Developing a Group into a Cohesive Team - Assignment Example

?Introduction Groups are different from teams in terms of their collaboration and high degree of commitment. Developing a group into a cohesive team equipped with all required skills, trained to participate, collaborate and communicate having aligned individual objectives with team objectives is critical to success (Fraser and Neville 2003). It is essential to nurture team spirit and clear understanding of final objectives in a group of individuals to form a cohesive team. In this report, different team building concepts like Tuckman’s Team Development Model, Myers-Griggs Group Dynamics, Belbin’s Team Roles, team cohesion, conflict resolution, decision making and leadership were not only discussed but also effects of their practical application in real scenario of team building process was analyzed which may help to improve the team building if redone again. During the course of project, many problems and conflicts surfaced as the team progressed through its four development stages as described by Tuckman’s model (Beyerlein and Johnson 2000), which were not beyond expectations. However, these were dealt along as the team developed more cohesion and understanding of the common goal but still the opinion is that these problems could have been avoided and effectively managed as highlighted by (Kayes 2004). Throughout the task, group remained engaged in number of activities that played vital role is team development and are discussed throughout the report. This project report is an aim to comprehensively elaborate significance of reflection in learning and evaluates how experiences are transformed into genuine learning (Kolbs 1984). Secondly, this report narrates process of building a group of individuals into a team and difficulties faced during this progression. It also encompasses the significance and critical role of different concepts and theory elements that influence this process. Problem and Context After the group was formed, I was much skeptical group future as to what form would it take, how we are going to interact and what would be the course of action towards desired goals. A good explanation for this could be that team was in its initial stage of forming as described by Bruce Tuckman in his model of team development (Beyerlein and Johnson 2000) since members were trying to get know each other and develop relationships. McManus (2000) distinguished group from a team in that team has a strong commitment, high degree of cohesiveness and accomplishment to each other and towards common goal than in a group because teamwork promotes creativity, problem solving, effective decision making and improved communication (Chaney and Lyden 2000). During initial sessions, I found that there were member who were not concerned deeply with purpose and goal of the team as they were often found busy in dealing with personal social issues which they thought were of more importance to them. Even at times, they were not prepared for what meeting were all about and had no agenda to talk about. At early stages, team did not seem much organized and interactive as members were shy and reluctant in sharing experiences and knowledge. I was of the view that these issues would induce many problems during the course of task completion and would make it difficult for team building and cohesion. Although team project went much better but often task-based conflicts arose when one member’s job depended on other member’s input or cooperation which (Bartos and Wehr 2002) stated as interdependence conflict. However, main cause of interdependence conflict was being unable to effectively communicate one’s part to another member which (Shapiro 2004) called communication breakdown conflict. Competitive conflict was exhibited by one of team members who always tried to prove himself better than other team member and tried to find his own way through the process if not agreed upon (Rahim 2011). However, overall the project was a huge success and a great effort to understand the team development process in practical scenario and analyze the outcome of applying different team building concepts and elementary theory to progress towards more improvements in real life. Reflection During initial sessions, group decided to select a team leader since lack of this role is likely to affect team performance. Stewart and Manz (1995) identified work supervision and management as primary reason for failure of self-management teams in yielding improvements and productivity. For this cumulative voting method using majority criterion was adopted in which a member with majority votes would be selected as team leader (Nitzan and Paroush 1985). In group’s third meeting, secret balloting was held and each member casted single vote, as the results announced I was selected as team leader. Although, I was not confident enough that I would be able to cope up with my responsibility because in my view I was shy and not aggressive to persuade my ideas, team members had a view that I am responsible, dedicated, good in communication, disciplined and reliable with a rational approach in decision making. This could very much be explained by Belbin’s Team Role Descriptions of implementer, team worker, coordinator and evaluator for planning an efficient practical strategy to achieve group’s objectives (Belbin 2010). Belbin (2010) defined implementer as disciplined, efficient, dedicated and reliable who turns ideas into practical strategies. Coordinator is the role who keeps team focused on objectives clarifying goals and delegates among team members while evaluator logically makes impartial and effective decisions in a dispassionate manner. Belbin (2010) also highlighted that a team member is cooperative, perceptive and responds to team members in any given situation. According to Belbin (2010), an implementer may be some acceptable weaknesses like inflexibility and gradualness in responding to opportunities where Fraser and Neville (2003) view implementer possessing high organizational and efficient problem solving abilities qualifying them for higher positions in the organization. Thus as the team progressed through forming to norming stage, I became more confident to assume responsibilities as a leader. The entire team undertook an exercise based on behavioral styles questionnaire