 Thank you for coming. It's truly my pleasure to stand here today and talk about teams, because we create them, we are part of them, and we truly rely on them. However, it's not always easy, and there are plenty of things that can get in the way and prevent teams from reaching their full potential. Obstacles are really easier to spot than others and some are hard to solve than others, but my belief is that together we can get rid of them. And if you wonder for whom is this talk useful or who is the target audience, I would say you. It's literally for everybody. For those of you who are team members, for those of you who are leaders, it's really for everybody. You can be the unhappy team member or leader, the one who is really motivated and satisfied or the one who is currently frustrated. It's literally for everybody. And keep in mind that we all have different levels of what we can tolerate, and someday you can come to work and be like, oh, damn, this is not working well. How come all of a sudden? Or you can be the type, hey, it's not working for years and since I've been here. How come that we cannot crack the nut? I believe today you will find some ways how you can overcome some of the challenges. But I wouldn't go away from you, because being a team member is the building block from the teams. And if you were here for the previous talk with Fernando, we didn't agree of using Slido together, but hopefully you got the gist of using Slido. So take out your mobile devices or computers, either go for Slido.com or scan the QR code. If you went to Slido.com, use the numbers and let me know what are the characteristics of a good team member. Maybe you can describe the person in your team, someone who was really pleasure to work with or someone that you want to become yourself. Let me know what are the characteristics from point of view of being a good team member. You have multiple choices that you can put in there. Just let me know what you think, what is in your mind. Okay, so far we have reliable that wins, communicative, willingness to listen, respectful, good listener, team player, team player once again, cheerful, proactive, proactive approach. I see agile, chill, responsible. We have a few more, awesome. And I see a few more people are typing. I hope you don't mind that I switch to the next. I prepared my own version in case the technology wouldn't work. I was so stressed out. All of these, what you put here and the one that I put there are sort of human skills, right? Or like the soft skills. We sort of assume if a person is on a team, they already had the hard skill to get in for like in the first place. But a good team member is literally a good human. Recently I came across this chart and it simply demonstrates or visualizes what makes a good team member or actually boosts the team. You're in a center trying and building with your coworkers the trust, mutual respect and humility. Being humble and human, it's truly important the same way as the respect and trust. And these words can become fuzzy. But I want to invite you to a little recall session or down the memory path. Think about one conflict. It can be the recent one or something that you, that was stuck in your mind as the conflict that happened to you. Do you have one? You could be the active participant in the conflict or just the observer. Something from those three, either it was trust, respect or humility was broken within that conflict. I work at Redhead. Open source culture is embedded in our veins and majority of you work upstream. When your pull request gets really awful review, how do you feel? You feel probably disrespected. The person could have done better job in communication. Maybe you lose the trust towards that person or you don't feel that person was humble enough. In either case, any of those three were disrupted. And it's that simple. It's really becoming human and trying to achieve all of these three to balance and boost the collaboration among team members. You already mentioned that. At least I saw it in word cloud. Proactivity and this is a huge one. I usually talk with leaders and the teams and sometimes it's from time to time it comes up. I feel that the team members just don't care. And I would encourage each of you who are part of the team to be truly proactive because the way how you show up, it matters. It co-creates the team culture. So if you are bothered by something not working with the team, looking to the mirror, the way how you actually behave and the way how we actually act with your team members, what is your role within the team? So don't rely only on the leaders to make everything work for you. The way how you showed up truly matters and you can influence quite a lot. The proactivity is a big one. Another big one. And I was lucky enough that I was with the teams who enjoyed learning and sharing the information through a majority of resources but I believe a good team member finds a joint in learning and never stops. And it really boils down to pure basics like being open to listen to the others or being open to reading a book or the ideas that you never thought before or being open seeking feedback or providing one. This one can get challenging or tiring in a long run but there are multiple ways how you as a team member can boost this up. Imagine you came across great article and you were like, hey, maybe let's share it in the chat. What my teammates think about this new way either working or technology, it can be any but it's a behavior to cultivate and empower others within the team to learn constantly. The teams that I've worked with, they organize monthly sessions, they shared technical work, what they've learned. So they could participate with one another or organize