Road to High Performance: 7 Steps to Develop a New Team

Just like flowers need good soil to bloom, your team needs a great environment to thrive. Setting up your team up for success is about making a space where everyone can grow and shine, so they can be in a much better shape to perform and show up for their big goals.

So, how do you create this kind of environment?

As an agile coach, I’ve helped many new teams grow into high performing teams. Although each team had their own characteristics and goals, from these experiences, I’ve observed common patterns that work really well in helping new teams grow into their potential.

To help you in your journey in building a new team, here are 7 highly effective steps to guide you along the way.

1. Define Your Team's Purpose

Defining your team's purpose is the fundamental step in the your team development journey. It's about identifying the longer-term impact your team aspires to make, not just for your business but for your customers too.

Your team's purpose serves as the North Star, giving clarity about the team's identity and the people it aims to serve.

For instance, if you're managing an E-commerce product team, your purpose might be to provide a reliable, safe, and fast shopping experience for users. This purpose sets the tone for everything your team does, aligning the team towards the same horizon.

2. Set Your Team Goals

Goals are the shorter-term objectives that keep your team on track. These goals typically span from 1 to 3 months and act as the guiding compass for your team.

They provide direction, focus, and priorities. Without clear goals, your team can quickly become lost in confusion and will typically run out of time/money/motivation before they even see results.

Following the previous example for an E-commerce product team, a goal for the team might include increasing the conversion rate or reducing checkout time. These goals not only provide a roadmap but also give the team a clear focus in their work.

3. Bring in the Right Mix of Capabilities

To build a high-performing team, you need the right people with the right skills. Once you've defined your team's purpose and goals, it's time to figure out the knowledge and skills necessary to achieve them.

Look for individuals with these qualities and bring them onboard. A cross-functional, self-sufficient team can greatly minimise dependencies and move things forward at a higher pace, compared to teams who are highly dependent on other teams to get things done.

4. Establish the Team's Ways of Working

Your team's ways of working represent an agreed-upon work pattern that everyone in the team follows. This pattern serves to minimise waste, increase quality of work, and ensure a well-structured approach.

In other words, the team’s ways of working describes how the team work together to produce value. This may include how work gets defined, the frequency and purpose of team interactions, and the tools used to get work done.

Having an agreed, regular pattern of work greatly helps the team build momentum in their workflow. It promotes predictability and reliability, which significantly contributes to improved team performance.

5. Clarify Roles, Accountabilities, and Decision-Making

After establishing your ways of working, it’s important to have a shared understanding of roles, responsibilities, and how decisions are made so everyone know how to best work together. So many teams skip this part and just leave this to chance, greatly lowering the clarity of what team members can expect from each other.

Without this clarity, teams risk stumbling into misunderstandings and conflicts, holding them back from growing. When everyone knows what's expected of them, they can work together more effectively and efficiently.

6. Form a Working Agreement

Effective teamwork requires explicit guidelines on how your team will work together. A working agreement is a document created collaboratively by team members that outlines specific behaviours and practices within the team.

This can include decisions on how to communicate during meetings (e.g., audio or video), how decisions are made, and how often the team want to get together socially. A well-defined working agreement promotes better collaboration, minimises misunderstandings, and can greatly boost team morale.

7. Bring in Proper Learning and Coaching

As your team progresses toward its goals, you'll surely encounter changes in market expectations, technology, or other factors that require your team to adapt. This means it's crucial to enable your team's growth by providing them access to the right learning and coaching opportunities.

Whether it's technical training, leadership development, or industry insights, nurturing your team's growth is important to consistently deliver valuable work. Aim to build a culture of continuous learning to constantly move your team forward.

Conclusion

Building a high-performing team is not just about following these seven steps. It's an ongoing process of improvement and adaptation that leads to consistent growth in an ever-changing market.

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Do you need help in developing a new team?

Talk to us today for a practical plan to help your newly formed team grow into a high-performing team.