Christy Johnson explains how leaders can align teams around vision and strategy.
At the turn of the century, organizational science expert Margaret Wheatley observed the basic human impulse behind organizing: “to accomplish something important that we could not accomplish alone.” When it comes to executing strategy, teams exist for just that reason. However, aligning teams around a shared vision represents one of the most difficult organizational challenges in modern times. Why? Teams drive effective strategy.
So, why are teams such a critical ingredient? As long as a firm has talented individuals, shouldn’t that be enough? Based on an analysis of 14 years of investments at Storm Ventures, Silicon Valley investor Jason Lemkin noted that failed startups all had one thing in common: “Problems in the team.” Lemkin called out several examples, “Co-founders that couldn’t work together. Co-founders that didn’t agree, not really, on the strategy. Even if the individuals were great, even if there were early happy customers in a great market … the initial crew just wasn’t a great team.”
The problem extends far beyond Silicon Valley. For decades, management thought leaders such as W. Edwards Deming have observed the critical importance of team dynamics relative to individual talent. According to his “85/15” principle, Deming claimed that workers are responsible for organizational failures only 15% of the time, whereas management and ineffective systems are to blame for the other 85%. Even “star” performers on Wall Street aren’t always so remarkable upon examination. In his book, Chasing Stars: The Myth of Talent and the Portability of Performance, Harvard professor Boris Groysberg unpacks the careers of thousands of “star” performers on Wall Street, only to discover that their performance often dipped once they left their teams. Just like W. Edwards Deming, Groysberg found that performance is determined largely by teams and institutions, rather than individual talent.
Key points include:
- 8 traits of good managers
- Developing team vision
- Setting and communicating team strategy
Read the article, How Teams Drive Strategy, on LinkedIn.