General Motors had over 7,000 employees broken up into many teams. Each team tries to optimize themselves and views other teams with hostility/competition because they didn’t understand what anyone else did. Similarly, The European space agency failed because different countries made each part of the rockets.Avoid this by encouraging members to forge relationships with members of other teams. Everyone doesn’t need to know everyone but if everyone knows a couple of people it’s likely there will be at least one connection in your own group to every other team﻿.

Team of teams is a network of networks

A team is different than a group. A team is built on purpose and trust.Reductionist hierarchical management techniques no longer work because organizations are too large for any one person to make all the decisions. The military and Ford motor company use a new management style where your team operates as a network with a shared consciousness and every member is empowered to execute.For McChrystal a team is a dynamic entity, capable of evolving and collaborating effectively within a larger network to achieve shared goals.

What is a team?

Trust is the bedrock upon which effective collaboration, innovation, and adaptability are built. Without trust there nothing else can work.We all come up with our own culturally influenced trust barometer, but trust inside of a team can be improved slightly:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Vulnerability: Being open & honest about strengths and weaknesses.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Reliability: Consistently delivering on commitments.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Respect: Valuing team members' contributions and perspectives.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Empathy: Understanding and sharing the feelings of others strengthens.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Transparency: Don't keep secrets. Share openly.</li></ul>

Trust: the bedrock of effective teams

McChrystal notices a shift in the traditional role of the leader. Rather than being a top-down authority figure, the leader becomes a facilitator:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Visionary: Sets the direction and articulates the team's shared purpose.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Facilitator: Creates an environment that fosters collaboration, innovation, and trust.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Enabler: Provides the necessary resources, support, and guidance for teams to succeed.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Coach: Acts as a coach, mentoring and developing team members.</li></ul>A leader should not be a puppet master but a culture crafter. Gardeners not chess masters. Drive the operating rhythm, transparency & cooperation.

What's the role of a leader?

<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Shared Purpose & Consciousness: Unified goals & a shared understanding of the situation</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Trust: Building trust among team members.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Adaptability: Adjust to changing circumstances. Requires flexibility, resilience, and a willingness to learn and evolve.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Leadership: Strong, visionary leadership is needed to set direction, inspire teams, and foster a culture of collaboration.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Empowerment: Granting teams the authority to make decisions and take action is essential for agility and innovation.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Idea Flow: The seamless and rapid exchange of information, insights</li></ul>

Essential Elements of a Modern Team

Shared consciousness is a fundamental concept in McChrystal's "Team of Teams". It refers to a common understanding and shared perspective among team members. This shared understanding goes beyond mere information sharing. It involves a deep connection and mutual empathy that enables teams to work together effectively and efficiently.This state is achieved in time with:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Open Communication: active listening, seeking feedback, and encouraging diverse perspectives.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Shared Experiences: trainings, deployments, or challenges</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Shared Values</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Regular Interactions: coffee breaks, water-coloer conversations</li></ul>

Shared Purpose & Consciousness

"The enemy is not a nation; it's a network. To defeat it, we need a network of our own."

Gen McChrystal refers to the ability of a team to quickly adjust to changing circumstances. In today's dynamic world, adaptability is essential for survival & success.Adaptability can be fostered through:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Decentralized Decision-Making: Make decisions at the local level. Bottoms up more than top down.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Continuous Learning: through a culture of learning and experimentation</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Psychological Safety: team members feel should safe to take risks and share ideas without judgment</li></ul>

Adaptability for modern teams

Leadership is not about titles or positions; it's about inspiring others to achieve their potential.

Leaders should empower their teams to make decisions and take action without excessive oversight. Too much supervision leads to slow, ineffective bureaucracies. This can lead to death on the battlefield or in the markets.A team should be able to:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Respond quickly to changing circumstances: Don't wait for the boss to redo the plan. Act in the moment.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Take risks & inniative: Don't always follow the beaten path.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Keep itself motivated: Empowered individuals are generally more satisfied and committed to their work.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Take ownership: Don't just follow orders. Own the results.</li></ul>

Leaders empower their team

For a team to function through shared consciousness, ideas need move freely, without being hindered by bureaucracy or hierarchical barriers. This is what McChrystal refers to as "Idea Flow": the lifeblood of a "team of teams," ensuring that the organization remains agile, responsive, and effective.Ways to get the ideas flowing:<ul><li class="ql-align-justify">Open Communication: Regular meetings or chat systems.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Cross-Functional Collaboration: Break the silos and get people with different perspectives working together.</li><li class="ql-align-justify">Learn from Failure: Never waste a failure. Massive chance to learn.</li></ul>

Ideas should flow inside of team

Stanley McChrystal led US troops in Afganistan from 2009 and 2010. The unconventional war against a very agile adversary made him rethink traditional military structures and practices. His insights can be applied more broadly to make better teams.

From the New York Times bestselling author of My Share of the Task and Leaders, a manual for leaders looking to make their teams more adaptable, agile, and unified in the midst of change. When General Stanley McChrystal took command of the Joint Special Operations Task Force in 2004, he quickly realized that conventional military tactics were failing. Al Qaeda in Iraq was a decentralized network that could move quickly, strike ruthlessly, then seemingly vanish into the local population. The allied forces had a huge advantage in numbers, equipment, and training—but none of that seemed to matter. To defeat Al Qaeda, they would have to combine the power of the world’s mightiest military with the agility of the world’s most fearsome terrorist network. They would have to become a "team of teams"—faster, flatter, and more flexible than ever. In Team of Teams, McChrystal and his colleagues show how the challenges they faced in Iraq can be rel­evant to countless businesses, nonprofits, and or­ganizations today. In periods of unprecedented crisis, leaders need practical management practices that can scale to thousands of people—and fast. By giving small groups the freedom to experiment and share what they learn across the entire organiza­tion, teams can respond more quickly, communicate more freely, and make better and faster decisions.  Drawing on compelling examples—from NASA to hospital emergency rooms—Team of Teams makes the case for merging the power of a large corporation with the agility of a small team to transform any organization.

GENERAL STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL

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