Get ready for a major shift in management styles. From large multinational corporations to small family-owned retailers, businesses all across the board are trading in the true-and-tried top-down model, where the boss is king, for a system of organized teams that pretty much regulate themselves.
Is this a revolutionary new way to work in the digital age or just a temporary fad? Could this collective switch work for your business? Here’s what you need to know before you jump on board.
Why Teams Are Trending
Teams are hardly a new concept, having been around to some degree since the dawn of civilization.
What’s different now is the idea that traditional office management has become too rigid for a tech-savvy workforce with a serious independent streak. While teams used to have limited authority and were expected to defer to supervisors, now they increasingly make their own decisions, relying on each other’s experience and a growing basket of technical tools to get the job done right with relatively little oversight.
Without costing any upfront investment, the shift to a team model has the potential to transform a business of any size into a competitive powerhouse through unique benefits, including:
1. Limitless creativity. Individual employees are full of one-of-a-kind ideas, skills and experiences. When you put their heads together, you have the ultimate dynamic for the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that can put your brand head and shoulders above the competition.
2. Hyper speed. Isolating projects to concentrated groups of workers who are in constant communication translates to less time wasted on progress meetings, regular reviews and late revisions.
3. The cool factor. Now that the global workforce is becoming increasingly made up of millennials who see collaboration as part of the natural order, having a social work structure without barriers can be a big draw for emerging talent.
4. Super powers. Some people are practical problem solvers who think on the straight and narrow, while others are creative geniuses who can’t stick to a schedule. Brought together, they can instantly nix each other’s weaknesses to reach their highest potential.
5. Smarter management. Teams have a built-in system of checks and balances, so barring a conflict, there’s little reason to interfere. With less time spent on mundane follow-ups, managers can actively focus on important long-term goals like growth and development.
Not Always a Quick Fix
Despite their many good points, teams do have some drawbacks that shouldn’t be overlooked. After all, if all problems could be solved by throwing a few people together, we wouldn’t still be dealing with today’s discouraging rate of business failure.
One of the biggest pitfalls to be aware of is the cover that sheltered groups can give to problems that would otherwise be obvious in a conventional top-down hierarchy.
For example, below-par employees who may ordinarily end up on the firing block can hide behind the accomplishments of their harder-working, more skilled peers, who in turn can feel resentful at being underappreciated. That not only leads to a higher risk of brain drain as the top employees might choose to strike out on their own, but it also robs upper management of chances to spot promising workers who can be groomed as future gatekeepers of the company.
In businesses that hire part-timers and contractors, the main issue may be cultivating productive teams in the first place. When workers don’t feel a strong sense of loyalty to their bosses, they’re less likely to put in the effort required to make self-starting groups successful.
In the end, the key to reaping the benefits of the team trend is to cherry-pick its best facets while actively mitigating the potential downsides. Instead of putting everyone on equal footing, it’s a good idea to appoint leaders who can set firm goals, evaluate individual team members and report the most important milestones to management.
And remember, teams don’t have to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Outsourcing one project to a small trial team, or designating specific days of the week for group work, is a safe way to test the waters.
