1. Overcoming Conflict
and Building High
Performance Teams
Anna Brockhurst BSc (Hons), MSc
Rebekah Lane BSc (Hons), MSc, CPsychol.

2. Context

3. How do you create and sustain
high performing teams?
• “To qualify as a team, members
must rely on each other and share
a common goal.” (Millward, L.J. in
press)
• In organisations “Performance is
the primary objective while the
team remains the means, not the
end”. (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993)

4. Definitions
• High performance teams are commonly defined in terms of
their specific abilities and skills, their commitment to
challenging goals, and their high mutual trust.
• “High performance teams typically reflect strong extensions
of the basic characteristics of teams: deeper sense of
purpose, more ambitious performance goals, more complete
approaches, fuller mutual accountability, interchangeable as
well as complimentary skills.” (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993)

5. The Team Performance Curve
High-performing team
PERFORMANCE IMPACT Real team
Working
group
Potential
team
TEAM EFFECTIVENESS
Pseudo-team
Katzenbach J R and Smith D K (1993) The Wisdom of Teams. Creating the High Performance Organizations. Harvard Business School Press

6. Team Development Cycle
F O R M IN G S T O R M IN G N O R M IN G P E R F O R M IN G F O R M IN G S T O R M IN G N O R M IN G P E R F O R M IN G A D J O U R N IN G
H IG H H IG H
D e s ig n T e a m I n t r o d u c t io n o f D e liv e r y T e a m
LO W LO W
The blue line represents the morale of the team. The green line represents productivity.
Adapted from R.B. Lacoursiere, The Life Cycle of Groups: Group Development Stage Theory (New York:
Human Service Press, 1980).

7. Identity
• Social identity
• Social identity within the
organisational context

8. Conflict
• Extent of conflict in teams
• Difference between task and
relationship conflict
• Trust as the key component

9. Teams - A Perspective

10. Our Teams

11. Team 2
Team 1

12. Team 2

13. Team 3

14. Team 4

15. Analysis & Results
Performance
Conflict
Identity
Team cycle/stages
Characteristics

16. Conclusions
Achieving High
performance
Individual/team
performance
Organisational
context/need
Characteristics of a high
performing team

17. Application
• Increase awareness of the theory
of teamwork
• Coach team leaders
• Guidance for the formation and
development of teams
• Explain difference between task
and relationship conflict
• Building blocks for team members

18. Future exploration
• Research limitations
• Romance of teams “good or bad”
• Criticism of construction teams
• Performance – individual / team

19. Thank you for listening
Anna Brockhurst
Email: anna.brockhurst@arup.com
Rebekah Lane
Email: rebekah.lane@arup.com