Use it when: You’re forming a brand new team.
If you’ve ever pulled together a team – especially one filled with people who are unfamiliar with each other – you know that you don’t just transform from a group of strangers to a well-oiled machine overnight.
That’s where the FSNPA model comes into play. In 1965, Bruce Tuckman, a psychological researcher, determined that teams move through five distinct stages as they evolve from a collection of individuals to a more cohesive unit:
1. Forming: team members come together to meet, iron out their goals, and understand the roles they’ll play on the team.
2. Storming: members start to experience some conflict as they learn more about each other’s work and
communication styles.
3. Norming: with those initial hurdles and hiccups behind them, the team starts to reach a place of more harmony. They better understand each other’s strengths and approaches and fall into a better routine with each other.
4. Performing: as the name implies, this is when the magic is really happening. The team is working together well and getting the job done with a clear understanding of each other.
5. Adjourning: when the project comes to a close, the team members go their separate ways – but they might participate in a retrospective or some other form of reflection first.
The last stage (adjourning) wasn’t added until later in the 1970s, and for that reason you might also hear this model referred to simply as the “FSNP model.”
Pros of this model:
-Knowing the natural phases of a team makes it far easier to guide your group through the phases of effective collaboration, rather than hoping they figure it out on their own as they go along.
-It allows leaders to easily pinpoint what stage their team is currently in so they can resolve problems or address tension more effectively.
Cons of this model:
-It focuses exclusively on new teams and doesn’t provide much context for long-standing teams who work together continuously (without adjourning) but might have various members coming and going.
-It provides little direction or context about what to do if the team seems to be stuck in a certain stage without moving forward.
2. The Lencioni Model
The Lencioni model of teamwork.