Organizations have to adapt to change. How you adjust to company growth and contraction and employee turnover will greatly affect your company’s success. Heidi Helfand, a corporate coach, researched the challenges of changing work teams. Almost all of her research originates from the software industry, which is her area of expertise – but this knowledge can apply to any business. Change is unstoppable and ongoing, and her manual is an important resource for anyone who leads teams.
Dynamic reteaming enables you to productively deal with inevitable change.
It means productively dealing with changing teams. “Eco Cycles” of dynamic reteaming can happen simultaneously, at different degrees and speeds, on three levels:
- “Individual” – Your team experience can change when you switch teams, your team adds people, the company changes, your duties change, or you move to another company.
- “Team” – As your team matures and grows, many factors can affect its structure. The team can flourish or wither and eventually die.
- “Company” – You could be on the ground floor of a start-up company that grows from a few employees to hundreds. A larger organization may take over your firm, creating significant changes in leadership and direction.
Since members of a team work toward the same goals and own the outcomes together, disruption can happen when people join or leave the team. Dynamic reteaming improves a team’s structure in order to promote positive change. Adding new members can bring fresh energy and new ideas that raise the group’s cumulative intellectual ability or knowledge.
Reteaming improves the group’s potential and provides learning opportunities for team members. However, you can’t just introduce reteaming into your company without any consideration and respect for the people.
Losing team members, either or to another organization or internally, also creates a different dynamic. The team could benefit if the person leaving was problematic. But if the person was an integral part of the team, the loss can be devastating. It takes time for current team members to mentally accept the loss. As a team leader, you need to understand that a newly organized team won’t move forward instantly.
Dynamic Reteaming: Beware of taking actions that may disrupt your team’s chemistry.
Managers can think that moving team members around could foster success, but this strategy can also backfire because human beings have their own beliefs, ideas, and feelings, so you should avoid disrupting the team chemistry of a highly functioning team. Sometimes organizations and teams aren’t ready for change.
Teams can harness analysis and self-reflection in order to increase their effectiveness. Team members may recognize structural inefficiencies and get permission from management to make necessary changes. If you lead a high-functioning team, leave well enough alone. If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.
It’s best for the organizations to give employees input for reshaping and building new teams. For example, managers can meet with employees to find out what they need and if they have any questions.
Discover the best way to successfully build teams, consistently connect with your leadership team, and predictably turn them into highly engaged employees. Book a complimentary appointment for us to discuss at https://go.oncehub.com/GregNichvalodoff or call me at +1 (604) 943-0800.
