How joining an existing team might not be as inclusive as we think

Agile Development teams are the heart of an agile organization. Whether the team uses Scrum, Kanban, XP, or some amalgamation of agile practices, the Agile Development team is the core make-up of the organization. These teams, in the spirit of agile, aren’t just nameless cogs in a machine, but have their own cuture, identity, way of working, and of course, a team name. Much goes into setting up a team and crafting its sense of self.

But teams change. Someone leaves, someone is added, or leadership shuffles the team a little or a lot. How do you incorporate a new team member? When the team completely changes, it is quite obvious that a whole new team culture must be created. But when just one person is added or removed, does that require a brand new team identity?

To answer the question, consider your response to the next question. Does the team go back to a ‘Forming’ phase when just one person is changed?

From my experience, the answer is yes, though never as drastically as when the team is first created. When a new team member joins an existing team, how far do we typically go to welcome them? Do we re-establish team norms? Identify a new team name? Revisit the team calendar and meeting cadence? Do you purposefully reset the team culture or expect them to form and adapt to the culture the team has already established?

From a practical view, I rarely see teams change their names or drastically change the culture for one person. Given the overhead associated with returning to the beginning of a team’s formation and starting from scratch, this stance makes sense. Going through all of the formation activities take time that few teams choose to invest in.

Yet let’s look at it from the new team member’s perspective. How welcomed would you feel if you were placed on an established team that expected you to conform to their culture? One might feel like a second class citizen, an outsider on one’s own team. They’re known or introduced as the ‘new person’ on the team. We’ve all felt out-of-place at one point in our lives and it’s not a great feeling.

The next time you have a new team member join your existing team, consider how you can be truly inclusive and welcoming for them. What might you do to fully welcome a new team member onto a team? How can we balance being pragmatic with being inclusive? And how can we ensure that the new team member and their skills are blended well with the team?