Copyright 2011 by the Mc GrawHill Companies Inc

Copyright © 2011 by the Mc. Graw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Chapter 11 Teams: Characteristics and Diversity Slide 11 -1 Copyright © 2011 by The Mc. Graw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. Mc. Graw-Hill/Irwin

Learning Goals § What are the five general team types and their defining characteristics? § What are three general types of team interdependence? § What factors are involved in team composition? § What are the types of team diversity and how do they influence team functioning? § How do team characteristics influence team effectiveness? § How can team compensation be used to manage team effectiveness? Slide 11 -2

Team Characteristics § A team consists of two or more people who work interdependently over some time period to accomplish common goals related to some taskoriented purpose. Ø A special type of “group. ” Ø The interactions among members within teams revolve around a deeper dependence on one another than the interactions within groups. Ø The interactions within teams occur with a specific taskrelated purpose in mind. § OB on Screen Ø We Are Marshall Slide 11 -3

Team Types § Work teams are designed to be relatively permanent. Ø Purpose is to produce goods or provide services, and they generally require a full-time commitment from their members. § Management teams are designed to be relatively permanent. Ø Responsible for coordinating the activities of organizational subunits—typically departments or functional areas—to help the organization achieve its longterm goals. Slide 11 -4

Team Types, Cont’d § Parallel teams are composed of members from various jobs who provide recommendations to managers about important issues that run “parallel” to the organization’s production process. § Project teams are formed to take on “one-time” tasks that are generally complex and require a lot of input from members with different types of training and expertise. § Action teams perform tasks that are normally limited in duration. However, those tasks are quite complex and take place in contexts that are either highly visible to an audience or of a highly challenging nature. Slide 11 -5

Table 11 -1 Types of Teams Slide 11 -6

Figure 11 -1 Types of Teams Slide 11 -7

Variations within Team Types § Virtual teams are teams in which the members are geographically dispersed, and interdependent activity occurs through electronic communications—primarily e-mail, instant messaging, and Web conferencing. Slide 11 -8

Time Stages of Team Development Forming § Forming - try to understand the boundaries in the team and get a feel for what is expected of them. Storming § Storming - remain committed to ideas, triggers conflict that affects some relationships and harms the team’s progress. Norming § Norming - realize that they need to work together to accomplish team goals. § Performing - members are comfortable working within their roles, and the team makes progress Performing toward goals. § Adjourning – members experience anxiety and Adjourning other emotions as they disengage and ultimately separate from the team. Slide 11 -9

Punctuated Equilibrium Adapted from Figure 11 -2 § At the initial team meeting, members make assumptions and establish a pattern of behavior that lasts for the first half of its life. Slide 11 -10

Team Interdependence § Task interdependence refers the degree to which team members interact with and rely on other team members for the information, materials, and resources needed to accomplish work for the team. Ø Pooled interdependence requires lowest degree of required coordination, members complete their work assignments independently, and then this work is simply “piled up” to represent the group’s output. Slide 11 -11

Team Interdependence, Cont’d Ø Sequential interdependence requires different tasks to be done in a prescribed order, members interact to carry out their work, the interaction only occurs between members who perform tasks that are next to each other in the sequence. Slide 11 -12

Team Interdependence, Cont’d Ø Reciprocal interdependence requires members to be specialized to perform specific tasks. However, instead of a strict sequence of activities, members interact with a subset of other members to complete the team’s work. Slide 11 -13

Team Interdependence, Cont’d Ø Comprehensive interdependence requires the highest level of interaction and coordination among members. Each member has a great deal of discretion in terms of what they do and with whom they interact in the course of the collaboration involved in accomplishing the team’s work. Slide 11 -14

Goal Interdependence § A high degree of goal interdependence exists when team members have a shared vision of the team’s goal and align their individual goals with that vision as a result. ØDevelop a formalized mission statement that members buy into. Slide 11 -15

Table 11 -2 The Mission Statement Development Process Slide 11 -16

Outcome Interdependence § A high degree of outcome interdependence exists when team members share in the rewards that the team earns. ØPay, bonuses, formal feedback and recognition, pats on the back, extra time off, and continued team survival. Slide 11 -17

Team Composition § Team composition is the mix of people who make up the team. § Role is defined as the behaviors a person is expected to display in a given context. Ø Leader–staff teams - the leader makes decisions for the team and provides direction and control over members who perform assigned tasks. Ø Team task roles refer to behaviors that directly facilitate the accomplishment of team tasks. Ø Team building roles refer to behaviors that influence the quality of the team’s social climate. Ø Individualistic roles reflect behaviors that benefit the individual at the expense of the team. Slide 11 -18

