I am interested on your thoughts about ” The team working together.” How can you keep it simple but still hear everyone’s opinion without bad conflicts?
The Team Doc Says…
Every team has team members who are vocal and those that aren’t. To find the balance and make sure every team member’s voice gets heard, you can institute some structured processes into the communication methods for your team. You’ll need to do this deliberately and plan ahead for it to work.
For starters, it would be a good idea to identify what team member has the most expertise in what topic. That way when a topic is up for discussion you can make sure that team member contributes.
There are several methods you can use to ensure you get a contribution from each team member. Here are three you could try.
- Collect information before the discussion via email or one-on-one interaction.
- Use brainwriting to help those team members who a shy about speaking up in a meeting.
- Use one-on-one partnering during a meeting to solicit ideas.
No matter what type of team you are working in, conflict is inevitable. The problem is that most people consider conflict in teams to be a bad thing. Conflict is not bad for a team. Unresolved conflict is what will derail even the best of teams. So your key to ensuring there are no “bad conflicts” is to make sure that they are addressed and resolved in a timely manner.
What other suggestions do you have? Please leave a comment.
About Denise O'Berry
Over the last few years I have used an activity called tug of war to illustrate the conflict between two belief systems. I get one person to hold onto each side of the rope and play the game tug of war with the objective that the winner is the person who gets the other to cross the line first. This takes only a few seconds. I then ask was there a quicker and more effortless way to have achieved this? After a few seconds of silence the penny drops and it is revealed that the only thing required was for some one to walk across the line. Then after the activity I ask the group what would it take for each one of them to let go of the rope and really listen to other members of the team?
That’s a really great approach Garry. I appreciate you sharing it here and will probably give it a shot when I have the opportunity.