pre-programming sessions, shadowing, lightning talks or even recently there is entire day once a quarter that is dedicated towards learning. It's really crucial to keep the culture of learning within the team because it helps us to be motivated and ultimately proactive. And one last that I have here is focus on what matters. I know it can be considered a blank statement and I'm so guilty of it as well. Recently I came across this sentence admiring problems and I'm so guilty of it and I see in many of us are we keep highlighting the problems, we keep naming them. Sometimes they are not really the problems but the demonstration of a problem but we don't act, we just comment. It's like we sit in a beer somewhere in the pub, hey the politics. Similarly we do in our companies, we keep talking the problems but ultimately we become what we practice so if we keep highlighting or admiring the problems we become dead, we become the problem itself. So remember just focusing too much attention on problems or blame won't get you anywhere and if you notice this behavior in a team, as a team member you can stop it by really simple question. Okay, what you can do with it or what we can do with it. And if the person keeps highlighting the problem and goes on and on and on, we repeat this question. Okay, so what you can do with it or what we can do with it. And if it continues you can engage in a discussion by focusing the attention on something that you can control or influence. It has no sense in putting your energy towards something that is out of your control. It's pointless, it drains your energy. So really focus on what truly matters. There are definitely goals that you can engage with. There is something that's happening around that matters more than the problem, which you cannot control. Simply participate in what matters. All right, it wouldn't be complete if I mentioned the role of the leadership. The team member is one part, but the leadership complements it. And when I say leadership, I don't mean the people manager only or tech leads only. You can be a leader by leading a project or some future development. You are ultimately the leader. So not just the formal leaders. And I believe each of you where did that leader had from time to time. If you are the leader, I hope you know that. It's like an old brainer. There have to be clear goals. And it's crucial for your fellow teammates to understand them. That's, I hope this is like a bread and butter and no needs to discuss. But when we are talking about these functions, if you don't know, there is a great book called five team dysfunctions that I will guide you through today. If you know the muscle pyramid, usually it evolves from the bottom. So unless you have the stable foundation, you cannot go up. And the most problematic or crucial part within the team that can go wrong is trust and it's absence. So imagine you're forming a new team. They don't know each other. It's really likely they won't trust each other from no get go. Some people, they start with trust as a default unless you disappoint them greatly, then they lose the trust. But for a majority of the folks, you need to gain the trust. They need to feel safe. It's really easy to observe a team without a trust. They are locked up. There is like a huge wall. They won't say anything particle because they feel it could be used against them or it could be stupid. They don't want to risk. So hey, I'm a job practitioner. So when I see teams experimenting, that's the joy of me being there observing. They wouldn't experiment because they would fear the failure and they don't have the courage for it. So as a leader, you can become vulnerable yourself and it's those little moments which could influence or build the trust. Also this morning Angie had a talk about building trust and collaboration in hybrid teams. I recommend checking. If you haven't seen it, the recording in YouTube afterwards. It comes down to being human and real. I wonder, anybody know the five team dysfunction of what's the next? What's the next stage related? It's a fear of conflict. So if you fear the conflict and trust me, I was, hopefully I was, one of them, I would show the problems that I've seen around under the carpet hoping they will solve themselves. They won't and they will rot and it will become a reward. And what you do by not addressing the conflict, you are creating artificial harmony which is not good for the team. So you should actually proactively demand a debate, a productive one, ideally, discussing real issues. And as a leader, you can do it in two ways. You can encourage those two having conflict and sit down or you can be the mediator throughout the conflict. It's a tough one, but as I mentioned earlier, there are plenty of books that you can learn how to navigate through conflict. I won't do it right here, but I'm definitely the one who needed and still needs to learn this skill. And I admire people who can do it just like that. I was like, what you've done? How will you raise the, you can address and conflict and demand debate that easily? But I believe it's a skill that you can learn. I'll ask the very same question. What do you think could be the next stage? Once the team has the trust, they can communicate the conflict with one another. Exactly, lack of commitment. And this one is really interesting and I observe in many teams, one of the indicator how you can notice that this is happening is through not building, like not seeing actually things get done, there is not buying. The indicators are there is a decision that was made, but the team was not involved in the decision-making process. So something like, we are going this direction, we will be working on this project, you do it. Okay, I