Form Systems Thinking Action Learning Team

The Big Picture

Forming Systems Thinking Action Learning Teams is a matter of developing people over the long-term. It is itself an investment. The people selected to a team as much determine the success of the venture as they do the breadth and depth of the learning they will glean from it.

Form the Systems Thinking Action Learning Team

There are four elements in forming Systems Thinking Action Learning Teams.

1. Select Team Members

There are two essential types of people on Systems Thinking Action Learning Teams:

• People who have established and proven knowledge and skill to contribute to the team.
• People who will acquire knowledge and skill as a function of being a member of the team.

Unpacking these reveals several other attributes of successful members of Systems Thinking Action Learning Teams.

• Commitment.
• Power to take action.
• History and familiarity with the problem, project, or challenge.
• Diverse points of view and experience.
• Disposition to collaborate.
• Consistency and reliability.

Finally, these criteria are helpful in selecting members for the team (credit to Bob Eichenger and Mike Lombardo).

• Success and failure are both possible and will be obvious to others.
• Requires take-charge leadership.
• Involves working with new people, a lot of people, or both.

• Creates additional personal pressure.
• Requires influencing people over whom there is no direct control or authority.
• Involves a lot of variety.

• Will be closely watched by people whose opinions count.
• Requires building a team, starting something from scratch.
• Involves fixing or turning around a team, and operation, or a project in trouble.

• Involves interacting with an especially good or bad boss/person of higher rank.
• Involves a major strategic component and is intellectually challenging.
• Something important to mission.

2. Select a Team Coach

The team coach plays a high leverage role in the life of Systems Thinking Action Learning Teams. The coach is responsible for:

• Creating a climate of learning in the team.
• Balancing the urgency for problem solving with an urgency for learning.
• Generating questions that lead to insight.

It is unreasonable for a group of people tasked with solving a problem to maintain their focus on learning without someone to serve as an ally and guide. Problem solving has a natural, intrinsic sense of urgency. The coach ensures that the long-term interests of learning are not lost in the current press of problem solving.

3. Adopt a Team Charter

Two of the most common causes that Action Learning Teams fail are eroding goals and eroding metrics. The team charter is as much a reminder to the members of the team as it is a commitment to the organization. Charters address issues such as:

• The purpose of the team.
• Team policies, norms, and practices.
• Roles and responsibilities of the members.
• The team's learning goals.
• The team's output goals, metrics, and measures of forward progress.
• Milestones and deadlines.