What NOT to do with Belbin's Team Roles

In the 80s, I was involved with a campaign group trying to get an arts centre set up in Newport. One of our publicity stunts was to organise a festival drawing together many of the artistic organisations within the borough (as it then was).

We had a fantastic and effective Chair. She facilitated discussions, gave her own views no greater weight than anyone else's and ensured that everyone was both able to contribute and understood what they were commiting to.

Chairman is one of the team roles described by Dr R Meredith Belbin in his 1980 book, Management Teams; many of you will already be familliar with the rest of that roll-call: Shaper, Plant, etc. etc. etc. (Going a bit Yul, there!)

I was surprised to find out yesterday that Wikipedia had no article on Dr Belbin and his model. Wikipedia being what it is, I was able there and then to start to correct this oversight. Please do have a look at the article and of course, feel free to add to it in the spirit of true Wiki.

What I was not able to put in the article of course was my personal opinions. That's what blogs are for! Here's my ten pence worth:

1) Do not treat team roles like personality types. There are similarities: shapers and resource investigators are more likely to be extraverts; team workers and completer finishers are more likely to be introverts. But tools like MBTI and Insights describe our Jungian psychological preferences, while team roles describe jobs that have to be done within a team in order for it to manage its processes effectively.

2) Do not photocopy the Belbin questionnaire you were given last time you did a half-day course on Team Building for £50 funded by your local Business Link. The questionnaire is a) Copyright; and b) 26 years out of date - his website says there's a new one which has been "fully normed". (Any statisticians out there can plain-English-ify that for us?)

3) Do not deselect an otherwise qualified team member simply on the basis that they do not fit your preconception of the "roles" that will be needed in the team. Rather, ensure that the team understands what these roles are and let them allocate them accordingly. These are jobs to be done, not personality types.

Of course, you could hire a talented facilitator to make sure your team did this and did it effectively...

Anyway, enough gratuitous self-publicity, back to Lindsay. She was a highly effective Chair. Clearly naturally introverted but with a great interest in process and balance. You might think. Nope. Lindsay was a passionate and determined campaigner for the things she believed in, just not while she was in our committee meetings. Her personality type fitted Shaper to a T, but she knew her role as Chair, and she stuck to it and did it well.

Don't treat roles as pigeon-holes.

All the best,

Dave Bull
Team Coaching Network Ltd
http://www.teamcoachingnetwork.com