A Recipe for Great Teamwork

Mar 7, 2023

The ability to successfully organize and maintain teamwork has become one of the core skills for every person, be it in the context of school, university, or job activities. In the 21st century, teams are going through a major transformation, becoming more digitalized and diverse: people of different backgrounds and cultures come together to work at inventing new solutions to problems and bringing innovative concepts to life. Nowadays, they are not restricted by their physical location and can interact entirely in virtual space. In the circumstances of constant and rapid change, it is crucial for us to understand how to optimize teamwork and make it a productive and positive experience for every member of the team.

Specific goals. First and foremost, a team should work on setting their ultimate goal as well as sub-goals, which allows all the members to clearly plan out their actions and establish their priorities. In order to achieve maximum performance from all the members of the team, the goals set should be:

Clear. Every member of the team should understand the plans and the direction their team is moving in, otherwise they might end up feeling unmotivated due to the seeming lack of purpose in their individual tasks. To ensure everybody’s understanding of the ultimate goal and interim targets, various visual representations can be used, such as diagrams or presentations.
Measurable. Measurable goals, unlike abstract ones, are much more useful and applicable to the context of real life, which makes the organisation and distribution of responsibilities more feasible.
Achievable. Setting ambitious goals is great, but it is important to be mindful of objective limitations and opportunities of the team. Overly ambitious goals are likely to intimidate and, hence, demotivate the team, which can lead to an even lower level of productivity than the level that could have been attained if the goals were realistic.

Distribution of responsibilities. Every member of the team should have clearly outlined responsibilities and tasks. Otherwise, there might occur a situation when multiple people in the team are working on the same task, while another task might be completely overlooked. Creating a task list where the distribution of roles within the team is specified can aid the members’ understanding of the channels of communication within the team. To further optimise the efforts of the team, everybody’s aptitudes, abilities and skill should be taken into account when assigning tasks.

Discussing the process and getting feedback. Discussing the work process with the team members is essential for high-quality performance of the team overall. Some members might have ideas on how to make the work processes more efficient, others might notice small flaws in the organisation of the work that other people fail to note. Carrying out regular feedback sessions along with frequent anonymous feedback forms allows everybody to speak their mind and boosts team members’ motivation. Any conflict of interests within the team should be dealt with similarly: both sides of the argument should freely express their point of view, and only after that can any decisions can be made.

Watching out for the number of team members. A great number of people in one team does not guarantee faster nor more effective work. In fact, it causes the opposite effect: the diffusion of responsibility occurs, and people tend to engage with the task to a much lesser extent, mentally passing the responsibilities to other members of the team. In addition, huge teams can suffer from a lack of trust relationships between the members and, thus, a decrease in efficiency. The founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, proposed the idea of the “two-pizza rule”: a team should be small enough that it can be fed with two pizzas. Such bounds allow effective monitoring of all the individuals in the team and high levels of productivity.

Using a single system of digital tools. In order to avoid internal confusion and loss of valuable time, a uniform system of digital communication should be established. For instance, if the team initially agreed to use Microsoft Office tools for working and Slack for formal communication, every member should try to adhere to the rules set in the beginning.

Keeping track of the progress and celebrating achievements. Regular formal or informal appraisals are crucial for the team’s future performance. It is important to celebrate not only individual progress and achievements of every member, but also the overall team’s performance and progress that you have made so far. When analysing the achievements, it is also beneficial to note the team’s strengths as well as their weaknesses in order to plan out further action and optimise the processes within the group.

These tips can help to build a strong foundation for the skill of teamwork organisation and give one a better understanding of what can be done to make their teamwork more efficient. Good luck in your future projects!