BU288 Midterm #2

How will you design a team?

group structure (individual, single-leader, self-managed), and tasks (additive, disjunctive, conjunctive)

Group

consists of 2+ people interacting independently to achieve a common goal

Interdependence

group members rely to some degree on each other to accomplish goals

Formal Work Groups

established by organizations to facilitate the achievement of organizational goals, designed to channel individual effort in an appropriate direction

Task Forces and Project Teams

temporary groups that meet to achieve particular goals

Team Cohesion

degree to which a group is attractive to its members

Cognitive & Behavioural Cohesion

members believe team will fulfill goals and needs

Emotional Cohesion

team is a part of person’s social identity

Group Development Process

form, storm, norm, perform, adjourn

Form

gather goals, test the waters

Storm

conflict development, compete for roles, low cohesion

Norm

settle into roles, accept group norms

Perform

fulfill role duties, mutual assistance

Adjourn

group disbands, success evaluation, emotional support

Group Norms

collective expectations we have regarding each other’s behavior

Norm Development Aspects

important function that norms serve is to provide regularity and predictability to behaviour, develop to regulate behaviours that are considered important

Typical Norms

dress norms, reward allocation norms (equity, reciprocity, equality), performance norms

Punctuated Equilibrium (PE)

when groups have a specific deadline by which to complete some problem-solving task, we can often observe a very different development sequence, it has a model

(PE) Phase 1

begins with first meeting and continues till existence midpoint - first meeting is critical, assumptions, approaches and precedents are developed

(PE) Midpoint Transition

marks a change in the groups approach and how they manage the change as critical for progress

(PE) Phase 2

includes with a final meeting that reveals a burst of activity and a concern for how outsiders will evaluate the product

Group Types

individual, single-leader, self-managed

Individual Group

working alone, independent

Single-Leader Group

Leader has others working interdependently on a single project

Self-Managed Team

Autonomous group of people working interdependently on a single project, provide their members with the opportunity to do challenging work under reduced supervision

Composition of Self-Managed Teams (CSMT)

stability, size, expertise, diversity

(CSMT) Stability

Require considerable interaction and high cohesiveness among their members

(CSMT) Size

Self-managed teams should be as small as is feasible without causing stress due to understaffing

(CSMT) Expertise

Members should have a high level of expertise about the task at hand

(CSMT) Diversity

Team should have members who are similar enough to work well together and diverse enough to bring a variety of perspectives and skills to the task at hand

Supporting Self-Managed Teams

training (technical, social, language, business)

Technical Training

include math, technology use, or any tasks that a supervisor formerly handled

Social Training

assertiveness, problem solving, and routine dispute resolution

Language Training

Important for teams with linguistic diversity

Business Training

provide training in the basic elements of finance, accounting, and production so that employees can better grasp how their team’s work fits into the larger picture

Problems of Bigger Groups

process losses, less satisfaction over group membership, lack of common goals, hierarchical

Process Losses

Group performance difficulties stemming from problems of motivating large groups

Problems of Very Small Groups

lack of talent, skills, and capacity

Group Diversity

the variety of identities, experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives within a group, has a strong impact on interaction patterns

Surface Diversity

involves age, gender, and race

Deep Diversity

involves personality and values

Less Diverse (homogeneous)

less conflict, faster development

More Diverse (heterogeneous)

more conflict, longer development, and more creative

Effects of Rewarding Individuals

creates a competitive atmosphere, reduced teamwork, and low morale

Effects of Rewarding Groups

cooperative atmosphere, increase collaboration, improve team synergy

Roles

positions in a group that have a set of expected behaviours attached to them, represent packages of norms that apply to particular group members

2 Types of Roles

designated, assigned

Designated Roles

formal appointments to a specific title or position, often with a name

Assigned Roles

the specific tasks and responsibilities given to an individual within that title

Role Ambiguity

exists when the goals of one's job or the methods of performing it are unclear, confusion

Role Assumption Process (RAP)

organizational factors, role sender, and the focal person

(RAP) Types of Organizational Factors

roles are ambiguous because of their function, middle management might fail to provide big picture that upper roles do

Role Sender

the identity (like a user or service) that initiates the request to assume a role

Focal Person

can refer to the principal (user, role, or service) that is being granted the ability to assume a role

Role Conflict

exists when an individual is faced with incompatible role expectations, role expectations might be crystal clear but incompatible

