How to Build a High Performing Team (Evidence-Based Guide)

The Short Answer: 7 Steps That Actually Work

If you're short on time, here's what research shows works:

1. Develop your leaders first — 70% of team engagement comes from the manager, not the strategy or the perks

2. Create psychological safety — people need to feel safe raising problems without fear of blame

3. Set clear direction — everyone should know what success looks like and why it matters

4. Spread learning over months — weekly touchpoints over 6-12 months beat a 2-day offsite every time

5. Get managers involved — the participant's boss needs to reinforce new behaviours, not just HR

6. Make specific plans — "If someone challenges my idea, I will ask a question before defending" beats vague goals

7. Measure behaviour change — track what people actually do differently, not how they rated the workshop

The rest of this guide explains each step, why most team development fails, and how organisations have done this successfully.

What High Performing Teams Actually Need

Before we discuss how to build high performing teams, we need to cover what they need. If you've read other articles on this topic, some of this will be familiar.

(For a deeper look, see What Is a High Performing Team? and 7 Characteristics of High Performing Teams.)

The research

Harvard researcher J. Richard Hackman studied thousands of teams and identified six conditions that predict team effectiveness. These conditions explain up to 80% of the difference between high and low performing teams.

Essential conditions (without these, teams rarely succeed):

Real team — stable membership with clear boundaries, not a team in name only

Compelling direction — clear, challenging purpose that energises and aligns

Enabling structure — right people, sound task design, clear norms of conduct

Enabling conditions (allow successful teams to excel):

Supportive context — rewards recognise team performance, access to information and resources

Expert coaching — available when needed, focused on improving team processes

Adequate resources — material, financial, and human resources required to execute

Google's Project Aristotle confirmed similar findings. After studying 180 teams over two years, they found psychological safety ranked first — the belief that you won't be punished for making mistakes.

What leaders actually experience

When we ask leaders what they need to build, they usually get it right. They talk about trust, clarity, psychological safety. The concepts aren't mysterious.

The gap shows up in specific moments. A leader knows they should welcome dissent, but when someone challenges their idea in a meeting, they get defensive. They know feedback should flow both ways, but they avoid the conversation because it's uncomfortable.

Why Most Team Development Fails

Here's the uncomfortable truth: most team development doesn't work. Not because the content is wrong, but because of how it's delivered and what happens after.

The knowing-doing gap

Research shows that goals alone explain only about 28% of whether people actually change their behaviour. Medium-to-large changes in goals produce only small-to-medium changes in what people actually do.

This is why workshops feel productive but rarely create lasting change. Participants leave motivated. They have new frameworks and good intentions. But intentions don't automatically become habits.

The forgetting curve makes this worse. People forget most new material within days unless they have a reason to recall it. This isn't metaphor — it's well-documented in memory research.

What leaders experience

Leaders often describe a familiar pattern: attend a workshop, feel energised, return to work, get pulled back into old habits within weeks.

The problem isn't motivation. It's not that leaders don't care or aren't trying. The problem is that one-time learning experiences don't account for how memory works or how behaviour change happens.

Why satisfaction scores mislead

When training is judged by how participants feel immediately afterwards, organisations systematically choose inferior designs.

Research shows that learners misjudge what works. Intensive workshops feel more productive than spaced learning — but spaced learning produces better long-term results. The approach that feels harder actually works better.

What Actually Works: The Evidence

The research on learning and behaviour change is clear. The challenge is that most team development ignores it.

1. Spread learning over time

One of the largest meta-analyses of learning research (586 studies, effect size d = 0.62) found that spacing practice over time is significantly more effective than cramming it into intensive sessions.

The practical finding: One hour of spaced practice produces learning outcomes equivalent to two hours of intensive practice. For organisations concerned about time away from work, spacing is not just more effective — it's more efficient.

2. Create specific if-then plans

Research across 94 studies found that specific "if-then" plans nearly double the rate of behaviour change compared to goals alone.

Instead of: "I will give more feedback"

Use: "If someone makes a mistake, I will ask what happened before discussing consequences"

This creates a mental link between situations and responses. When the situation arises, the planned response happens more automatically.

3. Get the supervisor involved

The work environment predicts whether learning transfers to the job more strongly than motivation does. Three things matter:

• Direct assistance from the manager

• Guidance on how to apply new skills

• Emotional support when trying new behaviours

What this looks like for leaders

Leaders who've been through well-designed development describe a different experience. The learning happens in small doses over months. There's time to practice between sessions. Their manager is involved.

Leaders Are the Key Lever

You don't build high performing teams by training teams. You develop leaders who create the conditions for high performance.

The 70% factor

Gallup's research across 3.3 million employees found that 70% of the variance in team engagement comes from the manager. Not the organisation. Not the strategy. Not the perks. The manager.

This makes intuitive sense. The manager shapes the daily experience. They determine whether mistakes are punished or discussed. They model whether feedback flows openly or gets avoided. They decide whether goals are clear or ambiguous.

