Essay: The Life Cycles of Executive Teams


	Life Cycles of Executive Teams Work with nature, don't put senile teams on life support by Edwin Lee Do you really want a highly cohesive and highly effective management team? Sounds logical, is taught in MBA programs, and is sought by OD specialists. However, it isn't strategically viable or productive! Read on to find out why. The P4 Group In 1984 I was invited to speak at a management workshop conducted by the business school of Santa Clara University. During my talk the subject of "P Groups" came up- because I had unknowingly contradicted what had been taught about them earlier in the day. P Groups were someone's way of describing the characteristics of a management team in terms of the team's effectiveness and cohesiveness. (See Fig. 1) That is, one team might be low in effectiveness and low in cohesiveness at one extreme, and another team high in both characteristics at the other extreme. Fig. 1:The P4 group, highly effective and highly cohesive. I was informed that the ideal team is one which is both highly effective and highly cohesive, a P4 group. After some three microseconds consideration, during which I compared this hypothesis to my own intuition, I delivered my usual, highly rational response: "bullshit." A heated discussion ensued for the next two hours, during which I developed the concept of the Life Cycles of Teams to explain what experience told me was more accurate. A Team is a living organism I've heard it said that one of the great breakthroughs of the 1950's was that management consultants became aware of management teams as entities. Since then, managers and Organizational Development professionals have devoted enormous efforts to develop healthy, effective teams and to help team members work smoothly together. My own association with team dynamics has been intensely practical. I've been involved with several social movements, several project teams, and many business organizations. In the process I have participated in the birth, growth, maturity, decay, and death of many teams. Birth, growth, maturity, decay, and death serve vital purposes in our individual lives and for the entire human species. No condition is superior to the others, and only death is permanent. Without decay and death, our world would overcrowd yet more quickly and our social systems would ossify. Those in power would remain in power decade after decade while the rest of us followed orders. Everyone would eventually be bored to death with life. Just look at China's government where the people who governed it in the 1940's are still in control fifty years later. China waits for Deng to die so that it can begin to renew its stagnant political life. Death is nature's way of making room for the new and innovative and for keeping life interesting! The prospect of Death instills in each of us an entrepreneurial sense of urgency about life. Likewise, the birth, growth, decay, and death of an executive team serve critically important functions for the business as a whole and for team members. I will describe the values and drawbacks of each phase of the life cycle both to corporate vigor and to individual growth. I will show how attempts to maintain a highly effective, highly cohesive management team undermines both the health of the company in which it operates and the personal growth of the individuals who are part of that team! It would be better for all concerned to hasten the death process rather than fight it! An overview of a Team's Life and Death With the help of Figures 2 and 3, I'll briefly describe an overview of the Life and Death of a typical management team. Fig. 2:The life cycle of executive teams. The period from Birth to Maturity is typically two to three years. Maturity to Decay may take two to five years. Decay to Death takes less than a year and is triggered (usually) by a catastrophe the team produces. An executive team is formed to achieve specific strategic business objectives within a few years. When the selection process is done correctly, team members are chosen based on their individual abilities to contribute to achieving those objectives. In the first few months of the team's life, its cohesiveness is low and its effectiveness is low (Fig. 3A). There is much uncertainty about how the team will work together, what each member will contribute, and how the team will fare as it interacts with the outside world. Team members are barely committed to the team, and are still strongly immersed in their external environments. There are abundant challenges and healthy doses of the unexpected and fun. There is uncertainty and anxiety about whether or not the team will succeed. The team's energies are concentrated on future successes. Each team member contributes the stimuli of his person and the information from his reality outside the team. This is the team's childhood, a time of maximum learning by team members, and maximum sensitivity to the world outside the team. Fig. 3:Relationships among team members and between team members and the world outside the team. Shown for different times in the life cycle. As team members learn from one another and take successful actions together, the team's effectiveness and cohesiveness increase. This increases the members' enthusiasm and commitment to the team. For a while there is a positive feedback loop in which success increases cohesiveness, which increases effectiveness, which generates more success. This is the team's adolescence (Fig. 3B). Eventually the team accomplishes its first major success, the strategic objective for which it was formed. That strategic success marks the point at which the team is considered to be highly cohesive and highly effective. But cohesiveness has a dark side: lack of openness to the world outside the team or to new team members (Fig. 3C). Success also has its dark side. The team changes its attitude about its relationship to the outside world. It succeeded, therefore it has the formula! It loses the very anxiety and sensitivity to the external environment which contributed to its success. The team