Who is your number 1 team?

You are sitting in you weekly Executive Team Meeting with your colleagues.  You are the head of Accounting.  The others in your team lead up a number of other key departments in the organisation – HR, Retail, Operations etc.

The team is making a decision regarding staffing and recruitment.  Your department is desperately in need of at least two more staff, however, the organisation is under pressure to restructure and your boss wants to place a freeze on hiring until the situation is sorted.  His motivation is to minimise the possibility of redundancies and job losses in the near future. 

You are NOT supportive of this idea.  Your own team is under pressure and you are not sure how long they can last.  However, the decision, after input from all parties, is made to place an immediate freeze on hiring until further notice.  

You leave the meeting and head back to the office and are immediately approached by your 2IC to discuss the recruitment of two new staff – a discussion that has been going on for a week or two.

You tell her of the Executive Team’s decision.  She is appalled and upset…. and you say “Yes, I know, I didn’t agree but was overruled.  Only Jennie from Retail was on our side!”

Your priority just shifted from your number 1 team to your number 2 team, and you have devalued and let your number 1 team down, creating unrest and unnecessary angst and frustration.

This is a dilemma that you may have experienced as a leader in a large organisation.  You may be a member of two very important teams – the one headed up by your own manager – your number 1 team – and the one you lead – your number 2 team.

We are deeply wired to be tribal – to seek connection and acceptance into our tribe.  What do you then do when you have two tribes???

As a leader of a team, you will feel compelled to make your people your number one priority, your number 1 tribe – after all, they look up to you, depend on you, and you are there to support them.  True.

However, they are, in fact, your number 2 team.  This can be hard to process.  It doesn’t mean they are any less important, it just means that your commitment in terms of decisions and guidance must come from your number 1 team.  You must be able to commit to the decisions made by your Number 1 team – the one you are a member of, not the one you lead – so that the organisation can create efficiency and alignment in terms of effort.

Without a commitment to your number 1 team, the system doesn’t work.  It breaks down.  Silos are created and wasted effort, useless diversions and duplication can be the outcome.  Not to mention the creation of negative emotion and ‘tribal’ (us vs them) wars!

Patrick Lencioni in the Five Dysfunctions of a Team talks about this concept in terms of a need for COMMITMENT to your team – and achieving real commitment to your number 1 team can be difficult.  Great teams commit 100% to decisions and plans of action, even if they didn’t reach CONSENSUS…and team members TRUST that each member of the team will carry out those decisions and plans of action as a united front.

Who is your number 1 team?  Which way do you lean when there is a clash between the needs and decisions of both teams?  Food for thought!  I’d love to hear your comments…

Here is an alternative ending to your initial dilemma…

You tell her of the Executive Team’s decision.  She is appalled and upset…. and you say “Yes, I understand that this may have been unexpected, and that it will be challenging, however, the there are good reasons for the decision.  Let’s focus on what we can do to support our team and make some changes to help us get through the next few weeks!”

Wow, you are such a great leader!!

Have a great day!

Michelle  🙂

 

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