can do it, but what about at least consulting? Is it feasible for me? I don't have commitment, I don't have buying. I don't have energy towards doing that. And if we name it even experiment, as a team member who is not committed, I would do everything for it to fail. Cause I don't have the commitment. I was not consulted, I was not embarking on the journey doing that. So focus on the clarity, ideally collective decision-making, unless you communicate the change properly in closure. The next stage, what do you think it could be? And this one is fairly common in the teams that I've seen. It's really connected to the commitment, avoidance of accountability. And when I say avoidance of accountability, I mean team accountability. I don't mean individual accountability. And there is a plenty of deal that you can do here as a leader and as a team member. Imagine we have a team goal, let's be the sprint goal. Not everything gets done. Common, really common. As a product owner say, okay, so what else we could do? It's partially was done, I'm happy. Wrong. You're accepting already this state and you create this culture that if we don't deliver everything, I won't make another try to adjust what we take on us for the next sprint. I know there is a behavior already in practice that if we don't deliver, there are no consequences. And ultimately, I accept being mediocre. So in this case, you can provide the feedback to the people or to the team. It can be, hey, feedback can be positive and negative at the same time. When done constructively, can help the team members and the team themselves. And super tough to do. Especially when you are friends among teams, how do you want to provide the feedback if you don't want to hurt your friend and still become a good team member? This is, I have troubles doing that. This is really extremely tough to do. For leaders, if you accept the behavior of lack of accountability within the team, you are creating mediocre team by these means, because you support this behavior by not addressing that. Last one is really interesting. I wonder if anybody could guess exactly. I bet you know the five team dysfunctions already in the book. Later on, I invite everybody to read the book because it's truly, it's just 100 pages. You can get through it in one afternoon. Very well written, it's really eye-opening. This could be demonstrated easily in sales team. So you would put your own personal goals above the team goals or the company goals. Because you would get gain, short-term gain on your salary, let's say. Or you know you are about to be promoted or there is promotion somewhere close and you need to do certain things for your promotion. But there are other goals for the team itself. You would opt in for the activity that gets you the promotion than helping the team. It's putting your own personal success about the team success. And what it happens, like how we demonstrate, you don't focus on the outcomes and you don't care that much about the success of a team. And this can happen also for leaders. So watch out. This is interesting slide. And as an agile practitioner, it resonates with me quite a lot. Because we are usually in teams to introduce the change, ideally help them to get on a better place. Not the worst, a better place. It doesn't always go according to the plans or expectations. I would invite you if you are about to change something, human in a team, just set high goals but low expectations. Because you get demotivated really quickly if constantly your expectations would be diminished or broken. So we are here for the long run. Set low expectations to be motivated. And with that, once again I would invite you for the Slido. And I wonder what is the main thing you remember from this talk? Let me know. It's not a rocket science, it's like human stuff. But I wonder what is the one thing that resonates with you? So you can either scan the QR code or go to the website slido.com, be a better human being. Stop admiring the problems. Nobody's perfect. The five, this leadership accountability. Be a better human being. Team building, denying problems, it's not the solution. Management is also part of the dysfunction. Put the team first. Okay, setting expectations, not goals. I didn't mean not to set goals. The goals have to be there, but set the goals really in smart ways. Specific, measurable, achievable results. The smart goals, but your expectations low. So you can keep being there and be motivated. Because the words that you can do as a leader to lose the motivation and get eaten by the system. Same goals over the personal goals. And with that, I would like to bring another summary. So if you're a team member, you want to highlight that you truly could create the team culture. So be proactive, don't let it only up to the leaders. If conflict arise, it's more likely that the humility trust or respect were broken. But these are the things that can get easily fixed. By being a human and demanding a debate. There is a charm in learning. And ultimately, if you want to continuously improve the essence or the prerequisites towards that is continuously a learn. So I'm glad that you are at the conference because you are learning here. And the question, okay, so what you can do about it or okay, what we can do about it. It's really amazing. It converts the blame into actions. And as a leader, I invite you to read a book, Five Team Disfunctions. You already know it. Communicate and set clear goals so they can be really understood. And keep being motivated by setting low expectations and high goals. These are the books. The Team Geek, truly amazing for team members. That's the first infographic I got from. The Five Team Disfunctions. I believe it's also accessible