also develops a team memory based on past successes and previous communications. The team memory now defines each member's role, the team's knowledge of the outside world, and how the team operates in that world. The team memory enables the team to perform like an experienced adult, able to quickly handle challenges in previously learned ways. But the team succeeds only as long as the team memory of how things *were* accurately reflects how things *are. When the outside world changes, for example in customer requirements, competitors' innovations, or new technologies, the members of a highly cohesive and highly effective team usually don't respond. They continue to see the world through the team memory and act accordingly. After all, that behavior was successful! Once the team becomes highly effective and highly cohesive, the communication of new information between the outside world and the team and among team members deteriorates (Fig. 3D). The team memory freezes and becomes increasingly detached from the present reality. Team members no longer listen to one another because they already know what to expect. They become bored with their predictable roles. Sooner or later, the team makes decisions that fail to meet members needs or fail in a changed external environment. The decay process is underway. After decay becomes well established, some CEOs seek outside help to restore their teams' to peak performance. The team members are highly sensitive to their own isolation within the team, and remember a team past in which things were much better. Consequently, the restoration efforts tend to focus on communication* and cohesiveness. Sometimes these efforts temporarily slow the decay process. Usually they have little impact, especially when the CEO exempts himself from them. Loss of effectiveness (typified by one or more failed decisions or projects) eventually overcomes the exaggerated management energy committed to cohesiveness, and the team disintegrates (Fig. 3E). Disintegration (death), frees team members to participate in new teams where they can renew their enthusiasms, develop new personal relationships, and revitalize their atrophied learning processes. Disintegration of the old team also makes room for a new leadership team; one that is able to start out anchored in the "real world," ready to deal with things as they are, not as they used to be. Project Teams and Executive Teams A project team and an executive team start life in much the same way. The significant difference is that a Project Team is disbanded when it achieves its initial strategic success. Project team members are rewarded, but one of the rewards is not continued employment. Executive Team members expect continued employment in return for past success. Comments I could write a book on the life cycles of management teams. However, in this essay I'll just make a few, thought provoking observations. 1. When a team is formed it focuses on the future. Once it succeeds it focuses on the past. Team members are usually selected based on how they will contribute to the teams strategic objectives. Once the team attains its first strategic success, however, a member of an executive team gets to stay on the team as a reward for the team's success. That member may not be appropriate for the future challenge. (An executive team has to fail repeatedly and miserably before team members are disenfranchised.) IBM lost most of the PC market (new challenge) because its key business decisions were made by people who succeeded with mainframes (past successes). 2. Success breeds failure. In business and in sports it is difficult for a team to repeat its success. A study of management teams found that most successes are followed by major failures. For example, the IBM PC (success) was followed by PC Jr. (abject failure). Apple II (success) was followed by Lisa (failure)! Apple MacIntosh begat Newton! There are almost no "three-peats" in sports or business. 3. Failure can breed success. Norman Schwartzkopf and Colin Powell endured the failure of Vietnam. They learned from that, and fought Desert Storm with the wisdom and anxiety that Vietnam fostered. I wouldn't select Norman Schwartzkopf to lead another battle because he succeeded in the last one. He would tend to repeat his past actions with too little sensitivity to changed circumstances. 4. Term limits of no more than 8 years for executives and executive teams would improve business effectiveness more than any other management change. In another essay I'll show why a leader can only lead change in the first two years of his tenure. After that he can only maintain a past direction, regardless of any change in his personal vision! If the management goal is predictable, consistent responses to a changing world, then leave a team in place indefinitely (The Pope and his Cardinals, China's leadership, Judges). If the goal is innovative change and consistent successes in a dynamic environment, then CEOs and their executive teams should serve no longer than 8 years! We have been wise enough to put an 8 year term limit on the President of the United States (and his cabinet). We haven't done so for Congress or business executives yet. An opportunity awaits management gurus and boards of directors. Of course, I'm not holding my breath. Conclusion A highly effective, highly cohesive team is a transitory state in a dynamic process. Business management will improve significantly when executives respect the values of that process and work with its dynamics. ____ Copyright © 1986, 1996 Edwin Lee All rights reserved. You may download and freely reprint this essay provided you include this copyright notice. 9351 Holt Road, Carmel, CA 93923 Tel: (831) 626-8719 Email: edwinlee@alum.mit.edu Homepage: www.elew.com

Life Cycles of Executive Teams
Work with nature, don't put senile teams on life support

by Edwin Lee

Do you really want a highly cohesive and highly effective management team? Sounds logical, is taught in MBA programs, and is sought by OD specialists. However, it isn't strategically viable or productive! Read on to find out why.

