Can you spot the team leader ?

Open up your Google browser. Type in "high performance team" and look for the images that turn up.  You will find stock photos of "sample teams" but these are not real teams. They are people posing for a picture that is supposed to represent a team. The pictures you will see of "real teams" are all sports teams. Bike riders, skydivers, rowing teams, or the Formula 1 team at a pitstop. And in all of these pictures, the members of the team are in full action. Where is the leader of each team ? Are they somewhere behind the scenes ? Or is one of the folks in the picture the leader ? Or are there many leaders ? I believe it is the latter. Sports teams work based upon leadership. not on the premise of a leader. Some lead the team in individual development, others in medical support, others still in communication, financing, equipment or recuperation.

Now turn to Amazon and look for books on high performance teams. All these books (and there are plenty) are focusing on who ? Not on the team, but on the team leader. There are plenty of models of what the team leaders should do. The 5 steps. The 3 dimensions. The 7 D's (I made these up ... don't look for them !). Because for some reason we are made to believe that it is the team leader who brings about the team performance. The team leader "does upon the team" certain things and then, voilà, the team propels itself to high performance. Or does it ... ?

And so here is a conundrum. Sports teams manage to deliver performance week after week. There is no apparent single leader or 'boss'. Yet at work, all the focus is on the leader and on what he or she does (or not) with or says (or not) to the team. Ever wondered why getting a team to work optimally at work is such a challenge ? Maybe we should be looking at teams again ...