Shared Reality

While other management philosophies prioritize the speed of knowledge transfer, TeamOps optimizes for the speed of knowledge retrieval in company-wide documentation.

All teamwork must be based on and informed by an objective — and shared — reality. A collective team member experience that your team shares to develop trust, direct contributions, motivate productivity and empowers new team members to quickly ramp up in their roles. Typically, this shared reality is composed of three elements:

• Information - All team members should be able to autonomously consume the information and resources that enable productivity in their role.
• Objectives - Ironically, the day-to-day of your shared reality is usually defined by what you are trying to bring to reality – a result that you’re collaborating to develop.
• Values - Team member experience is influenced by more than company operations, it’s most directly manifested as team behaviors which can be observed, recorded, and quantified.

Once defined and activated, this reality then is preserved for continuous and universal access and accountability through documentation in a knowledge management system, or “single source of truth.”

Action tenets of building a Shared Reality, including real-world examples of each, are below.

Single Source of Truth (SSoT)

To maximize universal information accessibility, TeamOps intentionally structures all information data (policies, objectives, workflows, instructions, values, etc.) in a virtual knowledge management system referred to as a single source of truth (SSoT). It is founded on the thesis that decisions are better informed when there is no such thing as a “latest version.” There is only the version.

Teams and functions may choose different mediums as the SSoT depending on the task and the nature of their work. TeamOps allows this type of SSoT flexibility, but requires that those who dictate the SSoT share that information transparently and crosslink where appropriate.

This type of system scales and maintains workforce awareness and empowerment with much less effort than word-of-mouth updates or memos. By writing guidance down transparently — in a way that others can modify, validate, or contribute to — leadership scales beyond an individual or team, and even beyond the organization. GitLab refers to this approach as handbook-first. A core outcome is that individuals are less dependent on others for the information they need to do their job.

Public by default

Conventional management philosophies may rely on intentional information silos or a “need-to-know-basis” model. This approach restricts transparency, with the goal of reducing misinformation. TeamOps flips this: information should be public by default, with the goal of allowing maximum contribution. “Public by default” requires an organization to designate which information is explicitly not public, creating a bias for transparency across all functions of a business.

A traditional business problem is “how do we get the right information to the right people at the right time?” A TeamOps organization asks: “How do we create a system that allows everyone to access information and make contributions, regardless of role or function?”

In practice, a TeamOps organization uses a project management system that allows any team member to view data related to all other functions. A marketing manager, for example, would be able to view a sales teams’ work and data, without requesting special access. The system is free of walls and information silos. The result is that, instead of needing to create a system for unblocking access to information, management’s role is to educate team members on how to use the information system, how to organize data, and how to self-serve.

This type of system scales with much less effort, and scalable leadership is effective leadership. By writing guidance down transparently — in a way that others can modify, validate, or contribute to — leadership scales beyond an individual or team, and even beyond the organization.

Collaboration guidelines

Many organizations are so focused on finalizing a decision that they neglect the critical precursor to a successful agreement: setting standards for how that decision will be made. TeamOps stresses intentionally designing, building, and reinforcing shared workstreams and collaboration environments through which decisions and projects flow. This helps align expectations, reinforce the a shared reality, and minimize unexpected barriers to success.

When shared realities are based on effectively and efficiently sharing information, it means that communication practices need to be as aligned as possible. Collaboration guidelines are the articulation and documentation of the cultural norms, software standards, and behavioral expectations that help standardize team member experience within an organization. These include details such as how company values are visible in workstreams, etiquette for various communication channels, organizational rituals, and guidelines for tool use. Codifying items like these facilitates more effective and universal collaboration, and helps ensure that miscommunication doesn’t unnecessarily stall a decision or result.

Guidelines should be included in your team’s Single Source of Truth (SSoT) for easy reference and continuous accountability. Depending on the format of your knowledge management system and the volume of codification you have, it could either be a dedicated section, or woven throughout all of the pages.

Low-context communication

Low-context communication assumes that the person you’re communicating with has little or no context about the topic at hand. This means the person delivering the information is responsible for providing everything the recipient will need to understand the situation and make an informed response—such as SSoT links, definitions, relevant team members, or updates. This empowers individuals to make decisions and take action without needing to ask unnecessary follow-up questions that could have been avoided.

Assuming that recipients of your communication do not know anything about the topic at hand and wish to learn as much as possible in as little time as possible, all low-context communication should be:

• Explicit, not implicit
• Direct, not indirect
• Simple, not complex
• Comprehensive, not narrow.

A critical principle of low-context communication is to Say Why, not just What. TeamOps organizations recognize that up-front transparency is a foundational element to team member autonomy, transparent documentation, and business continuity. This requires announcements, updates, and decisions to be shared not only with what the change is, but also why it’s being made. While saying “why” does not mean justifying every decision against other alternatives, it does require a leader to articulate their reasoning. This prevents speculation, contributes to institutional memory, and builds trust, which is one of the traits of being a great remote manager.

Also note that each business function may have unique expectations on low-context communication (e.g. what classifies as low-context in sales may not in engineering). If decisions within a function appear to be ill-informed, audit the expectations on context first.

Shared values

The reality of your teams’ day-to-day life at work – or team member experience – is influenced by more than company operations; it’s most directly manifested as team behaviors which can be observed, recorded, and quantified. These behaviors are best designed and managed in the context of a shared set of organizational values, which are one of the prerequisites for TeamOps. Without explicit cultural values, there is no group identity or basis for group cohesiveness.

Each organization may create its unique values, but whatever they are, values must be recorded in the SSoT for reference and accountability, then operationalized through habits, rituals, and workflow practices. Include definitions, examples, and measurable success criteria so that any team member within the organization can understand and activate them.

Shared values also create guardrails that provide more freedom for individual decision making. This leads to more informed decisions by removing guesswork on whether (or how) values were applied during operational processes.

Inclusivity

TeamOps encourages and supports a culture of respect.

Decisions and results are better informed when they include a maximally diverse array of perspectives. While team members should always be empowered to work autonomously, they should still remain included as a collaborator, informed as a colleague, and valued as a critical component of success.

In TeamOps, a bias for asynchronous communication fosters inclusion of many diverse personas, including underrepresented groups, folks from different cultural / geographical locations, and neurodiverse individuals. By defaulting to written, asynchronous sharing, everyone contributes in the same way, which standardizes and equalizes the weight of each written message. People of all backgrounds, abilities, and work styles are invited to participate in a way that serves their needs. The best idea—not the loudest voice in the meeting—wins.

TeamOps frees contributors from the conventional bounds of time zones and meetings, and invites a wider audience to participate in a shared reality. This generates more informed contributions from more parties, more thoughtful conversation, and more archived context for retrospectives and evaluations.

Informal communication

An intentional approach to informal communication is crucial in a fast-paced organization with a bias for asynchronous workflows and text-based communication. Understanding a colleague’s unique personality will help teams collaborate more effectively, so leaders should encourage team members to prioritize informal connections (e.g. coffee chats, social calls, special interest chat channels) and get to know the people behind the text. This builds trust, prevents conflict, and enables better communication during work-related interactions.

Building this level of trust also helps enable DRIs to make faster decisions, as there’s a foundation of confidence in the experience and judgment of others.