A Dash of Salt - Team Effectiveness

Stacy McCracken and Sharon Mawet discuss team effectiveness, focusing on the challenges of conflict and silence in teams. They emphasize the importance of psychological safety, where team members feel comfortable expressing opinions. Sharon shares an example of a cultural mismatch in her team, leading to reduced psychological safety and conflict. They also discuss the impact of burnout and boredom, noting that loneliness exacerbates these issues. Strategies for fostering team effectiveness include setting boundaries, modeling behavior, and recognizing team contributions. They conclude by highlighting the need for a balanced culture to achieve team success.

Action Items

• [ ] Reflect on personal Sunday scaries and identify the root causes.
• [ ] Establish clear boundaries and expectations for team meetings, including how to respectfully disagree.
• [ ] Explore ways to make work more meaningful and challenging for team members to prevent boreout.
• [ ] Assess cultural fit when hiring new team members and consider how they can help the team evolve towards the desired future state.
• [ ] Recognize team members' contributions and avoid taking credit for their work to build trust and psychological safety.

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Chapters

• 1:22 Weekly Spark
• 5:08 Main Topic: Team Effectiveness
• 32:00 Salt's Kitchen

Transcript

Keywords

Team effectiveness, psychological safety, conflict resolution, cultural fit, burnout, boredom, team dynamics, leadership, communication, boundaries, engagement, innovation, teamwork, emotional exhaustion, team goals.

Speakers

0:16
I'm ready. You're ready. All
S
Speaker 1
0:18
right, welcome to Two salting women. Sharon, it's great to see you, Stacy. It's, you
S
Speaker 2
0:25
know, always good to be
S
Speaker 1
0:29
back. We are, we are going to talk team effectiveness today. We're going to talk a little bit about employees. But I guess before we get started, we should probably introduce ourselves. So I am Stacy McCracken. I am one of the Co-hosts here for the dash of this, of of the salt, a dash of salt by two salty women. And I am a Midwestern girl turned Austin. I come from the corporate world, and I love talking about all things related to innovation and how, how we can just keep growing.
S
Speaker 2
1:03
Yeah, and I am Sharon Mawet, your salty companion. I am a native Texan, and I have a knack for baking up big dreams. And, you know, big projects


1:15
you do, you do, and they call it a spreadsheet,
S
Speaker 2
1:19
yeah. And I love spreadsheets for sure.
S
Speaker 1
1:22
All right, so, you know, we typically start with a weekly Spark. Since we're talking about teams and team effectiveness today, I thought it would be fun if maybe we started with maybe a game like, would you


1:38
rather? All
S
Speaker 2
1:40
right, I'm all into games these days. So
S
Speaker 1
1:44
So would you rather work on a team that has constant conflict or a team where no one ever speaks up?


1:54
I don't know. I probably take conflict.
S
Speaker 2
1:57
I am a person who like I I was the word I'm looking for like I'm a confrontational person, much to you know, it's not always good to be confrontational, but how about you?
S
Speaker 1
2:17
One is great, right? I've constantly been on a team that had conflict all of the time, and they do not prefer conflict. And so like just heading into the office or into a meeting and knowing that every there's just going to be conflict, and conflict not for good reason, I think that's what it boils down to, right? Is that all for conflict if it's going to move us forward, but if it's just because people don't like each other, and I've also been on the team where nobody speaks up, and that's terrible, so
S
Speaker 2
2:57
annoying, because you Yes,
S
Speaker 1
3:02
because you know that not everybody agrees, and you know that after the meeting, people are going to leave and they're going to go chat with their friends outside the meeting, and nothing ever gets resolved. And that means you get to have another meeting, which I don't like meetings to begin with, unless we're going to accomplish something, yeah, oh yeah. One of those are just terrible. So anyway, I would love to know from our listeners, right? I would love for them to comment on would you rather, right? Would you rather be on a team with conflict, or would you rather be on a team where no one speaks up?
S
Speaker 2
3:44
Yeah. Well, I'm sure most of our listeners might think that you know, being on the team with conflict is worse, but I think today, Stacy, you're going to talk to us about the real dangers will come when teams are exhausted or disengaged that no one speaks up at all. I just recently heard it was either a podcast or an article I wrote that are teams really exhausted, or are they just lonely? So I look forward to, you know, what are more we going to be talking about today? Stacy,
S
Speaker 1
4:18
oh yeah, that's great. That's great. So talk a little bit about the myth that great teams always get along, because I think that's a huge myth out there, which is, you know, if you disagree, then you're not a good team player. And and then also talk a little bit about how to thrive and challenge ideas in a way that's productive, and what the requirements are, so that people and teams can actually feel like they can have those conversations, right? And so that's just some things that I'd love for you and I to chat about today, because my guess is we have lived with different. Perspective, just like, you know, you're you're good on template and and I don't prefer it, right? And so and


