Remember the project teams you had back in school, whether university or prior? Often teachers like to assign you with people you never worked with before, so you get to experience working with different people.
Typical team composition:
- Someone contributed disproportionally because his/her goal is perfect and he/she’s willing to carry the project to his/her satisfaction
- Someone who is completely disengaged because of lack of interest or commitment
- Someone who follows along, contributes but will wait for instructions
- Someone who debates on everything but has no original ideas.
- Someone with lots of ideas but would not do anything
These may be exaggerated so you get the idea – and you also know which one you were back in school!
As you think back now, imagine the outcome and satisfaction if you just asked these 5 questions when you start every project?
- How important is this project to you? (we may have different majors)
- What do you want to get out of this? (why would anyone aim for < 100? but many actually have a sweet spot other than 100)
- How much time and efforts are you willing and able to put in? (other responsibilities, commute, interest)
- What are you particularly good at or want to learn more? (what would you enjoy doing more anyway)
- What do you want to avoid doing? (we all fight procrastination on the things we hate)
Wait a minute – how is this different from the workplace?
Successful Project teams tend to have
- Shared Goals binds a team together
- Aligned Motivation and Expectation
- Play to Individual and Collective Strength
- Awareness and Coverage of Weakness
While it is common to use language like adding or removing capacity, team outputs never really change linearly. Each “addition” of a team member work as Multiplier – imagine how each of the following can multiply your outcome for the same efforts:
- Skills
- Knowledge
- Perspectives
- Network
- Energy
On the opposite side, the limiting factors are also applied as a Divider. The entire team’s results can diminish if we have bottlenecks, blindspots, misunderstanding or simply a bag of negative energy.
What is your Team’s stats?
