By Kelley Reynolds

Patrick Lencioni has written a leadership fable about fictional Kathryn Petersen, the new CEO of DecisionTech. He has identified five dysfunctions that cause problems within organizations. Within each section, Petersen instructs her team through a series of exercise. The appendix offers additional specific exercises to overcome each of the dysfunctions.

Reading about the dysfunctions of team and thinking of the converse, high performing teams, one thought jumps into my brain: SWAT teams. These are the law enforcement special weapons and tactic teams. There are probably military teams who operate under the same philosophies, but my familiarity is limited to law enforcement. SWAT teams are highly specialized, highly trained cohesive teams. They HAVE to function. The consequences of dysfunction within one of their teams is not merely a slow quarter nor is not a lost sale. Dysfunction within a SWAT team could result in lost lives, civilian and law enforcement.

1. Absence of trust
Lack or loss of trust is at the core of any type of broken relationship; whether we call the relationship marriage, friendship or colleague. Without trust in place, there is no level of emotional intimacy. At best the interactions are cordial, the other end of the spectrum could include open hostility or worse. To have a cohesive team, you have to be able to be honest with each other. As well, there needs to be trust within the team for one to be honest about oneself while communication with the other team members.

You might be thinking, “Wait a minute. You mentioned a SWAT team. Where do emotions and intimacy come into play?” Oh, tough SWAT officers have emotions. Have you ever seen the tears well up in their eyes when their brand new armored SWAT vehicle is delivered from the showroom?

There are such rigorous standards to qualify for the team, from the beginning, the members know the new member is of high caliber. They train together. Hard, dirty, sweaty training. They build camaraderie through shared experiences.

2. Fear of Conflict
Without trust, team members will not have open discussion of ideas. What options are there for the team, if new ideas aren’t shared? If trust was lost, how can it be rebuilt until the issue is addressed. Addressing the issue is oftentimes going to involve conflict.

Okay, do you think SWAT team members have a fear of conflict? Yeah, me neither. Do they have conflicts on the team? You bet! However, they know what is at stake if they allow the conflict to fester and that is simply not an option. They address issues. Conflicts within the team get resolved.

3. Lack of Commitment
It is much easier to gain buy-in if everyone has an opportunity speak and is willing to share their ideas. Then, the team needs to engage in healthy debate surrounding the ideas. If the members aren’t involved in healthy conflict, it may impact their commitment to the plan.
So, SWAT members engage in discussion about executing search warrants. They weigh the pros and cons of using a flash-bang or other devices. Once the plan is made, all of them understand the plan and are committed to it.

4. Avoidance of Accountability
Without commitment and little to no trust, the fourth dysfunction occurs, and it is two-fold. If someone did not buy into the plan, how much responsibility will they take for their behaviors? “It wasn’t my idea. I knew it wasn’t going to work.” You can hear them say it. If there is little trust among peers, who among the team will hold them accountable?

This is where SWAT teams excel. There is no avoiding accountability. After every event, the SWAT team debriefs. Everyone in the room is given an opportunity to speak, twice. The first time around, the team member is expected to acknowledge any action they took or failed to take. If, during the first time around, someone failed to take responsibility for their own actions, on the second go-round, it is the other team members responsibility to point out the unacknowledged errors.

5. Inattention to Results
When members of the team fail to hold each other accountable, the team loses focus of the big picture. At this point, individual members may put their needs above the team or the team may look no further than itself without consideration to the organization’s needs.
The results of the SWAT team’s work is usually on the nightly news. Criminals may be arrested. There may be law suits filed. It is virtually impossible to ignore the results of a SWAT team’s work. Furthermore, the lessons learned from the debrief are incorporated into their training. They may become policy and best practice.

Learning from their experiences and modifying their tactics to keep citizens and officers safe is the mission of the police department. Teams working toward the mission of the organization is the goal that Lencioni’s book attempts to achieve.

By Kelley Reynolds

The impetus for this article was having recently returned home from an extended family vacation in Europe (yes, extended described both the family and the vacation).

While on the plane home, I reflected on the trip, experiences and adventures. We had some wonderful adventures exploring Spain and France. Tasting tapas; climbing castles; chewing croissants; boarding bullet trains (I couldn’t think of any appropriate ‘w’ verb to describe wine activity, probably just as well).

Looks fantastic, doesn’t it? Lest, you think my family is comprised of the characters from the Stepford Wives, where we all sit under rainbows and hug, we experienced some, um, unpleasant adventures, too.

In an effort to identify opportunities to improve future vacations, I reflected on some of the challenges we faced. After some thought, there was a consistent issue: communication. Sure, there are those communication challenges that will naturally occur with jet lag and a nine-hour time difference; not to mention the two different languages none of us spoke. Language was really an issue when we had to learn how to say: “Endodontist, I need an emergency root canal” in Spanish. However, we also experienced other communication challenges as described in Tim Schneider’s book, Lead Well: The 10 Competencies of Outstanding Leadership.

I can share with you the importance of good communication (or would have been).

Richness of communication can be described degree of emotional connectivity to the message. The greatest richness is achieved by in-person communication, followed by telephone, written and finally text. Oh, Richness, how I missed you. Lobert (the names have been changed to protect the innocent, and mostly because I have to see them during the holidays) did not coordinate when he booked his family’s accommodations. Lobert and his family ended up staying in another village, 30 minutes away from the rest of us! This impacted our ability to communicate face to face.

Prior to leaving the states, Lobert decided he did not want to pay extra to use his cellphone while in Europe. His plan was to communicate with us via the internet utilizing a messaging app. Unfortunately, in order to do this, the app required access to the internet which was not always available to Lobert. His plan was to locate cafes and bistros that offered free WiFi. This may have worked had Lobert remembered to bring his cellphone when he left his hotel. Maybe he was relying on his telepathic abilities? Hopefully, Lobert was not able to read the minds of the rest of the family who waited and searched for him.

To recap, we lost richness without in-person communication. Richness eroded further when we were unable to call each other. Written word was dependent upon the elusive free WiFi.

Clarity of communication is another challenge. ‘Too many words’ creates not enough understanding. Active Listening can go hand in hand with clarity. If someone is using a lot of words, we tend to stop listening and jump to what we think they are saying. So, we finally meet up with Lobert at one of the amazing 14th century castles/obvious landmarks of this particular city. Lobert begins to chat about the castle.

And talks and talks and talks. We nod and say “Uh huh”. Naturally, now the group of 15 of us are in line, with Euros in hand, to purchase the castle tour and audio guides. About 3/4ths the way through this castle, the 7th castle we visited on our extended vacation, a member of the family, who has honed her leadership skills, to quite possibly the Greatest Of All Time, who we will refer to as GOAT for short, finally asked a few of the other family members if they had wanted to tour the castle. None of them had been even the slightest bit interested. Not even Lobert, whom we had assumed wanted to explore the castle, had any interest in touring the castle. Ugh.

If we had clarity, the message might not have gotten lost in the words. Or, if we had practiced active listening skills instead of “Uh huh” we might have gone canoeing instead of wandering around another dank old castle.

After leaving the castle, GOAT noticed everyone was a little cranky and irritable. Well, they were all annoying her, so they must have been cranky. In a master stroke of leadership, she gathered everyone in a circle and made the suggestion to find a place to eat. To gain buy-in, everyone was given an opportunity to say where they wanted to eat. She used her active listening skills, asked appropriate questions and paid attention.

Dinner was a delicious triple scoop cone of pistachio gelato!

Oh, and the emergency root canal. You guessed it. Lobert’s!