Thoughts Decoded

Some days back a group of 7 developers was formed to handle a project. Most of them were freshers (i guess 5 were freshers). They were expected to form a winning team [The word ‘winning’ holds more importance here]. So the challenge before them was “How to build a WINNING Team?”

The team decided over a structure to be implemented inside. Every project has certain phases to be carried out like designing, coding, testing etc. The team decided that they will develop various specialists for these various phases. These specialists will lead the team over that crucial phase of the project. So the team will not be driven by just one person (i.e. the Project Lead), but will shift the gears, i mean leaders, according to requirements. For e.g. If someone is very good at documentation then he will lead the team for completing the documentation of the project.

Another thing they decided is not to set proper deadlines for smaller subtasks. The team was ofcourse having delivery dates and internal milestones. And following them was the responsibility of every team member. But they deliberately kept subtasks open ended to promote creativity and flexibility in the team. The schedule overruns, if any, were managed by smartley moving around the resources. They decided to ride on the thirst of a person to achieve excellence.

Interestingly the team won the ‘Best Project’ award of the organization for that year.

However when the same theory was applied to another team, which i believed was having same caliber, failed miserably.

Why the same theory that won a team ‘Best Project’ award failed so miserably with another team? What was the difference in the two cases? And what can be THE WINNING formula for a team? My conscious mind started analyzing the two cases.

The first team was more passionate and responsible about their work. They always appreciated feedbacks for whatever they did. Very rarely they spoke about their work in public. For others they appeared to be reserved.

The other team was less interested in whatever job they did. They loved to give away excuses and be less responsible for their work. Often they spoke about their abilities in public, though their work was not really up to the mark. However they appeared to others as very hardworking.

Hey, Wait a minute.. Do these qualities remind you of the typical gender war at the job? I mean, the job seems to be the last priority for a particular gender group in most cases. However for the opposite gender group it is top priority in life. Girls are more outspoken than boys (kahate hai ladakiyonke ke pet me koi baat nahi rahati, aur agar rah bhi jaaye to pet dard karane lagataa hai..).

Interestingly the first team was having majority of boys and second team was having majority of girls in the team. So was that the real problem?? Anyway i strongly believe that girls have more managerial strengths than boys. So may be too many managers in one small team were spoiling the results. [ Oops!! Did i say that??? ]

Another problem could be the taking up the responsibility. The whole theory assumes that the people in the team will show responsibility towards work and would always starve to achieve.

Here is another observation. It is said that in a team, juniors always follow the seniors in the team. Were the senior people in both teams the reason for the difference in achievements caused?

Huh.. It is really getting tough to point out what could be reasons for success as well as failure. But the question still remains,
What is the winning formula for a team? What can transform a team into super achievers?
I would like to hear your ideas if any. How your team does it? Can we really define any such formula?

My Answer: Forget all this. Its never about boys or girls, seniors or juniors. It’s about the need, passion for achieving excellence and the attitude. Its always about understanding the team, believing and respecting the team and more importantly its every constituent. Whichever team has majority of members displaying these characteristics, will surely perform excellently.