How do we want to work together?
I’ve participated in many team development sessions and facilitated plenty of workshops over the years. Inevitably, one of the first activities is to set some ground rules for the conversation. Most groups come up with the usual stuff: confidentiality, active listening, assuming positive intent, etc. All good things.
Occasionally, when you open up the “ground rules” or “group norms” conversation with a team, the list gets too lengthy – and people can’t remember what they agreed to. It feels like we need make tough choices and limit the list to a more manageable number.
The Firm Five worksheet is my attempt to turn defining ground rules into a conversation – not a brainstorming exercise. For project teams it might speed up the conversation and build consensus a little sooner.
The sheet proposes 10 possible ground rules (with additional space to add your own). You simply ask every member of the team to mark the ground rules that matter most for the project. The next step is to compare notes. Any ground rule that has complete agreement is automatically accepted, then the group can discuss the ones where they differ.
If you really want to take it to the next level with your team, ask the group which behaviours you expect to see (or not see) for each ground rule.
Give it a try and shoot me some feedback. What am I missing?
Firm Five Worksheet (1.0 MB)
Copyright, Use and Distribution
This worksheet is part of our Worksheet Wednesdays experiment. It is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. You are free to copy and redistribute this worksheet. You can remix it or adapt it to your purposes, providing you share your revised version too. If you use this worksheet, please attribute Thirdway Think and link to thirdwaythink.com
Source of Inspiration
Nawaz, Sabina. (15 Jan 2018). How to Create Executive Team Norms – and Make them Stick. Harvard Business Review (website).