Hey Mark,

Don't shoot the delivery boy :-)

>In a team concept, at least from the training I took several years ago, the ideal was to have a mix of personalities and skills. The team dynamics were such that almost anything goes when the team is behind closed doors. But, once the members are in public, whatever decisions made by the team are to be backed by all regardless of personal feelings and discussions held in the meeting room. If that can not be maintained, then the team concept fails and the team fails. Members have to expelled and new ones added until the team gels. The team concept we learned but could not implement in the government was that the team had to make all the decisions including the addition of new members and the removal of non-team players. Pride and ego must be left at the door for a team to truly succeed.
>

You are actually presenting the argument why this is both a pattern and anti-pattern. It's a pattern if the "guru" comes into the situation and mentors other team members; it's an anti-pattern if a hotshot comes in and things, with ego blazing, that only he or she can do anything right.