15 Key Dynamics That Drive Successful Teams

What characteristics make a winning team and how training can build successful teams.

Creating and maintaining a successful team in your workplace requires the development of key team dynamics, along with ongoing training from providers like HSI. This article reviews the 15 team dynamics that are important in fostering a successful team in your workplace, including:

• Dependability: Leadership development training can help leaders build accountability among the team through honesty, transparency, and openness.
• Accountability: Effective training can teach learners how to acknowledge issues, identify corrective actions, and move forward.
• Consensus decision-making: Online training can teach learners how to take an organized approach to group decision-making to gain consensus.

HSI’s training helps build a foundation that boosts job satisfaction, loyalty, engagement, productivity, innovation, and retention.

Everyone wants to be on the winning team! It’s a great feeling of accomplishment and personal fulfillment when your team successfully wraps up a company-wide initiative that results in high profits for your organization. But how often does this happen? Is it pure luck? No, every winning team must have the right set of group dynamics.

To say the least, it’s not pleasant to be a member of a team with poor team dynamics. Lack of effective leadership. No shared vision. No clear goals. Poor communication. Who would have a positive attitude for a successful outcome? Research indicates that high team performance failure rates occur in the early stages of collaboration. How do we keep this from happening? It takes a dynamic team in harmony with one another, openly working together and keeping an open dialogue by sharing their knowledge.

A team that embodies true teamwork has a strong sense of "we.” Each team member uses open communication and conflict resolution to build trust, foster collaboration, and maintain a positive work environment. They hold themselves accountable for their individual performance as well as prioritizing the team's overall goal over their own individual ones.

Not to mention, cohesive teams make their leaders' jobs easier as close management isn’t necessary.

Why Are Good Team Dynamics So Important?

How a team interacts, communicates, and collaborates has a dramatic impact on the success rate in meeting its goals and building organizational success.

Of course, dealing with human behavior is always tricky; there is no way to control how people respond to one another. As the team leader, you can affect the group dynamics through team building strategies. By leveraging team building strategies, a team leader can positively influence group dynamics.

15 Key Team Dynamics That Drive Success

Here are several key characteristics and team building strategies to help ensure a winning team:

1. Structure and Clarity. Each team member should understand why they are part of the team. They should understand the company’s mission, their pivotal role, the team’s overall goal, and the action plan to achieve that goal.

They should also clearly understand their value and commitment to the team members. This is a message that all new hires should understand and embrace during the interview process. Clear expectations should be shared and agreed upon again during the onboarding.

If a new team is formed for a special project, the team leader must establish the mindset upfront. Consider how productive your team would be if each member had a sense of ownership over the team’s work as they do over their individual work.

When a team is focused on fulfilling its common purpose, team members can work together to reach their goal by counting on each other for new ideas and assistance.

2. Meaning. Understanding the “why” behind their work influences how team members perform. People find meaning in their own way, but realizing its importance helps to keep the team moving in the right direction.

3. Job satisfaction. Are there tangible results, and do team members feel that they are making a difference? This “reason to get out of bed in the morning” dynamic matters greatly and affects how co-workers interact with one another and their organizations.

4. Common purpose. Team members who share commonalities, such as a strong mission, shared vision, or a cause, help strengthen the team bond. This means learning about your team members.

“Great things in business are never done by one person; they’re done by a team of people.” — Steve Jobs, Apple co-founder and visionary

5. Strong leadership. Strong teams should have strong leaders who are both caring and supportive of their team. A study conducted by Google’s people operations department found that one of the best predictors of a team’s success was having a manager who was supportive and caring towards team members.

As the team leader, it is your responsibility to provide a supportive environment where members rely on one another and strengthen their sense of belonging, from the start to the end of the project, and beyond. Employees are most productive working under a manager who shows empathy and compassion. This management style encourages team members to rely on one another, communicate openly, and share ideas without fear.

