There's An "I" In "Win" But You're Not Michael Jordan So You Need To Be A Team Player

One story about the basketball great Michael Jordan went like this. After a tight game where Jordan led the team to a come-from-behind victory, a reporter said to Jordan that "There's no 'I' in TEAM." To which Jordan responded, "No, but there's an 'I' in WIN."

All work happens in a social environment: submarines, basketball, farming, executive leadership, and especially cybersecurity. You must be able to be an effective team contributor as a cybersecurity technician; and if you're a leader at any level, you must be able to build and maintain a team.

Research say's you're bad at both.

Our friend Gordy Curphy over at LinkedIn has provided a year-beginning summary of the state of teamwork. It's grim.

Gordy is the world's premier expert on the behavioral science of team dynamics. While there are some excellent behavioral researchers in the team arena, Curphy is a psychologist who has assessed thousands of teams to derive his findings.

This post is worth reading in full. Here are twelve highlights from Gordy's post.

1. All organizations want teamwork

2. Teams are the default solution for many organizational issues

3. Organizations don’t know how many teams they have

4. Individuals get all the credit, but teams do all the work

5. People belong to multiple teams

6. Teams exist to achieve results

7. High performing teams are rare

8. Organizations are not team friendly

9. Leaders overestimate their team building ability

10. Teams with the best talent win

11. Teams improve by doing real work

12. Team building ability is the next superpower

I will focus on #6. Let's quote Gordy at length:

Teams exist to achieve results. When reviewing posts about teams on LinkedIn and other social media platforms, one might conclude that teams exist to improve belonging and inclusiveness. No doubt most people want to feel valued and accepted, but it is important to remember the why of teams, which is to achieve results. Teams are assembled to get things done, be it to design products, sell services, manage customer inquiries, provide technical support for other teams, or get candidates elected. As such, they are critical mechanisms for improving organizational performance. If groups of people are assembled for reasons other than getting things done, then they are more of a social club than a team.

Cybersecurity is unique in that its existence is focused on preventing intentional or accidental attacks. On occasion it goes on offense (red-teaming) but that's more of an AI thing. This is not the same as in sales, manufacturing, banking, home construction, education, etc. where there are not parties actively (or accidentally) working to beat you, steal things, etc. The 'why' of your cybersecurity team is to achieve results: secure systems, thwart attacks, and defend assets to the extent that risks to the system can be managed. 

There are implications that follow from this. If you work in a cybersecurity team then you need to be a super-team player to accomplish this goal. If you manage a cybersecurity team then you need to understand that challenges to building and maintaining a team -- and you need to overcome those challenges every day. And, if you are a cybersecurity executive, your self of self-esteem is -- or should be -- I WIN because of my team.

Be honest: how would you assess your own team-playing ability, your team building ability, and your team-building superpower?

Ask us how you can be a better team player and a better team builder so that you can be the 'I' in win.