• Effective followers take initiative, keeping their leader informed. This is not just about personal action but may involve influencing other people.
• Effective followers challenge flawed plans. This is one of the most valuable contributions that can be made by an effective follower. It is also one of the most difficult, since there is a risk of appearing negative, or distrustful of the leader’s judgement.
“There go the people. I must follow them, for I am their leader”
Attributed to Ledru-Rollin (1807–74), French radical politician
• Effective followers provide accurate feedback to their leader and their colleagues. This means providing both good and bad news in a timely, diplomatic and honest way.
• Effective followers support the leader’s efforts – all leaders need support and encouragement. This also means acting as advocates among their peer group and attempting to quash rumours.
It is a managerial responsibility to create an environment that encourages followership. This table summarizes the ideal conditions and behaviours of the followers and manager:
Effective ‘followership’ is a prerequisite of effective team management.
1.6 Manage a cross-functional team
Many teams are cross-functional: they are made up of people from different departments or functions or even organizations. In this situation, each person has a part-time role on this team and another job elsewhere. It is crucial that you take this into account.
If your team members have another regular role elsewhere, then they also have a regular line manager, regular teammates, regular objectives and regular loyalties. This is referred to as a ‘matrix organization’. The different lines of management and responsibilities make it much easier for people to become overloaded, distracted or confused, and conflicts of interest are much more likely.
In order to minimize the likelihood of problems with a cross-functional team, you need to work hard on six areas of your management skills. You will notice that the initial letters of these skill areas spell TOPCAT.
• T = Team building. You have to work really hard at this because your team members are already members of other teams. They already have a team identity and team loyalties elsewhere and these continue throughout the lifetime of your team. You need to balance getting them involved in your team without appearing to be trying to break them away from their other teams.
• O = Objective setting. You not only have to set clear, unambiguous SMART objectives (see Jargon buster), but you have to do this in conjunction with the objectives and deadlines that your team members have in their other teams. This requires constant review and adjustment as well as extra liaison with team members and their other bosses.
• P = Performance feedback. No one wants to be unappreciated, especially when a team member might be unpopular with their line manager for being ‘absent-on-duty’ with your team. Therefore, performance feedback is critical. If people are doing well, tell them (also tell their line manager). If they are not doing so well ask them what else they need from you in order to perform.
• C = Communication. If you don’t see your team members on a day-to-day basis, or they don’t see each other each day, you have to keep everyone informed of activities, successes, problems, solutions, changes and everyday news. But you have to avoid overloading people who might be getting similar updates from their other teams!
• A = Arbitration. You can’t expect your team members to negotiate for your benefit with their other boss; you are going to have to do a lot of arbitration for your team members’ time and resources. You will have to do this at the outset, when you set objectives, and frequently throughout the life of the team.
• T = Tackling conflict. Life in a matrix organization is full of potential conflict. You are naturally going to feel that your team is the most important, while every other manager is naturally going to feel the same way about their team!
Be a TOPCAT to manage a cross-functional team successfully.
If you are lucky you will be able to hand-pick people for your team. Otherwise, you will have to work with whoever is allocated. Either way, it is your responsibility to create ‘esprit de corps’. This French term means a ‘spirit of belonging in a group’. It applies when the team members know what to do and what not to do; they take pride in being part of the team; and they have the confidence to rely on their teammates.
If you are given the opportunity to pick people for your team, then you need to take care in choosing people who will not only have the technical competence to do the job but who will also work harmoniously with their colleagues and you.
• Recruit for harmony. You will actually need to consider how similar you want your team members to be to each other (or you!). Whilst there are benefits in getting people of the same mindset as each other, there are also tensions associated with having too many similarities between team members. For example, a team of 26 people who are all articulate, self-confident, ambitious, imaginative and highly motivated to be in the limelight can rapidly descend into a squabbling bunch of pushy people competing with one another to get promoted!
case study I was contracted to recruit a training specialist for a UK company. The initial request asked for candidates to be female graduates aged between 28 and 35 on the grounds that the team members were all female, all graduates aged under 33 and the team manager herself was 36. However, I put forward a shortlist that included a 42-year-old male ex-soldier who fulfilled all other criteria for the post. At interview he demonstrated a maturity and outlook different to the others in the team, and the company realized that he would provide a new perspective. He was recruited and quickly became a successful team member.
• Think about strengths and weaknesses. Within a perfect team there is a balancing act between individuals who get on together and individuals who bring specific strengths to the team. For example, on a football team you need to have a goalkeeper, some defenders, midfielders and strikers. You also need a balance of players who are good in the wet and some in the dry; some who play well when you are winning and some who shine when you are in trouble; some passionate players and some who are calm and methodical.
• Think about the environment. In a car sales environment, for example, you might want people who are self motivated, use their initiative, take calculated risks and solve their own problems. If you are building a team to run a nuclear power station then you probably want a mix of methodical, exacting, analytical and risk-averse people.
• Take inspiration from other teams. Many famous teams are made up of complementary characters. Think about the Magnificent Seven (gunfighters in the film), Wallace and Gromit (man and dog in animation series), Laurel and Hardy (comedy duo), the Dirty Dozen (assassins in the film), Hillary and Tenzing (real-life conquerors of Mount Everest), and even the ‘A’ Team (fugitive heroes in TV series).
Recruit great people to accomplish great things.