Network of Teams

What is a network of teams? Imagine your company is an interdependent network of people sharing information internally and externally with your partners, suppliers, customers and advisors. Timely, accurate, useful, intelligent and helpful Information exchange is the lifeblood of your company. If you have a blockage anywhere in your system, the backups cause a domino effect of problems.

You may have noticed that people don’t read long emails anymore. It’s almost impossible to track what is being said and know whether it was taken in and considered. Until you implicitly have these kinds of crucial conversations and get buy-in across the federation that supports the health of your business, your network is fractured.

Mapping this information flow and all the channels it moves through is a great way to find the blockage and build a solution that all participants will buy into and use. We know this is the case because nothing is worse for any member of your interdependent network to suddenly not have the crucial paperwork to get out an invoice, know the new lead time on a part, discover the customer changed something on the order, realize a decision you made wasn’t conveyed to a supplier, uncover a month later that shipping costs were not included in the invoice to the buyer or that your company’s reputation is being challenged in social media.

There are questions CEOs and team leaders need to reflect on to evaluate:

1. How well does information flow internally and externally in my business?
2. How effective are we as a team across all these different companies - do I trust my partners, my suppliers, my team in the field? Do we convey the right information at the right time? Do I hold them capable and competent? Do I need to control them? Do I suspect they never read the emails? Are they leaders or managers? Do I let them lead? Can we describe what they do and what is crucial to us? Can they describe what we do and what is important to us?

Answering these questions might not be easy. But the more you allow yourself to see how your network really communicate and interact with you and each other, the easier it is see how well you and your network of federated teams perform together…  and make the changes so they want to be high performing as much as you want them to be.

Do you want a high performing network of teams? Read more to discover what that could mean in your business so you know if it’s worth investing in.

Want an outsider’s independent view of how well your team is working together? Or if you know your team is struggling, then don’t wait for something to change, because it’s likely to break and then you’ll lose great people. Call Lorraine McGregor at 604-306-7707 to discuss what’s happening in your network of teams.