5:08
so. In fact, maybe we'd get started,
S
Speaker 1
5:11
you know, can you kind of story? Sharon, I was just thinking about you and I, we've worked together a long time. We've worked in a lot of different situations. Can you think of a time where you and I had maybe an epic team fail, or maybe a lesson learned?
S
Speaker 2
5:30
I don't know about lesson well, somewhat lesson learned. But if you recall, we went through a time when we started consolidating activities within our our department, and that meant we went to one social media challenge for our department at the time, and we myself, along with your direct employee, we're managing the combined social media and going through this process, we had members In our our team in our department, that disagreed strongly with the route that your employee and I were taking, and was extremely vocal about it. But I think ultimately it came down to two things. One, I don't think they under Well, they did not have a lot of experience in social media, and they thought everything had to be equitable and represented equally within social media and not trending topics or events, as the case may be. And then the second issue that I had with that is the loudest person ended up winning, in my opinion, and so our supervisors did not really take the appropriate measures to bring people together to resolve the conflict that was happening. They just wanted to hush hush everything, make the quickest fix and move on.
S
Speaker 1
6:54
Well, now I think I must have just now that you've told that story, I totally remember that time, I honestly just wanted to block all of that out. I mean, there's a recent reason why somebody on my team who is in because I just wanted no part of it. But you're so right. And I remember was just, was an unfortunate situation in that there was so much tension, there was so much energy that got consumed by not having a conversation and looking for that quick fix. And I think that, I think that that energy drain becomes that, that element of right? It leads to burnout. It leads people disengaging, right? Because they just don't have the energy to give to certain situations anymore, so they just kind of abandon the conversation. And so I think that's a great example of just the the importance, or the way you the effectiveness of your team can be impacted, right, when you're not having productive conversations, when you're spending that energy right? You You've done so much to avoid direct conflict that rather than, and I guess, I guess, I'd love to hear what your thoughts are, because I think there's a perception that, and this gets into kind of the first element of psychological safety, right? Where? Where psychological safety is, is feeling like it's okay to express an opinion, it's okay to to ask questions. It's an environment where you don't feel like you're going to be attacked for having a different idea or point of view and and so often, I think that there's a perception out there that that you'll just agree with me, and if you don't agree with me, then we aren't being a good team together. And so I'm just curious, you know, kind of what your thoughts are there. I


