Dynamic Re-Teaming with Heidi Helfand

Key Takeaways: 8. Episode – Heidi Helfand


Passionate teams are motivated


Yeah, a passionate team to me is a team that's comprised of
people that are motivated. They're very interested, intrigued and
driven to do the work of the team. There's something about it
that they feel like they're making an impact and they know it,
and so they strive to come up with unique solutions to achieve
the goals that they have from their customers.


Team chemistry by giving choice


You know, I think that if people have the freedom to choose their
teams, maybe there's a greater chance that the teams will have
chemistry, which the people will want to work together. Maybe the
people choose to work together. I think giving a choice in a
team, is something that, it's almost like risk management for
team chemistry, If people have a choice.


Sometimes people need to work with others


Forming, storming, norming, performing and you know, sometimes I
think, yeah, if a team is together too long, they could feel like
they're stagnating. Maybe there's not enough diversity of thought
[…]. You could try to change it up and bring in different work or
start a book club or something, but sometimes people just need to
work with others.


Change is also a personal choice


So it's a business decision how the rate at which you grow, it's
kind of like stepping on a gas pedal fast or slow. But then it's
also a personal choice, I think. Just like our opinions about
change in general, I might be a person that wants more change, or
maybe I might be a person that prefers more stability and less
change, and I think that's valid.


It's valid to not change your team


And it's valid not to change it. So I'm not saying bust up all
your teams, I'm not saying dynamically change all your teams as
fast as you can, what I am saying is that reteaming the ability
to change is an option that I think is left out of many of the
discussions in software development best practices. It should be
on the table for many reasons that are valid and then sometimes
invalid. Team change is gonna happen, so you might as well get
good at it.


Tap into the interests and needs of the people


Yeah, I would say really try to tap into the, get to know people.
Tap into their interests. What motivates them? We're motivated by
different things. You know, have one on ones. Talk in groups. Be
open to enabling people to grow maybe into a different role or
into a different squad, into a different team or to working on
something else like really try to tap into the interests and
needs of the people and really support them to help them into the
directions that they want, and it's the sweet spot when you find
the direction that the person wants to go when it's in step with
the direction the company wants to go. So I think through having
close relationships, we can make this happen.


About Heidi:


http://www.heidihelfand.com/about/