Interviews: The What and When of Team Agreements

First in a four-part series on updating our approach to team agreements

Author

Elise Keith
April 17, 2024

Hi there

In this update, we continue our probe into the evolution of collaborative teamwork and the strategies that support adaptive teaming.

Today, teams create collaborative clarity by forming agreements that outline how they'll work together. These agreements take many forms, some of which prove more useful than others. To learn which formats and approaches yield reliable value, I interviewed people with decades of successes (and failures) to glean their insights.

This episode is the first of four, establishing what these agreements are and when teams create them. In the following episodes, we'll hear about the specific agreements these experts recommend, how to ensure an agreement gets used, and their ideas for adapting this practice in the future.

Now, check out episode 1.

🚀 Episode Title: Future-Fit Team Agreements: What They Are and When We Need Them

🔍 Episode Description: In this episode, we learn the modern history of team agreements and compare perspectives from six pioneering experts. Listen in as they share their insights on when teams need to form strong working agreements, the challenges of aligning objectives, and the hard-won tips on what doesn't work.

🎧 Listen Now: here or watch on YouTube here.

👉 Episode Highlights:

  • Hear stories from the worlds of music, retail, construction, software, and more

  • Identify common missteps that prevent teams from reaching an agreement

  • Compare approaches from multi-day team interventions to quick conversations

  • Understand the relationship between Personal User Manuals and Team Agreements

🌟 Our Guests:  All of our guests are authors, business founders, and have decades of experience serving collaborative teams. You'll hear stories from Gustavo Razetti (Fearless Culture), Jim Benson (Modus Institute), Gwen Stirling Wilkie (Omni-Working), Bud Caddell (Nobl), Mark Kilby (Differability), and Lisette Sutherland (Collaboration Superpowers)

👉 Episode Timestamps:

  • 00:41 - Introduction to the Series

  • 01:56 - Gustavo Razetti loves culture design

  • 02:23 - Meet Jim Benson and the band

  • 03:08 - Gwen Stirling Wilkie's first experience with team agreements

  • 03:48 - Bud Caddell learns from failure

  • 04:35 - Mark Kilby the software team whisperer

  • 05:47 - Lisette Sutherland makes remote great

  • 07:49 - When teams need agreements

  • 12:18 - Beware too much cohesion

  • 12:58 - Defining working teams

  • 15:55 - The team agreement format

  • 22:35 - Putting first things first

🎧 Listen Now: here or watch on YouTube here.

About Our Guests

To learn more about and connect with our guests, visit their websites and follow them on LinkedIn:

Don't miss out on this enlightening conversation! Take a listen and share your insights and questions in the comments. Then, stay tuned for more answers in the episodes to come.

Elise & Dave

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