Lone Heroes and Giant Enterprises
Rather, and oddly, our attention and the prevailing media storyline tend to skip teams altogether and focus on two antipodes of business success: the lone hero and the giant enterprise.
This is both surprising and tragic. Surprising, because upon closer look no great modern enterprise of any kind can operate without having, at its core, teams of every different size and composition. Tragic, because by all-but ignoring the critical role of teams in the modern organization, we fail to take advantage of their unique powers – alertness, adaptability, maneuverability – in an age that demands these powers.
To miss the importance of teams, therefore, is a costly mistake – and avoidable. Thanks to the latest research by sociologists, anthropologists, neuroscientists, cognition researchers, historians and behaviorists, we have a better understanding of how teams are created, composed and operate than at any time in human history. These discoveries are waiting to be put to use. The best companies will put them to use.
At a time when two billion more people around the world are entering the global marketplace, when tech-driven change is speeding up, when the survival of both nations and enterprises will depend upon their ability to quickly identify change and then adapt to it, teams – that oldest of human institutions – are more vital than ever. So we owe it to ourselves to understand them and to help them operate at highest potential. Not just our success, but our very survival, may depend upon them.