Groups & Teams Flashcards
Group
Two or more people interacting interdependently to achieve a common goal
Formal Work Groups
Groups that organizations establish to facilitate the achievement of organizational goals
Informal Groups
Emerge naturally in response to the common interests of organizational members
Seldom sanctioned by organization
Stages of Group Development
Forming: group members try to orient themselves by testing the waters
Storming: conflict emerges as members determine whether they will go along with way group is developing
Norming: resolve issues from storming, develop social consensus
Performing: devote energy toward task accomplishment
Adjourning
Punctuated Equilibrium
When groups have specific deadline by which to complete some problem solving task, observe different sequence of development
Punctuated Equilibrium Timeline
Phase 1: first meeting, continues until midpoint of group existence
Midpoint transition: occurs at halfway point in time toward deadline
Phase 2: concludes with final meeting
Group Structure
Characteristics of the stable social organization of a group
Size & Satisfaction
Larger groups consistently report less satisfaction
Incorporating many members can promote conflict
Time available for each person to contribute decreases with larger groups
Additive Tasks
Predict potential performance by adding the performances of individual group members together
E.g. building a house
Potential performance increases with group size
Disjunctive Tasks
Potential performance of the group depends on the performance of its best member
E.g. looking for single error in computer program
Potential performance increases with group size because potential of group including a superior performer is greater
Process Losses
Performance difficulties stemming from problems of motivating and coordinating larger groups
Actual performance = potential performance - process lesses
Conjunctive Tasks
Performance of group limited by poorest performer
E.g. assembly line limited by weakest link
Both potential and actual performance of conjunctive tasks decreases as group size increases due to probability of including a weak link increasing
Social Norms
Collective expectations that members of social units have regarding the behaviour of each other
Roles
Positions in a group that have a set of expected behaviours attached to them
Designated/Assigned Roles
Formally prescribed by organization as means of dividing labour and responsibility to facilitate task achievement
Emergent Roles
Develop naturally to meet the social emotional needs of group members or to assist in formal job accomplishment
Role Ambiguity
Exists when goals of one’s job or methods of performing it are unclear
Role Conflict
Exists when an individual is faced with incompatible role expectations
Intersender role conflict: two or more role senders differ in their expectations for a role occupant
Interrole conflict: expectations inherent in several roles are incompatible
Person-role conflicts: role demands are clear but incompatible with the personality or skills of the role occupant
Status
Rank or social position accorded to group members in terms of prominence, prestige, and respect
Formal Status Systems
Represent management’s attempt to publicly identify those people with higher status
Group Cohesiveness
Critical property of groups
Cohesiveness is a relative property of groups
Factors Influencing Cohesiveness
Threat and competition (threat increases cohesiveness unless extreme)
Success (cohesiveness decreases after failure)
Member diversity (if agree diverse groups have success that outweighs dissimilarities)
Group size (bigger groups less cohesive)
Toughness of initiation (tough to get into = attractive)
Social Loafing
Tendency for people to withhold physical or intellectual effort when performing a group task
Free Rider Effect
People lower effort to get free ride at expense of group members
Sucker Effect
Lower effort because of the feeling that others are free riding
Counteracting Social Loafing
Make individual performance more visible
Make sure work is interesting
Increase feelings of indispensability
Increase performance feedback
Reward group performance
Qualities of Effective Work Teams
Psychological safety: shared belief that it is safe to take social risks
Team reflexivity: extent to which teams deliberately discuss team processes and goals and adapt behaviour accordingly
Shared mental models: team members share similar information about how should interact and what their task is
Capacity to improvise
Collective efficacy: shared beliefs that a team can successfully perform a given task
Team resilience: team’s capacity to bounce back from setbacks or adversity
Self Managed Work Teams
Provide members with the opportunity to do challenging work under reduced supervision
Tasks for Self Managed Work Teams
Tasks should be complex and challenging
Tasks should require interdependence among members
Cross Functional Teams
Bring people with different functional specialties together to better invent, design, or deliver a product/service
Virtual Teams
Work groups that use technology to communicate and collaborate across space, time, and organizational boundaries
Advantages of Virtual Teams
Around the clock work
Reduced travel time and cost
Larger talent pool
Challenges of Virtual Teams
Trust
Miscommunication
Isolation
Management issues
