Re: wisdom of teams LO1655

Dr. Ivan Blanco (BLANCO@BU4090.BARRY.EDU)
Fri, 16 Jun 1995 9:40:52 -0400 (EDT)

Replying to LO1647 --

> From: jack@his.com
> Date: Thu, 15 Jun 95 11:40:50

<<< some stuff deleted >>>

> "A team is a small number of people with complementary skills, who are
> committed to a common purpose, performance goals and approach for which
> they hold themselves mutually accountable."
>
> Last week I attended a workshop conducted by Peter Senge and Fred Simon.
> Simon was the program manager for the 1995 Lincoln Continental. In his
> part of the workshop, Simon challenged my idea of a "team" by stating that
> he began the work of building a learning organization by convening his
> entire team "off-site" - all 300+ of them. He said that in the course of
> the work the team expanded and contracted, and that at one point the
> number exceeded 1000. I looked around the ballroom, where just a bit
> fewer than 1000 people were assembled, and my mental model refused to
> budge. I stick with Katzenbach and Smith. Nevertheless, it was clear from
> the presentation that practicing the disciplines with facilitation from
> Peter Senge's organization (not clear whether it was an Innovation
> Associates project or a project of the Center for Organizational Learning
> or both) enabled a high order of open communication among the "team
> members" and that shared vision as described in The 5th Discipline drove
> the process. Simon gave really good examples of how the various practices
> applied in the development of his program. Readers of this list will be
> interested in two aspects of his talk:
<<< some other deletions here >>>
>
> Thanks for your patience.
>
> Jack Hirschfeld Can analysis be worthwhile? Is the theatre really dead?
> jack@his.com

The notion I use in my classes and with business groups when I
have the opportunity to talk to them is the same. I discussed the fact
that team members are very much aware of what each member's
repsonsibilities and role are, and they also know when one or more members
are doing a less than acceptable job or a superb one. When we then move
to larger numbers of people working together, I talk about COLLECTIVE
ACTION instead of a team. There could many teams within the group
performing to accomplish some collective effort. For instance, Chrysler
put together a group of 700+ engeineers, designers, etc. to work on the
development of the LH line. THese people where working in many different
smaller teams in charge of the large number of components. The degree of
interaction and knowledge of the waht each team is doing varies according
to the interconnecion of the tasks being performed. For instance, the
team working on the design of the dashboard could have a clear
understanding of what the team designing the airconditioning systems was
doing, but as much knowledge about what the team in charge of transmission
systems was doing. This does not indicate that all these teams,
regardless of the specific task they are performing, do not have a clear
understanding if the overall goal of the 700+ member group. They all
understand that their collective action is essential for teh success of
the whole project. I have not used the term organization here, because
some of these crossfunctional teams included suppliers (contractors and
subcontractors), so that the COLLECTIVE ACTION expands beyond the already
fuzzy boundaries of the organization.

Ivan,

***************************************************************
R. IVAN BLANCO, Ph.D. Voice 305 899-3515
Assoc. Prof. & Director Fax 305 892-6412
International Business Programs
Andreas School of Business _________E-Mail Addresses________
Barry University Bitnet: Blanco%bu4090@Barryu
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<<<<< ---------------- >>>>>
"Las naciones marchan hacia el termino de su grandeza, con
el mismo paso que camina su educacion." "The nations march
toward their greatness at the same pace as their educational
systems evolve." Simon Bolivar
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