Photo By Emiley Murphy | Attendees of the High Performing Teams Course at Norfolk Naval Shipyard (NNSY) work...... read more read more
Imagine you and your teammates are faced with a challenge – build the longest, sturdiest paper chain before the time runs out. You’re handed a pile of paper, tape, scissors – sounds simple enough. However, each of you are forced to remain silent for the duration of the building and are forced to only use one arm. You’re given a moment to come together as a team – and then it’s time to execute that plan while the clock ticks down. To some, this can lead into chaos, unable to overcome for any such reason like being unable to come together on a plan or struggling with the limitations presented. For others, it’s like a well-oiled machine, their planning beforehand able to keep them level-headed and focused on meeting the task at hand together as one unit. At the end of the day, it’s a fun exercise to showcase what it takes to be a high performing team – with similarities to the tough work that is done every day at Norfolk Naval Shipyard (NNSY) and the limitations we as a workforce must come together to overcome and power through in serving our mission.
This is just part of the lessons you’ll learn in the four-hour course entitled High Performing Teams, which is open to shipyard employees and provided by Code 2300T Professional Development Facilitator Clinton McRae Jr. This course dives into the lessons of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable by Patrick Lencioni – which shares the difference between a high-functioning team working together and a dysfunctional group who are unable to come together to meet the best outcome. These five dysfunctions are trust, conflict, commitment, accountability, and result.
“The goal of this training is to find what right looks like,” said McRae. “What are we trying to do better here in the shipyard and how can we get there? We have such a diverse culture here at the shipyard, all coming to the table with different experience and years on the job. How can we be more efficient and what are our roles in making it happen?”
In Lencioni’s teachings, he takes lessons in the world of business and presents it as a story that is digestible and easy to embrace by the audience – seeing how effective teamwork can thrive in the ongoing day-to-day operations of corporations. “Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology. It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage, both because it’s so powerful and so rare,” said Lencioni. In order to reach that state of high performing teams however, you have to understand what works – and what doesn’t. And with these teachings and McRae’s class, you’re able to discuss with your peers your own experiences and what your viewpoints are regarding dysfunctions and teamwork.
“If you don’t have a good team involved, all the investment is worthless,” said McRae. “We do some of the most important work in our Nation, serving the fleet and ensuring our Sailors have what they need as they race to meet the mission. People need to come together to make it happen. You have to understand that with a lack of truck, a fear of conflict, a lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability – there will always be a lack of results in the work we do. We have to come together, share our ideas, work through our roadblocks, and make the best decisions as one.”
This course is available through the Nuclear Engineering and Planning Department (NEPD) and can be registered through Waypoints with the course title 24-NNSY (FD300N-1) HIGH PERFORMING TEAMS.
| Date Taken: | 06.24.2024 |
| Date Posted: | 06.28.2024 11:47 |
| Story ID: | 475138 |
| Location: | US |
| Web Views: | 50 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, What It Takes to Be a High Performing Team at NNSY, by Kristi R Britt, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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