The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick

Lencioni
The five dysfunction of a team by Patrick lencioni is a remarkable
piece of work, the author has used a fictional/story telling method to
deliver what he has learned over the course of his career. The
author’s emphasis on the most occurring problem in every developing
and developed organizations is about making and managing the most
functional and effective team. He has also identified problems such as
not working together in harmony, distrust among peers and workers,
office politics and non-cohesiveness of a group/team. All these
problem are like a plague and can result in overall dysfunction/lesser
productivity and falling behind organizational goals.

My Favorite quote from the author:

“It’s as simple as this. When people don’t unload their opinions

and feel like they have been listened to, they won’t really get on
board”, Patrick Lencioni

From our childhood in our classes or a playground we have long

learned/observed these problems such as a cricket match in which
one player on thinks about getting the highest score for himself, not
giving chance to other team members who can hit and score victory
for the team. These types of problems are commonly experienced by
human being on different stages of life. For example in an office
environment where the peers put forth their ego and politics which
results in mistrust, conservativeness and leads to low organizational
output.

A fully functioning team with good cohesiveness is far more efficient

than combing the efficiency of the same team working individually. A
good teamwork can give a company competitive advantage over their
rivals and competitors.
Patrick Lencioni founder of Table Group, management consultants
which specializes in organizational health. He is also a renowned
author of many business books. In this book he uses a fictional tale
using his experience to bring forth the flaws of a dysfunctional team in
an organization as well as how to identify the problems and correcting
them.

Patrick lencioni explains the struggles of a new startup by the name of

Decision Tech in the Silicon Valley under the leadership of Kathryn
Petersen. At the start the company looked promising as ever, Decision
Tech had all the support of the investors as well as highly qualified
executives and staff for the job. After two years of startup the
company starts crumbling due poor management. The teams are non-
cohesive and are not working together to achieve the ultimate
organizational goal, struggles to take responsibility/commitments lead
to lesser agreements among teams and team members.

Going through the story I have learned the five dysfunctions of a team,
these problems are interconnected and cannot be solved without
looking the big picture. Root cause of the problems is the lack of trust
and the rest follows respectively,

1. Absence of trust
2. Fear of conflict
3. Lack of commitment
4. Avoidance of accountability
5. Inattention to results.

I have learned very helpful thing from these problems, which will
indefinitely help me build a successful, cohesive and thriving team.

As lencioni says “Teamwork is the ultimate competitive advantage”.

I also learned helpful strategies on how to overcome these
Dysfunctions and become a cohesive team. Because, as Lencioni
puts it, teamwork is the “ultimate competitive advantage.”  

The three basic things that I have learned from this book are as
follows.

1. While working in a group we have to share our strengths

weakness, mistakes, blunders and vulnerabilities. It helps build
trust among team members.
2. Commitment to the decisions is necessary not caring what the
consensus is.
3. Rather than looking for individual results, we must strive towards
team goal, because if the team is successful than all the team
members are successful.

Working together improves efficiency as well as quality of work.

Let’s see how?

By being open about mistakes/vulnerabilities a group build’s

trust.
In a good relationship, trust is the most important aspect, same goes
for a team. If the members of the team trust each other they are more
likely to discuss and talk openly with each other, sharing their
problems, finding a collective answer/solution to a problem.
The point where the team members are vulnerable to each other is
where they build trust. When the team members realize that they don’t
have to protect themselves, as human being we all carry some flaws
and lacking due to which we are mostly playing defensively. When
other members realize their peers shortcoming’s, weaknesses and
flaws, they are more likely to open up. The responsibility for opening
all team members lies on the shoulders of the leader. The leader has
to be an example of vulnerability. This can be explained by an
example from an example extracted from the book.

Kathryn CEO at decision tech knew that in order to make the

members share their mistakes with each other she had to make an
exemplary step by explaining to everyone about her past mistakes,
failures, disappointments due to which she was also fired once in her
past. When Kathryn open up to her employees she had earned the
trust which led other team member to open up to their mistakes.

Even if a few people disagree when making decisions,

everyone needs to be committed to the final choice.
The key to becoming a successful team is to make decisions together
and stand by them. Making a decision outweighs the benefits to not
making a decision at all, not making a decision bring about ambiguity
and confusion which effect the efficiency on every level of work. There
are times when a decision cannot be made looking at the consensus
as it is not practical nor easy to please everyone’s opinion. That’s why
everyone in the team need to be focused on making a decision that
serves a collective goal of the team.

However, a consensus may not always be possible. People often

have differing opinions, and it’s not easy or practical to please
everyone. That’s why effective team members agree to commit to a
decision that will help the common goal. A cohesive team will strive
towards that collective goal even if there are some disagreement
towards the final decision. Every member of the team has the right to
put forth his point but has to stand by the final decision made by the
team.

Focus on collective results rather than individual goals.

It is really fundamental for the team member to realize team score is
more important that individual gains. If someone put forth their own
gains in front of the team goals than it will hinder the work and efforts
of other team members. Every time this happen in the corporate world
the team member start losing the sight of the collective goal, this will
result in the lack of interest from the exceptional team players thus
resulting in losses for the company.

An example from the book where Kathryn told a story about her
husband who is a basketball coach. He had to drop one his best
player because he was more concerned about how much he scored in
the game weather the team won or lost the game. This selfish
behavior result in the decreased morale of the rest of the team players
whom felt left over.

An important thing that I need to point out here is that in order to make
a successful team one must make good team goals, the team goals
should be measureable and clear. This will help clear out all
vagueness and ambiguity and help the team focus on achieving the
goals collectively. For example, if team A reaches its sales target by
the end of this week they will get a week 3 days’ vacation and if the
target is not reached than nobody gets nothing.

In the end I will like to say that the five dysfunctions of a team is a very
powerful tools to be used by anyone who want an effective efficient
and cohesive team. The fable written by Patrick lencioni makes the
reader build interest in the content while reading because it is so much
relatable to our professional and daily lives. Anyone who learns how to
avoid these dysfunctions will overcome and build a successful team.