Optimize your team

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Introduction

Optimizing your teams allows you to strategically align team members with roles that capitalize on their strengths and expertise to achieve specific tasks. This boosts productivity but also ensures the effective utilization of organizational resources. A well-optimized team fosters collaboration, as individuals with complementary skills work seamlessly together, promoting a culture of innovation and problem-solving. 

Re-thinking your cross-functional team efforts is important as you consider shifting your processes to improve the uptake of the evidence that your organization creates or curates. For that reason, this tool provides you with the steps to take in order to ensure that your goals and aspired changes are informing your human resourcing and collaboration efforts. 

At a glance

  • What is cross-functional collaboration?
  • Building your team while fostering collaboration?
  • Managing cross-functional projects?
  • Fostering continuous improvement

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What is Cross-Functional Collaboration

Cross-functional collaboration is the strategy of aligning individuals from across functional areas of an organization to work together on a common goal. It requires promoting cooperation among a group of people with diverse skills and expertise.1

Successful cross-functional collaboration allows for:

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Effectiveness

Improved problem solving and innovation

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Enthusiasm

Augmented team confidence and motivation

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Efficiency

Increased organizational productivity

Expected challenges that come with cross-functional collaboration include:

  • Differing priorities across individuals or teams,
  • Varying mindsets among different departments, and
  • Gaps in knowledge as team members learn.

For this reason, it is important to have a systematic approach with shared ownership of the process in order for it to be successful. In the rest of the tool, you will find concrete strategies to build, manage, and improve upon your cross-functional team.

Building Your Team

Assembling a cross-functional team involves assembling individuals from various teams or departments that have complementary skills who will work together towards a common goal.

Recommended Steps

01

Define the Team’s Purpose

Find out who within your organization has the necessary skills for completing this project. Built a team with robust skills that complement one another.

02

Identify the Necessary Skills and Expertise

Think about what knowledge and skills are needed to achieve the team’s goals. What will the roles on this team look like?

03

Assemble Team Members

Find out who within your organization has the necessary skills for completing this project. Build a team with robust skills that complement one another.

04

Designate a Team Leader

Select one or two individuals to lead the team. Leadership experience is an asset to this role.

Building your team also includes building strong relationships within the team, which is crucial for collaboration, creating rapport, and fostering cooperation (especially given that you are creating your team with people from different professional backgrounds who may have very different styles of working and communicating. Three key strategies are to Listen, Lift, and Lead. 

Listen

Recognizing the diversity within teams, it is crucial to foster open communication channels. Encourage team members to share their thoughts and concerns through various tools, such as email, meetings, and messaging apps. Implement feedback mechanisms for continuous improvement in communication practices. Regularly assess and adjust strategies based on team input. Actively listen to team members, valuing their opinions and perspectives. Paraphrasing key points and demonstrating genuine interest ensures understanding and reinforces their value.

Lift

After actively listening to team members’ experiences, acknowledge and appreciate the diversity, including varied communication styles. Avoid assumptions and embrace learning from unique perspectives. Consider and incorporate diverse viewpoints, fostering transparency in information sharing to prevent misunderstandings and promote an open environment.

Lead

After actively listening to team members’ experiences, acknowledge and appreciate the diversity, including varied communication styles. Avoid assumptions and embrace learning from unique perspectives. Consider and incorporate diverse viewpoints, fostering transparency in information sharing to prevent misunderstandings and promote an open environment.

Managing Cross-Functional Projects

Effectively tracking and managing cross-functional projects is crucial for successfully enacting new processes to improve the uptake of your organizational resources. By incorporating the strategies below, organizations can navigate the complexity of cross-functional projects with efficiency and collaboration.

Listen

Recognizing the diversity within teams, it is crucial to foster open communication channels. Encourage team members to share their thoughts and concerns through various tools, such as email, meetings, and messaging apps. Implement feedback mechanisms for continuous improvement in communication practices. Regularly assess and adjust strategies based on team input. Actively listen to team members, valuing their opinions and perspectives. Paraphrasing key points and demonstrating genuine interest ensures understanding and reinforces their value.

