5: Working in Teams Flashcards
What is a team? how do they work? What are they usually made of?
Team:
- group of people working together to achieve a common goal
- individual members are dependent upon the contributions of each other to succeed
- often comprised of people with different skills, backgrounds, experiences
What are the 5 key factors associated with effective teams? what is the most important factor?
- dependability: team members can count on each other
- structure and clarity: Clear understanding of roles, plans, goals
- meaning: the work is personally fulfilling to team members
- impact: the team sees their work as important
- psychological safety: individuals are comfortable to take risks, speak honestly, be vulnerable
(MOST IMPORTANT ONE APPARENTLY)
Why was the most important factor in efficient teams the most important?
Psychological safety:
- more likely to generate diverse and creative ideas
- partner with others
- admit mistakes
- be rates as effective by executives
- bring in more revenue
- less likely to leave
What is the Tuckman model of team development?
4 stages:
- forming
- storming
- norming
- performing
Describe the forming stage:
Forming:
- politeness with a desire to minimize controversy
- uncertainty in roles and responsibilities
- work is done, but slow and not well coordinated
Quality of work is below potential for the team
Describe the norming stage:
Norming:
- mutual understanding of team goals, teammates roles
- quality of relationships and team function improve
Quality of work is improved (above forming)
Bad Norming:
- unhealthy behaviors or team dysfunction becomes allowed
- some members enter good norming, but accept unhelpful behavior from others
Quality of work suffers even further
Describe the storming stage:
Storming:
- more willing to speak their mind, often resulting in tension, disagreements, and power struggles
- some contribute less, some are forced to contribute more
Quality of work is diminished further
Describe the Performing stage:
Performing:
- team works as a unit
- strong team identity and health and supportive relationships
- welcoming of new ideas
Quality of work is at its peak
What is Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion?
Equity - make sure everyone has the same opportunities for success
Diversity - differences in background, identity, and experiences that people have
Inclusion - addressing inequities between people and working to build a welcoming community
What is underrepresentation and intersectionality?
Underrepresentation:
- when the proprtion of individuals a particular dimension of diversity is lower in a given context than in society overall
Intersectionality:
- the overall experience of discrimination or privilege based on the combination of dimensions of diversity
Why is diversity valuable to a team?
Diversity is valuable to a team as:
- teams with gender and ethnic diversity tend to develop more creative solutions to complex problems
- diverse teams tend to cultivate stronger relationships
- diverse teams consistently outperform non-diverse teams
What is Bias? What is Implicit Bias?
Bias:
- mental shortcuts that our brain makes that affect decision making
- can be formed from stereotypes
- can negatively impact efforts to support the principles of EDI and undermines psychological safety
- Everyone has bias (may not be aware of)
Implicit Bias
- the subconscious stereotypes that we develop about groups as a result of the patterns we see
- when one’s decisions are unconsciously influenced by pre-existing beliefs about a certain group of people.
What are microaggressions?
Microaggressions:
- brief and commonplace statements and actions that seem small and insignificant, but can communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative slights to specific groups
Implicit bias is communicated through microaggressions
What is stereotype threat?
Stereotype threat:
- When people feel concerned about conforming a stereotype for a group they belong to
Aka,
person is a part of a group that sucks at math. Due to this stereotype, they start to self doubt and underperform in math
What is allyship: proactive and reactive allyship?
Allyship:
- the process of taking actions to support those who might otherwise feel excluded
Reactive allyship:
- when someone observes unfair or unequal treatment and step in to defend them
Proactive allyship:
- When someone engages in actions on an ongoing basis to make people feel less underrepresented and marginalzied
What are three important considerations that enhance team effectivness?
- ensuring clear roles
- managing conflicts
- fiving and receiving feedback
How do we ensure clear roles? What are the types of leadership? What does a team need?
You need to determine your type of leadership as structure and clarity come from leadership
Types of leadership:
autocratic
democratic
laissez faire
transformational
A team requires a mix of leaders and followers. Roles can be shared and fair distribution of work is essential!
what is autocratic leadership?
One person is responsible for goal-setting and decision making
Advantages:
- clear structure, one vision, fast decisions
Disadvantages:
- create a power dynamic with less consolation and diverse opinion
What is democratic leadership?
All teammates share decision-making and goal-setting duties
Advantages:
- Everyone has a say, decisions are robust, and team trust is built
Disadvantages:
- decision can take longer, require more effort to manage
What is Laissez Fair leadership?
Each person takes responsibility for making their own decisions
advantages:
- individuals have more flexibility and more accountability for their own work
disadvantages:
- changes of missed tasks, especially if individuals do not all share the same vision
What is transformational leadership?
team members lead parts of the project they are most interested in
Advantages:
- rewarding since each member takes ownership of part of the project
disadvantages:
- requires effort to keep team coordinated and working towards the same goal
How does conflict arise? What can result from it?
Conflict arises from a difference of opinions, perspective, or goals between 2 more more parties
Can result in positive and negative impacts
- constructive and lead to new ideas
- unhealthy and result in bad norming
What are the 5 conflict management approaches? How are they catagorized?
Conflict management approaches can be categorized in a graph :
- y axis = assertiveness
- x axis = co-cooperativeness
low assertive / low cooperation
Avoiding: ignoring conflict
low assertive / high cooperation
accommodating: give up what you want
high assertive / low cooperation
competing: push to achieve what you want
med assertive / med cooperation
compromising: meet in the middle approach
high assertive / high cooperation
collaborating: take time to satisfy everyone
When should each conflict management approach be used?
avoiding: used to give everyone a change to calm down and think things through
accommodating: used when issue isn’t important and to build goodwill for later
Competing: a quick decision where outcome matters a lot to you
Compromising: need a quick decision and want to balance outcomes and relationships
collaborating: used for a big issue everyone feels strongly about and is happy with investing a lot of time and effort into
What are the 3 types of feedback?
appreciation - used to acknowledge, to give credit, to thank
coaching - used to address issues and to help someone improve performance or outcomes
evaluation - used to score or rate someone’s performance against standards
What should the sender be aware about? What should the message contain? what should the receiver do?
Sender:
clear
courteous
considerate
message:
concrete
complete
considerate
receiver:
clear
courteous
complete
