Zuzana Gočová
Scrum Master
ERNI Slovakia
Before the pandemics, it was rather easy to experience the team, how they are doing, what they are struggling with, and what is the team’s mood. The teams used to socialize together by going for lunch, coffee, playing table football, or organizing teambuilding. A lot of things have changed however and this was the main reason, why I have chosen team morale as my Senior Masterpiece topic.
Teams with high morale contribute with a lot of benefits, like e.g. they are willing to support each other, persist in the challenging situation, they enjoy the work on the project and within the team. To indicate whether the team has low, medium, or high morale I introduced a team morale form. It is based on few questions from various areas like tasks, recognition, teamwork and communication, and team socialization. The form is easy to use, time-saving and helps to understand, which areas need to be improved. I collected many actions and ideas on how to boost the morale in our teams, including tips for remote team building activities.
In the Masterpiece, I demonstrated the form and actions on three ERNI teams. By measuring team morale, analyzing the results, and implementing actions, we have successfully boosted the morale in all three teams.
Why to measure, maintain and improve team morale
Due to Covid-19 situation lot of organizations had to transition to work from home on very short notice. Team members, which used to work close to each other, need to keep even better synchronization and more effective communication.
For a Scrum Master or unit leader it becomes challenging to observe:
- what is the team mood?
- what they are struggling with?
- is team still motivated enough?
- is communication running smoothly?
- do they miss socialization?
Process of measuring the team morale
My objective was to measure the morale through a questionnaire created in MD Teams sent to the team members. Questions from all areas were included but it is also possible to focus only on one area, e.g. the mood within the team. Usually there are some standard areas examined in exploring team morale, which are the following:
- Ownership and empowerment
- Teamwork and alignment
- Safety to take risks
- Pride
- Fun and joy
It is advised to keep the questionnaire short as possible.
The range of answers in my case was ranked from 1 (minimum) to 7 (maximum). Based on it I analysed the results, focused on weaker areas and presented the results to the team and together with the team members proposed some improvement actions.
Following measurements can provide insights how well the implementation of the improvement measure worked. If the evaluation stays weak, further actions for improvement are needed.
The evaluation form is applicable for project teams, internal teams, new teams, or teams with newcomers or junior team members.
About the author
Zuzana Gočová joined ERNI in Bratislava, Slovakia in September 2015 as Office, Event and Travel Manager. She used to take care about well-being of the ERNI colleagues and contribute to building the company culture at ERNI Slovakia. Two years later she found herself in the role of a Scrum Master. Besides of her regular Scrum Master responsibilities, she tries to spread good mood and bring positive vibes into her teams.
