????我和斯坦福大學(xué)(Stanford University)的同事哈吉?拉奧花了7年時(shí)間研究企業(yè)如何百尺竿頭更進(jìn)一步,。我們發(fā)現(xiàn)，這個(gè)過(guò)程主要是通過(guò)團(tuán)隊(duì)帶動(dòng)的,。具體來(lái)說(shuō)就是以正確的方式和恰當(dāng)?shù)乃俣韧苿?dòng)新團(tuán)隊(duì)成長(zhǎng),，同時(shí)把公司上下多個(gè)團(tuán)隊(duì)的努力編織在一起。

????即使對(duì)微小的年輕公司而言,，這種動(dòng)態(tài)過(guò)程也是至關(guān)重要的。創(chuàng)建于2010年的“新聞聚合器”應(yīng)用脈沖新聞(Pulse News)就是一個(gè)絕佳范例,。這家公司的員工只是增加到區(qū)區(qū)8個(gè)人之后,，績(jī)效問(wèn)題就開(kāi)始接連爆發(fā)。有鑒于此,，創(chuàng)始人阿克沙伊?科塔里和安基特?古普塔把公司員工分裂成3個(gè)小團(tuán)隊(duì),。幾乎就在同時(shí)，這家年輕公司開(kāi)始以更快的速度生產(chǎn)出性能更好的軟件,。此外,，公司的人際關(guān)系也變得更加和諧，員工們時(shí)常攜手解決彼此的問(wèn)題,。

????當(dāng)脈沖新聞的員工擴(kuò)張到12人（分為4個(gè)團(tuán)隊(duì),，都在同一個(gè)房間工作）時(shí)，每支團(tuán)隊(duì)依然通過(guò)公告板向其他員工實(shí)時(shí)傳達(dá)各自的工作進(jìn)展,。每天下午,，每支團(tuán)隊(duì)都會(huì)做一個(gè)簡(jiǎn)短的發(fā)言，向公司上下匯報(bào)他們正在從事的工作,，以及他們需要在哪些方面獲得指導(dǎo)和幫助,。等到員工增長(zhǎng)到25人，用戶(hù)人數(shù)突破3,000萬(wàn)大關(guān)的時(shí)候,，脈沖新聞繼續(xù)依靠小團(tuán)隊(duì)的力量,。2013年，這家公司被社交網(wǎng)絡(luò)巨頭LinkedIn收購(gòu),，收購(gòu)價(jià)高達(dá)9,000萬(wàn)美元,。

????無(wú)論你正在嘔心瀝血經(jīng)營(yíng)一家像脈沖新聞這樣的初創(chuàng)公司，正在開(kāi)設(shè)多個(gè)新店面，還是正在一家現(xiàn)存的組織內(nèi)推行全新的實(shí)踐方式,，你都可以借助具有以下五大特征的有效團(tuán)隊(duì)來(lái)推動(dòng)企業(yè)茁壯成長(zhǎng)或擴(kuò)展某個(gè)項(xiàng)目的受眾群體,。

????構(gòu)建小規(guī)模團(tuán)隊(duì)

????當(dāng)團(tuán)隊(duì)工作需要進(jìn)行大量的信息交流和協(xié)調(diào)時(shí)，這一點(diǎn)尤為重要,。對(duì)于大多數(shù)任務(wù)而言,，4或5人是最優(yōu)人數(shù)，一旦超過(guò)10或12人,，團(tuán)隊(duì)表現(xiàn)和人際關(guān)系確實(shí)會(huì)受到影響,。許多經(jīng)過(guò)精心設(shè)計(jì)的研究表明，發(fā)生這種狀況的原因在于認(rèn)知超載,。比起3,、4個(gè)人的團(tuán)隊(duì)，協(xié)調(diào)10位隊(duì)友的活動(dòng),、同時(shí)還要跟蹤他們古怪的行為和情緒變化,，這個(gè)難度要大得多。為什么海豹突擊隊(duì)(Navy Seals)使用4人戰(zhàn)斗小組,，麥肯錫公司(McKinsey)的項(xiàng)目小組通常由4名咨詢(xún)師組成,？這就是原因所在。二戰(zhàn)期間,，美國(guó)海軍陸戰(zhàn)隊(duì)最初采用12人戰(zhàn)斗分隊(duì),，但很快就恢復(fù)為4人小組。這是因?yàn)?，士兵們突然變得萎靡不振,，?zhàn)斗力隨之大幅下降。一項(xiàng)由哈佛大學(xué)商學(xué)院( Harvard University Business School)教授梅麗莎?瓦倫丁和艾米?埃德蒙森主持的研究發(fā)現(xiàn),，當(dāng)一家大型醫(yī)院的急診科把醫(yī)生和護(hù)士分為4個(gè)不同的6人診斷團(tuán)隊(duì)（而不是嘗試著作為一個(gè)大組進(jìn)行運(yùn)營(yíng)）之后,，醫(yī)護(hù)人員的溝通質(zhì)量和信任程度大幅改善，就連病人等待就診的平均時(shí)間也從8個(gè)小時(shí)驟降至5個(gè)小時(shí),。

