Paul Musters recently shared something that caught my attention: "And you thought your team collaborated well?" Then he pointed to two Chinese speedcubers, Xuanyi Geng (using his right hand) and Qixian Cao (using her left hand), who solved a Rubik's Cube together and set a Guinness World Record at 8.9 seconds. He added one more detail that makes the story even wilder: Xuanyi Geng can solve a 3x3 cube solo in 3.05 seconds.

That short post works because it does two things at once. First, it gives you an almost unbelievable example of coordination under constraints. Second, it holds up a mirror to our everyday definition of "good teamwork" and quietly asks: are we actually collaborating, or are we just coexisting?

Below, I want to expand on what Paul Musters is really highlighting: high performance teamwork is not a vibe. It is a practiced system.

The real point behind the Rubik's Cube story

A two-person cube solve is a perfect metaphor for modern teams because it forces clarity.

Roles are unambiguous: one person uses the right hand, the other the left.
The objective is shared and measurable: the cube must be solved.
Feedback is immediate: a wrong move is visible instantly.
Time pressure is real: fractions of a second matter.

Most workplace collaboration is the opposite. Roles blur, objectives multiply, feedback arrives late, and time pressure is emotional rather than operational. The speedcubers show what happens when collaboration is designed, not improvised.

"And you thought your team collaborated well?" is a fun line, but it is also a challenge: define collaboration in observable behaviors.

What elite coordination actually looks like

When two people solve a cube together, they are not doing twice the work. They are doing one piece of work with two tightly synchronized inputs. That only works if a few conditions are true.

1) A shared mental model

They likely agree on the method, the notation, and what "good" looks like at every stage. In business terms, this is the difference between "We should improve customer experience" and "We will reduce first response time to under 2 hours and increase resolution rate to 85%".

If your team has constant debates mid-execution about priorities, definitions, or what "done" means, you do not have a shared mental model. You have parallel interpretations.

2) Micro-handoffs without friction

In many teams, handoffs are where work goes to die: approvals, rework, unclear ownership, missing context. Speedcubers cannot afford that. Their collaboration is basically continuous handoff.

A practical translation:

Define interfaces: what do I need from you, in what format, by when?
Reduce dependencies: can we restructure work so fewer tasks require coordination?
Make status visible: so we do not ask for updates, we read them.

3) Trust built by repetition, not optimism

High trust is not "I assume you will do your part". It is "I have seen you do your part, consistently, under pressure".

Speedcubers train together. Teams often do not. We hire smart people and hope teamwork will emerge. The post nudges us to remember that teamwork is a skill, and skills require reps.

4) Constraint-driven performance

Paul Musters highlights a quirky constraint: right hand only for one person, left hand only for the other. Constraints sound limiting, but they can create excellence.

In organizations, the right constraints can sharpen collaboration:

Clear decision rights: who decides, who advises, who executes.
Time boxes: decisions by Friday, prototype in two weeks.
Communication boundaries: one doc, one thread, one owner.

Without constraints, collaboration becomes a meeting culture.

The solo record matters too: teamwork is not a substitute for mastery

Paul Musters also mentioned that Xuanyi Geng is even faster alone, with a 3.05 second world record solve. That detail is important because it prevents the wrong takeaway.

Teamwork is not about compensating for low individual skill. In elite settings, collaboration multiplies strong individual capability. When each person is competent, coordination becomes leverage instead of babysitting.

Ask yourself two questions:

Are we collaborating to amplify talent, or to patch gaps?
Do we invest as much in individual craft as we do in team rituals?

A great team is often a group of people who each take ownership of mastery, and then design a way to combine that mastery efficiently.

What leaders can copy from this example (without solving cubes)

Most of us will never chase world records. But we can apply the same principles to projects, launches, client work, and product development.

Set a single scoreboard

Speedcubers have time. Teams need an equivalent. Choose one primary metric per initiative. Secondary metrics can exist, but do not let them compete.

Examples:

Marketing: qualified pipeline created
Support: time to resolution
Engineering: cycle time and defect rate
Sales: win rate and sales velocity

Rehearse collaboration before the big moment

Do not wait for the product launch, board meeting, or incident response to discover your coordination problems.

Run pre-mortems: "How could this fail?"
Do dry runs: demo the flow end-to-end.
Review handoffs: check inputs and outputs like an assembly line.

Make decisions cheap and reversible

In speedcubing, you do not debate moves. You execute patterns you have practiced. In teams, long debates often signal unclear decision rules.

Try:

"Disagree and commit" for reversible decisions
A decision log to prevent re-litigating
Explicit escalation paths

Why Paul Musters's post works as LinkedIn content

The message is strong, but the delivery is also a lesson in content strategy.

A high-contrast hook

"And you thought your team collaborated well?" instantly creates contrast between what we think we do and what world-class coordination looks like.

A surprising, specific example

Two names, two hands, one cube, 8.9 seconds. Specifics feel true and shareable.

A second punchline

Adding the 3.05 second solo record raises the stakes and keeps the reader from scrolling.

If you create LinkedIn content, this is a great pattern to study:

Hook (challenge an assumption)
Proof (a vivid example)
Numbers (make it concrete)
Implication (what it says about us)

Good viral posts do not just entertain. They give readers a sentence they can repeat to their team.

A simple takeaway to bring back to your team

If you want a practical next step, borrow the speedcubers' clarity:

Define roles as explicitly as "right hand" and "left hand".
Pick one scoreboard.
Practice the handoffs.
Build trust through repetition.

Then measure whether collaboration is actually getting faster, cleaner, and calmer.

This blog post expands on a viral LinkedIn post by Paul Musters. View the original LinkedIn post ->