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The magic of a dream team: three ingredients that make life memorable

There are three key ingredients that can make team life magical: mutual trust, widespread responsibility, common vision

8 May 2024

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"There are moments in the life of a team when you feel the magic. Those moments in which no problem is experienced with discouragement, in which you know you can always count on the people in the team, in which you are happy to be where you are and wouldn't want to be anywhere else in the world'. Of an evening at Pizza Popolare (Milan Via Albani 61) with Giovanni Rossi, Head of Human Connections Tribe at ING Italia, these words remain in my head like a prop. And Giovanni's invitation at the end of the evening: 'We need to talk about this, because this is what we need. And work on it'.

We have all had experiences like those described by John. If we leave aside the participation in spin-offs and the launch of start-ups or new products, which are stories in themselves, and focus on the life of teams within organisations, two interesting and highly topical questions arise. The first is: how is this magic created? The second is: is it really magic?

Let's start with the second question: the answer is yes, but also no (Crozza docet). The answer is YES because there are moments in the life of a team when everyone is pervaded by a special, exhilarating, generative sense of unity and participation. Purpose, goals, deadlines, sense of purpose, presentations are pervasive in the life of each team member, they are the first thought in the morning and the last at night before falling asleep. In those moments, that particular challenge, big or small, is lived as if it were a 'matter of life and death', as what gives meaning to daily living, as purpose personal before professional or corporate. Those moments, which may last weeks, months or, more rarely, years, are and will be indelible in the memory of those who experienced them. In this sense, the answer is YES, they are indeed magical experiences, because magical - in the sense of prodigious and extraordinary - are the emotions and sensations they generate. The answer is NO, it is not really magic, because this effect - experiences, emotions, aftershocks - is not the result of tricks, potions, concoctions or incantations as is generally the case in things of magic; rather, it is the outcome of hard, constant and precise work and, also, of a fair dose of luck, which is imponderable in human affairs, be they business or personal.

So let us return to the first and overriding question: how is this magic created?There are three key ingredients that can make team life magical: mutual trust, widespread responsibility, common vision. Ingredients that should not be considered nice-to-have (it would be nice if they were there), but three must-haves (you must have them, they are necessary). You cannot make bread without water and flour (salt, yeast and everything else are optional, according to taste).

Trust breeds speed, efficiency, a widespread sense of security, results. And results in turn fuel mutual trust (see the article The Connection Between Employee Trust and Financial Performance - Harvard Business Review - July 2016). Mutual trust has two foundations: professional esteem between team members and a common value asset. Below a certain threshold of professional esteem, a team cannot be expected to be cohesive and work effectively and efficiently. Professional esteem concerns the consideration each member has for the ability of the other team member to do his job, to fulfil his role or to manage his area of responsibility. If there are doubts about the skills and competences of even one person in the team, the appropriateness of his or her level of execution and suitability for the position he or she holds, trust is lost. Other people's thoughts will be focused on possible mistakes, the risks of each decision and unexplored alternatives. There are two values that, together with professional esteem, form the basis for mutual trust: intellectual honesty and knowing that you can count on the support of other team members. The first is 'conditio sine qua non': always take it for granted that no team member lies, is dishonest, or does not tell the whole truth. The second has to do with widespread responsibility.

Sometimes people still think that being responsible means being accountable for one's actions. Widespread responsibility takes on another idea of responsibility (philosophers Salvatore Natoli and Laura Boella, among others, have written extensively about it): that is, of he or she who behaves in a balanced and thoughtful manner, always consciously bearing in mind the dangers and damage that his or her actions and decisions could entail, for himself or herself and for others, and always tries to avoid any harmful behaviour. Responsible in this sense is one who recognises and seeks to avoid choices or decisions that may harm or damage another team member or have a negative impact on others. Responsible is, in the case of a trade-off to be managed, one who sits down at the table together with the other team members and, on the basis of common criteria, makes the best possible decision, trying to understand how to manage any damage or side effects together, orienting the decision towards 'the global optimum and not the local optimum' (to use the words of a manager with whom I happened to work recently). Widespread responsibility also implies feeling the goals, challenges and difficulties of every other team member as one's own: his fatigue is my fatigue, his failure is my failure, his satisfaction is my satisfaction (and not the other way around, as is still too often the case today). But what can be, in the case of trade offs, the common criteria? What can help choose the global optimum over the local optimum? This is where the third ingredient, the common vision, comes into play.

It is easier to have acommon vision when you have vision and a common vision. It is not just a play on words: a common vision makes it possible to share a common vision. A common vision is usually based on a common idea of good: the good you want to pursue, the legacy you want to generate. The explicit answer to certain questions is, in this sense, necessary: what is the team's common idea of good, that idea for which the team members have come together and chosen each other (even if perhaps at the beginning of their adventure they found themselves together not by choice but by fortuitous circumstances or by someone else's decision)? What is that idea of good that holds these people together and for which they are putting all their resources, energy, emotions and skills to work (so much so that they wake up in the morning and go to bed at night having as their first thought the common challenge they are experiencing together with all the other team members)? Salvatore Settis stated in an interview that the common good means, among other things, "cultivating a far-sighted vision, investing in the future, putting legacy first".

It happens to meet people who claim that there is not always, in a team or in an organisation, a common good or a common idea of good. In my personal experience and in the experience of many who have experienced 'magic situations', however small or not fully declared and aware, I have always found a common idea of good as the 'moving force' of all team members.

*Partner of Newton S.p.a..

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The magic of a dream team: three ingredients that make life memorable

There are three key ingredients that can make team life magical: mutual trust, widespread responsibility, common vision

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