X-Team from INSEAD

The X-team principles from INSEAD:

“Good teams often fail because they don’t work consistently and effectively outside their own boundaries,” -Henrik Bresmanm, INSEAD.

According to Bresman, X-teams “balance their internal activity with an equal commitment to external activity. They’re different from traditional teams because they go outside from day one. They keep going outside throughout their lifecycle. The actual balance between internal and external activity shifts as work requires but the external mindset is always there, always present.”

High levels of external activity
Members go outside the team to create effective goals and plans

Extreme execution
The team develops internal processes enabling members to coordinate their work and execute effectively while at the same time carrying out external activity

Flexible phases
X-teams change processes over time to keep products moving along and deal with the demands of different phases of a particular task
Flexibility is important as X-teams go through phases whereby they ‘explore, exploit and export’ in order to keep rolling out products. During the exploration or discovery phase, X-teams map out and make sense of issues. This phase not only involves ‘scouting’ but also the establishment of relationships with key individuals both inside and outside the organisation.

From trying to determine what’s out there, the X-team will then turn ideas into reality, choosing an option and making it happen. This is the exploitation phase when the team decides what it wants to do and how it will organise itself.
The third phase is implementation or exportation. This involves creating enthusiasm within the team and the marketplace as well as getting feedback from top management and the customer.

How X-teams translate ideas into concrete action:

Exploration
The discovery phase:
Map out the context, the issues, etc.
Get buy-in from top management

Exploitation
The design phase:
Choose one option
Engage in prototyping and search for best practices

Exportation
The diffusion phase:
Generate enthusiasm for product within the organisation or marketplace
Get feedback from top management and the customer

Although the three phases follow one another sequentially and are ‘separate modes of activity’, the book points out the ‘process is not always so neat’ in reality. Even so, the authors say, road maps of exploration, exploitation and exportation will help X-teams ‘stay focused and shift gears as needed’.

‘X-factors’ needed to support X-teams:
Extensive ties to useful outsiders
Expandable tiers allow others to ‘drop in’ for short periods to work on specific projects
Exchangeable membership allows a team to include other members as and when necessary and to rotate leadership

From - http://knowledge.insead.edu/contents/Bresman.htm