Ingredients for Growing Thriving Teams

I was delighted to read the recent New York Times article, "What Google Learned From its Quest to Build the Perfect Team".

Here's a summary of my key takeaways with a link to the article at the end.

Relevance and shared motivation:

It helps to understand the role of the team you’re in.
Do the things that have significance in the context of your organization and understand the impact of your actions.
Align shared actions with personal motivation - fulfilment
See how the work of the team contributes to the whole.

Empathy and emotional sensitivity:

Build empathy - social sensitivity. In the best teams, members listen to one another and show sensitivity to feelings and needs.
Psychological safety and emotional conversation are related. Talk about life, feelings, experiences, beyond the scope of the work at hand.
Dissolve work/life barriers in order to comfortable express more of yourself, wherever you are.

Equivalence and communication:

Everyone contributes to conversations. (Consider taking turns and balance quantity of contribution).
"In order to be psychologically safe we must know that we can be free enough some times to have hard conversations with colleagues who are driving us crazy."
Encourage emotional openness and be open.

Behavioural alignment:

Discuss norms – choose principles that build relationship and align action.
Develop a “common platform and operating language”.
Give and be open to receive feedback – (suggestions about how to improve things are usually easier to digest that suggestions about the “problem”).