Week 13, Group & Team Dynamics, Slides Flashcards
1
Q
History of work teams
A
- While work teams are present everywhere you look, they were not always part of work design
- Agrarian culture and family
- Industrial revolution and “interchangeable” workers
- Large scale labor was seen as more important than efficiency
- Employee attitudes were of no consequence
- The psychological study of groups was not seen as a useful research area
- Some researchers disputed the study (and the existence) of group phenomenon (behavior was studied at the individual level)
- No attention paid to “emergent properties”
- “Group behavior” as a fallacy
- Gestalt principles
** Similarity
** Proximity
** Common Fate
2
Q
Reification Image
A
- Constructive aspect of perception
Image
3
Q
Hawthorne Studies
A
- Mayo (1933)
- Study began in a strict environmental framework
- Uncovered the impact of group norms on human behavior
- Led the way to the modern study of organizations and
group dynamics - Influenced the work of Kurt Lewin in the 40’s & 50’s
** Grandfather of group behavior - In turn influenced McGregor who proposed Theory X and Theory Y management
4
Q
60’s Team Building
A
- T groups
- Portable exercises that highlighted new theories of team functioning
- Viewed as fun, but “touchie-feelie”
- Not viewed as a competitive tool by management, primarily because work was not yet conducted in teams
- Assembly line mentality
5
Q
The team philosophy
A
- Since the mid-eighties U.S. corporations have been rapidly turning to an emphasis on teamwork
- Significantly due to the large success of teams in Japan (Nahavani & Aranda, 1994)
- Deming, 1982
- Quickly became a driving force in Western Business
- 82% of US businesses with 100 or more employees employ some form of team
6
Q
The group phenomenon
A
- Aggregation occurs in the smallest organisms—bacteria—and the largest—whales
- Physical aggregation can be regarded as part of a continuum in group integration
- At one end of this continuum are territorial animals with little need
to engage in information transfer / no need for group structure (orangutan). - At the other end are highly integrated, long-term associations between individuals that know other members of the group (great apes)
7
Q
Group Dynamics
A
- General term for group processes
- A group is three or more individuals who are connected to each other by social relationships.
- Because they interact and influence each other, groups develop a number of dynamic processes that separate them from a random collection of individuals.
- Processes include norms, roles, relations, development, social influence, effects on behavior, etc.
8
Q
De-individuation
A
- Sense of self
- Deindividuation results in a loss of individual identity and a gaining of the social identity of the group
- When you are in a group, you may feel a shared responsibility and so less individual responsibility for your actions.
- Questionable acts may seem less personally wrong.
- Ex. lynchings, riots and wartime atrocities
- Also feel a strong need to conform to social norms.
9
Q
Social Loafing
A
- Process Loss
- Social loafing describes the tendency of individuals to put forth less effort when they are part of a group.
- Because all members of the group are pooling their effort to achieve a common goal, each member of the group contributes less than they would if they were individually responsible.
- Can be countered by making members accountable
- Staffing implications – e.g. 1 person less than needed
10
Q
Social Facilitation
A
- Process gain
- Social facilitation: Is a person’s performance on a task affected by the “mere presence” of another person?
** Triplett (1897) bicyclist’s times faster when racing together than
when racing alone. - Arousal enhances whatever response tendency is dominant (e.g. behavior during an emergency).
- Arousal also influences task performance by increasing concentration.
- Presence of others increases arousal which in turn facilitates performance on easy tasks for which the dominant response is the correct one.
- Learned fear of being evaluated—“evaluation apprehension”.
- Apprehension facilitates performance of simple tasks but inhibits performance of difficult tasks.
- Increase in self-focus reminds people that they can fail and therefore motivates them.
