Enabling teams to give their best - When I approach CEOs with this topic, they almost always think this is important for the teams reporting to them. Yes, the operations team needs to work more effectively. That business unit needs a boost in productivity. In the organisation, the different functions need to work closer together across the silos. While these are important areas for improvement, we forget one important team.

What about that team on the top? The CxOs forming a team together with the CEO. How important is it that they are a highly effective team?

In my experience, when this group of people are not enabled to give their best, it will slow down the entire organisation. Here are some of my observations:

• The air is cold on the top and often the team members on the top feel that they are in competition rather than collaboration with their peers; no mistakes allowed
• Based on this they have to rely on themselves and their own judgement to make decisions and are not able to rely on the broader wisdom of their peers
• The strained collaboration on the top is setting a standard for poor collaboration on other levels in the organisation; this results in silo mentality and a culture that does not allow experimentation
• Further, I observe that there is very few laughter and joy on the top level; a positivity and lightness is missing; two elements that are vital for intrinsic motivation and unleashing people's full potential

What can we do as CEOs to build stronger bonds, create a solid team that is effective and is setting the right platform for a great company culture? Here are some simple steps:

1. Focus on shared goals that go a) beyond financial targets and b) requires involvement of all the CxO members.
2. Engage your peers in a frequent dialogue and practice joint decision making; the result should be a shared leadership, while maintaining clear roles & accountability.
3. Define working and collaboration principles that you would to aspire to be adopted across the entire organisation; and be mindful to practice them yourselves.
4. Spend time together outside of the work context; get to know each other; like any other highly effective team.

Where do you see the barriers to effectiveness in your team? When will you schedule your next CxO lunch?

"Hope is not enough: turning vision into climate action!" This was one of the themes of the second Green Tech Festival held in Singapore. And for concrete and lasting action, I believe we need two essential ingredients: innovation & culture. This was a theme that weaved throughout the presentations and panels at the conference.

One example that stood out for me was the Hot Heart - a project with the purpose of decarbonising the district heating system in the Finnish capital. One the one hand, the technical solution is innovative in a way that it integrates the energy storage component when harvesting renewable energy for keeping the citizens warm.

On the other hand, the transformed the technocractic solution with an experience for its community: establishing a all-year tropical island right in front of the city gates. Why is this important? In this way  you bring the technology closer to the people, allow them to interact and benefit from the solution - in a very direct way. This will accelerate acceptance and inspire new innovation.

We at Hive17 believe that driving a sustainability culture in your organisation will drastically increase the adoption of climate action and in turn your efforts in substantial triple-bottom-line benefits.

How will your start your internal movement?

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Learn more about The Hot Heart.

Most companies are stuck in their corporate patterns: large overhead costs and bureaucratic burdens; a focus on short-term results; an inert workforce following a handful of leaders; exposure to bias and unfairness. We sort of know it is wrong, but we don't have the means to change to the better.

Except for one company! Very few people heard of the company Gore (mainly famous for its Gore-Tex fabrics) which churns out 3 billion USD of revenue with 9'000 employees worldwide. Gore has a very different management philosophy: no hierarchy, family feeling, CEO is selected via a poll, etc. The fundamental belief at Gore is that individuals know what's right for the company and success comes from collaboration in small teams; "we are all in the same boat". Followed by the guiding principles of freedom, fairness, commitment, transparency.

On my side, I love to share the story of Gore in order to inspire and show, it is possible to lead differently. Enabling leaders to think out of the box and facilitate change. Here are a few of the elements that define the leadership innovation at Gore:

1. Commitment, instead of assignment - focus on the Why and the understanding; touch people passion
2. Motivate the right behaviour - no complicated criteria, and embrace simple voting; enable ownership (shares) in the company
3. 10% working time to find fellows working on new ideas
4. Success comes from ensuring the culture is healthy and supporting innovation ('enabling teams to give their best')
5. Scaling is easy because Gore has a distributed management system; authority is pushed to the operating teams
6. At the core is culture! This drives the right behaviour in distributed, self-organising teams

Reading through this story, I see Hive17's Human Operating System confirmed: we need to start with a shared direction; then creativity comes up with solutions; experimentation allows to polish these ideas; and solid relationships motivate and allow fast decision-making.

How do you enable your teams to give their best?


Source: ​Innovation Democracy: W.L. Gore's Original Management Model
Photo Credit: Charlie Bibby, FT