Team Development

Team development is vital to improving the working effectiveness of your people. It’s about creating an opportunity for teams to find out about each other – to discuss what makes them tick, to open up about their successes, their hopes and their challenges – to open up about what they enjoy about their work-life and about what they don’t.

For teams to work effectively, its members must be able to contribute collectively to team outcomes. This doesn’t happen as if by magic. It’s a process that can only truly develop through nurturing.

Have you noticed? When your team first gets together for a new project, everyone sits around looking at each other, not knowing how to begin. Initially, you aren’t a team – just individuals assigned to work together.

Over time you get to know each other, to know what to expect from each other, to understand how to divide the labour and assign tasks, and to work out how you’ll coordinate the project. Slowly, you begin to operate as a team instead of a collection of individuals.

Teams go through distinct stages during development – often called Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing, and Adjourning.

Forming

A period of orientation and getting acquainted. Uncertainty is high, and team members are looking for leadership and authority.

Storming

The most critical and challenging stage, often marked by conflict and competition as individual personalities emerge. Team performance may decrease in this stage.

Norming

By now, the team have resolved any conflict. Some degree of unity emerges. Consensus develops around who the leader or leaders are, and individual member’s roles.

Performing

By now, the team is mature, organised, and well-functioning. There is a clear and stable structure, and members are committed to the team’s mission.

Adjourning stage

The team has accomplished many of its goals. The emphasis is on wrapping up final tasks and documenting the effort and results. As the workload diminishes, individual members may be reassigned to other teams, and the group disbands.

Our experienced team developers will work with you to analyse the challenges of the project and look at the potential areas of conflict within the team. We understand how sensitive issues can arise and will devise ways of overcoming difficulties that might arise. Team Development can last a day or over weeks or months.