This prominent luxury fragrance brand is a wholly owned subsidiary of a large, multi-national fashion and fragrance house. It was acquired some years before and had been operating independently since then. The new owner was now taking a more active role in management of the company and starting a process of integration. Most of the management team had been in place from before the acquisition. As a result of the integration, the remits of some of the team had changed and some were uncertain of their future. The CEO engaged Tapper Associates to lead a team effectiveness journey and lay the foundations for greater collaboration and success.
In addition to the new roles and insecurity felt by some team members, there were other obstacles to transitioning to a high-performing team. The team operated in silos and had a hierarchical approach to decision-making. There were cliques. There was mistrust.
A bespoke team effectiveness programme was designed based on our Team Effectiveness Journey offering. The programme focused on:
- Building trust among team members
- A ‘First Team’ commitment to the leadership group
- An assessment of leadership skills and development opportunities, and
- Solidifying personal and group commitments to the team and the business
A discovery phase created a base line of expectations of the leadership team from others in the business and calibrated the leadership capabilities of the group. That formed the basis of a 2-day Team Effectiveness Lab. The Lab used interactive exercises, videos and personal reflection to address individual participants’ contributions to the team, acceptable and unacceptable ways of working, agreed aspirations for the business and concrete strategies to stimulate team success.
The foundations of trust were established through shared and emotive personal disclosure. Videoed individual commitments to the team and a Team Charter outlining behavioural Do’s and Don’ts for working together paved the way for knocking down silos, piercing cliques in the team and rolling back hierarchical decision-making. With these behavioural elements established, an articulated set of business aspirations with agreed upon projects for the team were co-created, yielding specific actions to enhance team effectiveness. This concrete agenda helped address insecurity regarding the team’s future. Post-Lab follow-up in three group coaching sessions allowed monitoring of progress on commitments made by the team and course corrections as necessary.
Leadership team members and the group made strides toward heightened effectiveness throughout the journey. Follow-on activity included individual coaching for some team members who desired a boost on their personal path to success.