Is your team dynamic?
I mean, how is the actual dynamic of your team? Is it a well-oiled machine?
In this post, I want to specifically explore the dynamic that occurs in team interactions. The dynamic is ultimately about how the team is working together. A good dynamic means there’s ease and flow. The machine is oiled moving smoothly and easily in and out of gears, not rusty or restricted by friction.
Regarding human dynamics, team flow happens when there is presence, active listening, deep understanding of each other, collaboration, honesty & transparency, openness, straight yet artful communication, effective discussion and debate. When this all happens, the team makes better decisions and progress is faster with way less stress.
When the dynamic is not good - there’s often some level of fear, self-interest or ego at play. There is also old patterns of behaviour, our conditioning, that gets triggered. When this is all the case we end up with defensiveness, silo-mentality, hidden agendas, unhealthy conflict, blame, gossip, and politics. It’s entropy in the team system. It’s friction.
And the beautiful magical thing about this topic, is that the dynamic is only experienced and felt. It is not something that is visible or objective. It is of course very real yet it’s totally intangible. It is highly impactful, yet it is invisible so although it’s noticed by our subconscious, it largely goes unnoticed and often it’s undiscussed.
So what do you to to develop the dynamic in a team?
In our view, the first thing is to have open discussion about the dynamic. The team needs to collectively agree how the team is working.
If it’s agreed that there’s a need and desire to improve the dynamic, there’s then two key elements to work on: developing Quality of Mind and Quality of Communication.
Quality of Mind (QoM) is about the team’s thinking. The thinking of team members can really get in the way. Our thoughts about ourselves can limit what we say, how we say it or what we do. Our thoughts of others can cause allsorts of division and stiltedness.
To develop the dynamic, we have to become highly aware of thoughts (including the subconscious ones!), either letting them go, or finding productive ways to express them.
When thoughts are out of the way, there really can be amazing team flow and connection.
Quality of Communication (QoC) is the second art to master. It’s vital to have high quality conversations. QoC is about developing the team's ability to listen actively, to understand each other fully, to have people feel understood, for people to share constructively yet transparently, to take personal responsibility, to be open - open to challenge and open to others' ideas.
An invitation to reflect
So I’m inviting you to reflect on your team’s dynamic. How is your team doing? Is it dynamic? And what do the other’s in the team think?
As I mentioned, the first stage for the team to improve the dynamic is to talk about it. And to reach common agreement about how the team is actually functioning.
If you want some help with this, you might like to use our Team Effectiveness Assessment to enable this conversation. It’s a bunch of thought-provoking statements in a spreadsheet in twelve keys areas of team performance. It explores all components of team dynamic and more. It’s something we’ve developed from our years of working with teams.
We’re happy to provide it for free. Email Suzanne if you’d like a copy.
