Late last year (the end of 2016), Andy Parker and I were talking about a frustrating problem common to many senior people in teams: how to improve or positively affect the people we work with so that we were all happier and more effective? These discussions have lead me through one of the more intensive … Continue reading Culture, Ethnography, Grounded Theory and the Effectiveness of Stand-ups →

Since March 2017, Andy Parker and I have been studying the Culture Driven Team Building specialisation from the University of Pennsylvania (delivered through Coursera). The specialisation is composed of 5 different month-long courses. I have published blogs containing detailed study notes for all these courses. This post collects links to all those blog posts in … Continue reading Culture-Driven Team Building →

I’m studying the course Creating a Team Culture of Continuous Learning on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 4: Fostering Innovation in Groups and Teams. Introduction & Learning in Ambiguous and Uncertain Environments How do we balance what we don't know with what we do know? Organisations need to enable a learning environment: … Continue reading Fostering Innovation in Groups and Teams →

I’m studying the course Creating a Team Culture of Continuous Learning on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 3: Developing Groups and Teams for Positive Organisational Impact. What disables organisational learning? We need productive spaces and accountability, but we need discovery spaces too: Doing space and discovery space Exploit vs explore Operations vs emergence … Continue reading Developing Groups and Teams for Positive Organisational Impact →

I’m studying the course Creating a Team Culture of Continuous Learning on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 2. Diagnosing Problems in Groups and Teams We tend to think we bring together a group of people, and they will be high performing It doesn't always work! How can we identify the problems? Example: … Continue reading Diagnosing Strengths & Barriers to Learning on Teams →

I’m studying the course Creating a Team Culture of Continuous Learning on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 1. Framing, Reframing & Systems Thinking Framing and Reframing Metaphor: different camera lenses If you put on a telephoto lens, you're going to see something quite different to what you would see through a wide-angle … Continue reading Introduction to Framing and Systems Thinking →

I’m studying the Optimizing Diversity on Teams course on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 4. High Performance on Diverse Teams A high performing team (HPT) has High quality output of product Strong working relationships Meaningful takeaways for individual team members A HPT best practice:  willingness to be accountable for results Google example: … Continue reading Diversity Case Study →

I’m studying the Optimizing Diversity on Teams course on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 3. Why Conflicts Occur It is difficult to establish common social norms in a diverse group Conflicts can arise from deep level human needs, such as workers personal beliefs coming into conflict with professional expectations Team culture determines … Continue reading Managing Conflict →

I’m studying the Optimizing Diversity on Teams course on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 2. Diversity Matters and So Do Our Biases Ethnically diverse and gender diverse companies financially outperform their counterparts Diversity on it's own is not enough Baby-faced individuals are thought of more honest, naive and trustworthy than others Study … Continue reading Team Diversity Basics →

I’m studying the Optimizing Diversity on Teams course on Coursera. These are my revision notes for week 1. The Hidden Diversity Problem Research on gender dynamics in the workplace shows that when a woman acts assertively by speaking out in meetings, challenging others ideas, and taking charge, she is a lot more likely to be … Continue reading Promoting Diversity in the Workplace →