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RETURNS AND INVESTMENTS Great profits
from great teams
Great profits from great teams
Terry Cottrell
University of St Francis, Joliet, Illinois, USA 221
Abstract Received 1 October 2011
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explicate the universal theme of teamwork within Accepted 3 October 2011
organizations as a performance factor toward effective and efficient library cost savings and long-term
group success.
Design/methodology/approach – Focusing on lessons from the past, along with current research
and experience, library managers can gain insight into tried and true actions increasing the potential
for team success essential for smooth operations.
Findings – A multitude of elements contribute to effective team management. The cultivation of
creativity, the resolution and anticipation of conflict, the blending of physical and virtual interaction
and a focus on external environments are key.
Originality/value – This paper provides a comparison of current team dynamics with those of the
past to show that merely the context of good team management has changed while the core goal of
library team management has remained.
Keywords Teams, Groups, Conflict, Communication, External environment, Management, Libraries
Paper type Viewpoint
Teamwork is the target
The epic Gilgamesh, one of the world’s first written stories, is careful to outline the
benefits of using teamwork toward specific goals as a foundational testament to
human achievement. Ancient stories are richly peppered with examples of the virtue of
using teamwork toward conquering evil, forging new nations, saving innocents and
establishing legacies. From Aeneas leaving his burning city of Troy to found Rome
with the help of his loyal Trojans to Alexander’s renowned Companion Cavalry
spreading Greek culture as far as India, working together was a central theme of
ancient Western culture. In libraries, epic quests can be seen in the acquisition and
migration to new CRM systems, the restructuring of departments, and the writing of
grants for new services and offerings that aim to support the basis for services far into
the future. The scenarios of struggling for glory in ancient myths compared to present
realities are similar when considering finances and team. The spoils of war in the
ancient world always included land, other assets and (not least) currency. The library
manager of today wins the spoils of budgetary funding through skills developed from
battles in the boardrooms. Without the development, reward and retention of
functional and flexible teams, however, the library manager is doomed before the
journey begins.
Cultivating creativity The Bottom Line: Managing Library
Who creates a good team? What is the product of good teamwork and implementation? Finances
Vol. 24 No. 4, 2011
An effective manager realizes that not only mastering the totality of the collaboration pp. 221-226
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0888-045X
Special thanks to Michael LeFlem. DOI 10.1108/08880451111193316

2. BL environment is essential for effective team implementation, but also understanding the
24,4 individual players on the team is a requirement for success. The creativity born from
adding additional minds to the managerial mix is where new revenue streams,
innovative services, and cost savings ultimately begin. Picking the right staff to serve
on anything from special taskforces to standing committees is a skill that gives
innumerable rewards. Failure in this regard hurts morale, and hurts the bottom line as
222 reprimands are given, roles are rearranged, and possible terminations are required.
Time spent correcting legacy team member selection mistakes takes away from team
potential for creativity and innovation.
Teams are constructed today through a complex web of job origination, task
approval, recruiting, interviewing, testing, background-checking, employing and
subsequent positioning within larger managerial structures. If possible, current
employees can be consulted during the selection process (at hiring or afterward), as
they are the individuals who will have to interact with new members of the team much
more than managers. Similarly, they will respect a responsible, considerate manager
more for heeding their advice and consulting them before the team receives new
additions. This collaboration brings team management, composition and eventual
project execution full circle by strengthening crucial bonds of trust that are essential to
the smooth operation of any professional environment. The smooth operation of a good
team brings both efficiency and creativity. At this time in library management, the
goal of creativity and innovation is paramount as justification for organizational
expenditures in libraries is needed over and above other areas that produce a clearer
revenue stream. The proper mix of players on the team will produce positive results
beyond a manager’s expectations if team members can constructively plan and create
goals for themselves striving in the same direction achieving one accomplishment at a
time.
The teamwork environment of today: physical or virtual?
As communications technology continues to answer its long promise of brining many
voices from many distances together, managers and leaders are faced with new
decisions about how their teams will function and thrive. One popular subject is the
desire to save dollars through the use of virtual communications tools. Team members
working together, while not being together physically, fall under the popular moniker
of “virtual teams.” Current research is seeking to maximize the effectiveness of
individual members within virtual teams in order to better assess the sometimes high
outlay in mental and financial capital required to train and maintain virtual team
members. Many managers, however, do not have the time to debate these micro level
concerns. Projects need completion before research can be done, and the options
brought by virtual communication are too tempting to not try before vetting thorough
research.
It is important to remember that there are significant differences between virtual
and face-to-face teams. As organizations move deeper into the twenty-first century, the
pressure for collaborators previously working with each other in live environments to
simply transition full throttle into the virtual world is increasing. Even with all the
high tech tools for virtual communication, no one tool is anywhere near close to the
richness of face-to-face interaction. Librarians are known amongst each other as
purveyors of every new technological collaboration tool known to exist. How is it then

