Topic: Agile management
The notion of the self-organizing team is fundamental to agile thinking; but not everyone agrees that self-organizing teams are practical. As for me, I think the viability of the self-organizing model depends on the team members, their management, their organizational context, and (possibly) on the nature of the work they do. If we limit the discussion to software development teams, then I would say there are three critical success factors for growing effective self-organizing teams.
1. Clearly define the boundaries. The team has well-defined boundaries within which they may feel free to self-organize and self-manage. Without this, teams aren't sure how far they can go or how much they should attempt to do to manage themselves. When people are uncertain about this, they tend to err on the side of caution and do little or nothing without asking management's permission. That pretty much nullifies the benefits of self-organization.
2. Tolerate mistakes and allow time for learning. The organization is tolerant of mistakes and of learning-curve time. All too often, management declares teams to be "self-organizing," and the first time the team makes a mistake they step in and take "control" of the situation. Once management does that, the self-organization experiment is finished. It will take a very long time and considerable effort before teams will believe management is serious about allowing them to try and self-manage again.
3. Keep the team challenged, yet not frustrated. The team's administrative or functional manager is sensitive to the team's limitations, and adjusts boundaries and expectations carefully so as to provide the team with sufficient challenges to keep them in a state of learning and growing, while not expecting more of them than they can handle. I think it is unlikely that every team in any given organization will be at the same level of readiness and maturity for self-management. Each team will need its own boundaries and challenges so that the organization as a whole can improve its effectiveness.
