A little over a year ago, I attended the “Building Successful Teams” panel at LAVA’s Investment Capital Conference. I was blown away by the great advice the panelists had to offer, particularly with regards to team chemistry. If I took away one thing from the panel it was the importance of teamwork as explained in The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Ted Alexander of Mission Ventures. Coming from the ivory tower world of consulting, I hadn’t really given much thought to how important teams and relationships are to the success of a startup.

Since that panel, I’ve constantly been thinking about how to improve teamwork. A half-dozen management personalities, in a high-stress, rapidly changing, high-cash burn environment can result in unusual team chemistry. Emotional reactions, heated debates, passive-aggressiveness are all too common among early stage management teams. However, this isn’t necessarily bad if such dynamics are channeled into startup energy, and thus the team is able to become a more productive group.

I recently came across a post by Will Price of Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, who offers some excellent advice.

In managing start-ups and in building a culture open to change and to iteration, it really helps to arm the team to recognize that under stress we tend to react badly, and in the negative reaction we hamper the ability to maintain cohesion and our credibility.

It is important to ask people to be self-aware of their coping mechanisms and yours, to be aware of what triggers a negative reaction, and to develop good tools for effectively processing stress and defusing tension.
Some well known tools involve, listening, asking questions and for clarification, remembering not to take things personally, patience, acknowledgment of others, being dependable and trustworthy.

I think we can all recall instances where we could have used those tools to improve teamwork, and perhaps as many instances where we noticed others who could have done the same.� Next time we find ourselves in a high-stress, conflict ridden situations, be sure to take a second to think about the situation, the consequences of reactions and what can be done to resolve.

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