Groups are two or more people having common interests or objectives. These can include individual leadership, individual accountability, and individual work products. A group has two or more people who interact regularly to accomplish a common purpose or goal with similarities and gathering of people.
Teams are a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common mission, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. There is shared leadership, mutual accountability, and collective work products. Teams are a group of workers that functions as a unit, often with little or no supervision, to carry out work-related tasks, functions, and activities.
Types of teams
A Problem-solving team is the most popular team type; compromises knowledge workers who gather to solve a problem and then disband. A Management team consists mainly of managers from various functional areas who coordinate the work among other teams. A work team is responsible for the daily work of the organization; when empowered, they are self-managed teams; an example of student governments, sports, departments in universities. A Virtual team is a new type of team that interacts by computer; member enters and leaves the network as needed and may take turns serving as a leader. A Quality circle is declining in popularity, quality circles, compromising of workers and supervision, meet intermittently to discuss workplace problems.
Stages of team development:
Form group members to try to get to know each other and establish a common understanding and background to getting to know other members through that barrier. Storm groups in conflict members resist being controlled by the group and disagreements arise concerning leadership on the group; where most bad groups fail. Norm your group members to develop close ties, feelings, and camaraderie to allow group members to share a common purpose. When you really start to understand the goal and how to get back. Performance of group members is seen by the work toward achieving their goals.
Characteristics of groups/teams:
The role is the part an individual plays in helping the group reach its goals. A Task-specialist is a role concentrating on getting the group’s tasks accomplished. A Socioemotional role is providing social and emotional support to others on the team. Role structures are the set of defined roles and interrelationships among those roles that the group or team members define and accept; are a result of role episodes in which the expected role is translated and defined into the enacted role.
Role ambiguity occurs when the role sent is unclear; the set role is unclear and the individual does not know what is expected of him or her. Role conflict occurs when the messages and cues compromising the sent role are clear but contradictory or mutually exclusive: groups team development strategies
- Interrole conflict-the result of a conflict between roles
- Intrarole conflict-caused by conflicting demands from different sources
- Intrasender conflict-arises when a single source needs contradictory messages
- Person-role conflict-discrepancy between role requirements and an individual’s values, attitudes, and needs
Role overload occurs when role expectations exceed an individual’s capacities; happens to students allot. Norms are standards of behavior that a group accepts and expects of its members. Define the boundaries between acceptable and unacceptable behavior.
- Norm generalization-the norms of one group cannot always be generalized to another group; uga football v movies
- Norm variation-norms and their application vary within a group or team; group consensus is that is ok
- Norm conformity-conform as a response to: (GAIT)
Group or team pressure to conform to group behavior
An initial (ambiguous) stimulus prompting group behavior. Individual traits that reflect their propensity to conform. The influence of situational factors (group size and unanimity)
- Individual responses to norm conformity: adopt the norms of the group; try to obey the “spirit” of the norms while retaining individuality
- Socialization-norm conformity that occurs when a person makes the transition from being an outsider to being an insider in the organization
- Cohesiveness-the extent to which members are loyal and committed to the group; the degree of mutual attractiveness within the group
Factors affecting cohesiveness to increase include Intergroup competition, personal attraction, favorable evaluation, agreement on goals, and interaction. To reduce factors affecting cohesiveness include Group size, disagreement on goals, intragroup competition, domination, and unpleasant experiences.
Conflict is a disagreement between two or more individuals, groups, or organizations. There is an optimal level of conflict in organizations: too little conflict and the organization becomes complacent and apathetic, and lacks innovation and underperforms, too much conflict creates a dysfunctional organization where hostility and non-cooperation dominate, and the organization suffers from low performance, a moderate level of conflict fosters motivation, creativity, innovation, and initiative and can raise performance of groups team development strategies
Informal Leader-a person who engages in leadership activities but whose right to do so has not been formally recognized by the organization or group: may also be the formal leader for the group or may supplement the formal leader in fulfilling leadership roles, draw on referent or expert powers as leaders
Formal leader is a person elected or designated to engage in leadership activities by the group members; has been formally appointed or recognized by the organization as the leader of the group
Causes:
- Interdependency
- Competition
- Different goals and Activities
- Personalities
Interpersonal conflict-personality clash-two people distrust each other’s motives, dislike each other, or for some other reason simply cannot get along, differing behavior perceptions, competitiveness. Intergroup conflict is the interdependence, different goals, competition for scarce resources. Conflict between the organization and the Environment-conflict with competition, conflict with consumer groups, conflict with employees. Consequences of conflict include Hostility, withdrawal, increased Motivation, and increased performance.
Groups Team Development Strategies