Accountable on Desired Outcomes

Four Dynamics of Highly Effective Teams

Dynamic #3: Accountable on Desired Outcomes

During the past nineteen months and in large part because of the challenges that COVID-19 has brought to the workplace, teams have become more important than ever in determining the success of organizations. 

Every team, just like every individual, is different. No two teams are exactly alike, including yours. In coaching and working with teams, I’ve noticed four dynamics that are evident in every thriving team. In this series of blogs, we are unpacking these four dynamics – today it’s Dynamic #3: Accountable on desired outcomes.

The above chart also represents how the process approach can impact the work of your team!

Dynamic #3: Agreed and accountable on desired outcomes

This team dynamic is two for the price of one. Notice the two verbs being used, agreed and accountable. It is one thing to be accountable on a desired outcome, it is an entirely different thing when a team is agreed and accountable on that same outcome.

Over the past year, I’ve been working with a Founder and his leadership team, supporting them in developing his transition and their succession plan. As we got further into the process of naming the important components of this plan and who will be doing what in order to achieve these desired outcomes, some interesting behavior began to emerge that took the team a little by surprise.

One of the team members, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) began to actively push against the direction the other leaders were wanting to take. This frustrated the Founder, in part because he hired the CFO. So, we decided to hit the pause button on building the plan further until we uncovered what was wrong. 

Over the course of several months, we reviewed the desired outcomes of the Founder’s transition and succession plan. In doing so we stumbled across one particular outcome that the CFO could not fully support in its current form. Investigating it further, the CFO believed that this particular outcome would put undue risk on the cash flow and operational needs of the company. Given that, he couldn’t commit to something he thought would do the company harm.

This left the team with a choice to make and a few questions to answer. Do we listen to what our team member is saying? Do we charge ahead without him and just tell him to fall in line? Or is there something else at work here?

In his book, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Patrick Lencioni describes five relational challenges that teams can find themselves in and that can kill their effectiveness and overall functioning. One of the dysfunctions Lencioni describes is lack of commitment within the team. This concept was helpful in thinking through what might be challenging the CFO and his willingness to grab ahold of the broader plan. 

While the CFO was very committed to the financial well-being of the firm it turned out that the way in which the outcome was stated was unclear and too ambiguous. (It does make sense that a CFO may want a very specific financial and operational outcome.) We opened back up the process and created space for the CFO to provide additional clarity. In doing so, he created several more desired outcomes to help inform his financial services team in their work. A real win-win-win.

It goes to show that when you take a posture of curiosity and pose a question, you never really know what the answer will bring...in this case additional clarity and buy-in!

With the new document in place, the team met and gave their final approval to the founder transition and succession plan in under 30 minutes. I guess the CFO got his ‘giddy up’ back! 

If you would like to talk about how to help your team thrive, please feel free to schedule a high-value 30-minute discovery call with me. I'd be honored to listen.

As always, please feel free to call me at 616.516.9870 or email me at lons@designgroupintl.com.

Walking alongside you,

Lon L. Swartzentruber
CEO, Design Group International
Senior Design Partner