The five dysfunctions of a team

I’ve been reading The five dysfunctions of a team by Patrick Lencioni. Powerful book!.

The main lesson it teaches about leadership is that it really is about building high performance teams. Performance comes from great teamwork and the principles of teamwork are simple to understand but hard to follow. They require persistence and discipline.

To me, the book is so refreshing because it validates my long held intuitions about leadership. That being ‘political’ or ‘playing the executive role’ as some like to say is actually distortion or dysfunction, and ultimately leads to a high price being paid: the lack of performance.

The basic framework looks like this:

I won’t spell it out for you. You can read the book in one 2 hour seating.

Healthy teams at work feel like healthy human relationships elsewhere in life. A collection of individuals who are good listeners, can be frank and sincere, accept their faults and keep each other accountable, who can put the collective good ahead of their own goals and who use their brains at all times.

There’s a lot in the book about how teams overcome these dysfunctions but there seem to be two salient points:

• The leader must drive the correction of the dysfunctions by:
  • being genuinely vulnerable
  • not protecting members from conflict
  • being comfortable with making less than perfect decisions that may turn out to be wrong
  • stepping back and letting the team serve as the first and primary accountability mechanism
  • setting the tone by focusing on results
  • reserving rewards and recognition for those who make real contributions (and not self)
• The most effective way to work on correction is by spending quality, focused time together. The book suggests:
• • Annual three day offsite
  • Quarterly 2 day offsite
  • Weekly staff meeting – 2 hours
  • Ad hoc topical meetings – 2 hours