Chris Trainor
Family and Group Dynamics
Dr. McDiarmid
11/5/13
Twelve Angry Men Paper
“Then why don't you tell your white buddies to block for Rev better? Because they have not blocked for
him worth a blood nickel, and you know it! Nobody plays. Yourself included. I'm supposed to wear myself
out for the team? What team? Nah, nah what I'm gonna do is look out for myself and I'ma get mine.”
-
Julius Campbell; Remember The Titans
For those who haven’t seen the movie, the T.C. Williams Titans High School football team was
one of the greatest teams ever to exist on this planet. Being composed of black and white players, the
team was able to strive at a time where segregation was at its peak in the southern states of America.
However, this team was not just created and automatically achieved greatness. They had to face many
challenges in order for them to blossom from a group of individuals into a unified team.
The same can be said for any team that has existed on this planet. In order to become a team, a
group needs to overcome the hardships of a situation. The thing about a team is that it is made up of
multiple individuals, all who have their own opinion of the situation. In order to become a team, the
individuals must discuss each of their opinions, figure out which one is the best way to solve the
solution, and then when consensus is reached, put that option into action. There is a theory, known as
Tuckman’s theory, which is viewed as the “guidelines” for forming a group into a team. The theory is
made up of five steps: Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing, and Adjourning.
In the forming stage, a group is introduced to one another and they establish a set of ground
rules. Formalities are preserved and members are treated as strangers. In the storming stage, each
member communicates their feelings to the group. However, they still view themselves as individuals,
and as a result, they show hostility when one of the members tries to take control of the group. In the
norming stage, people start to feel a part of the team and start to realize they can achieve more if they
accept other viewpoints. This stage is when a group starts to become a team. In the performing stage,
the team works in an open and trusting atmosphere where flexibility is the key and hierarchy is of little
importance. Finally in the adjourning stage, the team conducts the assessment of the year and
implements a plan for transitioning roles and recognizing member’s contributions.
This five step process is viewed as an outline to how teams are created; however, there are
other guidelines which need to be followed as well. A movie that really shows the transformation of a
group turning into a team is the 1957 version of Twelve Angry Men. In this movie, an 18 year old from
the slums of New York is put on trial for allegedly stabbing and killing his father. The court case has
already taken place and it is now up to the twelve men in the jury to decide the boy’s fate. The twelve
men are sent into a room in order to come up with a unanimous decision about the boy’s fate.
Rather than explain the whole plot of the movie, I’m going to describe the different guidelines
which make up a team.
Before you can determine what makes up a team, you must first determine what the difference
between a team and a group is. According to the Discipline of Teams Handout we received in class, there
are several differences in how a group works and how a team works. In a group, there is a strong, clear
focused leader, individual accountability takes place, and the group is able to run efficient meetings. In a
team, leadership is shared throughout the members, individual and mutual accountability takes place,
and the team runs efficient meetings where open ended questioning and problem solving is
encouraged.
A prime example of these traits in the movie is when Juror #8 is trying to convince the other
members that there is not enough evidence to definitely say that the boy murdered his father. He tries
to convince the other group members that there is still reasonable doubt about the boy’s guilt. At this
stage, Juror #8 can be viewed as the strong and clear focused leader. For one, he is the only Juror ruling
in favor of the boy, but even if there was another person, I would say Juror #8 is still the leader because
he is very focused. He understands the circumstance of his future actions and wants to make sure that
his decision is the correct one, which in essence is individual accountability. He provides factual evidence
in favor of the boy that gets the other group members thinking that maybe the boy isn’t guilty. In other
terms, he is running an efficient meeting where is point is getting across to his listeners.
By the end of the movie, I would say that the majority of the people in the room would view
themselves as a team. There is the team that says the boy is guilty, which is depleting as the minutes go
on, and then there is the team that says the boy is not guilty. As more and more people start to join the
not-guilty team, you can tell that the leadership roles start to fluctuate. Juror #8 is still viewed as the
head of the team, but other jurors start to offer valuable information which Juror #8 had not even
thought of. More voices are being heard, and now instead of individual accountability taking place, a
form of mutual accountability is taking place, because one wrong statement would hurt the reputation
of the team’s rising perspective. Instead of just a meeting running efficiently, this newly formed team is
asking open-ended questions and using problem solving in an attempt to make their belief more
concrete. For example, one piece of evidence was that an old man walked out of his room, walked down
a long hallway, and opened his door where he saw the boy running out of the apartment. Instead of just
accepting this evidence, Juror #8’s team used problem solving techniques to determine that it was
physically impossible for this old man to walk the distance that he did in the time that he did and be able
to see the boy running. They also used open ended questions to question another piece of evidence,
that a woman saw the murder while lying in bed, looking out her window, while a train was moving in
front of it. By hearing all voices and using problem solving, Juror #8’s team determined that the woman
wears glasses and that there was no way that she could have seen a specific person through the window
of her apartment because she wasn’t sleeping with her glasses on.