9:11
think that's an excellent point. I think
S
Speaker 2
9:16
the situation was the person wanted to be right, and our leadership of our department, in my opinion, you know, talking about psychological safety, I don't think understood the issue. This was not an expertise area of theirs, either. So the environment and culture wasn't created to say, Hey, how can we educate our department on what the goals and the strategy of having social media accounts are and what the objectives should be, and then talk about how we're meeting it for every program or product that we have in our department, and to use that as a learning. Environment they I think people just felt the stress and the tension of the conflict and wanted to resolve that first, and didn't really think about the strategies and the goals that we were trying to achieve. Instead,
S
Speaker 1
10:17
I agree. I agree. You know, as you were describing it, it took me back to a time where I was on a multicultural team. I was I was on a global team, and so we had folks from all over the world as part of our team. And the boss, the CEO, was very quick to lose its temper, and so in meetings, so very results driven. And so if you you kind of follow the insights discovery, sort of colors, right? Of somebody with preferences for fiery red, and it's fiery red, right? They want results. They want to move quickly. They want to make decisions, you know, and they can lose their temper with folks who perhaps approach things from maybe a more introverted perspective. They're a little quieter, they're they are trying to maintain a relationship. So what is our guy who led our group in Japan would call me before our meetings because he didn't feel safe like communicating and giving his thanks, because he knew the boss would just get mad, because that was his nature. And so he would call me and he would say, safety, I need you to help lay the foundation so that I can bring up this really complex point without like a derailing the meeting. And so, you know, he found a partner in the room right to create some it gave him psychological safety to know that I was going to try to lay the groundwork, because I sort of knew how to navigate the emotions in the room in order to invite him to contribute, right? And I think that had, and it just demonstrated that, you know, it doesn't matter whether you're an introvert or an extrovert or your male or female, right? It you can always feel that lack of psychological safety to express your, you know, to challenge an idea or to disagree with your boss. And it can be detrimental, right? It can be detrimental to the strategy, and it can be detrimental to to getting work done.
S
Speaker 2
12:41
Yeah, and I found as a leader, you know a group of employees or of a team, you really miss out on the effectiveness of meeting those goals and strategies if you are not taking the time to learn and adapt to the different personalities and culture and creating an environment where people can feel free to speak up, but it takes a lot of time and a lot of patience. Not that I'm known for having patience myself, but I have learned, you know, if I go two steps forward and one step back, I learned that I have to pause and make the time and go back and apologize and, you know, make the effort so that we create that that safety where people can feel free to speak up. I
S
Speaker 1
13:31
think that that point about being willing to apologize or be vulnerable and say, Hey, I made a mistake in order to to build that trust, right, to create that safety, so that people will start to believe right, that they can bring their concerns up or challenge you in a discussion. And it's just a really hard environment to foster, because folks, especially if they come starred into your organization, you know, if they come from places I've worked so many places that were not safe from a psychological safety point of view, and so I know I carry that baggage into every organization, and that I am not quick to trust that I can express an opinion in a meeting until I kind of get the lay of the land and see how things are going and so, you know, and if our whole teams are bringing in their own baggage, it just is that it takes that much more energy and that much more work to create that that environment for them. Exactly. What are some of the Do you have any tricks or tips or things that you do to try to create that safety in your team?
S
Speaker 2
14:59
I don't. Know that I want to offer tips or tricks, because it is an area I struggle in, because I am a driver, but I try to incorporate at a basis fun. And to me, if you can get your team laughed, laughing together, and, you know, cracking jokes with each other, then I think that fosters a community that you can be more open and that we care about each other, you know, through that process. So that's one thing I try to do in some of my meetings to, you know, of course, not make jokes at the expense of anybody, but, you know, just have the ability to be light hearted. And again, going back to the I'm not afraid to admit when I make mistake or make fun of my own self, to foster the other thing that I love to do, I don't know if it creates the culture of speaking up, but I love passing out gold stars because I'm in a virtual environment, and if I can send somebody a gold Star through teams or a message, then that makes me extremely
S
Speaker 1
16:05
happy. You do. You do love your gold stars. You do love your gold stars. So I struggle with fun, with like creating, like being fun. But I think when I'm trying to create that that trust, right? It's it's more trying to draw people in and then validating them and and thanking them for their contribution, and so using those words thank you for your contribution, or thank you for sharing. That isn't a I agree with you or I disagree with you, it is I recognize that you've contributed to the conversation, and thank you for that. I do the same thing when I'm teaching, even in the classroom, because sometimes it's hard to get the discussion going. And I try to thank people for contributing, because I want them to get comfortable that they were seen and they were heard and


