Team Challenges Issues - Assignment Example

A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they are mutually accountable." (Katzenbach and Smith, 1993). According to these acclaimed authors, the aim of groups is to make better decisions through information sharing. Their synergy is neutral, they have accountability for the whole group is relatively low while that of the individual is high and there are varied skills present. In teams however, focus is on collective performance, the synergy is positive, accountability is for the whole team and the individual and team members have complementary skills. There can be problem solving teams, self managed work teams, cross-functional teams and virtual teams (Robbins & Judge, 2004). Answer no. 1: Some issues that may plague the team are conflicts. It has been said "Conflict arises from the clash of perceptions, goals, or values in an arena where people care about the outcome" (Alessandra, 1993, p. 92) According to the Interactionist view of conflict; it is a positive force that leads to better productivity (Brooks, 2005). But this conflict itself may be functional or dysfunctional. If dysfunctional, it may cause the team to lose sight of its goals. Cognitive conflict relates to ideas, problems and processes; whereas Affective deals with emotions, principals and beliefs team-members believe in. Cognitive conflict might arise because of a clash of ideas and might result in better solutions ultimately. Affective can be destructive and causes lower morale, hurt egos and divided teams (Huczynski & Buchanan, 2005). Hence, conflict needs to be understood and resolved. The leader must realize that productivity of the team is dependent on effective conflict resolution. He can utilize certain preventive strategies such as laying down ground rules before-hand, agreeing on methodologies for conflict resolution, using the right communication channels and properly aligning goals. The leader can adopt a competitive, collaborative, compromising or accommodating conflict resolution style depending on how assertive he wants to be. Instead of being a transactional leader, Rob should try to be a transformational leader so that he can inspire his fellow co workers and can gain their respect (Brooks, 2005). The leadership model states that the transformational leaders are both effective and active because they are more encouraging. Charisma is a trait that Rob should inculcate so that he can define a vision and engage his team members in achieving goals. The leader must try to build trust because Identification based trust leads to productivity and mutual understanding amongst the team members and increases cohesion. Deterrence based trust is very fragile leading to dissatisfied employees (Mullins, 2004). This can be a very big issue. Rob should try to strike a balance between transformational and charismatic leadership. It has been seen that team members high on proactiveness come up with better solutions (Mullins, 2004). According to the Big 5, model teams that are ranked lower in terms of extra version emotional stability, agreeableness, and openness to experience, conscientiousness and emotional stability are less productive (Brooks, 2005). However, teams that are diversified in terms of personality traits perform better. For instance, a person who is lesser extraverted but is very open to experience might be a valuable addition to the team. Clash of different personality types, for instance, Type A and Type B might lead to conflict in a group. If a team is not given distinctive incentives, for example, a reward, a pay raise, team members will be de-motivated (Expectancy Theory). Effective communication is important here. If a team sets goals that are not difficult and are too simple, the level of motivation will be low (Goal Setting Theory). For a team to perform really well, it can make use of Hertzberg theory and work on eradicating the Hygiene factors that can de-motivate teams. This team is at the Storming stage because roles have been defined, the team has been put together and the fundamental objectives and ground-rules have been laid. However, now various issues have arisen and there is an air of frustration and dissatisfaction prevalent in the environment. The team must properly manage conflict and have a participative paradigm of communication to transcend to the next stage of ‘norming’ (Robbins & Judge, 2004) Communication style needs to be varied according to culture of the team. Individualistic cultures value the individual above the team (Moore and Woodrow). The correct communication channel depending on its richness must be decided on (Daft, 2001). Some factors that can render communication in-effective are selective perception, filtering, and information over-load. Bad communication has been linked to low productivity (Robbins & Judge, 2004). Answer 2: The team has potential to do well because there are people of varied personalities present. Diversity leads to more innovative ideas as described above (Robbins & Judge, 2004). Jonah ranks low on proactiveness, but Maggie and Shannon rank high on agreeableness with regard to their clients, so they balance out. The idea is that the efforts of the whole should be greater than that of the parts. All the members have diversified personality traits and they can assume different roles as the team matures. Belbin’s team roles come to mind. Rob could assume the role of coordinator or shaper since he is the leader. Shannon since she has shown promise can be the plant for the team generating new ideas. Maggie could be the resource or investigator as she excels at the socializing bit of the job. Jonah can function as the implementer. It can be seen that every individual has his pros and cons, but over-all they complement each other leading to positive synergy. Since wedding receptions require creativity, diverse team demography and composition of different minded people will breed conflict, which can lead to better decisions. Rob needs to communicate more with his team and pay heed to the resisting forces prevalent in the team. For this, he needs to address everyone’s fears, concerns and criticism. Only then will he have succeeded in becoming a visionary leader. (References given earlier support this statement). Answer 3: Team effectiveness can be increased through using the Team Effectiveness Model which says that the most important factors for effective teams are context, composition, work design and process (Brooks, 2005). Hence Rob should ensure that the team members clearly understand the goals and purpose of the team. He should integrate skill variety, task identity and task significance in each sub-project of the event. This will greatly increase the motivation of each member and will increase the team’s success rate. Rob’s target should be to bring in the concept of team efficacy whereby the over-all confidence level of the team builds as it progresses (Mullins, 2004). The ‘Relationship conflict’ between Rob and Maggie should be curtailed, whereas ‘task conflicts’ should be encouraged as they are not dysfunctional and lessen the probability of the Groupthink phenomenon. Since Rob is a new member, has brought a new way of doing things to the team and has greatly disturbed the status quo, proper change management techniques need to be utilized. As Stadler and Gail have said job satisfaction is lowest before change and it increases as employees’ commitment to the project increases. Answer 4: If I were to enter a new team, I would disturb the equilibrium of the team, and would raise concerns about my credibility to add to the team’s over-all effectiveness. According to Lewis’s three step model says that there is un-freezing, movement and then re-freezing whenever there is change. In the same vein, Christopher G. Worley, PhD, and Yvonne H. Vick, MSOD have said that the more an employee is engaged in a process, the more he becomes committed to it and his productivity increases. So, it will take the team members some time to adapt them to the new way of doing work, after the inclusion of a new person in the team. This insecurity on the team members part will increase as the higher the rank of the new individual is. So, the team members will have to keep the new person in the loop and will have to re-align their compatibilities with the new team member. The phenomenon of group norms and group cohesion also come in effect here, because due to these the new member might not be able to express any dissenting or different views. The concept of social loafing also comes in. No one wants to give anyone a free ride. Also, the evaluation of the team should be done differently as it evolves. References Alessandra, Tony Ph.D. & Hunsaker, Phil Ph.D. (1993) Communicating at Work. New York: Fireside Publishers. Brooks, I. (2005) Organisational Behaviour, 3rd Edn. London: Financial Times/Pitman Publishing. Huczynski, A. & Buchanan, D (2001) Organizational Behaviour: An Introductory Text. 6th Edn. London: Prentice Hall Katzenbach, J.R. & Smith, D.K. (1993). The Wisdom of Teams: Creating the High-performance Organization. Boston: Harvard Business School. Lewis, J. (Aug 2008). Improving morale and motivating employees. Hudson Valley Business Journal , 9. Mullins, L. (2004) Management and Organisational Behaviour, 8th Edn. London: Financial Times Pitman Robbins, S. P., & Judge, T. A. (2004). Organizational Behavior. New York: Pearsons. Worley, Christopher G. & Wick, Yvonne H. (2009). Leading and Managing Change, Graziadio Business Report, Retrieved December 6, 2009 from: http://gbr.pepperdine.edu/052/change.html Read More