Self-motivated team
Motivation is a word that each of us perceives in his own way. Someone immediately begins to think about self-motivation, and someone about the prize due to him for the project. But today I would like to touch on a different kind of motivation. Team motivation and more precisely even the team’s self-motivation.
As is well known, many flexible methodologies strive to ensure that the team is maximally protected from external interference and to give it complete freedom in the implementation of the project. Naturally, by external interference, we mean the company's bureaucratic apparatus, and not effective communication with customers. The same Scrum (by which we tried to work) ideally implies that in mature teams the role of the scrum master should be diminished more and more, the more the team goes into a special state - a state of self-motivation.
In this regard, I would like to describe my little experience of working in a team that in my century is most closely approached to this particular state of team motivation. To my regret, no effectiveness of the interaction of the team implementing the project can smooth out the gross mistakes of the company's management and therefore, after working for a year, I had to leave it. But now the post is not about management mistakes, because as you know, there are no one-sided guilty people, but rather how to achieve this state of unity in the team that we desire so much.
How we did it:
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1) Isolation from the policy in the company.
It is advisable to isolate from all the internecine wars being waged in the upper echelons of power of the company. In our case, we were remotely located from the central office, and our team leader took the main blows from the top management. Is it good or bad, I do not undertake to evaluate, but it rallied the team strongly.
2) Freedom to change roles in the team.
Each team member could take on any role and perform it during the iteration. Oddly enough, but after each person has been in the "skin" of the scrum master, the scrum master as such has ceased to be necessary for us. We all began to cheer for the conduct of the daily status of the rally, retrospectives and other team practices.
3) A strong desire to learn.
Once a week we tried to conduct self-study, where any member of the team could tell about any technology or practice he liked, where it was possible to have a lot of fun.
4) Constant review and rethinking of the work done.
At the end of each iteration, we gathered and discussed what could be good in our work and what could be improved. But we did not stop at just discussions. Established a plan of action and appointed responsible for their implementation. It did not always work, but in the long run it brought huge benefits.
5) Listen to every opinion.
Whatever the argument, they always tried to sort out the current problem as thoroughly as possible. Without emotion rarely managed, but everyone tried to come to the best solution possible.
6) Constant review of team goals.
Only one focus on the successful completion of the project brings to the team an incredible spirit of cohesion. For us, this was the moment when we stopped concentrating on external problems that we could not change much, but began to think more and more about how to improve our part and increase the efficiency of our work.
7) Joint rest.
Several self-organized away events (bowling, karting) and we have a completely different team.
As a result, the application of all these practices, we approached the ideal - to the self-motivated team. To a team in which every player daily raised his awareness and involvement in the project (or at least tried to do it). I am sure it will help you significantly increase the effectiveness of your teams. And most importantly, it will allow you and your colleagues to enjoy their work more.
As an afterword, I would like to note that it was very sad to observe how the elementary lack of funding for the team extremely quickly ate all the benefits of self-motivation and led to a strong de-motivation. But this is a completely different story.
As is well known, many flexible methodologies strive to ensure that the team is maximally protected from external interference and to give it complete freedom in the implementation of the project. Naturally, by external interference, we mean the company's bureaucratic apparatus, and not effective communication with customers. The same Scrum (by which we tried to work) ideally implies that in mature teams the role of the scrum master should be diminished more and more, the more the team goes into a special state - a state of self-motivation.
In this regard, I would like to describe my little experience of working in a team that in my century is most closely approached to this particular state of team motivation. To my regret, no effectiveness of the interaction of the team implementing the project can smooth out the gross mistakes of the company's management and therefore, after working for a year, I had to leave it. But now the post is not about management mistakes, because as you know, there are no one-sided guilty people, but rather how to achieve this state of unity in the team that we desire so much.
How we did it:
')
1) Isolation from the policy in the company.
It is advisable to isolate from all the internecine wars being waged in the upper echelons of power of the company. In our case, we were remotely located from the central office, and our team leader took the main blows from the top management. Is it good or bad, I do not undertake to evaluate, but it rallied the team strongly.
2) Freedom to change roles in the team.
Each team member could take on any role and perform it during the iteration. Oddly enough, but after each person has been in the "skin" of the scrum master, the scrum master as such has ceased to be necessary for us. We all began to cheer for the conduct of the daily status of the rally, retrospectives and other team practices.
3) A strong desire to learn.
Once a week we tried to conduct self-study, where any member of the team could tell about any technology or practice he liked, where it was possible to have a lot of fun.
4) Constant review and rethinking of the work done.
At the end of each iteration, we gathered and discussed what could be good in our work and what could be improved. But we did not stop at just discussions. Established a plan of action and appointed responsible for their implementation. It did not always work, but in the long run it brought huge benefits.
5) Listen to every opinion.
Whatever the argument, they always tried to sort out the current problem as thoroughly as possible. Without emotion rarely managed, but everyone tried to come to the best solution possible.
6) Constant review of team goals.
Only one focus on the successful completion of the project brings to the team an incredible spirit of cohesion. For us, this was the moment when we stopped concentrating on external problems that we could not change much, but began to think more and more about how to improve our part and increase the efficiency of our work.
7) Joint rest.
Several self-organized away events (bowling, karting) and we have a completely different team.
As a result, the application of all these practices, we approached the ideal - to the self-motivated team. To a team in which every player daily raised his awareness and involvement in the project (or at least tried to do it). I am sure it will help you significantly increase the effectiveness of your teams. And most importantly, it will allow you and your colleagues to enjoy their work more.
As an afterword, I would like to note that it was very sad to observe how the elementary lack of funding for the team extremely quickly ate all the benefits of self-motivation and led to a strong de-motivation. But this is a completely different story.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/102733/
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