects to their Future Picture. Are you aware of the level your team currently
operates? Is it time to raise the bar of individual and team performance? Does
the organization actually have teams or groups of people working together?
These questions, regardless of where the organization stands at this very
moment, require some consideration and further unpacking.
Leaders of
small and large organizations have known the importance of facilitation for
successful team process, but few people have actually grappled with the issues
of trying to manage teams that are connected by distance in space and time.
With increasing relevance of distributed communications systems (Internet,
Intranets, etc) within a diverse segment of everyday working groups and lives,
innovators in the field will need to integrate best practices – in our opinion,
business warfighting practices – into their current team building stratagem,
while learning how to continually improve the organization's team development process.
There are a
few things to consider when thinking about integrating innovative thinking to
better define the team process:
§
Processes
for team leaders and development needs must be examined, designed, defined,
piloted, tested and refined.
§
The
“culture” of the organization has to be reshaped to support new structures and
processes.
§
Team
leaders have to be trained in new team management stratagem, thinking and
executing – they must understand how the team must be agile, strategic and
flawless with execution.
§
Organizational
structures have to be modified to reflect new team dynamics.
§
Rewards
systems have to be updated to reflect new team structures.
§
New
information technology (IT) systems have to be built to support teams.
§
New
management, measurement and control systems must be examined, designed,
defined, piloted, tested and refined.
To help with
achieving these and more, here are the twelve practices to consider, known as
“Business Warfighting for GREAT Teams,” to develop peak performing
organizational units. Each of them require further unpacking and will be
treated as individual articles to help team leaders and organizations learn the
specific practice for use:
Practice #1:
Understand the Unit, Realize the Team
Practice #2:
Examine the 5Ps within the Future Picture
Practice #3:
Place Team First – Mission Critical
Practice #4:
Walk the Talk
Practice #5:
Know the Art of Business Warfighting & Strategy
Practice #6:
Maintain Peak Performance
Practice #7:
Communicate Horizontally and Vertically
Practice #8:
Practice Front Line Adaptive Leadership
Practice #9:
Figure the War Room, Capitalize on Synergy
Practice #10:
Clarify Purpose, Procedure and Mission
Critical Execution
Practice #11:
Understand Successfirmations: Positive Mental Attitude
Practice #12:
Strive for Excellence – the Team's Vantage Point
As interesting
as it may seem, these practices offer a key mixture to achieving peak
performance that increases an individual's level of personal proficiency and
multiplies their deposits to the organizations and teams they are a part. All
of this translates into improved professional mastery. It basically comes down
to this; developing teams to outperform the competition with positive
organizational behavior and emotional energy to win is an absolute must.
Have you
wondered, at least over the past year, how to fire up the workplace to deliver
consistently higher levels of performance than the competition? If so, a
serious question must have crossed your mind at one time or another: “what is
the key ingredient to get the fire burning in a controlled direction with
agility to deliver successful outcomes?” Here's the answer for you; add a
little organizational behavior mixed with a bit more emotional commitment, shaken not stirred to accompany team maneuvers with a
splash of success!
Business
warfighting practices for great teams are as informative as they
are both knowledgeable and enjoyable. They stimulate peak performance that inspires great passion,
while aligning hearts to transition mindsets across entire organizational bodies.
They offer a straightforward approach to engaging relationships between people inside and
out of the organization (customers, suppliers, managers of collaborating
organizations, other stakeholders), helping them to become significantly more critical
to the success of the organization.
These important
concepts are essential in their delivery to provide leaders with fresh insight
into the intrinsic qualities found in highly productive organizations. In the
end, the unquestionable illustration of peak performance lies within the value
of the individual and how the resources are used to validate the importance of
commitment – individually and to the overall organization and team.
What's Next?
More and
more, teams are becoming more virtually connected with technology causing the
rules of engagement to change dramatically. It's time to stop thinking of them
as a special case and start developing strategies for dealing with the new
challenges they create. Virtual teams need the same things all teams need: a
clear mission, an explicit statement of roles and responsibilities,
communications options which serve its different needs, opportunities to learn
and change direction. It is the leaders role and responsibility to help the
team learn how to be “E Pluribus Unum” – one from many, and most of all, ensure
that each stakeholder in the process have some “skin in the game” (voice) and
the needed access to knowledge and experience from others to create successful
wins in the team's future. But, the most important thing to remember is that
managing and leading teams who are considered great basically comes down to the
process the leader him/herself is responsible to manage.
Is your team ready to
take off and reach new levels of success? Are you?
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