Seven Commandments for Kicking Butt as a Team

Being a black hat sucks.

When our team used the Six Hats of Creative Thinking, we found that including a black hat mentality in our brainstorming actually ruined creativity efforts. What I’ve concluded is that, like many things in life, use of the Six Hats must be contextually appropriate. For example, the black hat didn’t facilitate our brainstorming efforts, but was extremely valuable in the follow-up critical analysis of the brainstormed ideas. Unfortunately, coming to this conclusion required seriously dysfunctional team dynamics – but I’m a firm believer that everything happens for a reason!

In this case, we used our extreme degree of dysfunction as an opportunity to bond! As a group, we realized that our communication styles weren’t jiving, so decided to openly discuss the issue and establish appropriate guidelines and norms for future interactions. Essentially, we informally developed Seven Commandments for Kicking Butt as a Team:

1. Thou shalt not talk over others.
2. Thou shalt not shout.
3. Thou shall listen to others.
4. Thou shall prepare prior to meetings.
5. Thou shall actively catch up on missed materials.
6. Thou shall communicate issues proactively.
7. Thou shall use visual and oral communication whenever possible.

I’m an innately aggressive person, so embodying numbers one through three is my primary area of focus while working with the team. Because we’ve each made a conscious effort on implementing the Seven Commandment of Kicking Butt as a Team, our meetings have been noticeably more productive, efficient, and pleasant. This is just one more example of how vital communication is to group work.

Everybody has different strengths and weaknesses. One key to effective group work is understanding yourself and your team, working with everyone’s varying skillsets to leverage strengths and mitigate weaknesses. Interestingly, this has been especially valuable in dealing with conflicting schedules, a common challenge with group work. Different members of the team contribute in varying capacities and times. Luckily, it’s coincided with our team’s strength and weakness balance. The product of our group work speaks for itself, but the experience in developing these products has been similarly positive.

Time is a fickle foe. This is even more true when working with groups. Constant proactive management of time during group meetings is integral to success. One of the tools our team has leveraged with much success is establishing objectives for each meeting. These objectives effectively guide the discussion, and act as ongoing encouragement to maximize productivity.

Group work is like a teeter totter requiring proactively balancing of time, group norms, communication, productivity, and people.