The Mandatory Team Member

The day before yesterday, our post discussed the non-participating team member from the perspective of finding the cause of the trouble before we go to work on the cure. In exploring those causes we may discover that the non-contributor simply doesn't value the team's work, and/or its importance, and/or may simply have other priorities to attend to. If the non-contributor's participation is voluntary (or at least not mandatory), we can usually solve the problem by thanking the team member for letting us know, releasing the person from the team and seeking a new team member who wants to be an active contributing member.

But what if team membership is not optional for the person? Because of certain skills, or expertise, or some other aspect of their function in the company the person's membership in the team is mandatory and, therefore, a certain level of commitment, cooperation, contribution, participation and support is required from that person. What do you do when the mandatory team member fails to live up to their team obligations?

Assuming you've done everything you possibly can to get the person to live up to obligations and responsibilities of the team, you no longer have a team issue. You have a performance issue that transcends the team. The person is not doing their job. And that will require a level of counseling and discipline that goes beyond the functions of most team facilitators. If the non-contributor happens to also report directly to you, its time to remove your team facilitation hat and put on your boss hat. If the non-contributor does not report to you, then you need to let the non-contributor's boss know that their performance is not acceptable in terms of meeting the requirements of the team.

About me: Dan Pelley teaches coaching, counseling and team facilitation skills as part of his "Participative Management (Building High Performance Teams)" program, one of five programs leading to a Certificate in Supervisory Management. 137 companies in Connecticut (CT), Rhode Island (RI), Massachusetts (MA) and New York have one or more people who earned this certificate.

Copyright © 2009 Daniel W. Pelley
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