Autonomous Business Teams or Small Business Units (SBU) in their simplest forms, are groups of people, anywhere between 5 and 20, all working as a team to identify and make improvements to the way they work, within their “circle of influence”.
For this reason, SBU’s almost always share common business goals.
Small Business Units, in my opinion, still remain the most effective vehicle to engage a group of people and to harness the power of teamwork in business improvement programs.
The use of a facilitated approach in understanding the main issues and pain points, allows members to suggest, fix and own solutions, empowering decisions to be made, locally.
A classic question to always ask is:
“If this was your own business, what would you do to improve it?”
10 Characteristics of a Great SBU
a) Totally Inclusive – everyone should belong to one
b) Autonomous – a team makes its own decisions
c) Circle of Influence – Team fixes issues within their influence
d) Problem Solving – problems within the “circle of concern” are escalated.
e) Everybody is encouraged to participate
f) Focus is maintained on priority items
g) A Results oriented approach is vital
h) Simple metrics are used to agree priorities and assign actions
i) Collective and individual responsibilities for Actions are assigned
j) Team success is recognised and rewarded.
How do you engage the hearts and minds of the people in your business to ?
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For more resources, see our Library topic Quality Management.
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Carter McNamara of Authenticity Consulting, LLC, provides organizational development, consultant training and Action Learning services, and is developer of the Free Management Library.