The performance foundations
Toxic behaviour, high-performing teams and trust.
Three hours on the foundations of team performance: the cost of toxic behaviour, performance management as a system, Team of Teams, trust and psychological safety, and getting knowledge heard.
- Level
- Focus
- Learning time
- 3 hours
- Where
- Leading people
- Price
- £69
When you step up to a higher level, what you paid in the last 12 months for lower-level courses inside the bigger course comes off its price, in proportion to how much of each is inside it, whichever topic it's from. Courses at the same or a lower level don't give credit against each other. A Focus course or above always costs at least £15. Read the full terms
Certificate of Completion, or Certificate of Completion and Assessment with a short assessment
Overview and Outcomes.
Who It's For
Managers and team leaders raising their team's performance in health, housing, local government and the voluntary sector
Overview
A toxic performer usually costs a team more than they appear to contribute. This Focus, taken from the Immerse Raising the team's game, begins with Robert Sutton's aftermath, target and pattern tests, and Uber's leadership change and culture reset. It then treats performance management as a system, from forced ranking to continuous check-ins, with Adobe as the case. Stanley McChrystal's Team of Teams follows, where efficient is not the same as adaptable. It ends with trust and psychological safety, including Edmondson's hospital study and the difference between competence and character trust, and with getting knowledge heard, from the hidden profile problem to closed-loop communication.
Aims
This programme aims to help managers get the foundations of performance right first: separating talent from damage, running check-ins that genuinely matter, building adaptability alongside efficiency and creating the trust that lets a team share everything it knows openly and early.
In summary, you will be able to:
- Use Sutton's aftermath, target and pattern tests to separate genuine talent from damaging behaviour in your team.
- Plan a shift from annual reviews or forced ranking to continuous check-ins, learning from Adobe's experience.
- Apply psychological safety and closed-loop communication to make sure what your team knows is heard and used.
What you'll develop
Through this Focus course, you will build the ability to:
- Apply Sutton's aftermath, target and pattern tests to distinguish toxic behaviour from honest challenge or an occasional bad day.
- Explain the four flaws of the traditional annual review and forced ranking: timing, memory, the curve and cost.
- Explain why an efficient hierarchy struggles when speed and complexity rise, and distinguish efficiency from adaptability.
- Explain Edmondson's definition of psychological safety and use the standards and safety matrix to place your team.
- Explain the hidden profile problem and why groups tend to lose information that only one member holds.
- Explain why talent and damage are separate ledgers, and identify the hidden costs of toxic behaviour and the reasons it is tolerated.
- Plan a substantial check-in that covers current priorities, progress and obstacles, and development and support.
- Describe how McChrystal's three pillars of shared consciousness, empowered execution and trust across boundaries depend on one another.
Built from 3 parts.
3 hours of learning.
- 01The cost of getting it wrongToxic behaviour and performance managementBitesize · High Performing Managers2 modules
- 02Teams that go furtherHigh-performing teams: beyond TuckmanBitesize · High Performing Managers1 module
- 03Trust at the centreTrust and psychological safety in teamsBitesize · Team Development2 modules