Critical Knowledge inSight: Successful Team Behavior

January 8, 2019

An example or model of a productive and effective team can help leaders monitor and benchmark their own team’s performance.

A team leader can look for missing key behaviors, which help identify areas where a team is in need of help in order to perform at the highest level.

Jan Chodas, Director of the Office of Safety and Mission Success at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and Jim Erickson, Mars Science Laboratory Manager, sat down for a Masters with Masters discussion. In the video clip at time markers 14:08 – 17:03, Chodas talks about how looking for specific team behaviors can help you identify high performing teams. This early identification of team performance is a diagnostic tool to see if the team needs any changes or help to improve its performance.

Some video key learning points:

1. 1.
  Look for teams that have great camaraderie with each other.
2. 2.
  Come up with a prescription for good teaming behaviors to check against your team’s behaviors.
3. 3.
  Teams that work with little negativity or conflict put more effort toward mission goals.
4. 4.
  Communication is an essential team behavior for success.