Page 122 - Just Promoted A 12 Month Road Map for Success in Your New Leadership Role

Selecting, Building, and Developing Your Work Team 107

Team-building efforts take many forms, from a short, manager-led dis-
cussion about important team issues to a consultant-facilitated series of meet-
ings or off-site “retreats.” The overarching goal is usually the same: to become
a more effective work team in order to achieve desired results and the ultimate
vision of your organization. Leadership teams that work on improving them-
selves increase both their diagnostic and problem-solving abilities. Team
members are conscious of their behavior in groups and are striving to improve
their group performance. The team members’ abilities to analyze and improve
their team and the broader organizational and business processes are worked
on and valued. We will visit the opportunities and challenges of organizational
diagnostics and analysis in Chapters 6 and 7.

Situations in Which Team Building Is Most Useful
1. Formation of a new team:
■ New department, or a new district or region.
■ New offshoot function of an established department.
2. New people joining an existing group:
■ New director who wants to establish new work standards moves to an
existing function and inherits a staff.
■ New team members join the organization, possibly with an existing
leader in place.
■ Corporate reorganization results in new members or a reorganization
of roles and responsibilities.
■ New school superintendent or school principal is selected.
■ Staff is expanded for a growing organization.
■ Staff is reduced, which results in a new management team.
3. Revitalization of a stagnant staff or a staff in trouble:
■ Corporate team is having no growth in its market share. The group is
defensive, balky, and unhappy.
■ Staff is attempting to build new procedures and practices into the
organization.
■ A staff that has performed inadequately or has not competed success-
fully is being rebuilt.
■ Staff is seeking to become more effective while under constraints of
budget and potential staff reductions.
4. Building greater strength into an existing healthy team:
■ Twice yearly periodic “preventive health” team building to identify
and remedy small problems.