The Care and Feeding of a Winning Executive Team by Dan Phillips Partner, Phillips Dipisa
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The Care and Feeding of a Winning Executive Team By Dan Phillips Partner, Phillips DiPisa hen Rick Pitino arrived in Boston to Celtics demonstrated, you can be the greatest coach coach the Celtics in the winter of 1997, on Earth, but with the wrong team in the wrong New England basketball fans celebrated situation, it doesn’t necessarily add up to success. openly. After watching the Celtics stars of the W Effective Hiring is About More Than Just the 80s slowly age and retire, we had endured nearly a decade of disappointment. Pitino was here to Individual change all that. In sports, the concept of “the team” is always front Pitino’s resume included stellar runs as a coach and center. Coaches ramble on in press conferences at Boston University, Providence, and Kentucky, about “cohesion,” “teamwork,” and “playing as a taking the latter to the NCAA championship game unit.” Even superstar players – the ones who are in twice and winning a national title in 1996. He’d the best position to point to their own contributions even published a popular book – Success is a Choice – go to great lengths to credit “the team” whenever – in which he outlined his secrets to leading great a victory occurs. players and creating winning teams. In the business world, on the other hand, the Unfortunately, events opposite tends to be true. Here, the focus – here in Boston didn’t particularly when it comes to recruiting and hiring take place as expected. – is on the individual. What’s he done? Where’s In fact, Pitino’s tenure she been? How much does he/she know about was a disaster. He X? There’s a tendency to evaluate candidates based lasted less than four solely on their individual skills, experience, and seasons in Boston, personality, as if “filling the hole” will somehow fix never making the whatever problems or weaknesses the organization playoffs and never may have. finishing better than In practice, of course, it doesn’t quite work that fifth in the division. way. Hospitals, in particular, are team-oriented Pitino returned to institutions. And while individual contributions the college ranks and, certainly matter, the most successful organizations interestingly, started over the long haul are those that can assemble, Dan Phillips winning again. grow, and manage strong teams. What happened? Hospital Leaders Must Think of Themselves as Why did Rick Pitino “Team Builders” go from legend to loser and back again in just The “Rick Pitino Story” – one in which a change in a few years? The answer is teams. As Pitino’s the team changes the fortunes of a once-heralded experiences before and after his debacle with the Phillips DiPisa recruits leaders for healthcare organizations along the East Coast and throughout the Midwest. This article is part of a continuing series. leader – is one we’ve seen repeated over and over when she left, everything stopped working. again in the healthcare industry. The hospital finally decided to back-fill her departure with two hires – Bob for the more traditional COO role and another “...winning teams don’t just executive who took on Betsy’s “behind the happen... they need to be carefully scenes” work. Keep in mind, as well, that the loss of a key engineered, maintained, and led.” player may present an opportunity. Just as you rebalance your financial portfolio Consider the example of Paul, CEO of a mid- every year to make sure your allocations are sized New England hospital. It took Paul right, a change in your team is a chance to three years to pull together the right mix of reevaluate how your organization functions senior leaders who worked well as a team. But and to consider embracing a fresh approach. after a few years of outstanding results, three The key is to remember that people are not of the hospital’s brightest stars left for bigger cogs – they balance and compensate for opportunities. Paul has managed to replace them one another. Losing one from the mix can with other highly skilled individuals, but he has have far-reaching repercussions for a team’s yet to reestablish them as a winning team. performance. Make sure that when a senior In our experience, winning teams don’t just leader moves on, you take the time to assess happen … they need to be carefully engineered, how your entire management team will be maintained, and led. With that in mind, here are affected and respond accordingly. five things to remember when reaching for your championship ring: 1. Winning Teams Need Rebalancing Betsy was COO of a community hospital in Maine. After she resigned to step up to a CEO position, her former employer found Bob, an experienced COO who seemed perfect to step in and fill Betsy’s shoes. What the hospital soon realized, however, was that Betsy’s “soft skills” and knowledge of how the organization really worked reached far beyond the specifics of her job description. Her close relationship with the CNO kept the nursing staff productive; her strong communication skills allowed her to step in and soothe the often prickly CFO; her ties to the local community gave the hospital flexibility in moving capital projects 2. Winning Teams Take a Long-Term View forward. After bringing in Doc Rivers as coach of It’s important to remember that the Celtics at the start of the 2004 season, organizations have “working norms” and Danny Ainge, the team’s President of that these are bigger than any individual. Basketball Operations, felt tremendous Betsy understood how things got done, and pressure to get rid of him shortly thereafter. Rivers coached the Celtics through one of their worst seasons in the team’s history, he was responsible for managing the and many people wanted a quick fix. It finances of the institution, he believed was only Ainge’s belief in Rivers, his that the hospital revolved around him. system, and the culture he was creating He was selective about the information that enabled Rivers to keep his job – and he shared and his treatment of other win a championship just a few years later. functions and departments caused a number of people to go elsewhere. It wasn’t until David was eased out of the organization that the rest of the senior “Building winning teams is not staff truly began working together. Some so much about completion as it people do more harm than they’re worth, despite their capabilities. is working a plan and making But cultivating a team atmosphere isn’t just about removing the bad forward progress.” apples. It also requires establishing a culture and work ethic that rewards Similarly, we worked with a community collaboration. Examples of this hospital CEO who came into a situation include: getting your group involved in which the staff had become complacent. in multidisciplinary committees so that The hospital had been a big player in members understand and appreciate the a small pond for a long time, but it role of others; developing succession wasn’t working anymore. Like Danny plans that demonstrate a commitment to Ainge, the CEO understood that the organization as a whole; and tying worthwhile changes occur over time. your team-building efforts together by Over the next few years, he brought establishing incentive compensation on a new CFO, COO, and business programs and metrics that are linked to development executive. Within a few team goals. years of establishing his new team, the CEO oversaw the implementation of new satellites, new outreach, new joint ventures, an updated look, and an extensive renovation. Real change takes time. Building winning teams is not so much about completion as it is working a plan and making forward progress. This may mean assigning executives into varying roles until you start to see the results you need. 3. Winning Teams Cultivate Team Players David was a top hospital CFO with 20 The idea of the team player as hero has years under his belt in roles with ever- become cliché, but only because it’s so increasing influence. He was an absolute true. Just as a successful coach pays more expert at what he did. But because attention to winning a division title than to grooming the next league scoring champion, 5. Winning Teams Need to Be Led one of your key tasks as a leader is to build an Skilled or not, your players need leadership. organization that reinforces team behavior. As a long-time CEO client of mine likes to say 4. Winning Teams Aren’t Afraid to Be Coached in describing his role, “I’m like a lion tamer, standing in the center of the ring with the lions A few years ago, one of our clients was surrounding me. If I don’t keep the lions on experiencing some growing pains. Half the the pedestals, they’ll start eating each other management team had been there 20 years (or possibly me!).” It’s a graphic analogy, but or longer, the other half, less than three. The the point is well-taken: Good leaders know CEO was recruiting quality people, but as how to keep strong team members challenged a unit, they were dysfunctional. He was and working together…but not at each others’ committed to them working together but he throats. didn’t have the skills to make it happen. In the world of sports, there’s probably no So he brought in a professional facilitator – an better example of this than the annual NBA organizational development consultant who All-Star Game. The greatest players in the was skilled at turning players into teams.