17:01
that it was valued. Yeah,
S
Speaker 2
17:03
that's something I don't do well. I think, I think sometimes thank you is overused, but I do agree that it's important to recognize people I do my best to make an effort in teams, especially my employees or volunteers helping me in a project, to recognize their contribution to someone else. So I try not to take credit myself. I will recognize my team for doing it, but if I can recognize a specific person for contributing to part or all of something, I try to do that as often as possible,
S
Speaker 1
17:44
absolutely. And I think that goes a long way to building that trust and building that safety, to know, hey, my boss isn't going to take credit for my and things like and so I think those are, I think those are big things. So do you have, do you have a topic? I've got another one I can go into, but I wonder, do you have one that that you'd love to touch on?
S
Speaker 2
18:06
Yeah, my current issues with teams is the ripple effect when you have a cultural mismatch. I've been joking with people that I know lately. I've hired a number of people over the last couple of years or over my career, and regretfully, I don't feel I'm a successful hiring people, and I think my biggest issue with that, or bringing onboarding people into a team, is not really identifying a cultural match to the group or the organization that I'm bringing That individual into, because it has a huge ripple effect on the overall team or achieving your goal, if there is a cultural myth mismatch, if you will, my I'll give you a specific example. I hired somebody recently into my organization because that individual had the right skills to build a new process in my team that we needed quickly and we needed it built well. That person did do that extremely well, but in retrospect, that person is no longer on my team. But in retrospect, looking at that situation, they were not a good cultural fit to our department. Our department is about serving students right. And not that they didn't do that, but they were focused on driving so much that the ripple effect that they left in my team since leaving has been difficult because people felt very boxed in to their specific roles. They didn't feel like they had the ability to speak up. So it goes back to that psychological safety. But I think the mismatch on cultural fit really impacts that a lot.
S
Speaker 1
19:54
That's super interesting and and you're right, you know, not being a good cultural fit. It can absolutely impact team and team effectiveness, and can have kind of long standing ripples through there. I did see a headline recently about not hiring for a culture fit for where you are, but where you need to be going, because then you may have somebody who fits you today but isn't going to fit where you're trying to get to tomorrow. And I thought that was a really interesting idea, right? Because, because if you think, if the culture is one that is status quo, that is not adaptable. That is not changing with our changing times and technologies and and the culture is one where you're just going to come in and do the things on the SOP, and you hire for that, yeah, they're going to do great. But But then if you need to start shifting, because every organization needs to be shifting and growing, you know, do you end up with a whole team of folks who are ill equipped? Yes,
S
Speaker 2
21:15
and I think that's exact case for my one scenario I just mentioned, because they did their job well for what I was expecting the job to be. But as we implemented this new process, you know, it opened the door on different cracks, and it didn't turn out to be the situation that we anticipated it to be. And we as a the team that I hired and created, to not adapt quickly enough to that mismatch of the process, right? So, and then I agree, the person that we hired to do that wasn't equipped to be flexible, to be nimble and to change it based on the results that were happening in that process.
S
Speaker 1
22:04
Yeah, yeah. And so that's, that's really interesting, and, and it takes me to, you know, when you've got, when you've got a psychological safety problem, and you perhaps have a culture fit problem, and then you're, you're start asking the question, why isn't our team more effective, right? And then you start going, Man, are people burned out? Are they? Are they bored? Are you know, and you start to look at how folks start to disengage, right? Because if I don't feel safe, I'm probably not going to contribute in a meeting, right? And so then I'm going to disengage, and I'm probably not going to volunteer to collaborate with somebody else, right? Because, because, why would I Right? You know, maybe I don't get along with them because I'm not a good culturally, we don't have anything in common, or we just don't see the goals similarly. And so, you know, I've read a lot lately about kind of the difference between, especially looking at employees and and thinking about, you know, disengagement is at an all time high for employees and leaders. And you know, as the economy continues to kind of spiral, and there's so much uncertainty out there, I have to imagine it's only going