We have argued for years that unclear speaking (or writing) is indicative of unclear thinking and will impact shared project team values.

For example, most people do not distinguish between the meaning of a “group” or a “team.” Conversely, we find the difference so important, that it could represent the difference between “life” and “death.” Note the following impact on shared project team values.

Groups of people assemble. Teams get assembled.

With groups, members strive to arrive at a deliverable that satisfies each member. Therefore, people define “satisfaction” with respect to their individual interests. The primary challenge is building a deliverable (or decision) that satisfies the interests of all members who are acting on their own as individuals (or potentially as representatives of larger stakeholder interests). Individual reactions vary, even when attending a concert together and hoping to be satisfied by the music or entertainment.

Pushing in the Same Direction

The presence of teams suggests an overriding shared goal that sits independent of the interests of the individual members. With high-functioning teams, members emphasize the importance of the shared goal and make their personal interests subservient to the shared goal. Successful teams share a reaction, typically positive in nature. They will push or pull in the same direction to support a common cause.

Distinguishing Attributes

Some of the variables you need to consider when optimizing facilitated methods for teams include understanding the following questions:

• How effective and trusted has group decision-making been in the past for the organization?
• How much effort has been invested in understanding the quality of decision-making?
• To what extent will the formal leader of the team share the same or similar perspective?
• How much do the individuals share perspectives or derive from a similar level within the organization?
• To what extent does the culture promulgate distributed decision-making, where individuals are trusted to take a course of action that supports both the organization and the individual?
• To what extent is the group an actual unit in the organizational structure (e.g., reporting to the same leadership) or diversely representing many functional or geographic areas?

Be Conscious

As a leader stress the difference between groups and teams. Expect high performance, or you might not get it. Answer the questions above to support your selection of tools along the MGRUSH decision-making continuum that best serve your team and organizational situation.

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Don’t ruin your career by hosting bad meetings. Sign up for a workshop or send this to someone who should. MGRUSH workshops focus on meeting design and practice. Each person practices tools, methods, and activities every day during the week. Therefore, while some call this immersion, we call it the road to building high-value facilitation skills.

Our workshops also provide a superb way to earn up to 40 SEUs from the Scrum Alliance, 40 CDUs from IIBA, 40 Continuous Learning Points (CLPs) based on Federal Acquisition Certification Continuous Professional Learning Requirements using Training and Education activities, 40 Professional Development Units (PDUs) from SAVE International, as well as 4.0 CEUs for other professions. (See workshop and Reference Manual descriptions for details.)

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Facilitation Expert

Terrence Metz, MBA, CSM, CSPF, PSP01, HTTO1, is the Managing Director of MG RUSH Facilitation Leadership, Training, and Meeting Design, an acknowledged leader in structured facilitation training, and author of “Meetings That Get Results – A Facilitator’s Guide to Building Better Meetings.” His FAST Facilitation Best Practices blog features nearly 300 articles on facilitation skills and tools aimed at helping others lead meetings that produce clear and actionable results. His clients include Agilists, Scrum teams, program and project managers, senior officers, and the business analyst community among numerous private and public companies and global corporations. As an undergraduate of Northwestern University (Evanston, IL) and an MBA graduate from NWU’s Kellogg School of Management, his professional experience has focused on process improvement and product development. He continually aspires to make it easier for others to succeed.