Don’t mention it! Tackling your team’s taboos, Part 4

Beginning the fix

• Invite a trusted adviser from another part of the organization or an external facilitator to observe the team and give feedback on communication habits (including body language, who talks and how often, whom people look at when they talk, who interrupts whom, who or what is blamed when things go wrong, what is not spoken about, who stays silent, and whose comments are ignored).

• Engage a trained observer to carry out what MIT Sloan School of Management organizational psychologist Edgar Schein calls humble inquiry, where the aim is to elicit information and feelings important to the team’s mission. (The questioner’s outsider status allows for naive, unthreatening questioning of the unconscious processes at play).

• Use the Five Whys technique (asking “Why?” at least five times) to help the outsider drill down to deeper levels and surface what the team is avoiding.

Key learnings

Team leaders often underestimate the consequences of doing nothing to address undiscussables, which almost invariably results in strained working relationships. High-performing teams pay attention not only to what they achieve, but how they achieve it by working together. This does not come naturally: you have to work at it and introduce routines and forums to purge your team of undiscussables before they take root and cause problems. Tackling the taboos brings relief, boosts energy, bolsters team goodwill, and boosts organizational performance.

Further reading

Don’t mention it! Is it time to tackle your team’s taboos? Part 1

Don’t mention it! Is it time to tackle your team’s taboos? Part 2

Don’t mention it! Is it time to tackle your team’s taboos? Part 3

Let’s Talk: Why It’s Time to Stop Avoiding Taboo Topics at Work