The P4 Group
In 1984 I was invited to speak at a management workshop conducted by the business school of Santa Clara University. During my talk the subject of "P Groups" came up- because I had unknowingly contradicted what had been taught about them earlier in the day.

P Groups were someone's way of describing the characteristics of a management team in terms of the team's effectiveness and cohesiveness. (See Fig. 1) That is, one team might be low in effectiveness and low in cohesiveness at one extreme, and another team high in both characteristics at the other extreme.

Fig. 1:The P4 group, highly effective and highly cohesive.

I was informed that the ideal team is one which is both highly effective and highly cohesive, a P4 group. After some three microseconds consideration, during which I compared this hypothesis to my own intuition, I delivered my usual, highly rational response: "bullshit." A heated discussion ensued for the next two hours, during which I developed the concept of the Life Cycles of Teams to explain what experience told me was more accurate.

A Team is a living organism
I've heard it said that one of the great breakthroughs of the 1950's was that management consultants became aware of management teams as entities. Since then, managers and Organizational Development professionals have devoted enormous efforts to develop healthy, effective teams and to help team members work smoothly together.

My own association with team dynamics has been intensely practical. I've been involved with several social movements, several project teams, and many business organizations. In the process I have participated in the birth, growth, maturity, decay, and death of many teams. Birth, growth, maturity, decay, and death serve vital purposes in our individual lives and for the entire human species. No condition is superior to the others, and only death is permanent.

Without decay and death, our world would overcrowd yet more quickly and our social systems would ossify. Those in power would remain in power decade after decade while the rest of us followed orders. Everyone would eventually be bored to death with life. Just look at China's government where the people who governed it in the 1940's are still in control fifty years later. China waits for Deng to die so that it can begin to renew its stagnant political life.

Death is nature's way of making room for the new and innovative and for keeping life interesting! The prospect of Death instills in each of us an entrepreneurial sense of urgency about life.

Likewise, the birth, growth, decay, and death of an executive team serve critically important functions for the business as a whole and for team members. I will describe the values and drawbacks of each phase of the life cycle both to corporate vigor and to individual growth. I will show how attempts to maintain a highly effective, highly cohesive management team undermines both the health of the company in which it operates and the personal growth of the individuals who are part of that team! It would be better for all concerned to hasten the death process rather than fight it!

An overview of a Team's Life and Death
With the help of Figures 2 and 3, I'll briefly describe an overview of the Life and Death of a typical management team.

Fig. 2:The life cycle of executive teams. The period from Birth to Maturity is typically two to three years. Maturity to Decay may take two to five years. Decay to Death takes less than a year and is triggered (usually) by a catastrophe the team produces.

An executive team is formed to achieve specific strategic business objectives within a few years. When the selection process is done correctly, team members are chosen based on their individual abilities to contribute to achieving those objectives. In the first few months of the team's life, its cohesiveness is low and its effectiveness is low (Fig. 3A). There is much uncertainty about how the team will work together, what each member will contribute, and how the team will fare as it interacts with the outside world. Team members are barely committed to the team, and are still strongly immersed in their external environments. There are abundant challenges and healthy doses of the unexpected and fun. There is uncertainty and anxiety about whether or not the team will succeed. The team's energies are concentrated on future successes. Each team member contributes the stimuli of his person and the information from his reality outside the team. This is the team's childhood, a time of maximum learning by team members, and maximum sensitivity to the world outside the team.

Fig. 3:Relationships among team members and between team members and the world outside the team. Shown for different times in the life cycle.

As team members learn from one another and take successful actions together, the team's effectiveness and cohesiveness increase. This increases the members' enthusiasm and commitment to the team. For a while there is a positive feedback loop in which success increases cohesiveness, which increases effectiveness, which generates more success. This is the team's adolescence (Fig. 3B).

Eventually the team accomplishes its first major success, the strategic objective for which it was formed. That strategic success marks the point at which the team is considered to be highly cohesive and highly effective. But cohesiveness has a dark side: lack of openness to the world outside the team or to new team members (Fig. 3C). Success also has its dark side. The team changes its attitude about its relationship to the outside world. It succeeded, therefore it has the formula! It loses the very anxiety and sensitivity to the external environment which contributed to its success.