which helped to determine individual behavioral styles. From this exercise, I found that my behavioral style is spontaneous. This helped in bring more improvements in me so I could lead team in an effective manner. Next we had an exercise Lost on the moon where we had to determine the relative importance of all the factors to achieve the final goal. During the exercise, I felt that team members were neither focused and concerned nor they were communicative to each other. Thus as a team leader, I took charge of the situation and adopted a participative approach (Kippenberger 2002) cohesiveness and motivating the team so that they would share their knowledge, experience and ideas what could best fit in the given possible scenario. During the session, I was surprised to see that team members came up be very logical reasoning and arguments presenting a unique point of view that possibly could not have been figured out by me as an individual. The mindset or in other words “mind lock” was critical to break so that team can enter in storming stage as described by Tuckman’s Team Development Model (Beyerlein and Johnson 2000). In this stage, team members compare different ideas and address issues independently and as team to solve real problem. According to Beyerlein and Johnson (2000), this stage is critical to the growth of team but it could be contentious and unpleasant as team might fail without tolerance and patience. My role was evident in one of exercises when a team member was finding it difficult to carry out his part of assignment and correlate his results and thus losing focus. I worked with the team member to make him understand his unstructured problem and analyzed it in a logical way so that he could comprehend it and participate effectively in team activities. I obtained feedback from the team member throughout the activity to provide him confidence in dealing with the problem and guided him by logical and impersonal analysis for problem solving during all sessions, what Myers and McCauley (1985) state as a quality of thinking and intuition dominant leaders described in Myer-Briggs Group Dynamics model. I also worked with other team member to coordinate, collaborate and communicate all the relevant issues and solutions with a problem solving approach to gain final objectives. Being the team leader, I coordinated all group activities among all through face to face conversation, email and text making use of modern technology so everyone stays on the same page throughout the group task. During the entire group task, one of the team members say Person 2 maintained an assertive and uncooperative attitude which Shaw and Linnecar (2007) termed as competing conflict style based on results from Thomas Kilman’s Conflict Styles exercise. Actually a team member’s part of assignment was dependent on input of task performed by Person 2. However, Person 2 did not cooperate with the team member and did not disseminate the entire information as he appeared very possessive about nature of his assignment to claim personal credit which resulted in a conflicting argument between the two members. Here, I decided to play my role because if conflict is left to escalate to a point where people being to feel defeated and an environment of distrust and suspicion is formed then failure of team is imminent (Bowditch & Buono, 1997). I, therefore, told Person 2 how important his part of assignment was and valued a due credit but he needs to appreciate the importance of team work towards a common goal rather than individual assigned goals. I further told him that he would be requiring an input from another member to conclude his next task during the second phase of group project; therefore, the entire team is dependent on each other in one way or the other to achieve final goal. This helped to maintain a discipline with in the team and aligned team focus towards objectives. In same context, many team members were graded as having ability to withdraw and leave things unresolved what Thomas Kilman’s model defined as avoiding conflict (Shaw and Linnecar 2007). I deemed it important as it played a critical role in transforming team from storming stage to norming stage where all members take the responsibility and function as a team as Tuckman described in his model (Beyerlein and Johnson 2000). To enhance communication and collaboration between team members jigsaw exercise (Druskat and Woolf 1999) played a vital role where team members had to share information and ideas to solve the puzzle. I played a role of coordinator and evaluator to keep harmony and balance among team members and logically evaluate and scrutinize the information and workable ideas for impartial and effective decisions towards final goal. However, Strong and Anderson (1990) suggested being cautious during these type of team building activities as these may appear as a free rid for some team members and thus might lose its essence. Although I had many opportunities to demonstrate my role as a team leader and participate in team building activities as the team progressed through performing stage of Tuckman’s model (Beyerlein and Johnson 2000), I feel that during few activities I failed to present my role more effectively like from very beginning of the group activities, team members engaged themselves in social discussions which continued till last and consumed 5 to 10 minutes in beginning of every session. I am of the opinion that I should have adopted some methodology to keep team prepared and focused for every meeting. Similarly one of the team members used to judge others visioning her as self-reference in that her way is the correct way and many times it happened that she tried to take over the leadership role and act as boss. This created many opportunities for potential conflicts within the team and mostly was personality based; therefore, I had to engage her in interest-based negotiations and principled bargaining to reach an agreement where other members were able to present their role more effectively and convinced her what the best course of action was. The team member’s attitude seriously attempted to spiflicate team dynamics. I still believe that Ugli Orange and Mount Everest disaster exercises play a significant role in equipping me with skills to negotiate and make decision based on ethical principles. Alternative Course