Never before in the history of the workplace has the concept of teamwork been more important to the functioning of successful organizations. Ken Blanchard, bestselling coauthor of Raving Fans, The One Minute Manager , and Gung Ho! teams up with Donald Carew and Eunice Parisi-Carew to explain how all groups move through four stages of development on their way to becoming high performing teams -- orientation, dissatisfaction, integration, and production. The authors then show how a manager can help any group to become fully effective quickly and with hardly any stress. This valuable addition to The One Minute Manager® Library is essential for anyone who works with groups and wants to build a high performing team. The One Minute Manager Builds High Performing Teams By Ken Blanchard HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. Copyright © 2006 Ken Blanchard All right reserved. ISBN: 0688109721 Chapter One The One Minute Manager was staring out his office window. It was still his favorite place to come when he wanted to think. As he gazed across the grounds, the sound of the phone ringing startled him. Coming back to reality, he walked over to the coffee table in front of his couch and picked up the receiver. When he was in his office the One Minute Manager liked to answer his own phone. The voice on the other end of the phone was Dan Brockway, the director of training at a large chemical company. "How's it going, Dan?" asked the One Minute Manager. "Just fine," said Dan, "but I do need some advice on our Essentials of Management course." The Essentials of Management course was a new training program that Dan was teaching at his company that focused on the key skills managers needed to be effective in the new millennium. He had spent some time with the One Minute Manager while he was designing the course and was enthusiastic about the commitment of his company's top management to expose all their managers to the best management thinking available. "Didn't you just finish the first session?" "I sure did," said Dan. "And the reviews were great with one exception. A young woman, Maria Sanchez, who coordinates our customer service programs, has some serious concerns about the usefulness of some of the materials. In fact she wrote me a letter about her concerns and distributed copies to key people." "What were her concerns?" asked the One Minute Manager. "She said all the concepts taught focused primarily on managing people one-on-one and, as such, are limited. She claims that 50 to 90 percent of most managers' time is spent in some form of group activity with two or more people, and yet our course doesn't emphasize teamwork at all. Therefore, we are not providing help in one of the most significant areas of a manager's job." "That's interesting," said the One Minute Manager. "Tell me more. "She also thinks the concepts of One Minute Management are based too much on control," said Dan. "The manager sets the goals, the manager gives praisings and the manager delivers reprimands. Let me quote from her letter: 'We need managers who can foster teamwork, facilitate group problem solving and focus the group's attention and enthusiasm on continuous improvement. In today's world, group productivity is more important than individual task accomplishment. The success of individual managers should depend on how well the manager's team improves in quality and productivity on a continuous basis. Systems that can pit team player against team player must be changed so that the priority of each team member becomes the accomplishment of the team's mission. To do that, managers must give up a great deal of control to their people. When that occurs, a feeling of team ownership is created and the team develops pride that comes from producing high quality accomplishments. You will never hear "It's not my job" in an organization committed to teamwork." "She sounds like quite a person," said the One Minute Manager. "How can I help you?" "Could you dictate a response to her letter? She could really disrupt our whole program if we don't get her on track." "I don't think she's off track said the One Minute Manager. In fact, I'd like to meet her. Sounds like she is really aware of some important issues. I think that one Minute Management principles are sound, but I would agree with her that if you teach those principles without any attention to group skills, you have given managers only half the story. Let's have lunch tomorrow at 12:30 in the main dining room of City Hotel so I can explain to you why I think Maria is on the fight track." "That would be fine with me, said Dan. "Sounds like I still have some things to learn.""Don't feel like the Lone Ranger," said The One Minute Manager. "See you tomorrow!" The next day at lunch, the One Minute Manager immediately got to the reason for the meeting. "Dan, I used to be frustrated at work even though I knew all kinds of effective management techniques. For a long time I didn't know