3. that the library manager can identify which aspects of these virtual environment tools Great profits
truly help build good teamwork? The centering of teams on specific, pragmatic tasks from great teams
strongly helps members succeed as they focus intently on shared goals (Thompson,
2011). In the face-to-face realm, keeping a group focused takes a completely different
set of strategies targeting a distinct group of challenges.
Five elements for great virtual team collaboration include:
(1) Patience and understanding that virtual engagement involves the internet, and 223
the internet means distractions that are difficult for participants and managers
to detect and deflect.
(2) Persistence that the financial benefits of working through the challenges of
virtual teamwork are worth the time and effort.
(3) Tracking and recording to ensure that if key elements are missed or needed for
reference, they can be retrieved for maximum chance of dissemination and
retention in the future.
(4) Ease of access and equality in disclosure of essential information in a timely
fashion to all members needing to know.
(5) Shared sense of ownership toward all aspects of the product of the group’s
collaborative efforts.
Conflict in teams
Conflict in an unavoidable part of team environment, but do team members know this
going into their jobs each day? To ignore this dynamic through wishful thinking or
willfully imposed ignorance is to court problems down the line. Sometimes, however,
people forget. Though even the most efficient work force will find itself in gridlock
from time to time, there are predictable, reliably effective measures by which a
manager can both forestall and resolve potential conflicts within teams. Leaders
seeking to save time, energy and money through avoiding team conflict can discuss
common pressure points early and often as a way of wise preemptive management.
Some places to look for potential team conflicts are:
. intimidation from other members in the group during group functions;
. conflicts in individual passions over mission, direction and vision;
. past conflicts yet resolved;
. avoidance of complex and/or difficult issues while the team is together;
. splintering of activities between parts of the team without prior knowledge or
consent; and
.
silence from members who are afraid to voice concerns openly.
Each of the aforementioned is a starting point where managers can envision how much
time and effort (translating into dollars expended) is being used on disconnected teams
(Lencioni, 2006). The primary drive on the part of the fiscally responsible leader is
keeping one’s mind centered on conflict points, such as these, as the basis of
communication to team members.
One way to communicate conflict points like the aforementioned is through large
group meetings and/or retreats where some aspect of play is encouraged around

4. BL difficult subjects using motivational games and prizes. The use of play will reduce the
24,4 instinct to not trust. In order to eventually convince disparate team members to work in
unison, honesty is required. Anonymous opportunities to brainstorm in large group
settings are a way to foster this type of candor. If apprehension is detected through
attempts at large group play, smaller games can be introduced within subsets of the
whole. From here, subset leaders can report on results in the larger group setting to
224 initiate more understanding among all members. Trust will flow when members are
comfortable and eventually given the opportunity to stake claims to certain goals or
beliefs previously shared anonymously or in small subset groups. A sense of
trustworthiness will grow when individuals eventually reveal themselves fully
showing what they truly bring to the team through their personality as well as their
skill set (Thompson, 2011).
Another option for mediating conflict and opening lines of communication is
through the use of online social networking tools for members in diffuse locations. The
interface between members is not the same as the face-to-face environment, but this
does not mean it is less authentic. Some team members will feel this method of
communication is less personal – especially for resolving conflict. It is important to
emphasize, however, that some members will be more honest in this virtual
environment than they are when they are with their peers. Individual expression comes
from more than the audible voice alone. Offering this method combined with
face-to-face interaction may be a best practice for encouraging members to get to know
others and let they themselves be known. Ultimately, team cohesion will not occur
without members having a joint sense of what it is to know and understand one
another.
As with communicating openly about conflict, an often overlooked part of hiring
and team composition is complementary personality matching on the part of the
manager. Being aware of reflections of personality types seen through applicant
resume construction, cover letter composition, and non-verbal communication during
face-to-face meetings is critical to ensuring a comfortable and productive work
environment (Kroeger et al., 2002). It also ushers in a low rate of turnover as a display
of financial savvy as time is not being spent on team management and potential
termination and rehiring. Loyalty in teams is hard to acquire as well, and responsible
managers screening for potentially uncommitted employees who might be attempting
to join the staff for purely individual reasons adds to long term member retention.
While jobs are in short supply in this economy, managers can anticipate more
applicants looking for something much less involved than what a good library team
requires.
Dealing with a changing external environment
Things change, and leaders continually express this fact to their team members. In
libraries, change has been a going theme since the advent of the world wide web. Still,
as a way to save money and improve performance, managers search to more fully
understand externalities before they impact their organizations. An honest approach,
however, is the admonition that there are externalities facing libraries which are both
unknown and misunderstood. Increasingly seen are advanced technologies, transient
fads, and capricious cultural tastes showing that no matter how well established an
operation is run, teams will be faced with patrons who demand the unreasonable and

