Have you ever been on a team that struggled to make decisions, had conflicts, or couldn’t get on the same page? I’m guessing we’ve all been there before. A tool that I’ve found helpful to address this issue is working agreements. Also called team agreements or team norms, working agreements are guidelines that help people and teams create alignment, decide how they will work together, use their time effectively, and navigate conflict.
To provide an example of working agreements, here are the ones we use at Project Brilliant.
As you can see, working agreements address a wide range of topics, such as expectations, communication preferences, and how the team presents itself externally.
Looking back on my career, the highest-performing teams I’ve ever been a part of have had AND RESPECTED their working agreements. The emphasis on respected their working agreements is important because it can be common to create working agreements and then completely ignore them.
When a new team forms, I believe that one of the first actions they should take is to create working agreements.
Thinking about Tuckman’s stages of group development (forming, storming, norming, performing), working agreements can help teams get out of the storming phase faster. Creating working agreements when the team forms can help start off on the right foot and open up difficult and complex discussions before tension and conflicts mount.
I recommend keeping the number of working agreements to around seven-ish. When you get too many, it can be hard to keep track of them. I think it’s a good idea to have the number of items be something people could remember or memorize.
I also recommend that teams review their working agreements occasionally to ensure that they still make sense, are being respected, and add value. It is not a static document and should be changed when necessary. You definitely want to revisit the working agreements when a new team member joins. New team members should have an opportunity to ask questions, propose new ideas, and voice their opinions if they disagree.
Building on the point of a new team member disagreeing with the agreements, for an item to make it onto a team working agreement, EVERYONE must agree. Buy-in from the whole team is critical so that the agreements can be applied and openly discussed. When everyone buys-in to the working agreements, it makes it easier to talk about when someone is not respecting the working agreements. For example, let’s say a working agreement is that we are on time for meetings, and we’ve all agreed to that. If I regularly show up late to meetings, it’s easier for someone to bring it up and ask if anything has changed with my schedule or if we should adjust the meeting time.
After a team has created working agreements, it can be helpful to make them visible in a space where the team regularly meets. Pre-Covid, when we were mostly in-person, we would often post our working agreements on the whiteboard where we met for the Daily Scrum. A couple of teams even had everyone sign the working agreements to indicate their level of commitment.
In addition to having working agreements within a team, I have found that having working agreements across teams or between a team and a stakeholder or group of stakeholders can be extremely effective. For example, due to the nature of stakeholders making requests and teams delivering on those requests, tension, misunderstandings and misaligned expectations can quickly surface. Taking the time to meet with another team or a group of stakeholders and discuss how the two parties want to work together can smooth the path for collaboration.
In a similar vein to agreements outside the team, when I enter into a coaching relationship with an individual or team, I collaborate to create agreements. I call it a coaching agreement or coaching contract, and it serves a similar purpose. I have also created them when working with a group of coaches working at the same client.
Working agreements are an effective tool that successful teams use to make decisions, create alignment, establish accountability, and navigate conflict. They should be respected, visible, and updated when necessary.
Don’t have team working agreements yet? Simply get the team together and ask how they want to behave and interact with one another. You can even use Project Brilliant’s guide to creating working agreements.
Create it when a new team forms
Everyone must agree to all points
Keep it short and concise
Update it when new people join
Make it visible