????使用層級(jí)結(jié)構(gòu)擊潰糟糕的官僚主義

????隨著組織的發(fā)展,，除了分割大團(tuán)隊(duì)之外，為了把各支團(tuán)隊(duì)的工作編織在一起,，你還需要添加一些層級(jí)和流程,。就以脈沖新聞為例。在他們分成4支團(tuán)隊(duì)（每支團(tuán)隊(duì)都有一個(gè)領(lǐng)導(dǎo)者）之后,，他們使用公告板和午后簡(jiǎn)報(bào)來(lái)促進(jìn)4支團(tuán)隊(duì)之間的溝通和協(xié)調(diào),。層次結(jié)構(gòu)，流程和管理者有時(shí)候被人們看成是不好的字眼,。然而,，隨著組織變得越來(lái)越大,，越來(lái)越復(fù)雜，只要小劑量使用并輔以適當(dāng)?shù)姆婪?，它們都是必要的措施,。Twitter公司首席工程師克里斯?弗萊強(qiáng)調(diào)指出，如果各種規(guī)則,、角色和流程讓人們“覺(jué)得他們好像是在淤泥中行走”,，明智的領(lǐng)導(dǎo)者會(huì)使用層級(jí)結(jié)構(gòu)來(lái)修復(fù)官僚主義。

????My Stanford University colleague, Huggy Rao, spent seven years studying how organizations scale up excellence. We discovered that the process happens largely through teams -- by growing new teams at the right rate in the right way and weaving together the efforts of multiple teams across the company.

????Such dynamics are crucial to even tiny young companies. For example, Pulse News, maker of a "news aggregator" app, was started in 2010. Performance problems began to flare up after the company grew to just eight people. So founders Akshay Kothari and Ankit Gupta split Pulse into three small teams. Almost immediately, the young company started producing better software and doing it faster -- and people were getting along better and helping each other solve problems.

????When the company expanded to 12 people (working in four teams, all in the same room), each team maintained a bulletin board that communicated their current work to everyone at Pulse. Every afternoon, each team gave a short talk to the company about what they were working on and where they needed advice and help. Pulse continued to rely on small teams as it grew to 25 employees and 30 million users; the company was bought by LinkedIn (LNKD) for $90 million in 2013.

????Whether you are growing a startup like Pulse, opening multiple new locations, or spreading new practices across an existing organization, we identified five hallmarks of effective teams that will help you sustain excellence as you grow an organization or expand a program's reach.

????Keep teams small

????This is especially important when teams do work that requires intensive information exchange and coordination. For most tasks, four or five is optimal, and once teams get larger than 10 or 12, performance and interpersonal relationships really suffer. Many careful studies show that this happens because of cognitive overload. It is far more difficult to coordinate your activities and to keep track of the quirks and moods of 10 teammates than three or four. That is why, for example, the Navy Seals use four-person combat teams and McKinsey engagement teams usually have four consultants. In World War II, the U.S. Marines used 12-person combat teams at first, but quickly reverted to four-person teams because so many performance and morale problems reared their ugly heads. And a Harvard University Business School study by Melissa Valentine and Amy Edmondson found that when the emergency department of a large hospital assigned doctors and nurses to four different six-person pods (rather than trying to function as one big group), not only did communication and trust improve dramatically, waiting time for the average patient dropped from eight hours to five hours.

????Use hierarchy to defeat bad bureaucracy

????As organizations grow, in addition to dividing large teams, you will need to add a few more layers and a bit more process to weave together what happens across teams. Look at Pulse. After they divided into four teams (each with a leader) they used the bulletin boards and brief afternoon reports to foster communication and coordination across the four teams. Hierarchy, process, and manager are sometimes treated as dirty words. Yet as organizations get larger and more complex, these are necessary measures so long as they are used in small doses and with proper precautions. Chris Fry, who leads engineering at Twitter (TWTR), emphasizes that when rules, roles, and processes cause people "to feel as if they are walking in muck," wise leaders use the hierarchy to repair the bureaucracy.