11
Q
Risky Shift Phenomenon
A
- When people are in groups, they make decision about risk differently from when they are alone
- Shared risk makes the individual perceive less risk
- Greater risks are chosen due to a diffusion of responsibility
- Emotional bonds decrease anxiety and risk is perceived as shared
12
Q
Groupthink (Janis, 1982)
A
Premature concurrence seeking
Central antecedent is group cohesion
* High stress from external threat
* Decision difficulty
** Insulation from outside experts,
** Lack of impartial leadership,
** Lack of norms for methodical consideration
** Homogenous background of group members
Poor decisions as a result of a strong cohesion that
suppresses critical thinking
Most research involve case studies and retrospective
analysis
Contemporary example
* Challenger and Columbia incidents
Results in poor (sub-optimal) decision making
13
Q
Impacts Decision
Making
A
DM requires a systematic search for possible alternatives and rigorous evaluation in light of relevant information
Seven symptoms of defective decision making:
* Poor information search
* Selective bias in processing information
* Incomplete survey of objectives
* Incomplete survey of alternatives
* Failure to reexamine preferred choice
* Failure to reexamine rejected alternatives
* Failure to develop contingency plans
14
Q
Teams
A
Teams are more effective because:
* Complexity
* Teams are often self-reliant in gathering information and resources, which fosters a more efficient and speedy process
* Teams are a natural way to share and gain the new information
* Diversity of thought and innovation
The early implementation of teams focused on project
teams and quality circles (QC)
In the 1990’s a restructuring and re-engineering process
of teams began
Organizations realized cultural differences were a barrier to team functioning, and redesigned the process to incorporate these factors
15
Q
What is a team?
A
- One may walk into any organization and find the label “team” applied to any group of employees consisting of two or more individuals.
- However researchers have questioned the premise that it only takes two or more individuals to comprise a true team (Sundstrom, Meuse & Futrell, 1990).
- 2 commonalties are crucial in defining team dynamics
** Common goals
** Interdependence
16
Q
Classic definitions
A
- “interdependent collection of individuals who share responsibility for specific outcomes for their organization”
** Sundstrom, Meuse and Futrell (1990) - “a distinguishable set of two or more individuals
who interact interdependently and adaptively to achieve specified, shared, and valued objectives
** McIntyre and Salas (1995)
17
Q
A taxonomy of teams
A
- Research on teams has led to some inconsistent results
- Part of the reason is that teams differ, and that research has largely ignored the properties of teams
- Interventions will vary widely in effectiveness depending on the presence of these properties
18
Q
Intellectual team examples
A
Executive teams
* Uncertain environment
* Detect & solve problems
* Members have different functional backgrounds
Design Teams
* Creativity or technical innovation
* Cross functional
* Short lived
19
Q
Physical Team Examples
A
Production Teams
* Assemble tangible products
* Requires technical and tool skills
* Short recurring work cycles
Response Teams
* Move to natural disasters
* Tasks are ambiguous
* Scan the environment and solve problems on the fly (common sense)
** Rigid protocols don’t work (Hurricane Katrina)
20
Q
Devine (2002) image
A
Image
21
Q
Team Performance
A
Taskwork -operations related (what gets done)
* Represent the work on the technical core of the organization (McIntyre and Salas, 1995)
Teamwork – elements that strengthen the interpersonal relations of the team (how things get done)
** Facilitate the interaction of team members
22
Q
SMWT
A
- Self-Managing Work Teams are groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate their behavior on relatively whole tasks
- Discretion over decisions such as work assignments, work methods, and scheduling of activities
- Emerged in the 80’s as organizations cut out middle management to flatten organizational hierarchy
- One of the goals of SMWT is to utilize the various skills of different workers.
- Variety of skills necessary
- Rich source of performance feedback
- Benefits attributed to the implementation of self-managing teams include:
** increased productivity & quality
** employee satisfaction
** quality of work life
** decreased absenteeism and turnover - May or may not have direct supervisors
- May see SMWT coordinators to facilitate process
23
Q
Leading SMWT
A
- Some researchers have described leadership in self-managing work teams as a paradox
- Because teams can manage most of their own activities, the need for leaders who are not members of the team is reduced
- Self-managing teams are rarely delegated full decision-making authority (Yukl, 2002).
- How does one lead teams of employees who are supposed to manage themselves?
24
Q
Team Leader?
A
- Since the teams are self managed…what is the role of the team leader ?
- Doesn’t tell people what to do, just encourage them to engage in self managing behaviors – coaching
- Helping team members make their own decisions is related to perceptions of effectiveness for the leaders (Manz & Sims, 1987)
- Leadership roles are often split
** Team leader – task focus, manages boundaries
** Team coordinator – coach, facilitator
25
Hackman & Wageman (2005)
* Team leaders spend little time and attention on coaching activities
* Why no coaching?