to make the situation even more difficult, right, that the level of ambiguity and uncertainty is probably just going to increase that level of tension in the workplace, and then layoffs, all of the layoffs that have happened, right? So you've got smaller teams trying to do the same amount of work and and all of that, right? And so I've been reading a lot about kind of the difference between being burned out and being bored out and thinking about what those look like. And it's because I've been both. I've been both at the same time, and so just reference something so that I get this right for everyone, because I'm sure a lot of people have heard burnout, right, and and are familiar with sort of that term. And when you're burned out at work, you know you are emotionally exhausted, right? You just feel overloaded. You you feel like no matter how much I do, I just, it's not enough, right? And so that's that's that burnout situation, but bore out is actually a real thing too. And Sharon, have you ever heard that term, being bored out? It's.
S
Speaker 2
25:00
Yes, I have been in jobs where the responsibilities are very cyclical, and you go through a few iterations of that, and you improve upon the process, but by the time you get to the third or fourth or fifth cycle, you're like, there's not that much more improvement than I can get Yes, and we always like a good challenge, don't
S
Speaker 1
25:22
we do? We do right? And so I figured you'd be able to identify with that one, because to me, like the worst job in the world is to come in, and I describe it as taking these 10 folders on the left hand side of my desk, and my job is to move them to the right hand side of my desk, exactly, and that's really all there is to it. And I have a very fixed process that I'm supposed to follow. And it is, you know, I feel low value. Add zero creativity. It is just no longer. It doesn't feel meaningful, right? The work is not meaningful. And so you know that is boring. And when you combine that bore up with being disengaged right from your from your work, because you maybe don't feel safe in the environment. There's so much uncertainty, right? It's an incredibly horrible combination, right? Because, well,
S
Speaker 2
26:31
I'll add to that combination, you know, if you're talking about burnout versus not just bore out, but also if you add in the complexity of loneliness, which is impacting our nation since COVID hit, you know whether you have you know whether everybody's a good cultural fit, and you feel psychologically safety. You're using words like bored or I'm lonely. Your peers may or may not be receptive to that, because they'll be like, Why? Why can't you find a challenge in your own job? Why can't you fix your own issue instead of, you know, taking that situation and saying, Hey, how can we readjust responsibilities to fit your skills and strengths? Or, you know, add new creative challenges to their environment to make it fun and engaging again,
S
Speaker 1
27:24
absolutely, absolutely. It's a few ideas right, that that folks can do as they're kind of moving through this, this situation of whether it be loneliness and isolation at work, right, or or being burned out, being bored out. And you know, one of the first things, and this should not be a surprise to anyone, is to start looking at your routines, right? Look at what you've fallen into the habit of doing, because depending on how you start your day, whether you're getting enough sleep the Sunday scaries, right? So the Sunday scaries, if you start thinking about work on Sunday, and it just gives you this pit in your stomach where you're dreading going to work on Monday, like it's important to just take note of that, right? And go hmm, or maybe start reflecting, like, what's driving that? Is it? Is it the job itself? Is it a situation at work? Is it? And start to just try to uncover what it is, rather than just lumping it all together. Have you had the Sunday scary? I have a million times in different
S
Speaker 2
28:38
Yeah, and, but, you know, making, as you said, making that effort, instead of just dreading that Sunday feeling, is really taking the time to deep dive. What is it? Is it a big project I don't know how to tackle? Is it because I'm bored? So where can I find the challenge? Or is it because, you know, like your friend in Japan didn't want to talk to that leader, so then you're afraid to do that. So really diving deep into figuring out the why is a great place to start.
S
Speaker 1
29:13
Yeah, and, you know, another thing is about setting some boundaries. So I think that that in a team, as we talk about employee effectiveness and team effectiveness and creating psychological safety, and all of the things like just thinking about what the boundaries are for those team meetings or for those conversations, you know when the workday begins and ends, how we're going to treat each other in meetings, how we're going to have conversations, how we respectfully disagree with each other and and having those conversations do to honestly model and teach people who have. Of our work in place, how you can disagree and do it in a way that professional and productive? Yeah,


