How Google Creates High-Performing Teams

14 May 2019 How Google Creates High-Performing Teams

It happened during the most crucial go/no-go meeting of our mission-critical project. “Are we ready to go live”? I asked my project team leads. “Please pull out a piece of paper and write down 3 things: Your Name, Your Answer (Yes or No), and the top three risks or issues you believe may negatively affect a successful Go Live. When you’re done please fold your piece of paper and pass it to me. Then we’ll have a discussion.”

A moment later I looked over the nine pieces of paper I received from my team leads. They all said YES – We are ready to go live. None of them mentioned any Critical issues which may impede our success. They did mention a few Medium issues and a number of Minor ones. We then had our discussion during which I asked them lots of questions to clarify the nature of the risks and issues they mentioned. At the end of the meeting, I asked my team leads again, this time by show of hands: “Who believes that we are not ready to go live now?” No one raised their hand. Then I asked: “Who believes that we are ready to go live?” Nine hands went up. “OK,” I said. “We’re going live next weekend. Get your teams ready. You all know what to do, right?”

Half an hour later I received a phone call. It was the tech lead who mentioned a few issues on his piece of paper. “Uri” he said. “Can I speak to you in private now? I booked Conference Room B. It is really important.”

“Uri” he said when I entered Conference Room B, “I think we’re not ready. We have a major risk with the capacity of one of the servers. I suggested many times to the other leads that we should test it, but it would have taken an extra week and they did not want to spend the time.” He was talking very quickly, and I had to hold myself back from interrupting him. “Why did you not raise your concern in the meeting?” I asked once he finished talking.

“I did not feel safe to speak up.” He said. “I knew that if I mentioned this risk, they will try to shut me down. They have been doing so for the past six months every time I raised a concern. So rather than fighting a group of eight team leaders, I decided to shut up, and just do my job.”

“Why did you not tell me about this until now?” I asked. “It would have resulted in a bigger confrontation,” He said. “I wanted to avoid it. But now that we are facing this major risk, I had to let you know.”

“OK,” I said. “I am calling up a team meeting for four o’clock today. I will ask you to explain this risk to the group and let them know why you think we should not go live until we complete this test. I will then call the Senior VP and let her know that we are not ready to go live this month.” His face turned a little white and his shoulders slumped, but from the tone of my voice, he understood that he had no other option. He had to speak up.

The following week we tested the server’s capacity. Our tech lead was right. The server did not hold up. With the vendor’s help we determined how to boost the server’s capacity, we re-ran the test, and we went live successfully the following month.

Google’s Project Aristotle – Researching High-Performing Teams.

In 2012 Google initiated a project called Project Aristotle to look at 180 teams to determine what made teams successful⁽¹⁾. They looked at thousands of data points but could find no clear correlation between how well the teams performed and the characteristics of the individual members of the team. They looked at IQ, personality types, social backgrounds, education, hobbies, etc. To their frustration, nothing seemed to matter.

Google researchers then went back to review the scientific literature on team performance. In particular, they looked at the work of two researchers, Anita Woolley of Carnegie Mellon University⁽²⁾ and Amy Edmondson of Harvard Business School⁽³⁾.

Both researchers showed that teams who create an environment of trust and respect, which allows their team members to speak freely without fear of suppression, rejection, or retribution, perform better than teams whose members feel that they would be better off not expressing their views, especially if they contradict the view of the dominant members of the team. In fact, Edmondson coined the term “Psychological Safety” and showed it to be the most important contributor to team performance.

Based on the findings of these two researchers and after looking at their own data again, the Project Aristotle team at Google came up with the following approach to creating high-performing teams⁽⁴⁾⁽⁵⁾.

1. Psychological Safety

Psychological Safety was found by Google to be the most impactful prerequisite for creating high-performing teams. It means creating an environment in which all team members implicitly know that they can express their thoughts and ideas and that they will be heard – irrespective of their “standing” in the team’s dynamics. They know that they will not be “shushed down” or belittled for expressing even the most off-the-wall idea. They know that it is safe for any member of the team to talk about the “Elephant In The Room” without fear of retribution.

Team members also know that they will be given a safe space to try and even fail in implementing [prudent] ideas they want to experiment with. In fact, Google engineers are given one day a week to work on their own pet projects⁽⁶⁾.

To engender such a team environment, the team leader should ask her/himself the following questions every single day:

• Did I do everything I could today to maintain my integrity and earn the trust and respect of my team members?
• Did I give all of them an equal safe space to express their opinions and ideas?
• Did I encourage all my team members to respect and trust each other?

Additionally, the team leader should consider holding periodic anonymous surveys and open team discussions to explore the extent to which they feel their team environment is providing them everything they need to function as a high-performing team.

2. Trust and Dependability

Team members in a high-performing team also know that they can trust their leader and their team members to respect them, to be honest with them, to never play political games at their expense, and to never stab them in the back.

High-performing team members know that they can depend on each other to honor their commitments, to do what they say, and to complete their action items and deliverables on time and with the required quality.

The team leader should cultivate the trust and dependability of the team by setting her/his own example, by encouraging the team members to do so as well, and by holding open team discussions on the values that the team wishes to hold dear.

3. Structure and Clarity

Structure, process, and clarity of expectations are a must for every high-performing team. Different individuals and teams require different levels of clarity regarding what is expected of them. Experienced and more confident individuals and teams may need fewer detailed instructions, especially if they have been working together for a long time. Less experienced teams may need to spend more time upfront on clarifying expectations and ensuring alignment.

To ensure that her/his team will perform at the highest level, the team leader should ensure that each member of the team clearly understands his/her role and responsibilities, what is expected of them, how they should report the status of their work, and how they should escalate issues.

4. Meaningful Work

The Google researchers found that the more meaningful the work is to each member of the team, the more high-performing the team will be as a whole.

The team leader should pay attention to the preferences of each team member and, to the extent possible, match their roles and responsibilities to the type of work that will be more meaningful to them.

Directing team members to perform tasks which are not meaningful to them, which they are not competent in, and which they are not comfortable performing, can lead to frustration and under-performance.

Over time, the team leader can help her/his team members become more proficient in and comfortable with performing other types of work, at which time she/he can change the team member’s roles and responsibilities.

5. Impactful Work

The Google researchers also found that the more the team believes that its work is important to the organization, the higher the performance level of the team would be.

To increase the feeling that the team’s work is of value to the organization, the team leader can periodically invite high-ranking stakeholders to talk to the team about the impact of their work. As long as this is done with sincerity, it will go a long way to elevating the motivation of the team to produce high-quality outcomes.

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Although these concepts may sound trivial, they do require conscious awareness and an investment in time and energy on the part of the team leader to create an environment in which her/his team will perform at the highest level possible. Turning these concepts from common sense to common practice will produce handsome dividends.

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If this topic resonates with you, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Please do not hesitate to write to me at Uri@thewilltochange.com. Also, please feel free to forward this post to your colleagues.

References:

1. Charles Duhigg, What Google Learned From Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team, The New York Times, 2/28/2016.
2. Anita Woolley, Collective Intelligence in Human Groups, Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business, October 2013.
3. Amy Admondson, Managing the risk of learning: Psychological safety in work teams, International Handbook of Organizational Teamwork, London: Blackwell.
4. Google, re-Work, Understanding team effectiveness.
5. Charles Duhigg, Smarter, Faster, Better, Ransom House, New York, 2016.
6. Chade-Meng Tan, Search Inside Yourself, Harper Collins, New York, 2012.

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