How To Maintain And Use Group Power – Book Review of The PRIMES by Chris McGoff

Chris McGoff realized a personal goal and professional pinnacle with the publication of The PRMES – How Any Group Can Solve Any Problem. This book review is meant to show that this is not only a quick, impactful read for any leader or manager trying to get more productivity out of their team, it’s an enlightened and intuitive way of understanding group dynamics. 

This isn’t just a book review

Disclaimer: I helped Chris edit the book and promote it, so I’m not 100% objective on the subject but that’s not really the point. I still very much wanted to offer a book review and additional thoughts on this topic. I don’t do a book review often but this is a topic i’m passionate about. The reason I helped out and have enthusiastically integrated The PRIMES into my coaching, facilitation and strategic planning practice is that it works! With The PRIMES, Chris has boiled the complex study of human psychology and group interaction down into an accessible and visually memorable set of principles that anyone can use to manage teams.

What’s a PRIME and why should you care?

A PRIME is a pattern or principle that reliably comes into play when people gather in a group. It has to have been observed from antiquity to present and we must believe it will still be operative when humans group together hundreds of years from now. This observable pattern – once named and shared with the group – goes from being an unconscious pattern to a manageable dynamic. The elemental graphics in the book make it easy and intuitive to remember and share these useful principles. Here’s an example we can all relate to.

BIG HAT – LITTLE HAT

The PRIME BIG HAT – LITTLE HAT (see graphic above) is what happens when people in a group are arguing about the good of the whole (the BIG HAT) or the good of a part (LITTLE HAT). We’ve all been in meetings where people get wrapped around an issue, some wearing the BIG HAT and others the LITTLE HAT, both totally convinced that their perspective is right and the other wrong. In fact, they’re both right (another PRIME covers that), and the power of BIG HAT – LITTLE HAT is that when the group understands this dynamic happening, group members are empowered to call the parties to task and have them acknowledge their own and the other’s perspective. The rule associated with this PRIME allows a group to be powerful instead of getting bogged down in endless bickering. The rule is: all parties agree that anyone can wear either hat, but they have to acknowledge the perspective they’re choosing. Also, no one is allowed to argue the LITTLE HAT perspective at the expense of the BIG HAT. This simple agreement immediately raises the productivity of the group.

For more insight into some of the PRIMES, you can quickly scan the PRIMES I use most frequently in my work and visit www.theprimes.com (check out the videos of Chris for each PRIME.)

A powerful group makes a more powerful leader

Many leaders understand that their success is at least in part dependent on the success of those around and under them, but few leaders I meet take this concept to the level of working to achieve group power. In fact, a leader that can help a group they lead to operate powerfully increases their own impact exponentially. The PRIMES is full of wisdom on how to do this.

The potential exists with The PRIMES to help project teams, executive teams, task forces, committees, boards and ad hoc groups access unprecedented levels of power that leaders by themselves can never accomplish.

This possibility is in line with research looking into the idea of group intelligence but I think The PRIMES makes such insights extremely actionable. The PRIMES become shorthand for dynamics we all “know” are at play, but have little power over until they are named and managed.

Ways to use The PRIMES to build your leadership power

Here are some practical ways to use The PRIMES to help your groups become more powerful

• Read the book. It will take you an afternoon and you’ll immediately find a few PRIMES to apply in your next meeting. 
• Explore the web site. Videos and more explanatory text there.
• Share the book or this book review with your teams (volume discounts on shipping here). Once the whole group has the shared the vocabulary of The PRIMES, you’ll find people shortcutting arguments and issues that used to suck up time because they can catch the pattern before it fully plays out. As a leader, you can model this too, but don’t be surprised if folks start spontaneously identifying PRIMES patterns and suggesting ways to manage them.
• Consider integrating a PRIMES approach into your leadership development programs focused on specific business dynamics such as project or product management.
• Use PRIMES principles in your strategic thinking and design your planning processes using their insights into CHANGE and TRANSFORMATION as you plot your company’s future.
• For Organizational Development Professionals – get the book to find simple ways to explain complex concepts to your clients, and then use it to help them shape the culture intentionally. Get them trained up in high performance teamwork!

Come up with other uses and let me know. I’d love to share ideas for how the principles apply in different industries and disciplines.

Check out the resources in the InPower Coaching EQ at Work and Soft Skills Research Index.