Janet Mills, Ph.D.
Consulting
Dr. Janet Mills consults with organizations about developing work groups and teams. Some clients benefit from education about teams and team work-they want to get new teams off to a great start or rejuvenate an ongoing team. Others prefer an action research approach with data collection and interpretation (to diagnose team strengths, weaknesses, potentials and obstacles), followed by planning, implementing, monitoring and evaluating desired changes.
Discovering the Power of Teams
This intensive, highly interactive two or three day workshop provides education about teams and team work to intact work groups, start-up teams, committees and boards, and other audiences. Dr. Mills combines the best of experiential and cognitive learning activities so participants discover for themselves the power of teams, the competencies they need to develop individually and collectively, and the processes effective work teams regularly engage in.
Participants learn about the elements of effective teams, how teams move up the performance curve and about the typical obstacles teams encounter and how to overcome them. They learn about the best practices of team leaders and take away knowledge and skills about how team leaders turn followers into leaders. They also earn about themselves as team members.
Action Research and Organizational Development
Action research begins with the collection of quantitative and qualitative data for analysis and interpretation. With such information in hand, Dr. Mills involves work groups and teams in dialogue about what is going right so they develop a keen awareness of their individual and collective capacities and envision ways to extend these. She also involves them in dialogue about what is going wrong, so they can envision what needs to be different. From these dialogues, folks develop a set of ideas about their preferred situation. Then, they prioritize elements of the preferred situation in terms of their importance and urgency. Next, they plan changes, then implement and monitor these, and finally, evaluate the extent and effectiveness of their progress. Then, the cycle begins anew, usually without the consultant, as work groups and teams have gained the capacity to guide their own action research.
Throughout the process, Dr. Mills assumes many roles. As facilitator, she helps create a positive climate for growth and guides teams through self-study, analysis, planning and change processes. As data gatherer, she collects and reports information needed to evaluate team effectiveness. As process consultant, she assists clients in identifying and critiquing how work gets done and how people relate to each other. As change agent, she serves as a catalyst in helping clients increase mutual trust, communication effectiveness and accountability. As resource person, she provides clients with information based on her experience or suggests others whose expertise could be useful. As trainer, she administers diagnostic instruments, presents workshops, recommends readings and leads activities to boost the learning process. As executive coach and counselor, she meets one-to-one to enhance the personal effectiveness of team leaders and/or members.
The action research process invigorates and strengthens work groups and teams, building their present and future capacity to boost productivity by enhancing interpersonal effectiveness.
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