Teams of Leaders (ToL)
is a method for rapidly building and effectively employing
cross-boundary High Performing Leader Teams (HPLTs) unified by their
shared capacity to learn and adapt together, and to make and execute
decisions based on actionable understanding™ shared
among collaborating teams under pressure of complex, rapidly changing
operational environments. HPLTs involved in the definition of
missions and strategies based on shared actionable understanding
perform as Collaborating Command Teams™.
THE ORIGIN OF THE TEAMS OF LEADERS APPROACH
The
concept of Teams of Leaders has been developed by the US Army to help
it to interact with the civilian world of the post-Cold War era, and to
promote utilization of the immense intellectual, business, and
logistics capabilities of the Army in the service of the civilian
authorities. In addition, the ToL concept served to strengthen
the existing relationships with the long-standing allies of the US, and
to form new ones with the large number of rapidly emerging partners.
The original goal of the Teams of Leaders concept was to fill the
structural gap in situations where a single authority and a single
shared purpose were typically either unclear, subject to external
manipulation, or entirely absent. Hence, the driving force behind
the Teams of Leaders approach was the wish to promote an environment
that builds common understanding, and develops mutual trust and
confidence among a wide variety of professional, organizational, and
national teams forced to act jointly in the often turbulent setting of
the contemporary political, economic, and social world.
Ultimately, ToL policies, programs and practices were found to be
equally applicable across both the military and civilian governmental,
non-governmental, and corporate entities acting in the joint,
inter-agency, inter-governmental, and multinational (JIIM) setting of
globalized activities. The transition of ToL from the military to
the civilian sphere of activities was largely afforded through the work
of the Center for Collaborative Command and Leadership (CCCL, formerly
Center for Collaborative Leadership in Healthcare - CCLH).
Presently, the ToL concept serves as the unique and exceptionally well
suited tool in the development of collaboration among entities involved
in missions executed at all levels of the civil society and of the
corporate world.
What makes Teams of Leaders different?
The
Teams of Leaders concept is radically different from currently used
methods to build leaders within hierarchical organizational structures.
ToL provides a deliberate approach to forming and launching
collaborative, cross-boundary High Performing Leader Teams capable of
close cooperation and collaboration across boundaries of organizations,
cultures, and professions. Whenever required, ToL-based HPLTs are
highly capable to define organizational missions and lead their
execution. Such Collaborative Command Leader Teams™
offer a particular advantage in all activities of large, often globally
distributed organizations involved in complex tasks, by facilitating
mission execution at the local level, coordinating it with global
organizational strategies, and improving communication among all
involved actors.
ToL is mission-focused. The task execution of a shared mission is based on the concept of actionable understanding™,
i.e., the state that defines the final, binding and shared
parameters of the mission and its purpose, the form and pattern of its
execution, the allotment of tasks, responsibilities for task execution
and coordination within the mission, timelines of performance and its
milestones, the nature of interaction, and the rules of conduct
accepted and shared within individual Teams and among all collaborating
High Performing Leader Teams. The state of actionable understanding is the common effector pathway of all ToL-based interactions.
ToL represents a completely new approach to leadership that is well
suited to high tempo activities in environments of increasing
complexity, where uncertainty and unpredictably are the norm rather
than the exception, and where success is contingent on the closest
possible collaboration of all actors involved in the operation.
THE TEAMS OF LEADERS ADVANTAGE
Consistent use of the ToL approach assures High Performing Leader Teams rapidly acquire the critical competitive advantage: situational awareness.
The acquisition is not only rapid, but also continuously updated; the
teams are granted an unprecedented, shared, real-time understanding of
all nuances of the situation in which they operate. Consequent to the
shared understanding is the subsequent clear and equally shared
perception of all immediate and forthcoming operational requirements
that are or may be demanded by the Teams’ drive to success.
Rapid
development of situational awareness is generated and supported by the
shared purpose, trust and confidence that are the essential trait of
intensely collaborating and collaborative High Performing Leader Teams.
The transcending state of actionable understanding™
is the output of all interactions within individual and among all
participating Teams: it is the final pathway of a closely orchestrated
collaborative effort in which focused execution of all tasks, and the
elevated speed and quality of performance guarantee the complete
success in the achievement of the predetermined goal.
The
ToL approach has proven its validity and value in successfully
improving the output generated by hierarchical (vertical) and in
peer-to-peer (horizontal) teams within the same organization as much as
in cross boundary environments, i.e. where activities are spread across
independent agencies, corporate entities, or departments either within
the same geographical/national region or internationally, across the
globe.
THE STRUCTURE OF THE TEAMS OF LEADERS ENVIRONMENT
ToL has three components: people -the core component of high performing leader teams, and the enablers, information management (IM) and knowledge management (KM).
The first, and the most critical element, “People” consists of High
Performing Leader Teams (HPLT). The other two components, IM and KM
provide the “operational grease” of ToL.
The IM component makes ToL virtual and networked, whether team members
are co-located or dispersed throughout the world. The KM
component focuses on the activities directly related to people: the
operating procedures, business, and learning processes required of an
advanced learning environment in order to build the critical shared
skills, knowledge and attitudes - shared vision, shared trust, shared confidence, shared competence.
While technology is intimately intertwined with
the people aspect of ToL, it is the synergy emerging from the tightly
intertwined interaction of the three components that provides the
integral and indispensible constituent of the ToL approach. Technology
becomes an enabler of change and action rather than merely a popular
and largely mis-utilized fad or a reluctantly faced necessity.
The identification, creation, organization and
transfer of knowledge in a deliberate and meaningful way, facilitated
through consistent use of technology, fertilizes the formation and
launching of the leader teams and the development of critical
shared skills, knowledge and attitudes that bind individual team
members into highly collaborative entities.
TRAINING TEAMS OF LEADERS
Building
shared skills (behaviors), knowledge, and attitudes drives high levels
of adaptive leader-team performance. This leader-team development
requires a significant foundation of experiential learning based on
repeated, coached and deliberate practice through Leader Team
Development Exercises or LTXs. Like all training exercises, LTXs are
structured to provide for continuous retention and mastery of acquired
skills, while continuously introducing new ones. Through the
pattern of ongoing activities, HPLT members are prepared for activities
which are performed in environments of increasing complexity.
Initially, LTXs are executed under the direction of highly trained
coaches/mentors. Ultimately, however, the proficiency level of
individual Teams and Team associations reaches the level at which LTXs
can be executed by the Teams themselves. At this stage, ToL
coaches/trainers become ”on demand” advisors and mentors.
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