Stacy McCracken: who have never worked someplace, how you can disagree and do it in a way that's professional and productive.

30.04

Sharon Mawet: Yeah, well, it's also about setting boundaries, and you kind of hinted upon there. Are you modeling? If you're telling your team set boundaries, you know we have a leader in our department. That talks about it can wait till tomorrow, right? And they practice that very well. But I realized myself as a leader. 

Sharon Mawet: I will work an extra hour to get something done, because then that clears clears my mind. That is my boundary, because I've learned I am more effective if I can finish something versus

Sharon Mawet: thinking about it and staying awake all night to wait to do it tomorrow right? But I realize if I'm emailing somebody at 8 o'clock at night, I don't want to set the precedence

Sharon Mawet: that that's what they should do, because that's my boundary. It shouldn't be. I shouldn't set that expectation. So keeping those nuances is important. But you have to model. If you're talking about boundaries, you have to model it as well

Stacy McCracken: You do you do? Sometimes I use. I have the same issue, which is, I like to finish something that I'm working on right. If I'm in the flow. If I'm in the groove, it's gonna take me more energy to stop and restart than it is to finish. And so I've actually started to use that delay. Send feature in my email so that it arrives at maybe 8 in the morning, even though I may be sending it at 8 at night.

Stacy McCracken: it doesn't create the. It creates the illusion that I didn't send it till 8 in the morning. Right?

Stacy McCracken: because I've had people work for me who they'll see it come in, and even though I tell them not to respond, they will, anyway. And so so I've used that delay. Send feature to try to help

Stacy McCracken: manage that a little bit, and you know, I think, that I think we're also

Stacy McCracken: managing your calendar a little bit and thinking about like as a leader, really reflecting what you're calling on your team to do. How many meetings are? Do you have them sitting in? Are they productive meetings? Noticing who's engaged? Who gets to talk? Do all the same. People talk all of the time.

 Stacy McCracken: you know. Is there enough space for other people to contribute

Stacy McCracken: is also another way to help create that environment right?

Sharon Mawet: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

32,00

Stacy McCracken: Keep talking about this, but we probably probably it's probably time for us to wrap things up a little bit. Do you have something for us, for salt kitchen day.

Sharon Mawet: I do. Well, you know, I love talking about all the dynamics and all the ingredients that go into making you know the best team, the right ingredients, the right people, the right seasoning to make it work because too much of one thing, too much of one spice can overpower the dish too much of one culture or this or that can throw off the entire team and not help you

Sharon Mawet: make your goals. But I love a quote from Peter Drucker that says culture, each strategy for breakfast. So no matter how talented our team is, you know, if the culture is not right, success is hard to achieve. So, finding a balance between psychological safety ensuring people are not bored out or burned out, and that we all believe and adhere

Sharon Mawet: to the right culture and following the mission of the team

Sharon Mawet: gets a team that's aligned and engaged in season. Just right. So, as you said, at the beginning of the podcast you know, we'd love to hear from our listeners about. You know, how do you find the right mix for your team so that they are effective and seasoned just right.

Stacy McCracken: Awesome. Thank you so much, Sharon. I love that. Well, thank you. Listeners, for tuning in today to a dash of salt as we dove in to team effectiveness and mixing up just the right recipe for success. Hopefully, you found a a tip or just something to think about and reflect on to encourage you or to help you as you head back into your own teams as well

Sharon Mawet: And don't forget to subscribe and visit us at twosaltywomen.com for more content, and we look forward to talking to you next time

 Stacy McCracken: Absolutely take care.