6. Balance. Differences in personality, strengths, and approaches are positive team attributes.

Take, for example, the different approaches team members may use based on their personality. What happens when an introvert, an ambivert, and an extrovert are all on the same team and asked to brainstorm ideas on how to tackle a complex project? Complete disaster? No! The extrovert is energized by brainstorming sessions and is quick to offer ideas. Their enthusiasm spurs the ambivert. This employee enjoys engaging in group brainstorms but likes quieter focused work. They will join in, at times echoing ideas or refining. Introverts are thoughtful and process new ideas before speaking. So, they will circle back with well- considered ideas either in an email to the team or in a follow-up meeting.

It’s essential for a team to include members with different strengths. Richard Rodgers’ reflection on how he and Oscar Hammerstein achieved team success by leveraging each other's talents says it all!

“I hand him a lyric and get out of his way.” —Hammerstein describes his working relationship with Rodgers.

7. Psychological safety. Team members need to feel safe sharing information and new ideas without fear of punishment, embarrassment, or judgement. A psychologically safe environment allows employees to know it’s ok to make mistakes. This opens the door to learning and building a stronger team.

“For people to feel comfortable suggesting new ideas, they need to know that others in their group will support, or at least not criticize them.” —David DeSteno, professor of psychology and author

8. Open communication. An environment of trust creates mutual respect and open dialogue, leading to better ideas, greater creativity, and innovative solutions. Not to mention conflict resolution.

9. Dependability. Team members must be able to depend on each other to work towards the common goal. They need to be able to trust that everyone will meet their deadlines and carry their share of responsibility. As the team leader, it is your responsibility to build accountability. And, if a team member is not thriving in their current role, it’s not a matter of ability but of fit. Aligning their role with their strengths and skill sets will enable them to be a contributing member of the team.

“If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself.” —Henry Ford, automobile pioneer

10. Accountability. An important aspect of a winning team is each team member’s willingness to acknowledge and correct mistakes. When success is dependent on results, a productive team must establish the appropriate processes for measurement and evaluation. They must be open to constructive feedback. Employees should track their work and be willing to modify the plan if results are not satisfactory. A successful team will look for opportunities to learn from the situation. They understand continuous improvement is part of the learning process. They will not let past mistakes limit their future success.

11. Consensus decision-making. Harnessing the power of the team creates innovative solutions. Having more people involved in decision-making can channel the creative power of multiple minds. The key is consensus decision-making, which requires the right processes to be in place.

12. Participative leadership. There is no “I” in team. Successful team members understand everyone must step up as a leader, no matter how small their role might seem. Team members are allowed the space to work autonomously. Instead of controlling the team, management provides resources, guidance, and information.

13. Resilience. Dynamic teams are resilient. They don’t give up on challenges or setbacks. If your team can’t solve complex problems or make decisions and disagrees at critical points, it’s time to regroup with the entire team to ensure everyone is on the same page.

14. Status quo disruption. Successful teams look to transform challenges into opportunities and redefine what’s possible.

15. Continuous learning. High-performing teams embrace continuous learning. Whether it’s new technology, new team members, or new processes, they need to be nimble enough to adapt and learn new skills. They see how training allows them to grow in their careers and contribute at a higher level.

HSI Can Help

Let HSI help you build high-performing teams! Our training helps build a foundation that boosts job satisfaction, loyalty, engagement, productivity, innovation, and retention. Here are just a few examples of how training can help you with your team building strategies to ensure strong team dynamics.

Dependability: If you are in a leadership position, ask yourself, “Do my team members trust me?” Leadership development training can help leaders build accountability among the team through honesty, transparency, and openness.

Accountability: Effective training can teach learners how to acknowledge issues, identify corrective action, and move forward.

Consensus decision-making: Training can teach learners how to take an organized approach to group decision-making to gain consensus.

Request a consultation and let us help you build successful teams!

Additional Resources

• What Are the Costs of Not Training?
• 5 Steps to Building an Emotionally Intelligent Team
• Why Personality Assessments Are Beneficial In The Workplace