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Belbin's Project Team Roles

Understanding Team Roles Can Improve Team Performance

When a team is performing at its best, you'll usually find that each team member has a clear role and responsibilities. Just as importantly, you'll see that every role needed to achieve the team's goal is being performed fully and well.

But often, despite clear roles and responsibilities, a team will fall short of its full potential. How often does this happen in the teams you work with?

Some team members don't complete what you expect them to do.
Others are not flexible enough, so things "fall between the cracks."
Someone, who is valued for their expert input, fails to see the bigger picture, and so misses out tasks or steps that others would expect.
One team member becomes frustrated because he or she disagrees with the approach of another team member.

Dr Meredith Belbin studied teamwork for many years, and he famously observed that people in teams tend to assume different "team roles." He defined a team role as "a tendency to behave, contribute and interrelate with others in a particular way" and named nine such team roles that underlie team success.

Creating More Balanced Teams

Belbin suggests that, by understanding your role within a particular team, you can develop your strengths and manage your weaknesses as a team member, and so improve how you contribute to the team.

Team leaders and team development practitioners often use the Belbin model to help create more balanced teams.

Teams can become unbalanced if all team members have similar styles of behaviour or team roles.

If team members have similar weaknesses, the team as a whole may tend to have that weakness.
If team members have similar team-work strengths, they may tend to compete (rather than cooperate) for the team tasks and responsibilities that best suit their natural styles.

Knowing this, you can use the model with your team to help ensure that necessary team roles are covered, and that potential behavioural tensions or weaknesses among the team member are addressed.

Tip: Belbin's "team roles" are based on observed behaviour and interpersonal styles.

To find out which team roles you naturally fulfil, or to profile your team, visit www.belbin.com.

Whilst Belbin suggests that people tend to adopt a particular team role, bear in mind that your behaviour and interpersonal style within a team is to some extent dependent on the situation: it relates not only to your own natural working style, but also to your interrelationships with others, and the work being done.

Be careful:

You, and the people you work with, may behave and interact quite differently in different teams or when the membership or work of the team changes.
There are other approaches in use, some of which complement this model, some of which conflict with it. By all means use this approach as a guide; however do not put too much reliance on it, and temper any conclusions with common sense.

Understanding Belbin's Team Roles Model

Belbin identified nine team roles and he categorized those roles into three groups: Action Oriented, People Oriented, and Thought Oriented.

Each team role is associated with typical behavioural and interpersonal strengths.

Belbin also defined characteristic weaknesses that tend to accompany each team role. He called the characteristic weaknesses of team roles the "allowable" weaknesses; as for any behavioural weakness, these are areas to beware of and potentially improve.

Belbin's Nine (9) Team Roles

From "Belbin Team Roles" published online at Belbin.com.

Figure 1: Belbin's Team Roles

Action Oriented Roles

Shaper Challenges the team to improve.
Implementer Puts ideas into action.
Completer Finisher Ensures thorough, timely completion.

People Oriented Roles

Coordinator Acts as a chairperson.
Team Worker Encourages cooperation.
Resource Investigator Explores outside opportunities.

Thought Oriented Roles

Plant Presents new ideas and approaches.
Monitor-Evaluator Analyses the options.
Specialist Provides specialized skills.

Action Oriented Roles

Shaper (SH)

The Shaper is a task-focused individual who pursues objectives with vigour and who is driven by tremendous energy and the need to achieve. For the Shaper, winning is the name of the game. The Shaper provides the necessary drive to ensure that the team is kept moving and does not lose focus or momentum.

Shapers are people who challenge the team to improve. They are dynamic and usually extroverted people who enjoy stimulating others, questioning norms, and finding the best approaches for solving problems. The Shaper is the one who shakes things up to make sure that all possibilities are considered and that the team does not become complacent.

Shapers could risk becoming aggressive and bad humoured in their attempts to get things done. Shapers often see obstacles as exciting challenges, and they tend to have the courage to push on when others feel like quitting. Their potential weaknesses may be that they're argumentative, and that they may offend people's feelings.

Implementer (IMP)

Implementers are the people who get things done. They take the suggestions and ideas of their colleagues' and turn them into plans and positive action. They are efficient and self-disciplined and can always be relied on to deliver on time. They are motivated by their loyalty to the team or company, which means that they will often take on jobs everyone else avoids or dislikes. However, they may be seen as closed-minded and inflexible since they will often have difficulty deviating from their own well-thought-out plans, especially if such a deviation compromises efficiency or threatens well-established practices.

These are the people who you can count on to get the job done.

Completer-Finisher (CF)

The Completer Finisher is a perfectionist and will often go the extra mile to make sure everything is "just right," and the things he or she delivers can be trusted to have been double-checked and then checked again. The Completer Finisher has a strong inward sense of the need for accuracy and sets his or her own high standards rather than working on the encouragement of others.

