Making teams work at the top

Abstract

Making U Teams Work at the Top B Y J O N R. K A T Z E N B A C Host top executives pay lip service to their "team at the top" but achieve only a small portion of the actual team performance potential of the se-M nior leadership group. Others, who champion a team approach at all levels, become frustrated that they cannot run the company more as a team. Both extremes are missing the point: real team efforts at the top of large organizations have performance value o d y when applied to legitimate team opportunities.In other words, the senior leadership group (that is, all the CEO's lrect reports) need not try to become a real team. As obvious as this may seem, few senior leadership groups are disciplined about when and how they pursue team opportunities. As a result, they struggle for team performance when it makes no sense, and m i s s opportunities for team performance when it offers high potential. This happens even in companies that have mastered the use of teams in other parts of the organization.The reasons are simple to describe but &fficult to overcome. Shortfalls in team potential occur when leadership groups Do not appreciate the discipline of teams and the performance potential teams can offer-even at the top Do not differentiate between-nor make an explicit distinction in how they pursue-team and nonteam opportunities Depend upon crisis-type events to trigger team behavior Rely exclusively on the familiar discipline of executive leadership, whch conflicts with-and typically overpowers-the discipline required for team performance Regularly overlook new options for team composition, modes of behavior, and leadership roles they can play to build real teams in the right places 32 1,eader to Leader

The stable core and dynamic periphery in top management teams

“…(Pettigrew, 1992: 176). Recently, several scholars have argued that executives often may refer to a TMT, but these individuals do not necessarily function as a team (Hambrick, 1998;Katzenbach, 1998). My findings suggest that the TMT may work closely together on certain activities, including monitoring and controlling performance.…”

“…Beyond disagreements over how to define the TMT, some scholars have questioned whether CEOs actually employ teams at the top at all (Pettigrew, 1992;Hambrick, 1994;Katzenbach, 1998). Hambrick acknowledged that reality does not fit the conceptualization of TMTs prevalent in the "upper echelons" literature:…”

“…Similarly, Katzenbach (1998) argued that the CEO and his/her direct reports often refer to themselves as a team, but typically, they do not behave as such. He asserted that the CEO and other senior executives perform very little work collectively.…”

CEO relational leadership and strategic decision quality in top management teams: The role of team trust and learning from failure

“…When members of TMTs work together, they bring diverse experience to solve such difficult and unstructured problems as strategy making, while building involvement and commitment of key senior executives (Ancona and Nadler, 1989; Bauman et al, 1997). At the same time, research suggests that TMTs often fail to achieve synergy (Hackman, 1990; Hambrick, 1994; Katzenbach, 1998), find it difficult to resolve conflicts (Amason, 1996; Edmondson and Smith, 2006), build commitment (Wooldridge and Floyd, 1990), or reach closure in a timely fashion (Eisenhardt, 1989; Hickson et al, 1986).…”

Well-structured teams and the buffering of hospital employees from stress

“…Scholars in the field not only distinguished teams from groups, but went further to distinguish different types of teams. 16,17 A group is a loose group of individuals, with low business impact and low team effectiveness. Individuals' skills and strengths do not combine with those of other group members, who are often effectively working alone.…”