Principles of Teamwork and Project Management

A true team collaborates while a group of individuals cooperate.

A true team has a high level of psychological safety and individual team members will embrace the concept of radical candor in how they interact.

A true team has team members who will put the team's success ahead of their own.

Dear Kiron
Thank you for participating in this reflection and for your opinion.

I agree with what you wrote

Mentioned two important Principles:
- Collaboration / Union
- Honesty

Do you think there are more Principles to consider?

Luis -

I think we want to distinguish principles which apply to any high-performing team from working agreements which are defined by a specific team. The former would be at a more general level whereas the latter would establish the ground rules for the interactions within the team.

Kiron

To keep it simple I will say 3 Cs are important principles - Communication, Collaboration, and Conflict Resolution

Trust and Honesty will be key for the above 3 Cs.

Hi Branco,

Working with great team & part of that team is a very valuable part in PM. Both Motivation & dedication is the main key point I think. Also good communication, cultural ethnicity & collaboration must be treated as equal venture for the same.

Luis,

Important topic, thank you for posting it. Here are a some of the quotes/principles that I have written related to teamwork.

- Faith in one's team accelerates results and breaks down barriers to success. Motivational speech has value, but the words often drift away before activities even begin. Whereas continuously presenting a belief in one’s team renders increased accountability and accomplishment, as the team will constantly strive to fulfill the words spoken over them.

- Rationed knowledge starves realization. Knowledge is the accelerant that, when applied to a flame, produces the energy one needs to succeed. However, when knowledge is quenched, the flame lacks the energy to propel one forward and success becomes out of reach.

- Isolation of extremes reveals knowledge and enables solutions. To reveal solutions, one must first isolate the extremes that polarize knowledge and then execute due diligence on the facts that remain. Otherwise, misinformation will prevail.

- Collaboration is easily defined and spoken to, but will be elusive if one does not practice it themselves. One cannot simply speak collaboration into existence, as it can only be properly communicated to others through the modeling of the practice itself.

- Reaching true consensus requires the absence of assumptions and the adoption of one's ability to be wrong. Surrendering to one’s self and others that you can be wrong creates an environment that yields consensus and successful outcomes. Whereas consensus made among those who are never wrong is "future discord" masked as an agreement.

- That which you are willing to do in the trenches for your team, establishes a care fund that pays dividends in perpetuity. When the team doesn't appear to be responding to your directives, check your location as you may be on a hilltop where one’s voice is distant and obscure. Therefore, place yourself in the midst of the team and provide personal value to their objectives and then watch what happens when you speak.

If you are interested, there is more detail on each of these, plus a lot of other quotes on different subjects in an article I wrote back in 2018 called “Strategic Lessons Learned From a Battle-Hardened Project Manager."

Let's get back to basics here. Principle is defined as "a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation"
The basic principle is the 'collaborative effort to achieve a common objective'.
Everything else (honesty, truth, communications, respect, transparency, fairness, etc) are the ways and means.

Dear Peter
Thank you for participating in this reflection and for your opinion.

What will it be to "respect others"?