Aditi Bhatnagar

Book Review - Five Dysfunctions of a Team

The book absorbs the reader into a scenario of a company that is in a bad shape despite the excellent staff and plenty of investment. The board of the company assigns a new CEO on advice of the current CEO. The new CEO does not have a relevant background technically but is skilled at forming teams. She is observant for first the 2-3 weeks watching every staff member (the book is careful in not calling them a team member yet) and then decides to take the team on an off-site. The staff members feel their non-performing team needs to invest their time better than in an off-site but she pushes them to come. She also leaves a remark that on the end of the event, there is a chance few members would have to move on from the company.

When everyone shows up at the off-site, she goes through the five dysfunctions of a team and elaborates on how those are the core reasons of their team not doing well.

Quotes

  • Jack Welch didn’t have to be an expert on toaster manufacturing to make General Electric a success and that Herb Kelleher didn’t have to spend a life- time flying airplanes to build Southwest Airlines.
  • Politics is when people choose their words and actions based on how they want others to react rather than based on what they really think.
  • Things would have to get worse, maybe even much worse, before they would get better.
  • She let the partial apology sink in before continuing and made sure not to begin her next sentence with the word but.
  • I would rather overstate the problem than understate it.
  • It’s hard to come down on someone who is always pitching in.” Kathryn nodded and then added firmly. “You’re right. But that’s not a good excuse. The fact is, Carlos is a vice president of the company, and he needs to prioritize better according to what we agreed to do, and he needs to challenge people in the organization who are not responding to his requests.”
  • No, trust is not the same as assuming everyone is on the same page as you, and that they don’t need to be pushed. Trust is knowing that when a team member does push you, they’re doing it because they care about the team.
  • Whether it is an action movie, a drama, a comedy, or an artsy French film, every movie worth watching must have one key ingredient. What is that ingredient?” Martin answered dryly. “Well, since we’re talking about conflict, I’m guessing that’s it.”
  • “Can’t we have more than one overarching goal?” Kathryn shook her head. “If everything is important, then nothing is.”
  • “Okay, unless someone is holding some- thing back, I think I’ve heard all the opinions in the room. And we are probably not going to agree completely, which is fine, because there is no science here. I’m going to set the number based on your input, and we are going to stick with that number.”
  • Kathryn decided that this would be her first moment of truth as a CEO, and moments of truth, she knew, are best handled face-to-face.
  • But when a company has a collection of good managers who don’t act like a team, it can create a dilemma for them, and for the company. You see, it leads to confusion about who their first team is.
  • “Consensus is horrible. I mean, if everyone really agrees on something and consensus comes about quickly and naturally, well that’s terrific. But that isn’t how it usually works, and so consensus becomes an attempt to please everyone.” “Which usually turns into displeasing everyone equally.”
  • “She’s right. You act like we’re questioning your intelligence.” More calmly now, Martin persisted. “Isn’t that what you’re doing? You’re saying that I’m overestimating the amount of resources it takes to build and maintain our product.”
  • “No buy-in.” “What?” asked Nick. “No buy-in. People aren’t going to hold each other accountable if they haven’t clearly bought in to the same plan. Otherwise, it seems pointless because they’re just going to say, ‘I never agreed to that anyway.’”
  • “And I’m not joking when I say that. Our ability to en- gage in passionate, unfiltered debate about what we need to do to succeed will determine our future as much as any products we develop or partnerships we sign.”
  • trust is the confidence among team members that their peers’ intentions are good, and that there is no reason to be protective or care- ful around the group. In essence, teammates must get com- fortable being vulnerable with one another.
  • It sounds like your strength and weak- ness are rooted in the same things.” “Isn’t that usually the case?”
  • “If we don’t trust one another, then we aren’t going to engage in open, constructive, ideological conflict. And we’ll just continue to preserve a sense of artificial harmony.”
  • Kathryn knew from past experience that the departure of even the most difficult employees provoked some degree of mourning and self-doubt among their peers.
  • the ultimate dysfunction: the tendency of team members to seek out individual recognition and attention at the ex- pense of results. And I’m referring to collective results— the goals of the entire team.”