5. products that promise more than they deliver. While there is no simple answer to the Great profits
problem of bending a service team’s sense of comfort and actual production abilities to from great teams
those of patrons, a few important points are to be considered when examining the
pressures of external environmental change.
First, there are successful aspects of every good team no matter what the change in
environment brings. A big external change rarely negates the entire focus of a team’s
direction. Successful teams are not only successful because of the productivity they 225
bring, but also because of their synergy and adaptability. It is important to stress this
understanding upon team members as a way to continue existing team cohesion
during times of change. Second, the confidence groups of individuals display during
their initial setup is what will carry them through challenges as they modify their work
ethic to meet new tasks. In libraries, this confidence has been seen time and time again
in the team’s understanding that they provide great instructional methodologies for
retrieving and interpreting information. It is only the format types, or the containers, in
which information is held that have changed throughout the world. A cool approach to
change displayed by the library leader, will be reflected by subordinate team members
leading to increased rates of success (Kroeger et al., 2002). This approach is bolstered
by a shared sense that what is changing on the outside might be major, but through
teamwork, adapting to the major change can be completed by the careful execution of
minor changes that do not fundamentally alter original successful internal structures.
Thirdly, often the external environment is not always lasting or indicative of long-term
paradigm shift. Especially when dealing with technological change, distinctive
platforms emerge and disappear quickly. As time is the most valuable asset of any
organization, it is best to be sure teams do not invest too much of their intellectual
capital and efforts on “x” name technological tool, or “y” name competitor. There is a
core to what library teams bring to any larger community, and these elements are
unique to missions and visions that libraries do not share with other organizations.
Patrons visit libraries looking for both information and instruction. In either case, good
teams of employees know how to serve either need independently or jointly. Finally,
aesthetics is as important as the amount of revenue or output generated for most
organizations. Even if funds are saved, and contracts are negotiated ahead of the
competition, if the team knows this short-term success is at the expense of the core
values initially agreed upon on, it will slowly chip away at confidence and efficiency
costing much more in the long run.
Conclusion
In the end, it is only through the development of a good team that a manager saves
time, energy and ultimately, precious money so crucial to library operations. Through
the annals of history, historic leaders knew little of one-to-many communications
protocols for teamwork, or frameworks for interpersonal group dynamics. Or, did they?
The human experience throughout time has hinted at the connection of shared profit
for all through carefully selected teams (Mason, 2003). Leaders of today know the
teamwork mantra. They have sat through the requisite collegiate classes, attended the
organizationally-sponsored workshops, listened to calls to heed signs from external
environments, and read the latest and greatest pop science and anecdotal literature on
this important subject. They are awake to the power of progress via teamwork seen
through sources current and from the past. The lesson going forward is finding that it

6. BL is the careful selection of and subsequent communication with the members of the team
that lead to all eventual desired returns. The investment is in the time, effort, research,
24,4 vetting and courting of the right individuals – their talents and traits – for the tasks at
hand. After this, comes the continual “selling” of the vision of where the library is
going and how together the team can make the vision a reality.
226 References
Kroeger, O., Rutledge, H. and &Thuesen, J.M. (2002), Type Talk at Work: How the 16 Personality
Types Determine Your Success on the Job, Dell Publishing, New York, NY.
Lencioni, P.M. (2006), The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable, Jossey-Bass,
San Francisco, CA.
Mason, H. (Ed.) (2003), Gilgamesh: A Verse Narrative, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, NY.
Thompson, L.L. (2011), Making the Team: A Guide for Managers, 4th ed., Pearson, Upper Saddle
River, NJ.
Corresponding author
Terry Cottrell can be contacted at: tcottrell@stfrancis.edu
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