“If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”
That African proverb captures the essence of teamwork and the rationale for doing it well.
Regardless of their composition, teams don’t function in a vacuum. To help ensure success, it’s critical to establish and maintain the right environment. One of those conditions is a reinforcing framework that promotes and enables rather than inhibits team achievement.
In short, teams need recognition and reinforcement explicitly linked to excellent team performance. Recognition of good team performance encourages team members to think and behave from a platform of “we,” “us,” and “ours” rather than “I,” “me,” and “mine.” In addition, team recognition demonstrates that the organization cares enough about the team’s performance to invest resources to reward what it accomplishes.
This principle of contingent reward seems fairly simple, but it’s amazing how many organizations just don’t get it. I once coached the senior management team of a national retail jewelry chain. Every meeting I observed in that company featured high testosterone rah rah about the importance of teamwork. Posters and slogans extolling the virtue of teamwork were everywhere, even in the company restrooms. But the reward systems —focused almost exclusively on individual performance—sent a very different message.
At the company’s annual sales conference, a mammoth extravaganza at Disney World, teamwork was exalted in music, skits, speeches, on shirts, on hats, and on every trinket imaginable. Then it was time to present awards for sales performance. Virtually every presentation was focused on individual achievement. Even the awards that purported to acknowledge teamwork were really about individuals because they recognized stores that had two or more outstanding individual performers.
I tried and tried to point out this mixed message to senior management. But they wouldn’t listen. It took a serious hit (literally) to get their attention.
One of the company’s southern California stores was a leader in overall sales. A couple of its salespeople, both perennial top performers, obviously paid no heed to the teamwork mantra because they were rewarded on their individual performance. Teamwork was only the slogan. Fierce competition was the reality. Then one day one of the guys said to the other, “If you step between me and a customer one more time, I’ll deck you.” It happened. Two well-dressed salesmen punched it out in full view of customers.
When both men were fired, I said to the company president, “Who won on that deal? Neither salesman won. The store certainly didn’t win. The company didn’t win.” Only then did my warning about mixed messages get through. The unintended consequence of rewarding individuals while touting teamwork was finally clear.
For the sake of team performance, it’s critical that rewards are clearly contingent on what the team accomplishes. But while providing rewards that are contingent on desired team performance is important, it’s not enough. Team members must clearly understand the outcomes that are wanted and that will be rewarded. They must have confidence in the metrics used to measure performance. They must have genuine influence on the attainment of team goals. And they must believe that their aggregate contributions directly produce the results that trigger the rewards.
When these conditions are met, team members see the connection between their collective effort and the available rewards. Good performance is inevitable.