Team Standards 101

Finally learn what your Team Leader means when he/she is talking about Team Standards implementation

First of all, to clarify, this is the first time that we're teaching Team Standards to all of AIESEC in Moldova's members. We're doing this because we believe that if everyone in the network would know what the heck Team Standards are, we are for once going to complete all of them in one Team Leader cycle.

Second, if you didn't hear about Team Standards from your Team Leader (TL) yet, please report him/her to the MC so this mistake will not happen twice (we're joking of course, but please let your LCVP or LCP know if your TL is not doing his/her job so we can better learn how to support your TL), and if, in the events that you don't have a Team Leader, please report that IMMEDIATELY to your LCVP and you will be assigned one.

What are Team Standards?

In order for Team Standards to be delivered, there has to be a team, logical, right? By AIESEC standards (ha, get it, because we're talking about Team Standards), a team consists of 1 Team Leader and at least 2 Team Members and their experience as a team has to span for at least 2 months.

A team from its inception till its disbandment goes through a series of phases:

• Building

• Performing

• Closing

and through each phase the TL has to deliver certain activities and experiences so the team has the best possible performance and fun. That's basically what Team Standards are: a list of things and how those things should happen during the existence of a team in AIESEC so both the experiences of the Team Leaders and Team Members are great.

Building

This is the first phase and it happens right after the team is created.

In this phase people start to work together and understand who is in the team, what the team is about and what it’s set to achieve together, and what’s their individual contribution.

It usually lasts for a few weeks and it comprises of (but is not limited to):

• defining team rules

• defining the team purpose

• setting strategies for the team term

• assigning JDs (Job descriptions) to everyone in the team

• creating individual development plans

Performing

If the Building phase could be called the appetizer of Team Standards (imagine some grassini al prosciutto crudo, click on the link to get an idea of what I mean), the Performing phase is the meat and potatoes, the big course, the borș de casă. This is where the magic happens and is the longest lasting phase of the 3.

This is where the progress can be improved and tracked both for the team and individually. It’s where operations actually happen and where competence are developed on site.

The main things happening during this phase are:

• actually doing the job from your JD (yeah I know, surprising)

• team meetings

• one-on-one meetings

• performance reviews

• team working days

• team days (aka team buildings)

• feedback spaces

Closing

And we're finally getting to dessert. Another short phase which I'm sure you guessed from its name is the last one.

In this phase teams and individual debrief on the experience in terms of development and results, and suggest next steps. This is the stage when transition happens.

It also lasts for a few weeks and it comprises of:

• reporting

• knowledge and skills transition (if it makes sense to do that)

• documents and tools transition

• personal development plan review

• goodbye tears

And that's Team Standards in a nut shell for you!

NEC Spring 2020

Quiz

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