Completer-Finishers are the people who see that projects are completed thoroughly. They ensure there have been no errors or omissions and they pay attention to the smallest of details. They are very concerned with deadlines and will push the team to make sure the job is completed on time. They are described as perfectionists who are orderly, conscientious and anxious.

However, a Completer-Finisher may worry unnecessarily, and may find it hard to delegate.

People-Oriented Roles

Coordinator (CO)

A Co-ordinator is a likely candidate for the chairperson of a team, since they have a talent for stepping back to see the big picture. Co-ordinators are confident, stable and mature and because they recognise abilities in others, they are very good at delegating tasks to the right person for the job. The Co-ordinator clarifies decisions, helping everyone else focus on their tasks.

Coordinators are the ones who take on the traditional team-leader role and have also been referred to as the chairmen. They guide the team to what they perceive are the objectives. They are often excellent listeners, and they are naturally able to recognize the value that each team member brings to the table. They are calm and good-natured, and delegate tasks very effectively.

Co-ordinators are sometimes perceived to be manipulative and will tend to delegate all work, leaving nothing but the delegating for them to do.

Team Worker (TW)

A Teamworker is the oil between the cogs that keeps the machine that is the team running smoothly. They are good listeners, talented at smoothing over conflicts and helping parties understand one another without becoming confrontational. Since the role can be a low-profile one, the beneficial effect of a Teamworker can go unnoticed and unappreciated until they are absent, when the team begins to argue, and small but important things cease to happen.

Because of an unwillingness to take sides, a Teamworker may not be able to take decisive action when it's needed.

Team Workers are the people who provide support and make sure that people within the team are working together effectively. These people fill the role of negotiators within the team and they are flexible, diplomatic and perceptive. These tend to be popular people who are very capable in their own right, but who prioritize team cohesion and helping people get along.

Their weaknesses may be a tendency to be indecisive, and to maintain uncommitted positions during discussions and decision-making.

Resource Investigator (RI)

The Resource Investigator gives a team a rush of enthusiasm at the start of the project by vigorously pursuing contacts and opportunities. He or she is focused outside the team and has a finger firmly on the pulse of the outside world. Where a Plant creates new ideas, a Resource Investigator will quite happily appropriate them from other companies or people.

A good Resource Investigator is a maker of possibilities and an excellent networker but has a tendency to lose momentum towards the end of a project and to forget to follow things up.

Resource Investigators are innovative and curious. They explore available options, develop contacts, and negotiate for resources on behalf of the team. They are enthusiastic team members, who identify and work with external stakeholders to help the team accomplish its objective. They are outgoing and are often extroverted, meaning that others are often receptive to them and their ideas.

On the downside, they may lose enthusiasm quickly, and are often overly optimistic.

Thought Oriented Roles

Plant (PL)

Plants are creative, unorthodox and generators of ideas. If an innovative solution to a problem is needed, a Plant is a good person to ask. A good Plant will be bright and free-thinking. Plants can tend to ignore incidentals. The Plant might be caricatured as the absent-minded professor/inventor, and often has a hard time communicating ideas to others.

The Plant is the creative innovator who comes up with new ideas and approaches. They thrive on praise but criticism is especially hard for them to deal with. Plants are often introverted and prefer to work apart from the team. Because their ideas are so novel, they can be impractical at times. They may also be poor communicators and can tend to ignore given parameters and constraints.

Multiple Plants in a team can lead to misunderstandings, as many ideas are generated without sufficient discernment or the impetus to follow the ideas through to action. Plants can also create problems with the timing of their ideas. The fact that the team has decided on a valid way forward and is now in the implementation stage will not stop the Plant from coming up with new solutions and disrupting the implementation process.

Monitor-Evaluator (ME)

Monitor Evaluators are fair and logical observers and judges of what is going on in the team. Since they are good at detaching themselves from bias, they are often the ones to see all available options with the greatest clarity and impartiality. They take a broad view when problem-solving, and by moving slowly and analytically, will almost always come to the right decision. However, they can become very critical, damping enthusiasm for anything without logical grounds, and they have a hard time inspiring themselves or others to be passionate about their work.

Monitor-Evaluators are best at analysing and evaluating ideas that other people (often Plants) come up with. These people are shrewd and objective, and they carefully weigh the pros and cons of all the options before coming to a decision.

Monitor-Evaluators are critical thinkers and very strategic in their approach. They are often perceived as detached or unemotional. Sometimes they are poor motivators who react to events rather than instigating them.

Specialist (SP)

The Belbin Team Inventory was revised to include the Specialist role, since the role was not revealed in the original research because no specialized knowledge was required for the simulation exercise.

