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Cross-functional Team Defined
Cross-functional
team is a group of employees from various
functional areas of the organization – research, engineering, marketing,
finance. human resources, and operations, for example – who are all focused
on a specific objective and are responsible to work as a team to improve
coordination and
innovation across divisions and resolve mutual problems.
Why Cross-functional Teams?
To face today's complex challenges, you need to
incorporate a wide range of styles, skills, and perspectives.
Cross-functional teams are regarded as a means to manage social
collaboration and concept creation.
Some examples of cross-functional teams are teams established
to:
Customer
Success 360
9 Signs of a Losing Organization
-
Poor Cross-functional
Collaboration: functional mindset; lack of cross-functional goals
and cross-functional collaboration spirit; functional, not
enterprise-wide business process management; no cross-functional
management committees; lack of or powerless cross-functional
teams...
More
Innovation-friendly
Organization
Break Down
Barriers To Communication
Kaizen
Mindset
Inspirational Leadership:
10
Roles
-
Teamwork
is essential for competing in today's global arena. Build a star
team, not a team of stars. Diversity of thought, perception,
background and experience enhance the creativity and innovation.
A team should not just be diverse; it has to make the most of
it. Involve everyone, facilitate
cross-pollination of ideas, build and empower
cross-functional teams
if you wish to
harness the power of diversity. Challenge people from
different disciplines and
cultures
to come up with something better together and
achieve
creative breakthroughs....
More
How To Break Down
Barriers To Communication
More
Discovering Synergies
Synergy is the energy or force created by the working
together of various parts or processes.
Synergy in business is the benefit derived from combining two or more elements (or
businesses) so that the performance of the combination is higher than that
of the sum of the individual elements (or businesses).
Case in Point
GE
As far as
Jack Welch,
the legendary former CEO of GE, is concerned, middle managers have to be
team members
and coaches. Welch gives a
hypothetical example.3 Assume there is a multifunctional business
consisting of engineering, marketing, and manufacturing components. And the
business has the best manufacturing person it has ever had – someone with
excellent numbers, who produces high-quality goods on time:
"But this person won't talk with people in engineering and
manufacturing. He won't share ideas with them, and won't behave in a
boundaryless way with them. But now we're replacing that person with
someone who may not be quite a perfect but who is a good
team player and lifts the team's performance. Maybe the predecessor was
working at 100% or 120%, but that person didn't talk with team members,
didn't swap ideas. As a result, the whole team was operating at 65%. But the
new manager is getting 90% or 100% from the whole total. That was a
discovery."4
25 Lessons from Jack Welch
Case in Point
Hewlett-Packard Way
To create an organization that could sustain its
competitive advantage regardless of marketplace
whims and what their competitors were building, HP founders based their
corporate culture on the
integration and reinforcement of critical opposites. This became known
as the Hewlett-Packard Way. HP has achieved
"what appears to be the greatest dichotomy: creating an environment that
celebrates individualism, but at the same time one that is also wholly
supportive of teamwork. Although HP people are
taught to engage in cross-functional teams, they are also rated on the
performance of decentralized business units and personal achievement."1...
More
3 Strategies of Market Leaders
Building Your
Cross-functional Excellence...
Cross-functional Management...
Cross-functional Teams Leading
Organizational
Change...
Cross-functional Teams Leading Innovation...
New Knowledge Creation by Cross-functional Teams...
Systems Thinking...
Lateral Thinking...
Synergizing Business Processes...
Synergizing Value Chain...
How To Build Cross-functionally Excellent
Teams...
Achieving Deep Customer Focus:
10 Critical Breakthroughs...
Case in Point
Quantum...
Case in Point
Silicon
Valley Firms...
Case in Point
IDEO...
Case in Point
Harley-Davidson...
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