Does an 'All-Stars' team assure success? 5 ways to make it work

Rarely does one get an opportunity to select and design a team from scratch and when the opportunity does present itself – rarely does one find the complete freedom to do so often bound by the constraints of talent availability, timing and such. So, when given a choice, it is too tempting a chance to pass to create an all-stars team - that of high performers and achievers. A team of ambitious, goal-focused, self-disciplined individuals, who are driven by a strong personal desire to accomplish meaningful, important goals - an unfaultable recipe for success? Well, yes and no.

Take my 20 best people and almost overnight, Microsoft becomes a mediocre company” – Bill Gates

It is established that when it comes to talent, the difference between the best and the rest is huge with star performers outshining others by a country mile (What “A” Players Bring to the Table). Across all job types, it is estimated that the best performers are roughly four times as productive as average performers. And yet, conventional wisdom says - an all stars team just doesn’t work.

What could go wrong (and often does!)?

• Big egos: Inflated sense of self and rightness of my way comes in the way of the progress the team can make. Discussions and arguments get misdirected towards proving one-upmanship as the real merit of the case fall by the wayside.
• Overshadowing the Bs: The use of “A” teams can create an environment in which only the best feel valued, demoralizing the average performers (It is well known that the average performers generally grind out the work that makes it possible for the stars to shine). The feeling of alienation that may creep in by the constant recognition of the star team can mar the co-operation that they need from others to succeed.
• Great team, mediocre leaders: A team of stars headed by a poor leader can lead to mediocre results. Often times such leaders prove to be an impediment instead of an enabler to the team’s progress.
• Internal focus: Distances created by an over emphasis on the achievement of the internal goals coupled with a lower regard of others’ abilities, an alpha team may often lose sight of the larger organizational goals. They may start to operate in a bubble, which even with its superior results may lose its relevance.

Does this then imply that putting together an alpha team never makes sense or are there situations that request (in fact demand) them?

After all, we have seen all-star teams do extraordinary work - it took just 600 Apple engineers less than two years to develop, debug, and deploy OS X, a revolutionary change in the company’s operating system. By contrast, it took as many as 10,000 engineers more than five years to develop, debug, deploy, and eventually retract Microsoft’s Windows Vista.

Hold your aces

Alpha teams may not be worth the trouble or cost for small projects, the fire power best reserved for successfully executing a company’s strategy and delivering superior performance. Initiatives with clearly defined objectives, critical to the company’s strategy e.g. Product development or even a functional overhaul risen to the level of strategic importance, benefit the most from the deployment of such teams.

How to ensure success for Alpha teams?

1. Choose wise: The choice of team needn’t restrict itself to just a complimentary array of skills but needs to extend to personalities too. Though easier said than done, a foreknowledge of individual styles can help institute preemptive measures to mitigate the impact of potential derailers.
2. Stellar support: To succeed, a high performers’ team needs leaders and support staff who are exceptional too. Their need to achieve and beat the self-set (high) standards demands warrants a leader who they can learn from and grow with in the achievement of the common vision. High-caliber subordinates and support allow the team members the time and motivation to achieve more. Between 1990 and 1992, when Lehman Brothers’ equity research department was the best on Wall Street, its star analysts attributed their success in large part to the direction and guidance provided by their bosses, Jack Rivkin and Fred Fraenkel (Source).
3. Rewarding the right way: Lack of collaboration often comes in the way of star teams’ performance. The extraordinary creativity and productivity that could have been unleashed stays constrained by the lack of collaboration they refuse to extend to each other. A little prodding then becomes necessary - Lehman Brothers stipulated in 1992 that every analyst’s presentation had to refer to at least two compatriots. Goldman Sachs’s legendary co-leader from 1976 to 1985, John Whitehead, once cautioned an analyst: “At Goldman Sachs, we never say ‘I’.”
4. Don’t create disincentives for teamwork : Apart from the positive reinforcement for team work, its essential that any disincentives towards it may also be weeded out. This is especially important in the context of how the team’s performance is evaluated. As an example, the “stack ranking” system of performance appraisal may discourage an “A” player to join groups with other “A” players due to the fear of being seen as weakest member of the team.
5. Internal Networks: Alpha teams need to be encouraged and mentored to forge relationships across functions and disciplines. Not only will that ensure they stay aligned to the larger goal but also agility (with an ear to the ground) to shift gears quickly when required. This also needs to be a two-way exchange with the frequent reiteration of the team’s role in the achievement of the organization’s strategic objective, to ensure they receive a wholehearted support from others.

Talent, today is the most scarce resource organizations are struggling with and star talent doubly so. Carefully deployed, they hold the potential to bring multi-fold benefits to organizations. The best companies haven’t been found to have more stars – their success lies in how they cluster them together.

Picture credits: www. pexels.com, www.unsplash.com