Lesson

9
Teamwork
Source: Daft, R.L (2008), The New Era of Management, 2nd Edition, Singapore:
Thompson South Western.

This lecture notes are additional for the chapter 8 Working in Teams from your textbook :
Adler, R & Elmhorst, J (2007) Communicating at Work: Principles and Practices for
Business and the Professions. New York: McGraw Hill.
 A Team Is?

• Made up of 2 or more people

• Have regular interaction
• Team members share a performance
goal
Work Team Effectiveness Model
 Team type-Formal
A team created by the organization as part of
the formal organization structure.

Vertical team – manager & subordinates in

same area.
Horizontal team – employees from same
level, different areas of expertise.
 Team type-Self-directed
-Consist of 5-20 multi-skilled workers who
rotate jobs to produce an entire product or
service, often supervised by an elected
member.
-permenant
-Elements: several skills & function, access to
various resources to complete task,
empowered with decision making authority.
 Virtual & Global team
Virtual – geographically or organizationally
dispersed, rarely meet face to face, using
ICT.

Global – members from different

nationalities, virtual or F2F.
 Characteristics of Teams
 Size--
 Ideal size is thought to be 7
 Small teams (2-4 members) show more agreement, ask
more questions
 Large teams (12 or more) tend to have more
disagreements
 Member Roles--
 Task specialist role spend time and energy helping the
team reach its goal
 Socio-emotional role support team members’
emotional needs
 Members Role
• Initiate ideas
• Give opinions
• Seek information
• Summarize
• Stimulate the team into action
• Encourage
• Harmonize
• Reduce tension
• Follow
• Compromise
 Stages of Team Development
• Forming (facilitates social interchanges)
• Storming (encourages participation,
surfaces differences)
• Norming (help clarify team roles, norms,
values)
• Performing (facilitate task
accomplishment)
• Adjourning (brings closure, signifies
completion)
 Team cohesiveness
The extent to which team members are
attracted to the team and motivated to remain
in it.
Highly cohesive team – committed to team
activities, attend meetings, happy when team
succeeds.
Less cohesive team – less concerned about the
team’s welfare.
 Team Norm
A standard of conduct that is shared by team
members and guides their behaviors.

How team norms develop?

•Critical events in the team’s history
•First behaviors that occur in the team
•Carryover behavior (from outside)
•Making explicit statements
 Conflict resolution
Balancing conflict & cooperation
H

Team
performance

Amount of conflict
L H
 Causes of Team Conflict
•Scarce Resources: include money, information, and supplies.
•Jurisdictional Ambiguities: conflicts emerge when job boundaries
and responsibilities are unclear.
•Communication Breakdown: poor communications result in
misperceptions and misunderstandings of other people and teams.
•Personality Clashes: personality clashes are caused by basic
differences in personality, values, and attitudes.
•Power and Status Differences: occur when one party has disputable
influence over another.
•Goal Differences: conflict often occurs simply because people are
pursuing conflicting goals.
 Guidelines for Keeping
Teams Focused on Issues
 Focus on facts
 Develop multiple alternatives
 Maintain a balance of power
 Never force a consensus/agreement
 Potential Cost of Teams

• When teams do not work well it is usually

because:
– Power realignment
– Free riding
– Coordination costs
– System revisions