What leaders experience

Leaders who build high performing teams describe it as gradual capability development, not a single transformation event. They learned to model vulnerability. They practiced having difficult conversations until it became natural. They developed the ability to stay calm when challenged.

Where organisations go wrong

Many organisations invest in team workshops while neglecting individual leader development. They bring the whole team together for an offsite but don't develop the leader's capability to sustain what's discussed.

The result: temporary improvement that fades when the facilitator leaves.

Putting It Into Practice: A Step-by-Step Framework

Step 1: Assess where you're starting

Before building, understand your current state. How does your team perform against the six conditions from Hackman's research? Which of Google's five dynamics are present or absent?

This isn't about blame. It's about diagnosis. You can't improve what you haven't measured.

Step 2: Identify who shapes the culture

Who determines the team's daily experience? That's where development investment should focus. If the manager lacks capability, team interventions won't stick.

Step 3: Design for months, not days

Plan 6-12 months of development, not a 2-day workshop. Structure it so leaders practice between sessions and reflect on what's working.

Step 4: Create specific if-then plans

Don't just cover concepts. Have leaders create specific plans:

• "When I receive critical feedback, I will thank the person before responding"

• "If someone makes a mistake, I will ask what we can learn before discussing consequences"

• "When I disagree with an idea in a meeting, I will ask a clarifying question first"

Step 5: Get the participant's manager involved

Involve their manager before, during, and after development. Share what's being learned. Create accountability. Ensure someone is reinforcing new behaviours in the daily work environment.

Step 6: Provide real practice opportunities

Learning happens through application, not absorption. Structure opportunities for leaders to practice new skills on real work. Simulations help, but real situations create lasting change.

Step 7: Measure what people actually do

Track on-the-job application at delayed intervals. How are leaders behaving differently weeks and months later? What's changed in team dynamics?

Don't rely on end-of-program satisfaction scores. They tell you how people felt, not whether anything changed.

How Organisations Have Done This

MYOB

Challenge: Develop emerging leaders at scale across a growing technology company.

Approach: 6-month cohort-based program with weekly touchpoints, real-world application between sessions, and manager involvement throughout.

Results: 50% of 2020 cohort promoted within two years. 98% completion rate. Partnership extended to five years.

Supagas

Challenge: Build leadership pipeline and improve employer brand in a competitive industrial services market.

Approach: Sustained development across 150+ leaders over multiple cohorts. Focus on practical application, not just content delivery.

Results: 70% increase in job applications. Measurable improvement in leadership bench strength.

Camp Quality

Challenge: Develop leaders in a nonprofit context with limited resources.

Approach: Cohort program emphasising peer learning and real-world application.

Results: 30% of participants promoted. Engagement scores increased from 84% to 89%.

What these have in common

• Sustained development over months, not days

• Cohort-based learning with peer support

• Real-world application between sessions

• Manager involvement throughout

• Measurement of actual outcomes, not just satisfaction

Summary

Building high performing teams requires sustained effort over months, not a single event.

What works:

• Spreading learning over time (6-12 months, not 2 days)

• Creating specific if-then plans for behaviour change

• Getting the participant's manager involved

• Providing real opportunities to practice

The key lever: Leaders account for 70% of team engagement. Developing their capability is the highest-impact investment.

The gap to close: Most organisations already know what high performing teams look like. The gap is in building them. Closing that gap requires moving beyond workshops to sustained development that accounts for how learning and behaviour change actually work.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long does it take to build a high performing team?

Research suggests 6-12 months of sustained effort. Teams move through developmental stages, and leader capability needs time to develop. Spreading learning over time with weekly touchpoints produces better outcomes than intensive workshops.

Why do most team building programs fail?

Three main reasons: (1) People forget most new material within days without reinforcement, (2) Goals alone only explain about 28% of behaviour change, and (3) Transfer depends on supervisor support and practice opportunities that most programs don't provide. The content isn't usually the problem — the delivery and follow-through are.

What's the most important factor in building high performing teams?

Leader capability. Research shows 70% of engagement variance comes from the manager. Developing leaders who can create psychological safety, provide clear direction, and model the behaviours they want to see is the highest-impact investment.

Can you build a high performing team with a workshop?

Rarely. Workshops can introduce concepts and create short-term motivation, but lasting behaviour change requires learning spread over months, specific if-then plans, and supervisor support. One-time events don't account for how memory and habit formation work.

What's the ROI of high performing teams?

Gallup's research across millions of employees found that top-quartile teams achieve 23% higher profitability, 18% higher sales productivity, 51% lower turnover, and 78% less absenteeism. Documented team development programs show 4:1 to 7.5:1 ROI when properly measured.

About this research: 8,000+ leader reflections collected over five years. Participants span technology, industrial services, healthcare, and non-profit — from ASX-listed companies to 65-person organisations. Methodology co-developed with Professor Anne Lytle (Monash Business School, Kellogg PhD). Recognised by AACSB's Innovations That Inspire.