I was just asked the question “what do you think of a product management that seeks to start topics rather than finish them to try as many things as possible?”. I had been asked about “how to quickly move a team through the storming phase to quickly reach norming¹?”.

To all these questions, wisdom dictates that we answer “it depends on the context”. This wisdom is not the result of chance, or a dodge to avoid answers. Even though it can often leave our interlocutors unsatisfied. In fact, it’s mainly a leitmotiv to remind us how important context, the system in place, is, and that an approach or solution that makes sense for one may not be right for another.

Thus, on one hand, it’s preferable not to extract an element from its whole.

On the other hand, it’s preferable not to articulate a conversation around a means, which is only the vehicle, but towards a goal.

On the example of a team that we want to quickly see have group dynamics (forming, storming, norming, potentially performing). If the goal of this means (the team) is to succeed in a marketing campaign for a product launch: in my view it would be better to work directly on the goal (succeeding in this marketing campaign) knowing that this will have an impact on team dynamics and address it in this context. If the team has just been created, it’s forming to succeed in the marketing campaign. The formation stage might as well articulate around this goal. If the team is in the phase where things are grinding (storming), where it needs to calibrate itself, this calibration towards good functioning (norming) might as well happen around this goal (succeeding in the marketing campaign). X and Y are arguing about their overlapping perimeters with regard to the goal to be achieved, and it’s based on this goal to be achieved that the right solution will be found to articulate this dynamic. So we’ll avoid phrases like: “the team doesn’t get along” or “X and Y leave an abyss between them” in favor of: “the team doesn’t get along to succeed in this marketing campaign” or “There are too many misunderstandings between X and Y for the proper implementation of this marketing campaign”. This anchors the solution in the context, in the right intention: succeeding in this marketing campaign. And we perceive that the problem is not fundamentally a people problem but a situation problem, a system problem.

Triangulation

I’m told this is called triangulation. We don’t talk to the team about the team, we talk to the team about the team with regard to the objective. This changes conversations a lot. It anchors them. It materializes the context. There are no good or bad teams, there are good or bad teams with regard to an objective to be achieved. The conversation you have with them should integrate this objective (a triangulation: you, the subject, the target).

I took the example of the team, it’s true with everything. This product is good for what we want it to do. It’s not just good. “How do we improve it so it does xxx even better?” and not “how do we improve it?”. This may seem like just a game of semantics, of syntax, but all our answers, our reflections are conditioned by the form we use. The universe is structured by the way we describe it.

Change of posture

Naturally this can allow us to challenge the means: a) “I’d like this person to be firmer”, b) “I’d like this person to be firmer to make their teams deliver more regularly” c) “We need to support this person to help them make their teams deliver more regularly”. This changes the posture: I don’t want to move this team from storming to norming, I want to move this team towards the success of this marketing campaign (and I know this will probably go through phases of storming and norming for which we will act accordingly). These phases will be all the better overcome if we don’t seek to solve the team’s problems but rather seek to solve the team’s problems with regard to the success of this marketing campaign. It’s much more concrete and less pretentious. And also less guilt-inducing. It makes things actionable.

Context and intention

Context and intention are too often absent from conversations.

“What do you think of a product management that seeks to start topics rather than finish them to try as many things as possible?”. It depends on the context, what is the goal? What is the context, what is the intention? We find answers to the intention based on the context.

Watch your turns of phrase. I recently corrected someone during an intervision:

• Him: “okay so instead of saying we must do it like this, I say I recommend this.” (like you’re playing on words Pablo).
• Me: “No, I recommend this has the same bluntness as we must do it like this; rather: I recommend this with regard to the objective we want to achieve (describe the objective) in the context that is ours (describe what’s necessary from the context) and possibly: for such reason (describe the reason)”.

Is it long? Is it pompous? No. On one hand it’s not that long if you know how to conceptualize or simplify or synthesize well. Otherwise you need to learn, it’s important: you know “if you can’t explain what you want to an 8-year-old child, it’s because you don’t know what you want” – Einstein). On the other hand, you make the system, the context, the landscape tangible with your words, in which all these actions are inscribed.

I don’t know if this article can be useful to you, but this triangulation I constantly mention it in my coaching or my mentoring. By the way, if you want this kind of conversation in your context don’t hesitate: mentoring.