Intrasender Role Conflict

occurs when a single role sender provides incompatible role expectations to the role occupant (ex. manager tells an employee to take it easy while delivering another batch of reports that call for immediate action)

Interrole Conflict

several roles held by a role occupant involve incompatible expectations

Person-Role Conflict

Role demands call for behavior that is incompatible with the personality or skills of an occupant

Status

the rank or social positions accorded to group members in terms of prominence, prestige, and respect, groups evaluation of a member

Formal Status Systems

represents management's attempt to public identify those people who have higher status than others, implemented by the application of status symbols that are tangible indicators of status (titles, relationships, schedules)

Informal Status Systems

systems are not well-advertised, lack conspicuous symbols and systematic support that people usually accord the formal system

Consequences of Status Differences

paradoxical effect on communication patterns, many ppl like to communicate with others at their or higher status

How to Reduce Status Barriers

Foster teamwork and cooperation among the ranks (ex. VAN City Savings, the newcomers participate in a week-long orientation program no matter their role)

Social Loafing

tendency for people to withhold physical or intellectual effort when they perform a group task

Free Rider Effect

people lower effort to get a free ride at expense of fellow group members

Sucker Effect

people lower effort due to feeling that others are free riding

How to Counteract Social Loafing

make individual performance more visible, performance feedback, interesting work, and reward performance

Group Cohesiveness

critical emergent property of groups, groups that are especially attractive to their members

Factors of Group Cohesiveness (FGC)

threat and competition, success, member diversity, group size, and toughness/initiation

(FGC) Threat and Competition

External threat to the survival of the group increases cohesiveness in a wide variety of situations

(FGC) Success

Group becomes more attractive when it has successfully accomplished some goal

(FGC) Member Diversity

If the group agrees about how to accomplish some task, its success will outweigh dissimilarity

(FGC) Group Size

Bigger groups have a more difficult time agreeing on goals and will divide into subgroups

(FGC) Toughness/Initiation

Groups that are tough to get into should be more attractive

Consequences of Cohesiveness (CoC)

more participation in group activites, more conformity, more success

(CoC) More Participation

should be reflected in a high degree of communication within the group as members strive to cooperate with and assist each other

(CoC) More Conformity

cohesive groups are well equipped to supply information, rewards, and punishment to individual members, thus inducing conformity

(CoC) More Success

cohesive groups are good at achieving their goals, and group cohesiveness is positively related to performance

Qualities of Effective Work Teams (QEWT)

psychological safety, inclusiveness, team reflexivity, shared mental models, capacity to improvise, collective efficacy, and team resilience

(QEWT) Psychological Safety

shared belief that it is safe to take social risks

(QEWT) Inclusiveness

Teams will function at their best when everybody feels they are part of the team

(QEWT) Team Reflexivity

extent to which team deliberately discuss team processes and goals and adapt their behavior accordingly

Shared Mental Models

means that team members share similar information about how they should interact and what their task is

(QEWT) Capacity to Improvise

Not everything will go as planned for teams, and flexibility and adaptability are essential

(QEWT) Collective Efficacy

consists of shared beliefs that a team can successfully perform a given task

(QEWT) Team Resilience

Team’s capacity to bounce back from setbacks or adversity

Cross-Functional Teams

bring people with different functional specialties together to better invent, design, or deliver a product or service

Superordinate Goals

effects cross-functional teams, attractive outcomes that can be achieved only by collaboration

Virtual Teams

work groups that use technology to collaborate across space, time, and organizational boundaries

Benefits of Virtual Teams

around-the-clock work, reduced travel time, larger talent pool

Challenges of Virtual Teams

trust, miscommunication, isolation

Additive Tasks

group performance depends on sum of performance of individual members (tug of war), low interdependence

Disjunctive Tasks

performance dependent on the performance of the best group member, single-leader group

Conjunctive Tasks

performance limited by the performance of the worst member (ex. assembly line)

Motivation

the extent to which persistent effort is directed toward a goal

Aspects of Motivation (AOM)

effort, persistence, direction

(AOM) Effort

the strength of the person’s work-related behavior, amount of effort the person exhibits on the job

(AOM) Persistence

persistence that individuals exhibit in applying effort to their work tasks

(AOM) Direction

workers channel persistent effort in a direction that benefits the organization

Intrinsic Motivation

stems from direct relationship between worker and the task, self-applied, wanting to task for its own sake