Notes on
Teams

Teams are THE way to organize these days. They provide a new way to coordinate people and tasks in large organizations. The popularity of teams in modern organizations is one reason why there is so much emphasis on team assignments at BC -- employers want to hire college graduates that have experience working in teams.

Let us consider two questions about teams. First what typically happens in teams? Second, how can we make them work better?

What happens in Teams

Teams go through four predictable stages: Orientation, Conflict, Group Formation, and Differentiation.

1. Orientation: The team is formed.

Member behaviors: most comments directed to leader. Lots of questions about direction and goals. Status in the group mostly determined by roles outside the group (sex, age, race, position in the company) and by majority/minority status (only male in group of females). People fail to listen, resulting in non sequiturs and repeats.

Member concerns: what is my role? Can I do this? Who is the leader?

Ideal leader behavior: provide structure and clarity. Establish norm of non-domination by anyone. Share all information. Facilitate members learning about each other.

2. Conflict: Conflict over control with leader and with other members.

Member behaviors: attempts to gain influence. Suggestions, proposals. Subgroups and coalitions form, with possible conflict between them. Leader tested and challenged. Members judge and evaluate each other, shoot down ideas. Task avoidance.

Member concerns: what is my place in the pecking order? Who likes me? What are my issues?

Ideal leader behaviors: engage in joint problem-solving. Establish norm of supporting expression of different view points. Discuss the group's decision-making process.

3. Group Formation: Development of solidarity.

Member behaviors: Members can disagree with leader. Group laughs together, has fun. Jokes made at leader's expense. A sense of we-ness develops. Group feels superior to other groups in the organization.

Member concerns: How close should I be to other group members? How do we compare with other groups? Can we accomplish our task?

Ideal leader behaviors: Start sharing issues and concerns like any other member. Have members manage agenda items (especially those in which you have a stake). Give and request feedback. Assign challenging problems requiring consensus (e.g., budget allocations). Delegate as much as possible.

4. Differentiation: Development of differentiation and productivity.

Member behaviors: Roles are clear and each person's contribution is distinctive. Members take initiative and accept initiative of others. Challenging each other leads to creative problem solving. Members seek feedback to improve own performance.

Member concerns: None.

Ideal leader behaviors: Jointly set goals that increase group's scope. Question assumptions and traditional ways of behaving.

What Makes a Good Team?

Researchers have studied hundreds of successful and unsuccessful teams and compared them. Here is a list of characteristics shared by most successful teams and lacking in most unsuccessful teams.

Awareness and attention paid to group processes.

• This means that not only do you talk about the task and how you are going to do it, but you also discuss yourselves and what is happening in the group. This is often embarrassing and painful but turns out to be enormously beneficial

Common goal or vision

• Being clear about the underlying vision is extremely important because otherwise each individual works in ways that are subtly inconsistent with others, causing a great deal of time to wasted pounding everything back into a coherent whole
• A common vision is also a tremendous motivator which releases energy and creativity. Conflicting visions tend to demoralize

Discipline

• The team has the will to stick to the task and not degenerate into a social club.

Communication

• Teams need to ensure that everyone gets heard. Often, there are members who can't say anything unless specifically asked and given the floor: they won't fight for attention.
• Teams need to spend enough time chatting about each other's lives to give everyone a feel for who they are and where they are coming from

Shared knowledge of the groups goals and methods

• People often assume that their view of what the specific goals of the team, and the procedures they will employ to get there, are shared by all. But this is rarely the case. Teams need to explicitly discuss not only their goals but their style, their approach

Awareness of the group's place in the larger organizational context

• Meaning of success: tuning to the real needs of the organization
• Getting resources from the rest of the organization
• Develop list of outsiders that matter
• Interview outsiders about their expectations for the team's performance
• Schedule initial and final meeting with management

Personal security of individuals not an issue

• People need to feel safe in the team. This means they are not afraid that they will be made fun of or treated badly if they say something stupid or unpopular. Without this, people are not free to think and contribute ideas.