Fwd: google’s tips for effective teams

[Jack Ring]

Peter Diamandis shared this. Does it apply to our WG?

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.

Then he shares what is emphasized in his enterprise:

We take our culture extremely seriously and have built out a set of core values that guide the way we work and communicate.

I believe it is fundamentally important to build core values for your own teams as they act as the glue that binds everyone together.

Here are our nine core values:

1. “Yes and” Mindset for Team, Clients and Community:Innovative teams all know how to collaborate and maximize the present moment. “Yes” means accepting whatever information is given to you. “And” is how you respond to the idea and build onto it.

2. Moonshot Thinking - No Quick Hits: Instead of a mere 10% gain, moonshot thinking aims for a 10x improvement over what currently exists. Challenge your team to take exponential leaps, not incremental improvements.

3. Courageous Persistence: The world’s most precious resource is the passionate and persistent human mind. Get your team to embrace long-term thinking.

4. Relentlessly Proactive & Resourceful: The self-directed employee takes responsibility for her own decisions and actions. Having a team that can constantly say “We can figure it out” creates a competitive edge.

5. Encourage, Inspire and Support Ambition and Big Thinking: Individuals on the team must be motivated by the collective team's success as well as their own. Build an incentive structure that allows for that.

6. Dedication to Excellence: Perfection is not optional. The enemy of great is good. Always strive for the best possible product, service or experience.

7. Trust Each Other to Execute: In a decentralized team working remotely, this core value is extremely important. Always trust your teammates are doing their best work with good intentions. Don’t jump to conclusions or judgements.

8. Total Ownership & Dedication to Continuous Improvement: Every member of the team needs to embody a growth mindset: the belief that they can learn more or become smarter if they work hard and persevere.

9. Experiment, Listen to the Data, and Focus on the Customer: Experimentation is a crucial mechanism for driving breakthroughs in any organization. If you want to create a successful, hyper-growth company, you've got to focus on empowering your teams to rapidly experiment.

Shall we poll ourselves quarterly on how well we are co-evolving?