Work Groups and Teams - Term Paper Example

 Work Group and Teams Abstract Work groups and work teams are terms that are used interchangeably these days. In broader aspects, work groups or teams are defined as two or more individuals that work in correlation with each other in order to achieve a common goal. In today’s highly competitive era, the organizations depend highly on their team structures, that work together in order to achieve the organizational goals with high effectiveness and efficiency. There have been many techniques devised that can lead to the formation of effective team structures at a work place. The team structures have been modified over time to meet the challenges of current global environment so that the organizations could perform competitively. It’s not only the design of the work groups or teams that are of importance but once the teams have been properly structured they should be effectively managed so that they could perform with utmost efficiency. Work Group and Teams In 1984 McGrath defined a group as an entity comprising of two or more people. In his perspective the group was deemed to be small to maintain the integrity and dynamics of a group structure while accounting for the independent opinions of the group members. But in his classification a group structure normally included families, small social and friendship groups or work crews. In contest, Turner in 1987 defined a group structure as a unit which has a psychological meaning for the members. In his process of thought, when a member joins a group he drives norms and beliefs from the group itself which as a result effect the member’s attitude and behavior. Turner distinguished an individual’s affiliation to the group as more like a reference than a mere membership. Drawing from these perspectives, eventually, a group or a team, as a whole, is defined as an affiliation of two or more people who interact directly or indirectly in order to achieve a common goal (Earley & Gibson, 2002). Given the complexity of today’s work requirements, interdependence and correlation among employees is an unavoidable aspect of a work environment. In today’s global structure, people work interdependently, interacting with each other to maintain working and social norms at a work place. Groups and teams do not mean the same thing even though both these terms are used interchangeably these days. A group is defined as one or two people who have gathered together and are gaining satisfaction by the collective influences with no special attention to the common goal, whereas team is a structure where people are organized together, so that they could work in correlation with each other to attain that goal. So keeping the work environment in mind, it can be said that a team is a group working towards a common goal (Griffin & Moorhead, 2012). Diversity among the group members with respect to their age, gender, culture, expertise and status within the organization greatly contributes to the performance level achieved through the group. It was believed that a heterogeneous group was far more effective as compared to a homogenous one as it brings diversification and multiple perspectives to the group. For example a group comprising of male and female individuals will have different solutions towards a problem as it is a proven fact that females tend to take a different approach to matters like communication and conflict resolutions as compared to the male members of the groups (Lumsden et al, 2010). But the current heterogeneous population demographics of the United States of America, which has provided many examples of the heterogeneous work teams, have facilitated a deeper analysis of the team structure. Contrary to the previous assumptions which emphasized the positive aspects of such group structures, it has been found that such team structures influence the decision making process in the work environment both in a positive as well as negative manner. Thus it has become crucial to manage the resources in an effective manner so as to ensure that diversity is contributing towards the building of efficient teams (Voutsas, 2011). Though in the present it can be easily seen that just the differentiation between the group origins and composition is not enough, the battle between interdependence and diversity always comes into play in the modern world of connectivity. Old strategies are not so effective any more, thus organizations are motivating groundbreaking ways of thinking and strategizing so that goals could be achieved in a far more effective manner. In the current rapidly changing wok environments and the global economical states, organizations seem more inclined towards ‘hot groups’ rather than individuals or even ordinary teams for the completion of their assigned tasks. A hot group is more likely defined as a state of mind that brings people together around a stimulating challenge, inspiring them to meet that challenge with passion and determination. Hot groups are distinguished as highly democratic with respect to their internal demographics, meaning that they show no concern towards the organizational ranks of the individuals in the group as long as those individuals are deemed capable to add value to the task and their standards of excellence are considered to be meticulous. The main examples of hot groups would be the team structures at organizations like Google and Apple. They facilitate individual thinking and creativity, the team members in these organizations live and breathe their work; they have the idea that their work will change the present standards. These organizations do not give unnecessary attention to differences in matters like appearances, dress codes and other formal customs. And it is evident that their creations have not only changed the living styles of present generations but that of the upcoming ones as well. Even though these hot groups have a short life span but they are considered to be most effective in dealing with