A colleague asked my opinion on the various teambuilding activities she was considering for a new-to-agile team, to help them get to know each other and work together.
All the activities she considered were simulations of various kinds. I suggested she reconsider the simulations and focus on the work to help people learn to work together.
I’m not against teambuilding. However, I wonder if we overdo simulations, especially in new-to-agile teams where people don’t have the context.
I recommended she consider pairing, swarming or mobbing as a way to build a team. I recommended she ask the team(s) to consider experiments. They were new to working as an agile team. They’re new to the idea of team-based collaboration. When teams try pairing, swarming or mobbing (especially if the idea is to improve the products), they have many opportunities to work as a team:
- To learn to create hypotheses, with the requisite measurements. In my experience with new-to-agile teams, this is a brand new way of thinking.
- To consider alternatives for their board. I suspect they are new to visualizing their work.
- To see what they can do and what they can’t do as a team. This is also a new way of thinking for new-to-agile teams.
I recommended she ask the team to consider three days of experiments: a pairing day, a swarming day, and a mobbing day. I was thinking of that order, but maybe a different order would work better.
I suggested she facilitate a debrief at the end of each day to help the team see the results of that day’s work. And, a debrief at the end of three days to see if they like any of these ways of working.
Maybe it’s time for an open space to see if they have better ideas. Or, ideas about why these possibilities won’t work here.
My colleague had several assumptions, primarily that the team members wanted to and could work together. In some organizations, people are called teams, but they’re not measured as teams. Best to understand the real issues in the organization when people attempt to work together as an experiment than to have them try a simulation that doesn’t work in their real world.
I don’t find value in teambuilding activities that don’t correlate with the work the team is supposed to deliver. I find learning to work together useful.
| Published on Java Code Geeks with permission by Johanna Rothman , partner at our JCG program. See the original article here: Creating an Environment of Teamwork Opinions expressed by Java Code Geeks contributors are their own. |
