Team Characteristics and Diversity

Question 1

Groups

Answer 1

Authoritarian in nature, one person is responsible for assigning activities and held responsible for results

Question 2

Teams

Answer 2

Conducted in a collaborative fashion, authority equally dispersed among members

Question 3

Team characteristics

Answer 3

Two or more people, work interdependently over some time period to accomplish goals related to a task-oriented purpose

Question 4

T/F Teams are a type of group

Answer 4

True

Question 5

T/F The interactions among members within teams revolve around a deeper dependence on one another than the interactions within groups

Answer 5

True

Question 6

Different types of teams

Answer 6

Work team, management team, parallel team, project team, action team

Question 7

Work team

Answer 7

Produce goods/services, high member involvement, long lifespans

Question 8

Types of work teams

Answer 8

Problem solving teams, self-managed work teams, cross-functional teams, and virtual teams

Question 9

Management team

Answer 9

Integrate activities of subunits across business functions, long lifespan, moderate member involvement

Question 10

Parallel team

Answer 10

Provide recommendations and resolve issues, life span varies, low member involvement (advisory council or committee). Composed of members from various jobs who provide recommendations to managers about issues that run parallel to the org’s production process

Question 11

Project team

Answer 11

Produce a one-time output (product, service, plan, etc.), life span and member involvement vary

Question 12

Action team

Answer 12

Perform complex tasks that vary in duration and take place in highly visible or challenging circumstances (ex. musical group, surgical team). Ex. Thai cave rescue team

Question 13

Stages of team development

Answer 13

Forming, storming, norming, performing, adjourning

Question 14

Task interdependence

Answer 14

Degree to which team members interact with and rely on other team members for information, materials, resources needed to accomplish work for the team

Question 15

Types of interdependence

Answer 15

Comprehensive, reciprocal, sequential, pooled

Question 16

Which type of interdependence requires the most coordination

Answer 16

Comprehensive

Question 17

Pooled interdependence

Answer 17

• Lowest form of interdependence, results in least amount of conflict
• Members do not directly depend on one another, but draw resources from shared source
• Members contribute to overall goal, outputs of each member are then pooled at organizational level
• Although success and failure of each member does not directly affect each other, affects success of team
• Requires standardization in rules and operating procedures

Question 18

Sequential interdependence

Answer 18

• Asymmetrical chain of one-way interactions, output of one unit becomes input for another unit
• Increase in communication increasing potential for conflict
• People in early part of chain would remain more independent, but later people in chain are highly dependent on first part
• Adaptive planning
• Concern abt performance variability in first part of chain bc. it directly affects productivity of later parts

Question 19

Reciprocal interdependence

Answer 19

• High potential for conflict, requires communication dependency due to flow of output and input of activities operating between units
• high member dependency
• High level of productivity or conflict
• thorough and constant information sharing

Question 20

Comprehensive interdependence

Answer 20

• Potential for conflicts is high due to complexity of interdependence
• with an increase in frequent and intense communication, difference in opinion or goals is likely
• loss or addition of team member can greatly affect performance of group

Question 21

Goal interdependence

Answer 21

Exists when team members have a shared vision of the team’s goal and align their individual goals with that vision as a result

Question 22

Outcome interdependence

Answer 22

Exists when team members share in the rewards that the team earns

Question 23

Team composition components

Answer 23

Member roles, member ability, member personality, team diversity, team size

Question 24

Member roles

Answer 24

Can be team task roles, team building roles, individualistic roles

Question 25

Member ability

Answer 25

Cognitive and physical abilities needed in a team depend on the nature of the team’s task

Question 26

Types of tasks

Answer 26

Additive tasks, disjunctive tasks, conjunctive tasks

Question 27

Additive tasks

Answer 27

Contributions of each member are combined into the final group product. Group is more effective than individual

Question 28

Disjunctive tasks

Answer 28

Single problem for the group to solve. Most competent person in the group usually finds the solution. Group of people working collectively will be more likely to hit the right answer than one working alone.

Question 29

Conjunctive tasks

Answer 29

Requires all group members to work towards the goal and productivity is limited to the least competent member. Individual performance is better than group performance

Question 30

Member personality

Answer 30

OCEAN (Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism)

Question 31

Agreeable

Answer 31

Cooperative, trusting, positive attitudes that smooth interpersonal interactions

Question 32

Conscientious

Answer 32

Dependable, work hard to achieve goals

Question 33

Extraverted

Answer 33

Perform effectively in interpersonal contexts, more positive and optimistic in general

Question 34

Team diversity

Answer 34

Degree to which team members are different from one another in terms of any attribute that might be used by someone as a basis of categorizing people
-value in diversity problem-solving approach, similarity-attraction approach, surface level diversity, deep-level diversity

Question 35

Value in diversity problem-solving approach theory

Answer 35

Asserts that diversity provides a larger pool of knowledge and perspectives, fosters learning

Question 36

Similarity-attraction approach

Answer 36

People like and are attracted to others who are similar, birds of a feather flock together

Question 37

Surface-level diversity

Answer 37

Differences are easily notable, easily measured (race, gender, culture, language)

Question 38

Deep-level diversity

Answer 38

Personality, beliefs, functional experiences (less easily seen)

Question 39

Team size

Answer 39

Having a greater number of members is beneficial for management and product teams, but not for teams engaged in production tasks. Most team members are satisfied when number of members is between 4 and 5