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My Experience in Building High-Performance Software Development Teams
You can’t do it alone, even if you try hard!
The first expectation from any technology leader is that they build high-performance teams. If you think you can build a high-performing team single-handedly, you have got it all wrong. Building a great team requires effort from everyone in the team.
The Most Important Ingredient
The best teams are not created overnight by hiring top-performing individuals but by laying the foundation for a great culture.
Culture is what differentiates the high-performing from the weak and mediocre teams. A weak culture is like a sandcastle, the next wave or storm will wither it away. No matter how beautiful it looks, it will not stand the test of time.
Since we have established that the first ingredient in creating a great culture, the next logical question is how do we do it and what role does everyone play in it.
Setting up a new refreshed team fabric is an arduous task. It’s human behavior to resist change and go back to old ways of working. However its not hard as it seems. Everyone likes to follow a new habit if they see the benefit in it.
As a leader, your job is to set the team fabric and inspire people on the benefits a great culture will have for everyone. It's about analyzing your current behaviors and then either keeping or changing them for better ones together as a team. Once you have done that, it's time for the leader to move away and let the team drive those every day. As I said, you can’t do it alone, the team needs to exhibit behaviors that showcase how awesome the team is and creates a great environment for everyone.
“Determine what behaviors and beliefs you value as a company, and have everyone live true to them. These behaviors and beliefs should be so essential to your core, that you don’t even think of it as culture.” — Brittany Forsyth, VP of Human Relations, Shopify
Other Ingredients
Once you have set up your team for a great culture, the next thing is to provide a playground. In team sports, as the captain of the team you define the strategy and execution, but don’t…
