Team Dynamics
Team dynamics are the unseen psychological forces at work within a team that either: Serve to bring the team together and thus create an efficient, high performing, motivated and cohesive team. Or .. These same dynamics (if negative) will serve to create an inefficient, de-motivated underperforming and fractured team.
As the word dynamic suggests these unseen forces are always in a state of flux or change and are easily affected by forces within the team and outside the team. Team dynamics can best be described as the chemistry that exists within the team at any given point in time. This chemistry is all about how each of the individual members of the team contribute to the whole.
Each member has their own unique personality and brings their own thoughts, feelings and behaviours into work every day. An example here could be if Joe is going through a rough time in his relationship or is having other personal problems, it’s not possible for these things to effect Joe’s performance. Joe may be the team’s top performer and as his performance starts to slip this may effect the outputs of the other team members.
Joe may then start to feel guilty about this and may become more defensive towards his colleagues. This creates communication barriers that have a negative impact on the team. At this point you may say the team chemistry or dynamics has become negatively affected.
Examples Of Forces That Affect Team Dynamics?
- The working environment, layout of the office, amount of light etc
- The style of team leadership and management
- The inter-relation between the members of the team
- The goals and the style of goal-setting for the team
- Stakeholder influences on the team (customers, shareholder’s, tax-payers etc)
- Organisational culture, “the way things are done around here”
- Other external influences, personal life crisis of team members, fear of redundancy, economic crisis, key member of team leaving etc.
So What Are The Ingredients Of Good Team Dynamics?
When we bake a cake we will need to follow a recipe to achieve the successful outcome we desire. Unfortunately when working with people it is not as simple as saying three grams of laughter, zero criticism and four kilos of organisation. There just is no recipe.
However, when we bring teams together we need to be mindful of the effects that each individual has on the whole of the team. Managers and leaders can do the best to provide the appropriate environment for the team, but key is be continually monitoring the team for small signs that the dynamics are not right and then to act quickly and decisively to resolve any issues that could jeopardise the performance of the team.