Teams, Teamliness, and Team Effectiveness Explained

In my practice, I coach entrepreneurial management teams in discovering how they can improve their teamliness. Authentic teamliness can enhance team effectiveness which can improve enterprise performance – both short-term and long-term (see article #1V4 for a complete explanation of what ‘performance’ is relevant for growth-oriented entrepreneurial ventures (‘GOEVs’) at different stages-of-development). Improving enterprise performance should translate into improved risk-adjusted returns for investors – like VCs. I also coach CFOs in high-growth entrepreneurial ventures on enhancing their wingmanship-style support of their entrepreneur-leader. Improved working relations in this crucial dyad within entrepreneurial management teams (‘eMT’) contribute to similar impacts and, with effective communication, elevated Board confidence and support. The quality of all of these research and practice activities requires a working understanding of teams, dyads, and social interaction in the entrepreneurial context. Five reasons why this is important are summarized in this article’s introduction: if you want more details, download in the full article using the link provided.

Most research on management team theory has focused on management teams in established organizations. But, GOEVs face unique challenges – two of the most significant of these are limited resources (especially financial & human capital) and a team that is under development/metamorphosis as the same time as enterprise progresses through the venture life cycle.

There are several definitions of teams available. I use Kozlowski & Ilgen’s 7-element definition but I think these 3 elements are particularly relevant to focus on if you want your team to ‘act like a team’ and not just a rag-tag group: common goals, interdependencies, and social interaction. I contemplate teams achieving high levels of performance like you expect from your favourite elite sports team. As a Nationally-certified coach, I have also coached ‘rep’ sports teams and have learned that to achieve high levels of performance, the following conditions must be achieved:
- each member must be highly competent in their own task function;
- teams should have a complementary set of functional task capabilities among the members;
- all members must get to know each other really well; as a minimum, these means understanding one another’s task competence in terms of potential contributions to the team’s common goals so the team knows what capabilities it has that it can draw upon; but, I also mean knowing one another as a person because that is relevant to the next point because contrary to the expression “There is no ‘I’ in team” … the team is completely comprised of “I”s;
- members must develop the ability to socially interact/communicate with one another effectively to discern their common goals, how individual members can contribute, to identify how they depend on one another or how they might help one another, to identify & constructively resolve conflicts (which are prevalent in the pressure-cooker of GOEV development), and to develop cohesion and understanding how to have each others’ backs.
And we also know that for teams to learn to ‘work well together’ at a high level, they must practise together – including the conscious management of their social interactions (think about pre-game strategy discussion and on-ice/on-field active communication).

The article discusses ‘team effectiveness’. Most people think of this in its simplest form: achieving the goal or objective (e.g. win the game/match). But, for enduring teams or teams with enduring goals such as an eMT, team effectiveness is more than accomplishing the current task because there will be many more goals/tasks/activities that will require collaboration in the future. For this reason, team effectiveness also includes organizational learning (that can be leveraged in future activities), member satisfaction, and member commitment to the team. The last two are essential for team viability or continuity. A member who is not personally satisfied or not committed to the team can disrupt activities and frustrate achieving high-level performance. This is a key reason why ‘getting to know each other really well’ is important. Team members should understand what makes other tick and how being part of an effective team will contribute to others satisfaction. In other words, there is a social dynamic to team effectiveness and performance: it is not just about the task. While task may be the ultimate barometer for external parties, persisting high task performance is conditional on the conscious management of social interaction/integration.

A reason why management of the social component is a critical factor in eMTs is because ultimate goals (e.g. a VCs’ desired 10-fold increase in enterprise valuation) is only achieve through a series of high-level achievements. This requires sustained high-performance by the team and minimizing disruptions that can weaken task performance or slow down development due to team member turnover. Using the VC example is one reason why I recommend VC-investors should be sponsors of developing team effectiveness – concentrating on the social development of the team and not just performance of the current milestone step.

Therefore, it is essential that entrepreneurial management teams within GOEVs aim to develop what I call ‘teamliness’. This is more than cohesion (affinity + commitment). Teamliness applies to enduring teams and incorporates many of the concepts previously described: collective feelings of belonging & bonding, mutual respect & trust, mutual understanding & appreciation of what each members brings to the team, ‘having each other’s back’, possibly friendship (that may transcend work), and at least a modicum of satisfaction/ happiness/joy/spirit/pleasure from the combination of the foregoing. The combination of cohesion & teamliness is important to eMTs: research indicates that venture teams that ‘have it’ tend to have interactive advantages in that they experience less destructive affective conflict and greater constructive cognitive conflict, leading to higher levels of satisfaction and better growth.