Ricardo Fiel, Cloud Solutions Architect at Microsoft, gave a presentation at the Scrum Gathering Portugal 2016 on some common ground he has found when collaborating with several types of organizations and about the lessons he has learned on his way while trying to leverage teams’ environment.
Fiel mentioned Tony Robbins, an author and speaker and his Ted Talk “Why We Do What We Do?” to explain not only the six human needs – certainty, variety, significance, connection / love, growth and contribution – but also our two primary fears as human beings:
He also presented the pyramid of the five dysfunctions of a team from Patrick Lencioni to get in some more detail on the things one should avoid when fighting for an healthy workspace and team environment.
Based on the former, he considers that an ideal team environment should comply with the following: safety first, extreme autonomy, focused on growth, transparency and fun. To achieve an environment as described, the lessons shared by Fiel were:
InfoQ talked to Fiel to get into some more detail on the approached topics:
InfoQ: Your lessons learned are mostly focused on people. What about technology, office conditions and other perks? Are these of less importance when creating an ideal team environment?
Fiel: People and culture come first. Smart people in a room with no light will always perform at higher standards than mediocre people in an amazing office, so perks are a nice to have, of course, but not mandatory.
