Module 6
Teams in Organizations
PowerPoint Presentation by Charlie Cook
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
Model of Team Effectiveness
Overview
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Figure 6.1
6–2
Boundary Management
• Boundary management refers to the way in
which a team handles interactions with those
outside its boundary
• Boundary management:
 A major team operation category
 Plays key role in creating and maintaining team
effectiveness
 Is critical to achieving cross-functional coordination,
speedy delivery of new products, and integration
across nations and firms
Overview
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–3
Boundary Management (cont’d)
• Teams need to manage various interfaces and
interconnections with parts of the organization
• These interactions can be examined across the
following dimensions:
 Influence
 Task coordination
 Information
Class Note: Outward Bound
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–4
Boundary Management (cont’d)
• Influence dimension is vertical
 Important external connections are upward
 Upward communication helps a team align goals with
that of top management
 Team needs to identify secure, effective sponsorship
within upper management
Class Note: Outward Bound
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–5
Boundary Management (cont’d)
• Task coordination is essentially horizontal
 Involves lateral connections across functions and
managing a team’s work interdependence with other
units
 Teams bargain with other groups, trade services or
resources, and get feedback from others
 Teams coordinate with other groups, pushing them to
meet deadlines and deliver on commitments made to
the team
Class Note: Outward Bound
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–6
Boundary Management (cont’d)
• Information activity is also largely lateral
• Liaison involves:
 Investigating markets, technologies, and competition
 Gathering information on what is going on in other
parts of the organization
 Bringing large amounts of data to the team
Class Note: Outward Bound
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–7
Boundary Management (cont’d)
• Steps in carrying out boundary activity:
 First, educate team members about its importance
 Next, team members must organize themselves to
carry out a comprehensive strategy
 Then, team must decide how to allocate the work of
managing liaisons
Class Note: Outward Bound
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–8
Simplified Aston-Blair Organization Chart
Case: Aston-Blair, Inc.
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
Exhibit 1
6–9
X-Teams Defined
• X-teams:
 Are externally oriented, adaptive teams that
emphasize outreach to stakeholders
 Respond more nimbly than traditional teams to rapidly
changing characteristics of work, technology, and
customer demands
 Often outperform their traditional counterparts
• Effective teams today must be able to adapt to
new competitive landscape, as X-teams do
The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–10
Components of X-Teams
• X-teams are set apart from traditional teams by
five components:
 External activity
 Extensive ties
 Expandable structures
 Flexible membership
 Internal mechanisms for execution
The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–11
X-Teams
Vs. Traditional
Teams: Five
Components
The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–12
Components of X-Teams (cont’d)
• External activity
 High levels of external activity are key
 Outreach may be role of leader or any member
 External activities:
Ambassadorial activity—aimed at managing upward
 Scouting—lateral and downward searches through the
organization for knowledge and expertise
 Task coordination—managing the lateral connections across
functions and interdependencies with other units

The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–13
Components of X-Teams (cont’d)
• Extensive ties
 To engage in external activities, X-team members
need to have extensive ties with outsiders
 Types of ties:
Weak ties—good for specific purposes
 Strong ties—forged when relationships are critical on both
sides and built over long periods of time

The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–14
Components of X-Teams (cont’d)
• Expandable tiers
 X-teams operate through three distinct tiers that create
differentiated team membership:
Core members—carry the team’s history and identity
 Operational members—do the ongoing work
 Outer-net members—join the team to handle tasks that are
separable from ongoing work

The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–15
Components of X-Teams (cont’d)
• Flexible membership
 X-team membership is fluid
 People may move in and out of the team during its life
or move across tiers
The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–16
Components of X-Teams (cont’d)
• Mechanisms for execution
 Traditional coordination mechanisms are as important
to X-teams as to other teams
 X-teams use three coordination methods:
Integrative meetings
 Transparent decision making
 Scheduling tools such as shared timelines

The Press: The Comparative Advantage of X-Teams
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
6–17
Staffing the Team
• Before staffing the team, understand the external context
• Change team members as needed
• Treat a team member’s connections as a key competency
Creating an
X-Team
Building the Team
• Map the external domain, including key stakeholders
• Create mechanisms for internal and external communication
• Set team goals, knowing what external constituencies want
Create a Supportive Organizational Environment
• Design and support a three-tier team structure
• Formulate decision rules for an unambiguous yet flexible process
• Maintain a rich information infrastructure
• Establish a learning culture
X-Team
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6–18