Teamership: Four myths about leading high performing teams

80% of teams are not high performing teams despite the aspirations of leaders. Photo by Dylan Gillis on Unsplash

Most leaders want high performing teams for all of the benefits that come with them - better performance, learning, engagement, resilience and more.

Most teams are not high performing. Depending on where you look, only about 20% of teams are high performing.

In other words, 80% of teams are not high performing teams despite the aspirations of leaders.

Here are a few common misconceptions about why that gap exists. Understanding these lets us get to work on some of the things that are actually more likely to help leaders have high performing teams.

Myth #1 - Leading teams is simple

Teams are small, dynamic, human systems. With the complexity required to understand and work with ourselves, it is a bit optimistic to think that it’s easy to lead a group of humans who are interacting with many other humans inside and outside of their team and organisation.

There are no simple solutions to the complexity of leading teams.

I often hear the unspoken implication that there is some sort of right way to lead every team in every situation. As an intellectual crush of mine, Jennifer Garvey Berger, says…”Simple stories are a mind trap”

Myth # 2 - There is a way to guarantee success in a team.

If anyone tells you that they can guarantee successful outcomes and performance in teams, please don’t believe them.

This is related to Myth #1 and the complexity of teams. Decoupling team behaviours and outcomes is difficult but valuable.

Your team’s results don’t always reflect your team’s actions and behaviours - or the efforts of the leader.

Sometimes you get favourable results in spite of your behaviours.
Sometimes you do all of the things that you expect to work and don’t get the results.

If there is no way to guarantee success in a team, there is no single way to lead high performing teams.

Myth #3 - Team leaders need to invest more time

Team leaders are as busy as ever. This is increasingly the case for those who are not in executive roles. Executives have long been expected to put in long hours, but as organisations become more “lean” (or “flat”, or “horizontal”) and removing layers of management, more is expected of individual leaders throughout the organisation.

Gartner’s recent research suggests that 75% of HR leaders report that managers are overwhelmed with the expanding scope of their responsibilities.

Most leaders are stretching themselves further and wider across responsibilities. We could have a conversation about whether leaders are spending their time in the most important aspects of their role - that’s always a useful avenue to explore. It’s rare, however, that leaders aren’t putting in the time.

Myth #4 - Team members aren’t up to speed

It’s easy to think that leaders who are committed and putting in the effort must be leading teams who don’t have the requisite skills or characteristics to be a part of a high performing team.

That’s probably not true.

Sandy Pentland from MIT’s Human Dynamics Laboratory points out in Harvard Business Review, “individual reasoning and talent contribute far less to team success than one might expect”.

In other words, we tend to overestimate how much talent and experience contributes to team performance and underestimate team dynamics.

In the coming weeks, I will explore some of the patterns that are making it difficult for leaders to have high performing teams.

In the meantime, here are a few things to consider:

• Are you or your teams telling yourselves simple stories that are stopping you from seeing the reality within your teams?

• Can you effectively separate your teams' behaviours and their results?

• How might your leaders and teams give team dynamics more of their attention?