One of the more bothersome issues managers face in today’s work environment is ensuring that all employees are kept up-to-date on the various issues that keep cropping up. How to make sure that ‘everyone knows what everyone knows’ is a hugely important job crucial to the smooth, effective operation of an organization. How can managers be sure that it is done accurately and continuously without putting a major dent in everyone’s schedule? That is the million-dollar question. Fortunately, it has a ‘ten-cent’ answer - Team Huddles!
What is a Team Huddle?
Basically, a Team Huddle is just what it sounds like - a weekly informal get-together of team members to quickly make sure everyone is on the same page concerning such topics as:
new projects/plans/initiatives, etc. for the coming week
what each team member is doing and where s/he will be this week
any urgent issues everyone needs to be aware of that will assist them in their work this week
progress/developments on urgent issues/projects
handing out kudos to deserving team members for outstanding performance
answering questions that team members have. Note: keep both the question and the answer brief! This is not the place for complicated or contentious issues.
What Happens in a Team Huddle?
Simply put, team members update each other on urgent/important issues - see previous section - that they feel their team members need to know about this week. The specific topics will, of course, depend upon the nature of the organization’s business. In order to keep this gathering a ‘Huddle’ rather than a ‘Meeting’, each issue needs to be dealt with in a minimum amount of time, e.g. one minute. As a result, each member of a team can be ‘in the know’ inside of 15 - 30 minutes!
Sounds fine so far BUT does it actually work?
A review of the few articles that have attempted to determine the effectiveness of Team Huddles showed that in fact, they do work. However, it depends on what is being measured. For example, a study titled ‘Evaluation of Huddles: A Multisite Study’ published in The Health Care Manager, June 2017, found that huddles in several healthcare organizations were useful in improving awareness of safety concerns and also improved communication between disciplines. Another study titled Huddling Up for Safer Healthcare published by the University of Bradford, the York Health Economics Consortium and the Improvement Academy on April 30, 2018, concluded that Team Huddles had enhanced team working and safety culture in participating hospitals. However, there was scant evidence of their impact on patient harms such as falls, pressure ulcers and cardiac arrests.
The Challenge
Other organizations had experienced some success with Team Huddles but would they be effective in a different setting? A moderately sized non-profit organization that provided supportive housing to people on social assistance decided to find out.
The Executive Director of Accommodation-Information & Support Inc. (AIS) initiated the Monday Morning Huddles as a way to improve internal communication among all team members and departments. It was seen as a way to help it to address two key strategies outlined in their Strategic Plan of 2017 – 2020:
1. Tenant Wellness and Engagement
To provide housing and innovative Support Services that address diverse tenants’ needs and promote
wellness, autonomy and safety.
2. Organizational Wellness and Internal Capability Building
To enrich internal knowledge and skills to operate and govern effectively.
Once the Huddles had been operating for several months, a brief survey was developed to collect the employees’ reactions to and opinions and perceived effectiveness of their Monday Morning Huddles (MMH’s). This evaluation was meant to be exploratory in nature rather than a definitive statement on the utility of Team Huddles.
Reasons Huddles are Important to Employees
First of all, it was very important to determine whether or not the Huddles were important to the participating employees, and if so, to discover the reasons for this - see table and graph below.
Factors Contributing to the Importance of Huddles
According to the survey, 78.57% of employees found Huddles to be very important in their work. The remaining 21.43% found them to be somewhat important. The reasons employees felt that Huddles were important are expressed in their own words as follows:
- Communication with other departments saves phone calls
- Being able to flag issues helps me to work professionally & efficiently if I know the client’s situation
- Use for follow-up & co-ordinate activities that involve Support, Admin. & Property staff
- Advising co-workers of tenant behaviour has led to wellness checks to provide support & address concerns
- Understanding safety risks enables me to manage them better
- Knowing what’s going on in the buildings makes me feel more equipped to handle situations
- Being aware of safety concerns
- Being updated in a timely fashion on all aspects of our agency
- Learning from others
- Informed about clients’ issues and know how to follow up their cases
- Know what is happening in other sections of the office
- There are the times I forgot the items, I always got a reminder at the Huddles
Factors that Contribute to the Effectiveness of Huddles
While employees obviously understand the importance of Huddles to their work, this factor alone might well not be sufficient to sustain Huddles over the long-term. Huddles need to be effective as well in order to ensure their existence over the long-term. The following factors were seen to be contributing to the effectiveness of Huddles.
The Benefits of Huddles to the Employees
A very important factor in sustaining the longevity of Huddles is the importance of the benefits that accrue to the employees who participate in them. If not for these factors, Huddles might well not exist for long.
The employees expressed in their own words the numerous benefits of participating in the Team Huddles.
- We got the information from the Huddles, so the issue has been addressed properly.
- Co-ordinating pest control preparation
- Knowledge of upcoming unit inspections
- Health & safety updates
- Advising staff in advance of building repairs & projects has enabled staff to keep tenants informed and decrease tenant anxiety
- Enhanced counselling skills through a shared approach to client de-escalation
- Knowing who has concerns with pests before possibly entering their unit/apartment building
- Information provided/shared in a timely fashion regarding safety matters
- Have an opportunity to advise staff to follow up with their clients on rent/income verification issues
- When I can’t get one tenant to prepare for bedbug treatment, the huddle gives me the opportunity for calling for support.
Impact of Huddles on Employees
There is a feeling among many employees that were already too many meetings to attend. This was particularly concerning in an NFP organization in which the employees carried out their duties in numerous locations spread throughout a large urban area. Nevertheless, the data indicate that Huddles have had a strongly positive impact on the manner in which the workers carry out their tasks. In addition to the positive data in the chart below, it should be noted that every employee continues discussing issues that require follow-up outside of the Huddle.
Impact of Huddles on Client Care
On the whole, the evidence strongly indicates that Huddles have had a very positive impact on client care. The following statements are in the employees’ own words.
- Improved ability to flag client at risk, security matters and property work that will affect program planning.
- Timely resolution to issues concerning housing and mental health
- The team knows what is going on and if there are any issues or concerns that all staff should be aware of.
- Better communication between our department and timely problem-solving
- Other staff could jump in to care for whose workers are absent
- We just opened our eyes more bigger on our tenants
- Significantly impacts face-to-face spent with clients - almost half a day every week is lost due to attending office for Huddle
Some Unintended Consequences of Huddles
As with many things, in addition to the positive results, there are always some unintended consequences. In the case of Huddles, however, they are neither numerous nor serious.
- Monday mornings are far less productive for me than previously
- Lost time, some unnecessary information for me than previously
- A later start on Mondays but I think it saves time and confusion in the long run.
- Huddles have provided an opportunity for staff to raise unimportant issues
- Learning about the various challenges my colleagues face in their daily work.
- Some meetings exceed their half-hour limit
- We know our co-workers better than before since I do not work at the Spadina office
Conclusions
In addition to the obvious conclusion that Team Huddles are very beneficial to the effective operation of an organization there are quite a few other interesting points to be made about them.
More specifically, Team Huddles:
- Ensure that all employees are up-to-date re: important client/organizational issues
- Provide a forum for employees to support each other re: difficult issues/situations
- Provide an opportunity for employees to bond with/support each other
- Improves client care in organizations
- Improves communication
- Facilitates issue resolution
- Improves health & safety awareness
If you think that Employee Huddles might benefit your organization, give them a try!
If you would like support implementing and/or evaluating Employee Huddles please contact me. I can help. It’s what I do.
Michael Zroback mzroback@primus.ca 647-444-3502
