Part 3 Organizing

it.77 Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway’s intermodal team, which was charged
with finding efficient ways to combine transportation through trucks and trains, was
a particularly cohesive team. Dave Burns, a member of that team, says, “In my mind,
the key word to this team was ‘shared.’ We shared everything. There was a complete
openness among us. And the biggest thing that we shared was an objective and a
strategy that we had put together jointly. That was our benchmark every day. Were
we doing things in support of our plan?”78 The same was true of the team that came
up with MasterCard’s endearing “Priceless” ad campaigns. Each ad in the series
features a list of ordinary transactions and the dollar amounts associated with those
© iStockphoto.com/Hans Martens

Cohesion and Team

Performance

H
ave you ever worked in a really cohesive
group where everyone liked and enjoyed
each other and was glad to be part of the
group? It’s great. By contrast, have you ever worked
in a group where everyone really disliked each other
and was unhappy to be part of the group? It’s terrible. Team Performance with Independent Tasks
Anyone who has had either of these experiences can
appreciate how important group cohesion is and the Teams generally are not suited for independent tasks
effect it can have on team performance. Indeed, 46 that people can accomplish by themselves. When
studies based on 1,279 groups confirm that cohesion teams perform independent tasks, there is only a 60
does matter. percent chance that cohesive teams will outperform
less cohesive teams.
Team Performance
On average, there is a 66 percent chance that cohesive
teams will outperform less cohesive teams.

Some caution is warranted in interpreting these re-

Team Performance with Interdependent Tasks
Teams work best for interdependent tasks that require
people to work together to get the job done. When
sults. For example, there is always the possibility that
a team could become so cohesive that its team goals
become more important than organizational goals.
Also, teams sometimes unite around negative goals
and norms that are harmful rather than helpful to or-
ganizations. Nonetheless, there is also room for even
more optimism about cohesive teams. Teams that are
© Cengage Learning 2013

teams perform interdependent tasks, there is a 73 per- cohesive and committed to the goals they are asked to
cent chance that cohesive teams will outperform less achieve should have an even higher probability of suc-
cohesive teams. cess than the numbers shown here.79

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