5 Dysfunctions Of A Team By Patrick Lencioni

Summary:

The book is mostly an anecdotal tale about a silicon valley startup company that’s executive team is filled with a bunch of common personality types. The personalities range from the introverted CTO, to the knowledgeable ex-CEO who is bad leader, to the “everyone in the world is an idiot but me” marketing leader. A new un-proven CEO is appointed by the board of directors to help turn the company around, and the book follows the series of offsite meetings she holds to fix the teamwork problems on the team.

The 5 dysfunctions:

• Lack of trust - invulnerability
• Fear of conflict - artificial harmony
• Lack of commitment - ambiguity
• Avoidance of accountability - low standards
• Inattention to results - status and ego

Like:

• Fast, engaging and enjoyable read.
• The book does a good job of capturing pretty authentic personality types and their typical reactions to a new leader.
• The dysfunctions are pretty logical and build on each other.
• Kathryn’s approach in taking over was very well done. Come in, learn, assess and solve.
• Accountability and having a clear goal for the year are really great key ideas. Kathryn always repeats the problem statement at the start of every meeting. Goals should always be clear and known by any employee.

Dislike:

• The book never discusses what the rank-and-file employees reaction to the whole series of events. The CEO is demote, new person brought in, several key executives leave. That is a lot of stress for a start-up organization.
• Kathryn is a little too much the person with all the answers. I think things could have been improved by adding some more “real life” company events into the mix. (A new competitor, a new competitor release, a big problem within the company.)
• The “bringing it all together” section at the end of the book is a little weak. I think some of that might have been better done by being interjected at the end of some of the chapters.