Table 11 -3 Team and Individualistic Roles Slide 11 -19

Table 11 -3 Team and Individualistic Roles, Cont’d Slide 11 -20

Team Composition, Cont’d § Member ability – team members provide a wide array of abilities, both physical and cognitive. Ø Disjunctive tasks are tasks with an objectively verifiable best solution, and the member who possesses the highest level of the ability relevant to the task will have the most influence on the effectiveness of the team. Ø Conjunctive tasks are tasks where the team’s performance depends on the abilities of the “weakest link. ” Ø Additive tasks are tasks for which the contributions resulting from the abilities of every member “add up” to determine team performance. Slide 11 -21

Discussion Questions § Do you think student teams function best in an additive, disjunctive, or conjunctive manner? § What are the advantages and disadvantages of each structure? Slide 11 -22

Team Composition, Cont’d § Member personality - team members possess a wide variety of personality traits. ØAgreeable people tend to be more cooperative and trusting, tendencies that promote positive attitudes about the team and smooth interpersonal interactions. ØConscientious people tend to be dependable and work hard to achieve goals. ØExtraverted people tend to perform more effectively in interpersonal contexts and are more positive and optimistic in general. Slide 11 -23

Team Composition, Cont’d § Team diversity is the degree to which members are different from one another in terms of any attribute that might be used by someone as a basis of categorizing people. Ø Value in diversity problem-solving approach says diversity is beneficial because it provides for a larger pool of knowledge and perspectives from which a team can draw as it carries out its work. Ø Similarity-attraction approach says people tend to be more attracted to others who are perceived as more similar. Ø Surface-level diversity refers to diversity regarding observable attributes such as race, ethnicity, sex, and age. Ø Deep-level diversity refers to diversity with respect to attributes that are less easy to observe initially, but that can be inferred after more direct experience. Slide 11 -24

Team Composition, Cont’d § Team Size ØHaving a greater number of members is beneficial for management and project teams but not for teams engaged in production tasks. ØResearch concluded that team members tend to be most satisfied with their team when the number of members is between 4 and 5. Slide 11 -25

Figure 11 -4 Five Aspects of Team Composition Slide 11 -26

Figure 11 -5 What Characteristics Can Be Used to Describe Teams? Slide 11 -27

How Important Are Team Characteristics? § One aspect of team effectiveness is team performance. Ø Quantity and quality of goods or services produced, customer satisfaction, completed reports. § A second aspect of team effectiveness is team viability, which refers to the likelihood that the team can work together effectively into the future. § The relationship between task interdependence and team performance is moderately positive. § The relationship between task interdependence and team commitment is weaker. Slide 11 -28

Figure 11 -6 Effects of Task Interdependence on Performance and Commitment Slide 11 -29

Application: Team Compensation § Outcome interdependence has obvious connections to compensation practices in organizations. § High outcome interdependence promotes higher levels of cooperation because members understand that they share the same fate — if the team wins, everyone wins, and if the team fails, everyone fails. Ø Design team reward structures with hybrid outcome interdependence, which means that members receive rewards that are dependent on both their team’s performance and how well they perform as individuals. Slide 11 -30

Takeaways § Teams are comprised of two or more people who work interdependently over some time period to accomplish common goals related to some task-oriented purpose. Teams are more interdependent and task focused than groups. § There are several different types of teams—work teams, management teams, parallel teams, project teams, and parallel teams—but many teams in organizations have characteristics that fit in multiple categories and differ from one another in other ways. § Teams can be interdependent in terms of the team task, goals, and outcomes. Each type of interdependence has important implications for team functioning and effectiveness. Slide 11 -31

Takeaways, Cont’d § Team composition refers to the characteristics of the members who work in the team. These characteristics include roles, ability, and personality, as well as the number of team members. § Depending on the team’s task, it may be important to consider the average ability of the members, the ability of the most able, or the ability of the least able. § The effect of diversity on the team depends on time and whether the diversity is surface-level or deeplevel. The effects of surface-level diversity tend to diminish with time, whereas the effects of deep-level diversity tend to increase over time. Slide 11 -32

Takeaways, Cont’d § Task interdependence has a moderate positive relationship with team performance and a weak relationship with team commitment. § Outcome interdependence has important effects on teams, which can be managed with compensation practices that take team performance into account. Slide 11 -33