Back in 2013, Google’s People Operations Group conducted a rigorous analysis deemed Project Aristotle to identify what underlying factors led to the most effective Google teams.
Over 200 interviews were conducted across +180 active Google teams over the course of the two-year study.
More than 250 attributes were identified that contributed to both success and failure.
Their hypotheses was that they would find the perfect mix of individual traits and skills necessary for a stellar team -- take one Rhodes Scholar, two extroverts, one engineer who rocks at Python, and a quantum physics Ph.D. Voila. Dream team assembled, right?
Turns out they were dead wrong.
The researchers found that what really mattered was less about who is on the team, and more about how the team worked together.
Here are the top five keys to an effective Google team, in order of importance:
1. Psychological safety: Psychological safety refers to an individual’s perception of the consequences of taking an interpersonal risk or a belief that a team is safe for risk-taking in the face of being seen as ignorant, incompetent, negative or disruptive. In a team with high psychological safety, teammates feel safe to take risks around their team members. They feel confident that no one on the team will embarrass or punish anyone else for admitting a mistake, asking a question or offering a new idea.
2. Dependability: On dependable teams, members reliably complete quality work on time (vs. the opposite -- shirking responsibilities).
3. Structure and clarity: An individual’s understanding of job expectations, the process for fulfilling these expectations, and the consequences of one’s performance are important for team effectiveness. Goals can be set at the individual or group level, and must be specific, challenging and attainable. Google often uses Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) to help set and communicate short- and long-term goals.
4. Meaning: Finding a sense of purpose in either the work itself or the output is important for team effectiveness. The meaning of work is personal and can vary: financial security, supporting family, helping the team succeed, or self-expression for each individual, for example.
5. Impact: The results of one’s work, the subjective judgement that your work is making a difference, is important for teams. Seeing that one’s work is contributing to the organization’s goals can help reveal impact. Think about your Massively Transformative Purpose here as a North Star here, inspiring and uniting your team around a common goal.
(Source: Peter Diamandis)
