Three Cs of Building Effective Teams

                To ensure success in today’s workplace, building effective teams is essential.  Effective teams have clarity, competence, and commitment.  The purpose of the team and the role of team members must be clear in order to produce optimal results (Bakken).  Team members need to be chosen for their skills and abilities to perform, not their personalities (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993.  Goals cannot be met without the skills needed to achieve it.  Buy-in from team members is essential to show everyone is fully committed to producing the best results possible (Cook, 2014).  Without clarity, competence, and commitment, teams will fail.

                In order to be effective, teams must have clarity in their purpose and roles as team members (Bakken).  Teams may or may not reach their end goal if the purpose of the team is ambiguous.  Develop a clear purpose, and set clear goals to achieve the results desired.  Once the team’s purpose is clear, clarify each team member’s role in working to achieve this purpose (Bakken).  By developing clear roles, members know what they are supposed to do and become accountable for certain results.

                Teams also need competence.  This means team members need to be selected for their skills, not personality.  These skills are not only limited to technical skills but also include problem-solving, decision-making, and interpersonal skills (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993).  Technical skills are needed to ensure team goals are completed.  Problem-solving, decision-making, and interpersonal skills allow teams to complete them in the best possible manner.  Without such skills, a team will struggle in accomplishing its purpose.

                Commitment is needed to ensure every team member desires to see the team succeed.  To become more fully committed to producing results, team leaders need to establish buy-in from their team members (Cook).  This can be done by listening to and implementing ideas and feedback and creating a sense of fairness when making decisions. Team members feel a greater duty in pushing the team to success when they are personally invested in the results.

                Effective teams have clarity, competence, and commitment.  By establishing clear purposes and goals and developing role clarity, team members know what needs to be accomplished.  Competence is achieved when members are picked for their skillset and not solely their personality.  Buy-in from team members is essential for creating commitment.  By implementing these three Cs teams will have greater likelihood of success.

References

Bakken, E. (n.d.). Twelve ways to build an effective team. Retrieved from http://people.rice.edu
/uploadedFiles/People/TEAMS/Twelve Ways to Build an Effective Team.pdf

Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (1993). The discipline of teams. Harvard Business Review, 162-171.