A few years ago, I had the pleasure of working alongside an IDEO team on a project for a consumer audio company. Two learnings stand out from that experience. The first was the way the IDEO team balanced a disciplined design process with creative thinking. The second was their instinct to collaborate and learn, even from another team at a startup company. Seeing the results of their approach, we adopted those lessons into the practices of our own team. When I began my doctoral research into team performance, it was no surprise that IDEO consistently appeared among the companies that fostered high-performing teams. What lay behind those experiences I had with the IDEO team?