Team Building

Lecture 10
What is Team ?
• A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who
are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and
approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable.
• Together
• Everyone
• Achieves
• More
What is Team?
This definition highlights the essentials of a team or in other words the team basics.
Here the focus or emphasis is on three characteristics – small number,
complementary skills and commitment. These are what basically differentiates a
team from a group and makes a team something much more productive and result
oriented than a group. We shall analyze them:
• Small number – five to ten people
• Complementary skills – appropriate balance or mix of skills and traits
• Commitment to a common purpose and performance goals – specific
performance goals are an integral part of the purpose.
• Commitment to a common approach – team members must agree on who will do
a particular job.
• Mutual accountability – at its core, team accountability is about the sincere
promises we make to others & ourselves – commitment & trust.
Why team is needed?
Satisfies the human social need to belong
Two heads are better than one
The whole can be greater than the sum of its parts
Team members build trust and want to help each other
Promotes better communication
Multiplies the potential of individual members
Team Building
• Team building is a collective term for various types of activities used
to enhance social relations and define roles within teams, often
involving collaborative tasks. 
Approaches to Team Building
• There are four approaches to team building which are given as
follows.
1. Goal Setting
2. Role Clarification
3. Problem Solving
4. Interpersonal Relations
Approaches
1. Goal Setting: This emphasizes the importance of clear objectives
and individual and team goals. Team members become involved
in action planning to identify ways to define success and failure and
achieve goals. This is intended to strengthen motivation and foster a
sense of ownership.
2. Role Clarification: This emphasizes improving team members'
understanding of their own and others' respective roles and duties.
This is intended to reduce ambiguity.
Approaches to Team Building (Cont’d)
3. Problem Solving: This emphasizes identifying major problems within
the team and working together to find solutions. This can have the
added benefit of enhancing critical-thinking.
4. Interpersonal-Relations: This emphasizes increasing teamwork skills
such as giving and receiving support, communication and sharing.
Teams with fewer interpersonal conflicts generally function more
effectively than others. A facilitator guides the conversations to develop
mutual trust and open communication between team members.
Stages of Team Building
• 1. Forming: In this stage, most team members are positive and polite.
Some are anxious, as they haven't fully understood what work the
team will do. Others are simply excited about the task ahead.
• As leader, you play a dominant role at this stage, because team
members' roles and responsibilities aren't clear.
• This stage can last for some time, as people start to work together,
and as they make an effort to get to know their new colleagues.
Stages of Team Building
2. Storming:
• Storming often starts where there is a conflict between team
members' natural working styles.
• If differing working styles cause unforeseen problems, they may
become frustrated.
Stages of Team Building
3. Norming:
• Gradually, the team moves into the norming stage. This is when
people start to resolve their differences, appreciate colleagues'
strengths, and respect your authority as a leader.
• your team members know one another better, they may socialize
together, and they are able to ask one another for help and provide
constructive feedback. 
• People develop a stronger commitment to the team goal, and you
start to see good progress towards it.
Stages of Team Building
4. Performing:
• The team reaches the performing stage, when hard work leads,
without friction, to the achievement of the team's goal. The
structures and processes that you have set up support this well.
• As leader, you can delegate much of your work, and you can
concentrate on developing team members.
Stages of Team Building
• 5. Adjourning:
• Many teams will reach this stage eventually. For example, project
teams exist for only a fixed period, and even permanent teams may
be disbanded through organizational restructuring.
• Team members who like routine, or who have developed close
working relationships with colleagues, may find this stage difficult,
particularly if their future now looks uncertain.
Stages of Team Building
How to Build a Team
• Know the individuals
• Skills and abilities
• Strengths, weaknesses, blind spots
• Know what the team needs to do
• Match talents to team purpose
• Try it; course correct
• Condition the team for the work
• Coach individuals and the team
Applications of Team Building
• Schools
• Organizations
• Sports