It’s often assumed that teams are moving together in the same direction with a strong and mutual commitment to shared goals. In reality, individual commitment levels can range from low to high, which influences how the team works together and whether team members perform at their peak. The first step in cultivating a strong commitment across the team is to recognize the presence of common disruptors. Identifying and addressing these commitment issues will allow your team to come together without reservation to achieve a common purpose.
Unidentified Flying Objects
Your team members can’t commit to what they can’t clearly define. When a team’s mission and vision is left unarticulated, team commitment is diminished because the direction is fuzzy at best. Vague project goals and poorly bounded scope are similar culprits in confusing a strong sense of direction that garners team commitment.
Nail it down: By clarifying and communicating the team’s shared mission, vision, and specific project goals, team members can commit wholeheartedly to moving forward together.
Within-team Competition
On the surface, teams compete collectively against other teams (within the organization or outside of it). Yet, behind-the-scenes there are myriad ways in which team members may be competing with one another. Individual goals may war against collective goals or team members may be motivated to outshine their teammates in search of accolades or promotion opportunities. In any case, these internal competitions hinder team commitment by dividing loyalties and undermining high quality contributions.
Incentivize collectivism: Create rewards that recognize collective achievements and minimize internal competition so team members are incentivized to act in the best interest of the team.
Lack of Fit or Belonging
Sometimes a team member just doesn’t belong. This may be due to a lack of role fit or a sense of being an outsider. Either way, team members with low team identification (identity tied to being a member of the team) will experience lower commitment to the team as well. When an individual’s identity is only loosely connected to the shared identity of the team, it will not matter much to the person whether the team excels or merely plods along.
Bring outsiders in: Examine your team’s in-group/out-group dynamics and work to create a strong sense of belonging by cultivating collective identity so each team member can say, I belong here and my contribution to the team matters.
Social Loafing
Commitment to shared goals suffers when some team members simply aren’t pulling their weight. This can occur for a variety of reasons, many of which are unintentional and not the result of laziness. For instance, skill levels, stages of the project, and personality can influence how much of the work individual team members take on. However, when workloads are unevenly distributed among team members, it hurts everyone’s sense of camaraderie as overworked members may become resentful and underworked team members get bored.
Share the load: The twofold solution involves first identifying the tasks that need to be tackled, then thoughtfully and fairly distributing the work, giving everyone a chance to contribute in substantive and meaningful ways to the final project.