Unlocking Team Potential - McKinsey's Core Areas & Hawkins' Five Disciplines

Unlocking Team Potential

McKinsey's Core Areas & Hawkins' Five Disciplines

When I was reading the McKinsey article titled "Go, teams: When teams get healthier, the whole organization benefits" (October 31, 2024), I immediately started seeing the connections between McKinsey's core areas and Hawkins' Five Disciplines. This inspired me to conduct an analysis to connect the two, which I'll share below.

Discover how McKinsey's core areas of team effectiveness can be achieved through Peter Hawkins' Five Disciplines Model.

Understanding the Link

McKinsey's Team Effectiveness Index (TEI) provides a comprehensive framework for assessing and improving team performance. It identifies key drivers of team health, including role clarity, alignment, effective execution, and continuous renewal. However, while McKinsey highlights what effective teams look like, it doesn't prescribe a specific methodology for achieving these outcomes. This is where Peter Hawkins' Five Disciplines Model comes into play, offering a structured approach to develop these key areas and drive team effectiveness.

McKinsey's Four Core Areas

McKinsey's Four Core Areas focus on different aspects of team effectiveness:

1. Configuration
   Do we have role clarity and the necessary mix of internal and external perspectives?

2. Alignment
   Are we committed to the team and are we clear on our purpose and goals?

3. Execution
   Are we effectively carrying out our day-to-day work?

4. Renewal
   Do we create the right working environment and enact practices for long-term learning and improvement?

The Five Disciplines Model

Peter Hawkins' Five Disciplines Model is an exemplary framework that provides a systematic approach to creating high-value teams. Each discipline addresses critical aspects of team dynamics, ensuring that teams are not only effective but also resilient, adaptive, and innovative.

1. Commissioning
   Focuses on defining the team's purpose and aligning it with organizational goals. This involves contracting with stakeholders on what the team must deliver, creating a common purpose that guides all team activities.

2. Clarifying
   Emphasizes the importance of clear objectives, strategy, operations, delivery, systems, and roles. By clarifying roles and responsibilities, teams ensure that every member understands their contribution to the collective endeavour.

3. Co-creating
   Addresses the interpersonal and team dynamics that shape team culture. Co-creating fosters collaboration and innovation, leveraging the diverse perspectives and skills within the team.

4. Connecting
   Involves engaging with all key stakeholders, both within and outside the organization. This discipline emphasizes the importance of building robust communication channels and fostering strong relationships with stakeholders.

5. Core Learning
   Encourages continuous reflection, learning, and integration of new insights. This discipline ensures that teams remain agile, adaptable, and prepared for future challenges.

Configuration & Clarifying

Configuration (McKinsey) emphasizes clear roles and diverse perspectives within the team. This aligns perfectly with Clarifying (Hawkins), which focuses on defining collective goals and roles for clarity. By ensuring every team member understands their contribution and the broader mission, teams can operate more cohesively and effectively. This directly supports several of McKinsey's health drivers:

• Diverse Perspectives
  Teams benefit from a mix of perspectives that drive their work forward.

• External Orientation
  Teams stay connected to networks outside their core group to gain new insights.

• Role Definition
  Clear understanding of individual roles and responsibilities within the team.

Alignment & Commissioning & Clarifying

Alignment (McKinsey) ensures commitment to team goals and clarity on purpose. This core area is strongly supported by Hawkins' concepts of Commissioning and Clarifying, which involve understanding stakeholder needs and defining specific goals. Together, these elements ensure that teams are not only clear on their objectives but also aligned with organizational priorities and stakeholder expectations. This alignment is crucial for achieving McKinsey's health drivers:

• Commitment
  Team members are dedicated to the team’s success over their own.

• Goals
  Challenging individual and team goals aligned with organizational priorities.

• Purpose
  A clear, shared understanding of what the team is meant to accomplish.

Execution & Co-creating

Execution (McKinsey) focuses on effective day-to-day work. Co-creating (Hawkins) enhances this by fostering generative collaboration within the team. By leveraging diverse skills and perspectives, teams can innovate and solve problems more effectively, leading to improved execution of tasks and projects. This approach addresses several of McKinsey's health drivers:

• Collaboration
  Agreed-upon norms that enhance teamwork and improve ways of working.

• Communication
  Effective and sufficient communication using the right methods.

• Decision Making
  Clear roles in decision-making processes, quick and high-quality decisions, and learning from poor decisions.

• Feedback
  Honest and effective feedback, inviting direct feedback, and receiving coaching support.

• Meeting Effectiveness
  Focus on actionable items, involving the right people at the right time, and following through on next steps.

Renewal & Core Learning

Renewal (McKinsey) emphasizes creating a sustainable working environment and practices for long-term learning and improvement. Core Learning (Hawkins) complements this by encouraging teams to reflect, learn, and integrate new insights continuously. This ensures teams remain agile, adaptive, and prepared for future challenges. This aligns with McKinsey's health drivers:

• Belonging
  Team members feel they are part of the team and can be themselves.

• Conflict Management
  Addressing conflicts effectively to improve team relationships.

• Innovative Thinking
  Seeking out opposing perspectives, having open discussions about change, and encouraging out-of-the-box thinking.

• Psychological Safety
  Feeling comfortable making mistakes and taking risks without fear of negative consequences.

• Recognition
  Recognizing excellent performance, celebrating accomplishments, and holding each other to consistent performance standards.

• Trust
  Relying on one another, giving each other space to get work done, and demonstrating good judgment.

Connecting: Engaging with Stakeholders

Effective communication and stakeholder engagement are the cornerstones of successful teams, as highlighted by both McKinsey and Hawkins. The Connecting capacity in the 5C model emphasizes the importance of collective endeavor, focusing on the need for teams to connect with all stakeholders within and outside the organization. This involves engaging with customers, suppliers, partners, and the broader community. Building robust internal and external communication channels, spreading enthusiasm, and ensuring that the team’s message and purpose resonate beyond their immediate group are essential. Engaging with stakeholders ensures alignment, support, and collaborative effort, creating a robust network that enhances the team’s ability to achieve its goals. This is in line with McKinsey's health drivers:

• Collaboration and Teamwork
  Fostering collaboration and teamwork within and outside the team.

• Stakeholder Relationships
  Building strong relationships with stakeholders.

• Communication
  Ensuring open and effective communication channels.

• Trust and Safety
  Establishing a safe and trusting environment for team members.

Achieving Team Excellence

By applying Hawkins' Five Disciplines, teams can achieve McKinsey's three key outcomes: efficiency, results, and innovation. Hawkins' model provides a clear methodology to reach these outcomes by addressing all of McKinsey's drivers, including the four main drivers: trust, communication, innovative thinking, and decision making.

McKinsey's insights highlight the importance of these drivers, but they don't provide a specific methodology to achieve them. This is where Hawkins' model excels, offering a structured approach to develop these key areas and drive team effectiveness. By mastering the Five Disciplines, teams can ensure they are not only meeting but exceeding the expectations set by McKinsey's research. Additionally, fostering increased employee satisfaction is crucial for long-term success, making Hawkins' model a comprehensive solution for team development.

Unlock Your Team's Full Potential

Let’s work together to transform your teams from good to great. After all, if McKinsey and Hawkins can align so beautifully, imagine what we can achieve together!

Sources

Professor Peter Hawkins - 5 Disciplines model - Renewal Associates: Renewal Associates
McKinsey Article: Go, teams: When teams get healthier, the whole organization benefits