The Importance of Team Development Techniques in Agile, Small-team Structures

As we move towards more small-group structures, monitoring and continuously improving team performance and health should be a management priority

One of the most important trends in management and organisational design is the shift away from large, amorphous department and functional structures in favour of a focus on small, multi-disciplinary teams as the centre of value creation.

In so many areas, from technology to customer service, we are learning that a small, agile team that owns an outcome or a service will tend to produce greater value at lower cost than bureaucratic project team or matrix structures, whilst innovating and improving much faster. The rise of AI helpers and automations will accelerate this trend, enabling small teams to do more than ever with greater speed of manoeuvre and more autonomy and accountability.

The future of work will look less and less like the vertical org charts of the Twentieth Century corporation, and more like the networks and clusters of cellular or amoeba management structures we wrote about in relation to Kyocera and leading ecosystem-based firms like Haier. Groups of small, focused teams using technology and AI to leverage outcomes, can outperform departments ten times their size.

But as with high performance sports teams, we need managers and team members to work ‘on the team’ and not just ‘in the team’ if they are to continue delivering performance improvements. Maintenance matters.

As organisations embark on this team transformation journey, it is important to focus both on the team — restructuring processes, cultures, and frameworks to support this new era — and in the team — applying these innovations to solve problems, enhance agility, and drive continuous improvement.

By embracing new approaches, such as the shift from symbolic to connectionist methodologies, teams can unlock unprecedented levels of flexibility, responsiveness, and innovation.

This week’s newsletter will explore how adopting such approaches can fundamentally change the way we think about governance, management, and organisational change, paving the way for a future where AI and smart technology is not just a tool, but a potentially transformative force in how we work and live.

Photo by Bhautik Patel on Unsplash

Key Principles of Working 'On the Team'

Working ‘on the team’ involves shaping the structures, cultures, and processes that enable a team to adapt, innovate, and thrive. Here are some guiding principles to help teams build a robust framework for digital transformation:

• Adaptability and Flexibility of the team’s structures and processes.

• Decentralised Decision-Making to empower teams with the autonomy needed close to the centre of the action.

• Continuous Learning and Development to keep pace with change.

• Data-Driven Decision-Making to ensure that actions are grounded in accurate, relevant, and timely information, which requires access to high-quality data and analytics tools.

• Increased Emotional Intelligence (EQ) can help teams navigate the complexities of digital transformation, boosting skills such as empathy, self-awareness, and emotional regulation.

• Psychological Safety is also important for ensuring open, honest communication and root cause analysis of problems, as well as improving creativity and innovation.

• Cultural Transformation is needed to unlearn the behaviours of rigid, hierarchical management and cultivate agility, inclusivity, and innovation.

• Integration with Organisational Strategy is also a key guideline to ensure the work we do ‘on the team’ is closely aligned with broader organisational goals.

These principles can create a solid foundation that supports the development of high-performance teams, but we also need some structured techniques can help guide the process of team transformation.