* Leaders underestimate the potential benefits of coaching
* Don’t know how
26
What do coaches do?
* Many non-professionals assume that coaches are there to help resolve interpersonal and emotional issues
* Also assume negative emotional responses are synonymous with poor performance
* While emotions have a huge impact in the workplace they aren’t always the driver of poor performance
* Confusion of cause and effect
27
It’s all in the timing...
* However timing is important
* Readiness of work teams for coaching changes over time
* Readiness:
** Issues are on team members’ minds
** Not preoccupied
* Motivational coaching at the beginning
* Consultative coaching at midpoints
* Educational coaching at ends
28
Early stages
* Best suited for orientation and motivational interventions
* Coaching interventions that help a group have a good “launch,” can increase commitment
* Kick off meetings
* Not good times to help teams formulate work strategy (no framework)
29
Midpoint
* Strategy-focused coaching works best at the midpoint of a team’s task tenure
* Re-evaluation & goal clarity
* Difficult to introduce a strategy intervention at the beginning of a task cycle
30
When it is all over...
* An opportunity for coaching occurs at the end of a performance period
* Strategic (future oriented) and educational (training)
* Time for reflection
** After Action Reviews (Debrief)
* Clarify team actions and reduce blame or credit taking
* Timing is completely arbitrary...but a robust phenomenon
31
Issues in Selecting Team
Members
* What makes a good team member?
* Which factors should be considered when selecting team members?
* What is the best composition of team member knowledge and skill?
* How does diversity play into effective teamwork?
* Compensatory model: as long as the trait is well represented in one member, it does not need to be present in others.
* Threshold model: where presence of the trait is beneficial to a point, but not in excess.
* Team personality variables seem to be more closely related to team behaviors (i.e., processes) than to more distal outcomes
* Cognitive ability has the strongest, most consistent positive relationship with team performance
* Findings do not support the contention that heterogeneity (or diversity) has a reliable impact on team performance
* Functional diversity (i.e., functional background, tenure): more likely to be associated with task conflict
* Demographic diversity (i.e., age, race, gender): more likely to lead to emotional conflict
* Task conflict was found to enhance performance whereas emotional conflict had the opposite effect.
32
Virtual teams
* Trust, collective efficacy, and team orientation are all effected by distance
* Teams who communicated only via text experienced greater difficulty in establishing trust than either video-conferencing or face-to-face teams
** Video-conferencing teams experienced more difficulty than did the face-to-face teams
* Status effects might be altered because it is less clear who is more experienced, wealthy, older, and so forth
* Virtual communication includes more inappropriate statements due to reduced inhibitions from feelings of anonymity
33
Jackson, S. E., & Joshi, A. (2011). Work Team Diversity.
* Gender and ethnicity most often aspects of diversity reported
* Some types of diversity may have greater potential benefits than other types, and some types may require more active management to avoid potentially disruptive consequences
34
Theories on Diversity 1
* Emphasizes the role of employees’ personalities, values, and interests as forces that shape organizational life
** Increasing diversity may lead to higher turnover since people are more comfortable working with people similar to them
** Worth it if the company reaps other benefits from diversity
* Organizational Demography Perspective: highlights importance of membership in social groups defined by attributes such as age, tenure, gender, and ethnicity.
* Social Identity Perspective: similarity is socially
constructed and specific to situations. People bring many attributes to each situation, but only those that become salient shape behavior.
35
Theories on Diversity 2
* Information Processing Perspective: emphasizes the role of less visible attributes, such as knowledge and skills
** Employees bring differing approaches and expertise to decision-making activities
* Social Capital Theory: social interactions create value for individuals and groups
** work team diversity can be both detrimental and beneficial
* Faultlines Perspective: differences among team members are most likely to have significant consequences when they elicit the formation of distinct subgroups
36
Theories on Diversity 3
* The ASA model, social identity theory, and social capital theory all suggest that work team diversity is likely to impede frequent and effective communication among team members, while team homogeneity should facilitate effective communication.
* Diverse teams had more turnover, but the characteristics of individual team members did not predict the likelihood of their leaving.
* Gender and age diversity show mixed results for effect on team performance
