BUS102 Introduction to Management

TeamsLecture 3

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Activity

• In groups, you are required to create a paper plane.

• You cannot create more than one.

• This means that, as a group, you need to discuss and decide on the best model for your plane.

• Once you’ve constructed it, you will be asked to fly it in competition with the other groups.

• The group whose plane flies furthest, wins.

Teams

• That activity is essentially what today’s lecture is about.

• When working in teams, there are myriad complexities and conflicts that arise.

• The purpose of this lecture is to introduce you to these nuances and to guide you on how they can be managed.

What is a team?• A team is two or more people working together

on a shared goal.• Teams can be formal or informal:

– Formal teams are those that are put together, usually by managers, for a specific purpose. An example of a formal team is the one that just occurred with the airplane exercise.

– Informal teams are those that occur organically, usually due to friendship or common interest. For example, if you go to the movies with people from this class, that would constitute an informal team (or informal group).

• Often, formal and informal teams overlap.

Team development process

• This is one of the most enduring models of team development, by Bruce Tuckman in 1965.

Forming Storming Norming Performing Adjourning

Activity – Part 1• Listed below are individual-based issues that

arise during the team development process.• In groups, see if you can correctly place them in

each of the five stages:

– “How can I best perform my role?”– “How do I fit in?”– “What do the others expect me to do?”– “What’s my role here?”– “What’s next?”

Activity – Part 2• This time, here’s a list of organisation-

based issues that arise during the team development process.

• In groups, see if you can correctly place them in each of the five stages:

– “Can we agree on roles and work as a team?”– “Can we do the job properly?”– “Can we help members transition out?”– “Why are we fighting over who’s in charge and

who does what?”– “Why are we here?”

Team roles• In order for teams to function effectively, the

members must have a defined role.

• Team roles generally fall into two categories:

– Task roles are those that help a team to achieve its goals.

– Maintenance roles are those that keep the team cohesive.

• It is common for these to overlap such that team members assume more than one role.

Team rolesTASK roles MAINTENANCE rolesInitiator EncouragerInformation seeker / giver HarmoniserOpinion seeker / giver CompromiserElaborator GatekeeperCoordinator Standard setterOrienter CommentatorEvaluator FollowerEnergiserProcedural technicianRecorder

Source: Benne and Sheats, 1948

Activity• Imagine you are a team of astrophysicists who

have designed and built a spacecraft capable of flying to another planet where a new human civilisation will be formed.

• Your spacecraft fits the members of your group plus only five additional people.

• Your task is to identify five famous individuals who will join you on this voyage.

• You have five minutes to decide.

Problems in teams• Which of the roles from the table on Slide 10 did each

team member adopt during that activity?

• Sometimes, in adopting these roles, certain problems arise, such as:

– Role overload: When one team member takes on too much work.

– Role conflict: When various individuals have differing expectations of a team member.

– Role ambiguity: When a team member does not know what is expected of them.

• Which of those problems materialised in your team during that activity?

Team norms• Problems in teams can often be avoided by

establishing a set of norms.

• Norms dictate how team members should behave.

• They can encompass attitudes and actions.

• Norms can be formally written down but most times they are unwritten, implicit and develop organically over time.

Team characteristics• Research has demonstrated that the

following characteristics are frequently found in the most effective teams:– Clear purpose– Informality– Participation– Listening– Civilised disagreement– Consensus decisions

Source: Parker, 1990

– Open communication– Clear roles and work

assignments– Shared leadership– External relations– Style diversity– Self-assessment

Activity• Reflect on the activities you’ve performed

as a group so far in this class.

• In some cases you would have worked well together; in other cases not so much.

• Using the characteristics on the previous slide as a guide, develop a list of five norms you feel would make you a more successful team in the future.

Other types of teams• Teams come in many different shapes and sizes

beyond the traditional type discussed in this lecture.

• This most commonly includes:

– Self-managed teams– Cross-functional teams– Virtual teams

Question: In which organisational contexts may each of those types of teams be useful?

Social loafing• Social loafing is one of the most frequent reasons why

teams don’t reach their potential.

• Social loafing occurs when the effort invested by individual team members declines the larger a team becomes.

• There are four reasons why this happens:– Team members think the task is unimportant or boring.– They think their individual effort won’t be noticed.– They think their colleagues are loafing as well.– They think everyone will be rewarded the same way

irrespective of their varying levels of effort.

Self-reflective question: During the activities that have been run so far in this class, have you been a social loafer? If so, make sure you don’t do it in your group assignment!

Summary• Teams can be formal or informal.

• The five stages of team development are forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning.

• Roles within teams can be task-related and/or maintenance-related.

• Team norms can help overcome some of the common problems that occur in teams, such as role overload, role conflict, and role ambiguity.

• Teams come in varying forms: what matters most is that effort is exerted to adopt as many characteristics of successful teams as possible.

TUTORIAL

Tutorial – Academic Development

• Go to ‘Learner Support’• Plagiarism• Follow the paraphrasing

Activity

Tutorial – Academic Development• Paraphrasing is not…..

Tutorial – Academic Development• Paraphrasing is not…..

Tutorial – Academic Development• Paraphrasing is not…..

Tutorial – Academic Development• Paraphrasing is not…..

Complete Paraphrasing ActivityThe majority of organizations make use of at least some team-based work (Hills, 2007; Kozlowski & Bell, 2003), so it is not surprising that employees of these organizations will often work as a part of teams (Sonnentag & Volmer, 2010). Furthermore, the use of teams in organizations has increased in recent years (Miller, 2003). What do managers see as the effect of these teams for their organizations? A recent survey (Martin & Bal, 2006) suggests that managers tend to see teams as a critical ingredient in their organizations’ performance. However, this same survey also highlights a common concern voiced by managers of teams and academics studying the use of teams in organizations. The respondents voiced a concern that their teams were not performing optimally (Martin & Bal, 2006). The need to improve team performance is a key motivation for this review.