TL;DR
The last time we presented project team member roles. Today we share Johanna’s advice on how to make a team member make a bond. The post is based on a remarkable book written by Johanna Rothman, Manage It!
Shared Task
This is first what you could do to make a project team bond. Assign several team members to work together on a common goal. Do not micromanagement them. That task should be problem-solving. Mini Team needs to provide a solution for this problem!
Alert. Be careful not to put in Mini Team a loner, team member with a proven record of producing the best result working on his own.
Tools Are Enablers
Based on Johanna’s practical experience, two tools are essential to make a team bond: version control system and bug tracking system. Today this is Github. Github not only has source code management, but it also provides pull requests, Wiki, Issues, and task tracking features. If you can not use Github, you should always look for products with comparable features. One tool that helped one of my teams make a bond, the Altova XMLSpy. Not that it only helped us in managing complex XML files, that tool required a license. After the trial period expired, the whole team united to get licenses.
Five Team Stages
A team has a life cycle. Here are five team stages:
- Forming
- Storming
- Norming
- Performing
- Adjourning
The Forming Stage is the time at the beginning of the project when team members join. Then we have a Storming Stage, team members start to work and assess each other’s capabilities and power in the group. When group behavior is established, this is Norming Stage. The group starts to accomplish good work and moves to Performing Stage. At the project end, the group adjourns.
Remember
Storming and Norming stages are critical for your project. Be careful that team member role is synched with member capabilities.