The team also develops a team memory based on past successes and previous communications. The team memory now defines each member's role, the team's knowledge of the outside world, and how the team operates in that world. The team memory enables the team to perform like an experienced adult, able to quickly handle challenges in previously learned ways. But the team succeeds only as long as the team memory of how things were accurately reflects how things are. When the outside world changes, for example in customer requirements, competitors' innovations, or new technologies, the members of a highly cohesive and highly effective team usually don't respond. They continue to see the world through the team memory and act accordingly. After all, that behavior was successful!

Once the team becomes highly effective and highly cohesive, the communication of new information between the outside world and the team and among team members deteriorates (Fig. 3D). The team memory freezes and becomes increasingly detached from the present reality. Team members no longer listen to one another because they already know what to expect. They become bored with their predictable roles. Sooner or later, the team makes decisions that fail to meet members needs or fail in a changed external environment. The decay process is underway.

After decay becomes well established, some CEOs seek outside help to restore their teams' to peak performance. The team members are highly sensitive to their own isolation within the team, and remember a team past in which things were much better. Consequently, the restoration efforts tend to focus on communication and cohesiveness. Sometimes these efforts temporarily slow the decay process. Usually they have little impact, especially when the CEO exempts himself from them.

Loss of effectiveness (typified by one or more failed decisions or projects) eventually overcomes the exaggerated management energy committed to cohesiveness, and the team disintegrates (Fig. 3E). Disintegration (death), frees team members to participate in new teams where they can renew their enthusiasms, develop new personal relationships, and revitalize their atrophied learning processes. Disintegration of the old team also makes room for a new leadership team; one that is able to start out anchored in the "real world," ready to deal with things as they are, not as they used to be.

Project Teams and Executive Teams
A project team and an executive team start life in much the same way. The significant difference is that a Project Team is disbanded when it achieves its initial strategic success. Project team members are rewarded, but one of the rewards is not continued employment. Executive Team members expect continued employment in return for past success.

Comments
I could write a book on the life cycles of management teams. However, in this essay I'll just make a few, thought provoking observations.

1. When a team is formed it focuses on the future. Once it succeeds it focuses on the past. Team members are usually selected based on how they will contribute to the teams strategic objectives. Once the team attains its first strategic success, however, a member of an executive team gets to stay on the team as a reward for the team's success. That member may not be appropriate for the future challenge. (An executive team has to fail repeatedly and miserably before team members are disenfranchised.) IBM lost most of the PC market (new challenge) because its key business decisions were made by people who succeeded with mainframes (past successes).

2. Success breeds failure. In business and in sports it is difficult for a team to repeat its success. A study of management teams found that most successes are followed by major failures. For example, the IBM PC (success) was followed by PC Jr. (abject failure). Apple II (success) was followed by Lisa (failure)! Apple MacIntosh begat Newton! There are almost no "three-peats" in sports or business.

3. Failure can breed success. Norman Schwartzkopf and Colin Powell endured the failure of Vietnam. They learned from that, and fought Desert Storm with the wisdom and anxiety that Vietnam fostered. I wouldn't select Norman Schwartzkopf to lead another battle because he succeeded in the last one. He would tend to repeat his past actions with too little sensitivity to changed circumstances.

4. Term limits of no more than 8 years for executives and executive teams would improve business effectiveness more than any other management change. In another essay I'll show why a leader can only lead change in the first two years of his tenure. After that he can only maintain a past direction, regardless of any change in his personal vision!

If the management goal is predictable, consistent responses to a changing world, then leave a team in place indefinitely (The Pope and his Cardinals, China's leadership, Judges). If the goal is innovative change and consistent successes in a dynamic environment, then CEOs and their executive teams should serve no longer than 8 years! We have been wise enough to put an 8 year term limit on the President of the United States (and his cabinet). We haven't done so for Congress or business executives yet. An opportunity awaits management gurus and boards of directors. Of course, I'm not holding my breath.

Conclusion
A highly effective, highly cohesive team is a transitory state in a dynamic process. Business management will improve significantly when executives respect the values of that process and work with its dynamics.

____

Copyright © 1986, 1996 Edwin Lee All rights reserved. You may download and freely reprint this essay provided you include this copyright notice. 9351 Holt Road, Carmel, CA 93923
Tel: (831) 626-8719
Email: edwinlee@alum.mit.edu

Homepage: www.elew.com