How to Build a Cohesive Team: Stage 4 Culture

This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Tribal Leadership" by Dave Logan, John King, and Halee Fischer-Wright. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.

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What’s Stage 4 culture? What do cohesive teams have in common? How do you create one?

According to Tribal Leadership, any organization succeeds or fails on the culture of its tribes—groups of individuals that share ways of thinking, interacting, and working—and we can improve our organizations by upgrading the cultures of those tribes, progressing from one stage to the next. Stage 4 culture involves a cohesive team. Tribal Leadership outlines three characteristics of cohesive teams and three strategies for building one.

Keep reading to learn these characteristics and strategies for how to build a cohesive team in your organization.

Tribal Leadership Stage 4: Cohesive Teamwork

According to the book, just under a quarter of the modern workforce operates at Stage 4. At Stage 4, the tribe comes together around shared values and pursues a well-crafted mission. They explicitly recognize themselves as a tribe, and they unify under a strong leader to pursue ambitious goals. Authors Dave Logan, Halee Fischer-Wright, and John King share three markers to help you determine when an organization is at this stage, and they offer three strategies for how to build a cohesive team.

Stage 4 individuals have high energy, enthusiasm for their work, and positive relationships with their peers. They often express gratitude or appreciation for their jobs, and they respect and value effective tribal leaders.

On the collective level, Stage 4 cultures or tribes have much the same characteristics. The tribe cooperates effectively, and tribe members often resolve day-to-day conflicts by remembering their shared values. Leadership and staff respect each other, so they work together effectively and enjoy doing so. Altogether, Stage 4 tribes get more done with less effort, and they do it with a contented enthusiasm you won’t find at earlier stages.

The authors explain that Stage 4 tribes often have mature and creative cultures that attract the best talent, and their teamwork empowers them to innovate and achieve great things. Much like a sports team, a Stage 4 tribe needs a foe to compete against—usually an industry competitor. Competition spurs the tribe to innovate, stretch their abilities, and become better.

Collaboration Isn’t a Panacea

After the challenging natures of Stages 1 through 3, the authors describe Stage 4 with an optimistic, idealized tone. However, even collaborative work cultures have advantages and disadvantages. The advantages include those described above—greater employee satisfaction, a happy workplace, and a creative culture. However, the authors don’t provide any quantitative proof of the benefits of Stage 4; on the other hand, recent research shows that overfocus on collaboration lowers productivity in measurable ways. The study found that:

Employees spent around 80% of their time on administrative tasks, such as emails and meetings.

3% to 5% of collaborators provide upwards of 20% to 35% of the value.

The few employees who contribute the most become overinvolved and begin to cause bottlenecks, wherein work can’t proceed until they’ve contributed. At the same time, they stretch themselves too thin to work effectively.

To counteract these effects, the researchers suggest identifying two people—the overinvolved “helpers” and the “help requesters”—and encouraging behavioral change that redistributes the workload. For instance, you might encourage helpers to say no to projects that don’t play to their unique strengths, and you might show help requesters how to find what they need elsewhere, such as from other employees who aren’t as known for willingness to help.

Three Key Markers of Stage 4

Like the previous stages, Stage 4 has three characteristic markers: its stance toward values, its language, and its relationships.

Marker #1: A strong and explicit commitment to shared values. Unlike the previous stages, a Stage 4 tribe develops shared values—the tribe members and leaders discuss and articulate their values together. With values made explicit, the members of a Stage 4 tribe recognize their shared identity, and they begin to see each other as kin and allies.

According to the authors, an organization dominated by Stage 4 tribes finds creative ways to express and embody their values. For instance, it might replace cubicles with modern co-working spaces to encourage teamwork. Or it might reimagine how meetings work, allowing anyone from anywhere in the hierarchy to contribute equally to the conversation.

(Shortform note: In addition to their importance to businesses, psychologists recognize values as a key to finding personal well-being. Your “core values” are what you stand for, through thick and thin—such as reliability, passion, or rationality. There are several ways to find your core values, including by using a “values inventory” tool, reflecting on the best and worst experiences you’ve had, and observing your behaviors to find out what drives them.)

Marker #2: Tribe-centered language. In a Stage 4 culture, the prevailing mood is one of camaraderie and authenticity, and the language reflects this. Both tribe members and leaders often praise one another, expressing how great it feels to be part of such a strong, collaborative organization. According to the authors, they use “we’re great” language.

(Shortform note: The authors’ description of a Stage 4 tribe evokes the camaraderie of a sports team, wherein the team’s success explicitly depends on how good the team members feel about themselves and each other. In this same vein, some collaborative companies use sports-themed retrospectives to review their work and stay aligned, since sports offer a rich array of team-building exercises and wisdom to draw from.)

How to Build a Cohesive Team: Stage 4 Culture