Many organisations are aware of the benefits of forming aligned top teams to run their businesses. But too much group think or team alignment can hamper high performance, and in some cases, result in bad decisions, says Martyn Sakol

If we take a look at recent events, you have to wonder whether too much team alignment is good for business. In fact, too much group think or alignment has been blamed for a number of fiascoes over recent years. Take the current financial crisis/credit crunch. Where were the senior executive objectors to toxic balance sheet assets within the global financial service sectors?

Both the Challenger (1986) and Columbia (2003) space shuttle disasters are examples of fatal group think. They both resulted in the deaths of all the astronauts on board, and it has been suggested that faulty decision making, underpinned by group think, was endemic within the NASA culture. In the Challenger case, where the shuttle was destroyed 73 seconds after lift off, NASA managers were aware of potential problems with the design of the solid rocket boosters, but pressure to launch on time and a culture that discouraged dissent meant that concerns were minimised. In the Columbia case, management limited the investigation into damage caused on takeoff on the grounds that nothing could be done about it anyway. Columbia disintegrated on re-entry.

Group think is a type of thought exhibited by group members who try to minimize conflict and reach consensus without critically testing, analysing and evaluating ideas. Individual creativity, uniqueness and independent thinking, however, are lost in the pursuit of group cohesiveness, as are the advantages of reasonable balance in choice and thought that might normally be obtained by making decisions as a group.

Top team alignment?
Ironically, the aspiration for top team alignment/cohesion is very often publicly stated but unrealised, particularly if staff survey results are to be believed.  Top teams whether in the private or public sectors are more often than not considered by their employees to be too remote, lacking cohesion and alignment, and collectively ineffective in communication. However, whilst we have facilitated top teams with the clearly articulated aim of building top team alignment around strategy, accountability, capability, culture and behaviour, too much alignment or group think is neither necessary or desirable in the current challenging economic climate.

High performing executive teams are typically made up of independent, ambitious and striving individuals – leaders in their own right. It is their very independence combined with capability, skills, drive and ambition that has got them to where they are, so why should they be aligned and cohesive?

In the current unpredictable economic climate, expert facilitation needs to enable top teams to proactively recognise and leverage diverse capability, creativity, tenacity, tensions, styles and preferences. If we do what we’ve always done, we are likely to get what we’ve always got and challenging times require something different. External facilitation can provide a lever to get a high performing diverse team to work together effectively.

Facilitating team effectiveness
So, how do you get these high performing teams to maximise their relationships and work effectively together? I must confess that after more than 20 years as a practicing psychologist, I have come to the conclusion that there is no such thing as a balanced individual. However, I do buy in to the notion of a balanced team. By balanced I mean a team that can positively leverage the different, diverse, dynamic and difficult, and play to each others’ strengths and compensate for weaknesses.  The gap between success and failure, however, is a narrow one.

Of course, the more diverse the team is, the greater the risks, but so are the rewards. For example, one of our clients, a country region within a global FTSE professional services firm, had all the makings of a high performing team, with the collective capability to survive and flourish in most economic climates.  However, under pressure their combined differences and collective strengths were causing conflict, mistrust and tension.

Our role, as expert facilitators, was to help create an environment that would enable their collective strengths to emerge, dominate and deliver. So what exactly did we do to achieve this? The UK Regional Managing Director of this FTSE professional services firm enlisted the help of ER Consultants to help maximise the collective effectiveness of her executive team. Business was tough with added pressure on margins, and her region was the underperformer of the group. Relationships within her executive team were tense, and the lack of cooperation between executive members was cited as a source of underperformance. 

Our approach to this challenge involved two phases of intervention. The first phase involved a diagnosis, and the second phase, a series of facilitated business meetings:

Phase 1: Diagnostic
Step 1: Individual interviews with all directors.

Step 2: Psychological profiling and individual feedback for all directors to understand individual and collective preferences, styles, key business tensions, opportunities and issues.

Step 3: Facilitated workshop to explore feedback about key themes, team preferences and individual differences, and to agree a series of actions to
maximise collective effectiveness.

Phase 2: Facilitated business meeting(s)
We facilitated a series of business meetings focused on delivering specific outcomes and used these as real case studies to illustrate individual and collective insights about leveraging differences. And the team agreed how they were going to work together going forward.

The results
The team learned from the diagnostic phase that there where indeed very diverse styles and preferences at play. For example, the Regional Managing Director (Sheila) combined a preference for the big strategic picture, with an unambiguous affinity for detail. A powerful combination, but her Marketing Director, (Michael) was conceptual and communicative, and his creative preferences couldn’t deal with detail. The consequence was that whilst Michael had some great ideas about new markets, new products and growing market share, his lack of detail infuriated Sheila. One ‘eureka’ moment the team will never forget was during a facilitated meeting when Sheila said to Michael, “Now I understand why you don’t give me the detail I need. It’s not because you can’t, it’s because it doesn’t light your fire!”

Michael, in response glowed, relieved that the tension was over and that he could now play to his strengths. “Yes Sheila,” he replied. “It’s because I’m a creative conceptual thinker.” “Great,” replied Sheila. “That’s great,” she said again empathetically. “However,” she added, “Whilst I understand that might not be your preference, can I just make it clear, that if in the future I want detail, you’ll give me bloody detail!” The team fell about in laughter. But what this illustrates is that a combination of self-awareness and awareness of others, reinforced the diverse preferences and capabilities of this team, which not only enabled them to work more effectively together, but also tackled their underperformance. We undertook this work in the first quarter of this business’ financial year. By the fourth quarter their region was the highest performing in the group with respect to revenue growth and gross margin.

Although I can’t attribute this solely to the work we did on maximising individual and collective effectiveness, however, both the executive team and I are in no doubt that facilitation played a significant part in the group’s success.



For more information, contact:  Martyn.Sakol@erconsultants.co.uk