When looking at the teams I’ve been on over the years, whether as part of a functional department, project, or sport, it’s obvious that not all teams are created equal. Building winning teams isn’t about handing out ‘one-size-fits-all’ uniforms to warm bodies. The names on the jerseys matter. This isn’t a shocking revelation by any means, yet all of us can surely think of situations we’ve been a part of when team building was an afterthought and assignments were simply doled out to whomever was available, regardless of fit.
A person in our industry whom I have a tremendous amount of respect for once shared his approach to building project teams with me. He does not start the process by looking for people who fully align with a specific job description. Rather, he is always on the lookout for “all-stars”, first and foremost. He seeks people who “get it” and can apply their skills to a variety of situations to figure out how to best drive the results needed. Bring more people like that on board, and they will figure out what needs to be done and do it. Needless to say, he’s built some pretty great working teams over the years. I have kept this perspective close to my heart and it was a big consideration in my pursuing the opportunity to work at Citisoft.
Specific titles and narrowly defined roles may be useful for low-skilled task work, but they can actually be a barrier to problem-solving. In project-based consulting, we must often address new challenges and find solutions where there is no script to follow. If your team has plenty of warm bodies with XYZ application experience but no “all stars”, the project could be doomed for failure. I can’t help but think of the Brady Bunch episode where Greg Brady got the role of singing sensation “Johnny Bravo” because he fit the suit tailored for the part, even though he was not remotely qualified. Over the course of my career, I’ve come across a few of these “Johnny Bravo’s” and they can be spotted a mile away. Too often, firms build project teams based on the next person in line, instead of considering fit and investing in the effort to find the best people. This approach is shortsighted and the outcome is predictably poor. Investing a little more effort in putting together the right team can save time, money, and frustration down the road.
At Citisoft, our approach is all about finding the best people and building “all star” teams. This approach is a big part of our identity and the result typically speaks for itself. The next time you have an important mission to lead, really think about the people you need to involve to confidently get the work done well. Sometimes it requires a battle to get the right people or to allocate the resources to do so, but if the project is worth doing, it’s all well worth it in the end.
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