Specialists are passionate about learning in their own particular field. As a result, they are likely to be a fountain of knowledge and will enjoy imparting this knowledge to others. They also strive to improve and build upon their expertise. If there is anything they do not know the answer to, they will happily go and find out. Specialists bring a high level of concentration, ability, and skill in their discipline to the team, but can only contribute on that specialism and will tend to be uninterested in anything which lies outside its narrow confines.

Specialists are people who have specialized knowledge that is needed to get the job done. They pride themselves on their skills and abilities, and they work to maintain their professional status. Their job within the team is to be an expert in the area, and they commit themselves fully to their field of expertise.

This may limit their contribution, and lead to a preoccupation with technicalities at the expense of the bigger picture.

How to Use the Tool

Knowledge of Belbin's Team Roles model can help you to:

Identify potential strengths and weaknesses within your team
Overcome conflict between your co-workers
Understand and appreciate everyone's contributions.

If you want to learn more about the Team Roles that you and your team exhibit, you can purchase a full, personalized behavioural report by going to belbin.com (prices may vary according to the number of reports that you require).

Once you've received your report, you can apply it with the help of the Team Role Circle. This is a free resource from belbin.com that gives you a structure to follow.

It comprises four steps:

If you have a large group, divide participants into "teams" of approximately five or six. If you work with a smaller group, avoid splitting it up.
Ask each team to draw a circle, to divide it equally into nine sections, one for each of Belbin's team roles, and to enter their names in the segments that correspond to their top two roles.
Encourage discussion among the team members by asking them to list five main areas where they think their strengths and weaknesses lie, and how these match, overlap or contrast with those of their co-workers.
Ask your team to come up with three action points based on its findings, focusing on helping the team to perform more effectively.

Tips:

Remember not to depend too heavily on this idea when structuring your team - this is only one of many, many factors that are important in getting a team to perform at its best.
Just knowing about the Belbin Team Roles model can bring more harmony to your team, as team members learn that there are different approaches that are important in different circumstances and that no one approach is best all of the time.

The Belbin Team Inventory

The Belbin Team Inventory is a behavioural test, also called the Belbin Self-Perception Inventory, Belbin Team Role Inventory, BSPI or BTRI. It was devised by Meredith Belbin to measure preference for nine Team Roles; he had identified eight of those whilst studying numerous teams at Henley Management College.

The Inventory assesses how an individual behaves in a team environment. The assessment includes 360-degree feedback from observers as well as the individual's own evaluation of their behaviour, and contrasts how they see their behaviour with how their colleagues do.

Belbin himself asserts that the Team Roles are not equivalent to personality types, and that unlike the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which is a psychometric instrument used to sort people into one of 16 personality types, the Belbin Inventory scores people on how strongly they express behavioural traits from nine different Team Roles. A person may and often does exhibit strong tendencies towards multiple roles.

Application and Use

In the initial research, eight team-role behavioural styles were identified - Chairman, Shaper, Plant, Monitor-Evaluator, Company Worker, Resource Investigator, Team Worker, and Completer-Finisher.

The current schema has been refined to include a ninth style - Specialist - and in addition has renamed the Chairman behavioural style Co-ordinator and the Company Worker Style Implementer (probably more for reasons of 'political correctness' rather than any identified changes in behaviour of people in these classifications).

Belbin now administers the refined Belbin Team Inventory via e-interplace, a computerised system which scores and norms the data to produce feedback reports for individuals, teams, groups and jobs. Meredith Belbin argues that the optimum size for a team is 4 people. Beyond this number, individuals do not work closely enough together to constitute a team and are defined as a group.

Data from the Belbin Team Inventory can also be amalgamated and interpreted to assess how effectively a team is likely to work together, including selecting the best candidate to fulfil each role, and identifying gaps and overlaps in the Team Role distribution which might affect a team's success. The Belbin Team Inventory can also be used in conjunction with the Belbin Job Requirements Inventory to assess a candidate's behavioural performance in a particular job.

Other Team Role Inventories

Team Management Systems (TMS)

A competitor to the Belbin's system, developed independently in Australia by Charles Margerison and Dick McCann, is the Margerison-McCann Team Management System. This can be shown as a similar wheel with rather similar roles, whose titles however are different.

The company states: "Independent British Psychological Society reviews available on each Profile"

Star Roles Model

The Star Roles Model is used by organisations to describe the positions managers and mentors adopt, when guiding direct-reports and mentees. The concept builds on the Group Roles model developed by Benne & Sheats in 1948, taking a short-cut route to describing preferences when guiding others. Similarly, the Roles Model follows the Mintzberg 10 Management Positions - drawing in the most relevant elements when considering the mentoring relationship in detail.