Good teams require good collaborators; however, even with the best collaborators, it does not mean that you will have a good team.
I was reminded of this recently - by contrasting experiences with teams comprised of great collaborators - with entirely different energy.
On one team, the energy is great, making the project a joy.
On the other team, I can't stand the energy, making the project miserable.
What is the difference?
The synergy between team members, their competencies, & their ability to co-create a good project.
On my fun team, everyone plays a role well - with one person contributing ideas, another doing the legwork, & a third adding competency to research design or analysis.
Everyone contributes at different points in time - with minimal backbiting when others work more or less - at some stage in the knowledge creation process.
Our synergy rests on trust - because everyone knows that every team member will deliver an essential element to the project at some point.
In contrast.
On my not fun team, roles are not clear - with more than one person trying to lead, others wanting similar niche roles, & differing world views resulting in conflict over what work needs to be done.
On that team, a member failed to deliver value at crucial points in the paper writing process - leading to backbiting & dissatisfaction.
The team failed to form trust or synergy - resulting in a subset of the team having to finish the project.
The irony? I honestly thought the not-fun team would be fantastic.
So what made one team better than the other?
First, shared experience. My best teams have some members that have rich experience working together.
The shared experience made it easier to distribute work.
Second, diversity. My fun team had late & early career scholars.
Awareness of these differences translated to more patience & understanding of #roles.
We didn't have #conflict - because we all knew who was the boss of each part of the project.
Third, distinct #competencies. We didn't have competition over who knew the correct theory, method, or coordination approach.
We had short calls, quickly distributed work, & converged on ideas at warp speed.
Fourth, clear #goals. We defined bite-size #deliverables so that we felt momentum as we rapidly iterated on the project.
With each iteration of work, we trusted each other more, making it easier to solve problems.
Finally, serendipity. My best #team emerged from a conversation about an exciting topic. Nothing was forced.
Rather than seeking to publish, we wanted answers to interesting questions.
In the end, I realized there was no silver bullet. Building a great #academic team requires #synergy, #trust, and a good measure of #serendipity!
If you are curious about how I pick collaborators, you can find more here: https://lnkd.in/gWksw-t3
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/jason-thatcher-0329764_roles-conflict-competencies-activity-6937586680782626816-iCCL?utm_source=linkedin_share&utm_medium=member_desktop_web
Comments