So basically what I’m trying to say is that in the beginning, the room of jurors started out as two
groups, a guilty and a not guilty group. As time went on and the stages of Tuckman’s theory progressed,
the two groups actually ended up becoming one unified team. But the road was not easy, the group
faced many obstacles before becoming a unified team.
One obstacle the group faced was that there were a lot of different personalities in the room.
After going back and looking at my functional roles of group members worksheet, I determined that this
group was made up of multiple roles. The two leaders, Juror #8 (not guilty) and Juror #3 (guilty) each
took on an interesting role of leadership. Juror #8 was more of an initiator. He was very cool, calm and
collective, and he proposed solutions and decisions to evidence that no one had thought of before. Juror
#3 was more of a dominator. He was very hot headed and interrupted almost everyone who talked. He
went on long rants and monopolized the group’s time. Both me were able to gain/keep followers for a
certain period of time. Juror #8 did it with reason and a level head. He did not try to dominant any of his
followers, in fact he graciously asked for their opinion in certain matters. Juror #3 on the other hand
lead more by intimidation and tried to put anyone down who strayed away from his decision of the boy
being guilty.
All of the members took on different roles in the meeting. Just to name a few, Juror #1 was a
gate keeper because he tried to facilitate the meeting and keep communication open between
everyone. Juror #7 was a tension reliever because whenever a conflict arose, he tried to turn it into a
joking matter and ease the tension which resulted. Juror #12 was a deserter because he always seemed
to be daydreaming and wandering from the subject by engaging in non-relevant side conversations.
Because of all the different personalities, the psychology of the meeting changed very often. I
would say this meeting took on three different psychology types: Barkers and Biters, Constant
Complainers, and Silent Steamers.
The Barkers and Biters Psychology is obvious. At one point in time, the guilty group was literally
screaming out pieces of evidence thinking that the louder they said it, the more of a chance they had of
convincing the not guilty group into siding with them. Obviously this technique didn’t work, and it
actually backfires at one point. Juror #8 gets Juror #3 to say that he is going to kill him. By saying this,
Juror #8 proves a point that anybody can say that and not actually mean it. This was important because
on piece of evidence that was used to prove the boy guilty was that someone heard him scream “I’m
going to kill you” to his father.
At one point in time, the meeting takes on a Constant Complainer psychology. In this situation,
Juror #10 was going on a rant about how this boy could not be trusted because he was from the slums.
He goes on to be very prejudice toward people living in the slums and states that they are all criminals.
This upsets Juror #5 who early stated that he was born in the slums and that not every person living in
the slums is like that.
Because he is tired of arguing with Juror #10, Juror #5 simply leaves the table, obviously upset,
but doesn’t say a word. Without even knowing it, Juror #5 changed the psychology of the meeting into a
Silent Steamer type. Eventually, everyone starts to get up a leave the table while Juror #10 is still ranting
about the slums. When Juror#10 realizes he is ranting to nobody, he walks away from the table and sits
in a corner by himself. He realizes that what he was saying was wrong and offensive and he becomes
ashamed at himself for even bring it up to the group.
Juror #10 realized that he broke two major components of the Communication Skills handout.
He was being prejudice and he was exaggerating. By doing this, he created an uncomfortable
environment, one which nobody from either side wanted to be a part of. Obviously a team cannot
succeed if they are not comfortable with the members which consist of it.
Now obviously it is hard to condense everything which took part in that movie into a five page
paper, but I believe the main points were touched upon. One learned the difference between a group
and a team and the stages that a group must go through to become a team. One also learned that
sometimes challenges arise which make it hard to become a team, such as personality types and
meeting psychologies. Although many obstacles stand in the way of becoming a great team, the final
product is definitely worth it as one can succeed in a comfortable environment and accomplish anything
they set out to accomplish.