Self Organizing teams

Before talking about self organizing teams, let us try to understand the term self organizing. Even today, when someone allocates work to me I do not fully own it. That is the same case when someone higher up in the hierarchy provides me with unsolicited suggestions about a piece of my work initiated by me. They may be doing it with genuinely good intentions. Unfortunately, very often the actual impact is negative. It takes away ownership. This is the case with majority, that is why work ownership and accountability are still hot topics in business circles. So, work allocation is a thing of the past.

self organizing teams

Agile teams are self organizing teams. Agile teams thrive with work volunteering. That means the teams self organize and decide who will do what. There is no manager to allocate work. The Scrum master (manager) is a servant leader who constantly work to improve the capability and productivity of the team by coaching and removing impediments. ” The best architectures, requirements, and designs emerge from self-organizing teams.” sums it up.

Characteristics of self organizing teams

A team that has a certain level of decision making authority

Is working towards meeting their emerging vision

A team that takes ownership of how they work and continuously evolve

A servant leader nurtures an open and trustworthy environment which is a must for self organizing. Teams cannot self organize under command and control freaks.

Reference

Forbes article – Three Common Misunderstandings Of Self-Organized Teams