ETETE - A Team Development Process
ETETE - Exploring Then Enhancing Team Effectiveness
We view the Team Leader as our primary client and seek to build an open, trusting and supportive relationship with them, though we value the need to liaise with your HR or L & D staff.
We can also support team effectiveness through evaluation, linking development with existing objectives, measures or service level agreements. We increasingly use the Balanced Scorecard approach (where feasible) to help measure impact.
ETETE - Taylor Clarke's Team Development Process
This summary model is a typical Taylor Clarke team development approach. Although the actual process used is always agreed at the outset.
1. Preliminary Stage
We discuss with the team leader what the issues are, that if addressed, could lead to improved team performance? We explore how to link these to team and/or company targets.
We cover and agree roles i.e. of consultant and team leader. We normally work in a collaborative mode to ensure our objective and external perspective is balanced, built on and supplemented by, the internal in-depth perspective of the team leader.
We ensure that buy-in and ownership of the team development intervention stays with the team leader, through building rapport and trust to enable shared openness. We always look for ways to exchange knowledge and transfer skills between our consultants and the team leader.
We discuss the value of identifying where team member and team leader perceptions differ and if such differences exist, agree where and how to address them in the review and design stage.
Also at this preliminary stage we would agree the detail of the subsequent stages of this process. This would be determined on a case by case basis depending on factors such as the amount of time and resource available and the seriousness of the issues the team were facing.
2. Diagnostic Stage
For us the diagnostic phase has the over-arching aim of ensuring that the time spent on the actual team development intervention, often a workshop lasting 1-3 days, is focused on areas where it will have most impact. This aim is achieved in four ways:
- Firstly, by gathering data from team members that builds on the information and clarifies the issues the team leader sees as important.
- Secondly, by offering the chance for team members to raise other issues they see as important to involve the team in the process and getting their buy-in.
- Thirdly by building rapport between the consultant and the team members before the workshop phase of the process.
- And finally, the diagnostic phase can provide data that can be used for evaluation purposes at a later stage as it is in effect a base-line study.
We normally use two main methods, and a supplementary method of gathering data from team leaders and members. These are one to one, normally face to face interviews and the completion of a Team Climate Inventory questionnaire. We also often use appreciative inquiry as a method of getting an alternative perspective on how the team is working.
3. Review and Design Stage
This stage involves feedback to the team leader about the data collected, together with a suggested way forward, i.e. workshop design. Our intention is to make this a collaborative relationship ensuring ownership of the team development process stays with the team leader.
The outcomes of this stage are:
- An agreed (between the team leader and the consultant) set of objectives for the team building workshop.
- Agreement of the amount of time required i.e. normally 1–3 days, perhaps with an overnight.
- A clear idea of what success will look like and how it will be measured.
- A structure for the time allocated, although we believe we need to stay flexible in case unforeseen issues are raised during the team development workshop.
4. Implementation e.g. Team Development Workshop Stage
The actual timing, structure and content of the implementation, often a workshop, will vary depending on the issues raised by the previous stages.
All of our workshops would feature action planning as a major part of the last day.
Listed below is a range of tools and techniques that we would expect to draw on during the workshop stage. These are often plotted against the four main areas of team effectiveness addressed by the Team Climate Inventory (TCI), one of the main diagnostic tools used.
5. Follow-up and Evaluation Stage
Our work with clients has shown that the benefits from team development workshops can be consolidated and sustained through the use of a follow up session approximately 6-8 weeks after the main workshop.
This follow-up session, usually lasting half or one day, acts as a target date by which the agreed actions have to be carried out. It helps ensure that team development remains a high priority. This session also offers the chance to reward changes successfully made and/or analyse why agreed actions have not yet been taken.
Depending on the agreed evaluation strategy, stage 5 may be the time to assess if the objectives agreed in stage 3 have been met. If a longer period was required, another follow up or separate evaluation process may need to be undertaken.
It may have been decided at an earlier stage that a longer-term evaluation strategy was needed. If so then subsequent evaluation of follow up work may be carried out with the team.
