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Team Charter: Path to Success A team is made up of focused individuals all trying to achieve a common goal. Personalities, individual skills and trust can often prevent team success. A team charter is one method of defining team goals, team skills, ground rules, a code of conduct, and conflict management. The charter is the opportunity for the team members to agree to their objectives, identify challenges, potential conflicts, record their responsibilities to the group, and chart the course that lay ahead.
A successful team will use the charter as a developmental tool to improve performance and team unity. Assessment Our team has completed three personality assessments: What’s my Jungian 16-Type Personality? ( Marcic,1989), Do I trust others? (Glenn & Pood, 1989), and How good are my listening skills? (Rosenberg, 1957) in an effort to gain a better understanding of ourselves and each other. These tools aided in the creation of our learning charter, defining strengths and weaknesses of each individual adding depth to the skills inventory section.
One key point to note is that the charter does not tell the team how to solve the problem or what a solution should look like. The charter sets the process in motion, establishes key milestones and desired outcomes, but does not suggest a solution path(Wilkinson & Moran, 1998). In having this information, the team can create a charter that will best cater to the needs of the team and the relative performance of the team. Performance Each member of the learning team is enrolled in this course to learn and expand their views about business.
In this course and in business, team members are measured by how well or poorly they perform. The team charter helps the team by defining what is acceptable or unacceptable performance, how the team members will interact with each other and how conflict will be resolved should it arise. Each team member contributed to the formation of the team charter, voicing opinions, personal preferences and engaging in debate over topics of concern. During the formation process, team members begin learning about each other, building trust, and forming relationships.
The result is a charter that is representative of each member of the group. The charter serves as a benchmark that the members can measure their interaction with the team and overall performance against. Each member has agreed to fulfill specifically defined goals and be held accountable for maintaining the goals as defined by the charter. The charter provides a cornerstone to which the team can build upon, pulling on each of our strengths so the group can perform at peak levels.
The charter clearly defines expectations removing any ambiguity or misinterpretation by each member as to expected outcome of a project, assignment, or group meeting. Conclusion As the team progresses through this course, the members will gain each others trust, learn to listen to differing viewpoints, and learn why other people make decisions and how they come to a conclusion. What makes good team members are individuals who are able to work well with others and understand how their behaviors affect the team’s performance.
In other words, having a high level of emotional intelligence or empathy separates high-performing teams from lesser-performing teams(Snow & Mulrooney, 2002). The team charter outlines how the team will interact with one another, giving each team member an opportunity to express viewpoints in a team environment. Without the charter to define how the team should interact, set team goals, how conflict will be managed or how decisions will be made, the team would spend more time ineffectively communicating, have no formal direction, and be unsuccessful in accomplishing any goal set before them.
References Glenn, E. C. , & Pood, E. A. , (1989), Listening Self-Inventory, Supervisory Management, 12–15. Retrieved November 5, 2008, from https://ecampus. phoenix. edu/secure/aapd/sas/robbins_sal3v3/sal3v3web. html Janet L Snow, Christopher P Mulrooney. (2002, March). Effective top teams: Five strategies for success. Healthcare Executive, 17(2), 22-5. Retrieved November 9, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 109791393). Marcic, D. (1989). Organizational Behavior: Experiences and Cases. St.
Paul, Minnesota: West. Retrieved November 7, 2008, from https://ecampus. phoenix. edu/secure/aapd /sas/robbins_sal3v3/sal3v3web. html Nancy L. Wilkinson, John W. Moran. (1998). Team charter. The TQM Magazine, 10(5), 355. Retrieved November 8, 2008, from ABI/INFORM Global database. (Document ID: 86922472). Rosenberg, M. (1957). Faith in People, in Occupations and Values. Glencoe, Illinois: Free Press. Retrieved November 7, 2008, from https://ecampus. phoenix. edu/secure/aapd/sas/robbins_sal3v3/sal3v3web. html