online. And if you want to be a better human being and practice your communication skills, not only crucial conversation, but also nonviolent communication is great for that. And I believe we are here for the question. So if you have any, I invite you to ask me anything, hopefully I will have the answers. If not, I believe the audience can help. And I want to mention one more thing. With the Five Team Disfunctions, there is also assessment at the end where you can assess your team and see where are you in the pyrum. Where are you and your team? And direct tips what to do. I should get paid, but it's really good book. So how can you effectively give this message to them? Because I'm on you, I can't give them your presentation. This presentation should be recorded so you can send the presentation to them. But what I've seen, and it's not something that I came up with, but I was a witness to. If the managers work together or their teams work together, it's good to create the team among managers as well. Like the folks that you lead create a management team. And it's hard to set that, like it's easier set than done. Because we expect from team members actually who do the work and who are on the line to be part of the team. But we don't expect the same from the managers. I see Peter over there. If you would like to chime in. It's really, I was a witness to it and it's a journey as anything, but I would demand the same from the managers. And if they read the book, they highlight this very problem as well. So don't expect only the engineering teams or any other teams to be teams, but also one layer above. But when I say teams with everything that entails the good and bad, the help, the collaboration, everything. For example, what is low expectation for the team? Certainly. Where to start? Oh, okay. So the question was about example of setting low expectations by high goals. And it can have truly many forms. Let's say the problem within the team is that they don't share information among each other. They're siloed, hybrid teams, we are siloed at home. And you would think maybe in a quarter it can get miraculously solved by introducing these activities and these learning opportunities. But the quarter runs out and nothing dramatically changed. Your goals were simple and said hi. You want them to communicate and collaborate more, ideally through cross learning. But it didn't deliver the results that you hoped for. Or you want the team to become more sustainable. Let's put it this way. They go for vocation, summer is coming. Not that same amount of work will get done throughout the summer. You want them to manage their capacity slightly better. So the ones that stay at work won't get burned out. You have the goal in mind. It's quite ambitious, it's quite high, but realistic. Set your expectations low. Okay, so if you have numbers you can measure it. If we deliver 30% with the same people not being burned out and becoming actually sustainable and you know the numbers, don't be too ambitious with your expectations. Like set them low, because otherwise you wouldn't be tempted to try that once again in another iteration because you would feel the motivated and whatever you do won't work. But you have to keep trying and in order to keep trying you need to feel motivated. And trust me, I was one of the person who was in despair. I was like, whatever we do, nothing works. But it came from me having high expectations or assumptions. How would you do the line between if bringing up the golden goal is something you need to do and get you into the line by providing the golden. That's a really good question. I was a witness when the team, for example, complies about with first structure. It's not something that they directly fix. So they don't control it, but they have a feeling they can influence it. So they keep bringing this problem up so management would see the problem is still there. And in that sense, it makes sense for them. But the more you point finger at the problem and you keep influencing it, nothing is happening, you're becoming the problem itself. So at some point, you simply need to take a step back and let it go. It's hard, it's super hard. But the realization that you cannot do anything about it, you try different things and it's totally out of your reach. You are eating yourself alive. It's hard, but it's the recommended approach. I forgot to repeat the questions for the recordings. And I was reminded through all times. So now the question is about selfish team member. One, you can provide feedback in a constructive manner and if there is no reflection mirror working for that team member, it's up to the leader to communicate what is truly important within the team and what behaviors we want to grow and keep a maintain within the team. If the leader doesn't do so, we keep the poisonous people in. But it's up on them. If there is no self reflection, even after multiple trials of constructive feedback and the leadership either through communication or through actions cannot solve this, we are keeping the poisonous people in the team and it directly impacts the behavior of the team. And ultimately, remember, teams are what we practice. So if we practice this, we become this. And I don't want to blame it on leaders. Sometimes they have tight hands and they cannot do such actions, but it's about the poisonous people and the culture you want to build within the team. Any other question? You trust and you as well, and it's public. Sure, it's my first public presentation. I was so scared. And especially with the follow room, but I'm glad I've done it. And hopefully, I truly hope you get at least a little bit out from this presentation. If not, recommendations for really great books. Thank you.