Biz Bits
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The popular edict “There’s no ‘I’ in team” holds true for businesses, and author Deborah Mackin can prove it. President of Vermont-based New Directions Consulting with more than 20 years of experience building workplace teams, Mackin decided it was time to update her 1994 team-building book. Th e result: The Team-Building Tool Kit: Tips and Tactics for Effective Workplace Teams, Second Edition (AMACOM, $17.95), which is filled with ready-to-use tools, advice and more. Here, Mackin reveals how team building has and hasn’t changed over the last decade.
There’s no “I” in Team
1 Accountability
“People still dodge accountability. If you’re not careful, there’s an assumption made that the team will own it, but experience says that nobody owns it. It’s necessary to build in a structure that keeps the ‘I’ in accountability… [which includes] everything from making sure to list who’s accountable to rotating team roles.”
2. Decision Making
“We’ve gotten more aware in our understanding of consensus decision making in the last 10 to 12 years, and one of the things that is striking to me is that oftentimes, we treat silence like agreement, when, in fact, it isn’t. I use different methods… but every member has to give some indication. The minute you do that, it changes how people participate in the decision-making process because they have to take a stand.”
3. Problem Solving
“I’m still seeing people discuss a problem and have absolutely no method of solving it. The book is designed to give a team specific rules to problem solving—to focus, analyze and execute—and through that process, help people understand a very definitive approach.”
4. Team Meetings
“Data says that 50% of time in meetings is wasted. The first thing I suggest is to write a help/hinder list, behaviors that help meetings and what will hinder them. We encourage a meeting that flips meetings on their heads. Ordinarily, meetings are predominantly information sharing with very little time for problem solving. Instead, put all the emphasis on planning, problem solving and decision making. Require the team to do the information sharing [beforehand], so members are expected to come prepared to discuss issues.”
Hotels in these five cities made it onto Travel + Leisure’s 2007 list of the top business hotels.
