Managing Your Team (Part 3) - Who's Dominating Your Team

It's not the first time I have been facilitating a workshop or group session and as early as the first break, other members of the group have asked me to deal with someone who is dominating the session.

How often have you been in a similar team setting and said to yourself...

"Why don't they shut up for 5 minutes? They're talking through a hole in their whatsit!"

What can make the situation worse? Those that just love to hear themselves talk...

  • Quite often are only repeating what someone else has said.
  • May not have the authority to speak.
  • May not have the expertise or any experience in the particular subject.
  • Even when not talking, are not listening - they are too busy thinking about what to say next
  • Will inhibit other team members from participating

    • Whatever you do don't stop for breath. The slightest pause, even natural quiet times that occur in meetings are regarded as opportunities for the dominating team member to talk some more.

    Seriously, these situations can be tricky. We want the whole team or group to participate in a balanced (not necessarily equal) way.

    Moreover, depending on the team session, or team project, some team members may have more experience and expertise than others and we may need to depend on their expertise to move forward.

    This dependency in itself can lead to another type of challenge which is covered in Managing Your Team (Part 4).

    Leaving this dominating issue unresolved can definitely harm the overall effectiveness of the team. Over time, other participants will either attend team sessions reluctantly or find a "very good reason" not to attend at all. This will greatly damage the sense of team worth and teamwork.

    What can make it tricky is that we want to deal with this without alienating the dominating participant - they are a member of the team and still have a valid and valued contribution to make to the overall success of the team and, therefore, their participation still needs to be encouraged.

    So, how do we lead dominating team members?

  • If it's a team meeting, group session, or project meeting for example, give everyone a chance to prepare. Using meeting management best practice, all participants are given the agenda in advance, asked to prepare their inputs depending on the subject matter. Team members will all also note that each of them have been given a certain time slot and a certain amount of time to give their inputs. It's up to the team leader or facilitator to ensure the agenda is adhered to. We all do that anyway, right?
  • Play to their strengths. Recognise that a team member may have more experience and expertise than others and their inputs are valued but also emphasise that all team inputs are important.
  • We discussed "reluctant" participants in Managing Your Team (Part 2). So, without pointing the finger at "dominating" participants, it could be worthwhile running a team session which specifically discusses team participation, balance of participation, reaching consensus on the 'rules'.
  • For those of you unfamiliar with the term gatekeeping, as team leader it well within your power to address the issue in situ by, for example, thanking the dominating team member for their contribution and emphasising that you would like to get inputs from other team members.
  • Use one of my preferred techniques - Brainstorming or another where you get members to write down their ideas, say top three, and then in a structured way, invite each team member to share their ideas with the rest of the team.

    • Managing Your Team (Part 4) will look at Disproportionate Amount of Influence.

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