crises. Whenever there is a crisis facing an organization, it is often seen that a small group of individuals are assigned the task to join forces and deal with it so as to minimize its effect on the organization, those groups are the hot groups. Thus it is necessary for organization to motivate such team structures in their organizations wherever appropriate so as to inspire some degree of innovation in its operations (Lipman-Blumen & Leavitt, 2009). With ever growing organizations, the numbers of employees are also bound to increase, as larger the operational bases are the greater the numbers of employees are required to carry out those operations effectively. Studies have been carried out to analyze the effect of the team size on the team performance. According to a study performed on the team structures of two team-based private manufacturing companies, the team size has no direct correlation and effect on the employees’ commitment to their work and work place, however it was also found that the employees who had positive attitude towards their production work teams were more committed to their work than those employees who show negative or neutral perceptions (Ogungbamila et al, 2010). Designing a team structure is not the only aspect of work team that requires the management’s attention, managing these teams is also very important. In order to ensure efficient results from the teams, it is necessary that the teams should be positively managed. Motivation is a vital component when it comes to the team management. As many individuals come together under one team structure to achieve a common goal, the question arises as to how these individuals should be kept motivated so that their work performance is not compromised. Motivation is an important tool in order to maximize the effectiveness of the output from the team members. There have been literally thousands of researches conducted in order to understand what motivates a team. Many behavioral approaches have been designed that could lead to increased efficiency of a team so that the team members can combine their individual resources and apply them in order to achieve the common task assigned to that team. Besides these behavioral approaches many tools and applications have also been put into motion to achieve this goal. Many researches that have been conducted in this aspect have shown that maximizing team efficiency is an important factor in today’s work environment and many resources are being utilized daily to design more and more tools that could lead to the increase in team efficiencies (Kozlowski & Ilgen, 2006). Besides motivation, another important aspect of work groups and teams is conflict resolution. When a group of individuals work together, disagreements are bound to arise. The effective management of work teams tends to resolve these issues before they increase in magnitude, because serious disagreements can affect the performance of the team as a whole. Many techniques have been introduced by researchers to contribute towards conflict resolution. Through these techniques there are many ways to minimize or even eliminate common problems like personality clashes or wastage of time. In order to minimize conflicts, decisions can be made through a simple voting procedure and efforts should be made so that these procedures can be carried out peacefully. Through effective management, problems that arise among the team members can be identified beforehand, and can be resolved even if there are no predefined solutions available. For conflict resolution it is vital that group members should develop some social bonds among themselves and it can be achieved through arranging pre-meeting tasks that could be carried out by the team members, this will not only save time but will also encourage full participation on the team members’ behalf (Fox, 1987). Work groups and teams are an important part of today’s work environment. For their effectiveness and efficiency it is very important to define the team structure carefully. Every team structure should be designed by keeping the operations of the organizations in mind, so that maximum output could be derived from the team’s efforts. Although there are many team structures defined in the researches that are conducted through time, it is important to keep the organizational and current technological needs in mind before constructing a work environment. Establishing a work team is not the only aspect of an effective work environment, there are many other tasks associated with it. Once the work teams have been carefully designed and put into place, they should be properly managed so that organizations can benefit by their collective efforts. Bibliography Earley, P. C., & Gibson, C. B. (2002). Multinational work teams: A new perspective. Mahwah, N.J: L. Erlbaum Associates Griffin, R. W., & Moorhead, G. (2012). Organizational behavior: Managing people and organizations. Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning. Lumsden, G., Lumsden, D. L., & Wiethoff, C. (2010).Communicating in groups and teams: Sharing leadership. Australia: Wadsworth Cengage Learning Voutsas, K. (2011). Effects of Heterogeneity in Work Teams: Creativity and Conflict? Insights To A Changing World Journal (5), 115-120. LIPMAN-BLUMEN, J., & LEAVITT, H. J. (July 01, 2009). Beyond Typical Teams:. Hot Groups and Connective Leaders. Organizational Dynamics, 38, 3, 225-233. Ogungbamila, B., Ogungbamila, A., & Adetula, G. A. (December 01, 2010). Effects of team size and work team perception on workplace commitment: Evidence from 23 production teams. Small Group Research, 41, 6, 725-745. Kozlowski, S. W. J., & Ilgen, D. R. (2006). Enhancing the effectiveness of work groups and teams. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers Fox, W. M. (1987). Effective group problem solving: How to broaden participation, improve decision making, and increase commitment to action. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Read More