Regular Communication

Create and maintain open communication channels

Communication is key, so establish a robust plan and leverage project management tools to streamline collaboration and task tracking. Foster a culture of cross-functional collaboration where team members actively share insights and solutions.

Timely Assessments

Assess your progress during and after the project

Identify and manage risks, and regularly assess progress using key performance indicators. Following project completion, conduct a post-project evaluation to capture lessons learned and improve future cross-functional initiatives. Remember that you can use external tools like Asana to help you with tracking.

Exercise

Articulate your goals and strategies
Once you have understood your cross-collaboration need, use the form below to explore how you would articulate your goals, communication strategy, and tracking plan.

01

Cross-Functional Project Goal
Write down your primary objective, timeline, and key team members

02

Communication Strategy
Write down your plan for communication throughout the project

03

Tracking Strategy
Write down your plan for progress tracking

Fostering Continuous Improvement

In the dynamic landscape of education, where needs and challenges evolve, an organization committed to continuous improvement can adapt swiftly. By encouraging a culture of ongoing reflection and refinement, your organization can ensure that its resources stay relevant and responsive to the evolving needs of educators. Cross-functional collaboration can become a catalyst for innovation, bringing diverse perspectives to the table and sparking creative solutions. 

Through a continuous improvement mindset, your organization can harness the collective intelligence of its cross-functional teams, identify areas for enhancement, and iteratively refine its strategies. This iterative approach not only enhances the quality and effectiveness of your resources but also positions your organization as a dynamic and responsive partner in the education ecosystem, contributing to sustained impact and positive outcomes.2

Strategies to Foster Improvement

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Document and Share Best Practices

Monitor the progress of the team to keep track of what works best. Promote sharing of key insights and new tools that may help the team work faster or resolve challenges.

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Create Initiatives for Improvement and Celebrate Achievements

Incentivize meeting key objectives with formal recognition and prizes. Make sure to acknowledge when members of the team meet their goals!

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Embrace a Growth Mindset

A growth mindset is the belief that hard work and effort will improve one’s abilities and intelligence. This is essential to encourage learning and professional development.

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Frequently Discuss Progress

Create a framework and timeline for regular evaluation of the team’s performance. Include ways for members of the team to self-assess their work.

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Promote a Culture of Learning

Craft a learning plan for new team members with key timepoints and learning objectives. Supply them with resources to understand the project and complete their tasks.

Alignment Worksheet

In the dynamic landscape of education, where needs and challenges evolve, an organization committed to continuous improvement can adapt swiftly. By encouraging a culture of ongoing reflection and refinement, your organization can ensure that its resources stay relevant and responsive to the evolving needs of educators. Cross-functional collaboration can become a catalyst for innovation, bringing diverse perspectives to the table and sparking creative solutions. 

Through a continuous improvement mindset, your organization can harness the collective intelligence of its cross-functional teams, identify areas for enhancement, and iteratively refine its strategies. This iterative approach not only enhances the quality and effectiveness of your resources but also positions your organization as a dynamic and responsive partner in the education ecosystem, contributing to sustained impact and positive outcomes.2

Exercise

Map the ecosystem of your organization

Fill the template

Complete the exercise by accessing our template. You can either download and use it online or print it for use with your team.
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Do you need help defining KPI’s?
Refer to the tool above to help you define key performance indicators

Related tool

Establish your metrics

What parameters can best inform your decision making?

Summary

Optimizing teams involves strategically aligning members with tasks that leverage their strengths, boosting productivity and resource efficiency. An optimized team fosters collaboration, innovation, and effective problem-solving. When shifting processes for increased evidence adoption, reevaluate cross-functional team strategies to align efforts with goals and desired changes. A systematic approach with collective ownership is crucial for the success of this process.

Key Takeaways

  • Map your organization’s key players and goals
  • Assemble a team with a clear purpose
  • Foster a culture of continuous improvement

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