The Five Pillars of a Well-Formed Team
I was discussing with a customer how to design well-formed teams and what we need to think about before embarking on this journey.
We came up with the following five pillars on a whiteboard. This is still quite rough and I would love to hear what you (the readers)think. What is still missing or not making any sense, please feel free to comment.
- A clear mission- The team knows what it is trying to achieve, and everyone is aligned on the goals. This reduces confusion and helps the team make better decisions.
- The right skills & capabilities- The team has the skills and resources it needs to succeed. This allows the team to work autonomously and achieve its goals more quickly.
- Clear processes- The team has well-defined ways of working, both internally and with other teams. This reduces the need for coordination and makes it easier for the team to get things done.
- The right size- The team is not too large or too small. This ensures that the team is efficient and effective, and that everyone has a chance to contribute.
- A culture of trust and collaboration- A well-designed team is one where people feel comfortable sharing ideas, giving and receiving feedback, and working together to achieve common goals. This culture of trust and collaboration is essential for teams to be successful.
These five pillars are essential for any well-designed team. By focusing on these areas, teams can increase their chances of success.
This is also closer to and inline with what Jason Yip published here on Medium- “4 simple rules for team design”. In addition to that, Large Scale Scrum (LeSS) has got this as part of the guidance wrt Well-Structured Teams. (Reference: https://less.works/less/framework/teams).
Well-structured Teams
In LeSS each team:
is cross-functional — all skills required are inside the team or the team can acquire them
shares responsibility for all the team’s work
has a shared team goal
has responsibility for managing its own relationships with external teams and people