of Action In my opinion the task went very overall and there was not much conflict what was there was part and parcel of the group based activities and required to be addressed. In my view, acknowledging and appreciating Tuckman’s team development model from very beginning of the group formation is critical to team development process (Beyerlein and Johnson 2000). As from the forming stage each group would face different problems which restrict the cohesion and forming of group as team what really matters is the methodology and technique to deal in with the given situation (McManus 2000). As a team leader and worker if I had the opportunity to redo the task, I would be doing few things differently and would devise tools and techniques specific to preventing the problems and conflicts from occurring rather than correcting and solving (Bowditch and Buono 1997). I would take forming stage of the team building as an opportunity to establish roles and structure team based on their skills and experiences so everyone is focused, concerned and owns the mission. This would clarify the each individual goal and align it with the team goal determine how members would respond in under normal and pressurized conditions (Fraser and Neville 2003). Also it would prevent against changing and transforming roles among team members, called change catalyst when a team member assumes the role of another member or team leader (Goleman and Cherniss 2001). Similarly, protocols for attending meetings, meeting agenda, minutes of meetings and interaction among team members would be defined so no new groups are formed with in the group, discipline is maintained and communication breakdown is prevented throughout the task (Midura and Glover 2005). Here, I deem important that in parallel to group task-based activities the session must include attempts to familiarize team members to each other for building trust among them and improve coordination and collaboration (Midura and Glover 2005). In my view, adopting a more directive and communicative behavior in leader role in early stages would help team by providing strong guidance and suggestions to focus and align towards common goal. However, as the group matures as a team in later stages a change in leadership role from directive to participative approach may be more beneficial depending upon group circumstances. This is an example of situational leadership approach (Northhouse 2010). In that very case, team members would be encourages to participate in decision making process through consensus, come up with innovative and creative ideas, and to simulate learning environment by sharing knowledge. Another important aspect that I would be stressing is to build team commitment and esprit de corps through ethos leadership throughout all stages of team development (Fraser and Neville 2003). Also adoption of Hill’s Team model provides the leader with a mental road map to help diagnose team problems, and then take appropriate action to correct team problems (Northouse, 2010). In doing so, I would enact variety of functions needed to process and handle information, focus on problem solving techniques rather than jumping to unwarranted conclusions and formula answers. Learning From the learning point of view, project helped me to equip myself with knowledge, tools and skills that would be much beneficial in practical life and are at the core heart of industry. I became aware of many aspects of my life that were unknown to me (Stewart and Manz 1995). Most important thing I learnt is not to evaluate any person or situation on basis of perception or stereotype imaging rather a well thought and logical evaluation of situation would avoid potential conflict and undesired situations. It is recommended to take some time so that team members get accustomed and familiar to the group and the mission for better cohesion and functioning (McShane and Glinow 2007). During the exercise, Tuckman’s team building model approach played a significant role as I practically saw the team to progress through all the team building stages. I led the team throughout the project as team leader and participated in all activities as a team member. This has developed in me the confidence to manage any team building activity in future whether in academic arena or real practical scenario. I also learnt to adopt and vary leader roles with changes in group circumstances from directive to participative style, a situational leader model approach (Northhouse 2010). Communication is at the heart of any team building process and must be considered with special emphasis. Although I am shy in nature, but my role in the team provided me with the opportunity to break silence barriers and be more confident as mostly I had to initiate any conversation in a particular session. Also I had to coordinate and collaborate among all team members to facilitate deciphering and flowing of required information. Lastly, I also learnt different types of conflict and conflict resolving techniques which I count towards an asset in my knowledge inventory and feel confident to deal with any conflict. I also learnt a more thorough and logical methodology to analyze and solve a problem for achieving desired goals. I think that I would be able to effectively use these acquired skill more in future task based situations. Conclusion To conclude, I feel that my project went successful with limited conflicts; however, different situations that occurred were dealt effectively to contribute in team building process. Still I am of the opinion that some of these conflicts and problem solving sessions could have been handled and managed in a better manner. From the project, I developed a lot confidence and learnt many tools, techniques and skills to lead the team towards a common goal. The project made it evident that reflection has a significant role in learning process and presents opportunities to analyze the situation and look ways for improvement. With the skills and experience gained, I am confident that I would be able to apply these in any given practical situation and lead a team more effectively towards a common goal by developing emotional and task cohesiveness. References Beyerlein, M. and Johnson, D. (2000) Team Development, 5th ed. New York: Elsevier Science Inc., p.143. 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