1
COMMERCE 2BA3
ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOUR
Class 5
Groups and Teamwork
Dr. Christa Wilkin
Brain Teasers
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LANG4UAGE
search
and
I'm
world
thought an
Last Class
3
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Content and process theories of motivation
Money and job design as a motivator
THIS CLASS
 Groups and teamwork
Agenda
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Team development
Team structure
Team decision-making
Types of teams
Ultimate Student Chair task
5
CH 7: GROUPS AND TEAMWORK
Question
6
What is your best/worst team experience?
 Describe the behaviours of team members/ team as
a whole and what made it so good/bad?
Teams vs. Groups
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
Teams are generally distinguished from groups by:
 Team
goals: groups don’t need to have goals
 Shared leadership
 Shared accountability
 Self-developed mission
 Continuous problem-solving

Formal vs. Informal
 Established
by organizations vs. emerging naturally
 E.g., work on project vs. play on softball team
Typical Stages of Team
Development
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Teams develop through a series of stages over time
Each stage presents the members with a series of
challenges they must master in order to achieve the
next stage
Not all teams go through these stages
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Individual Task: Put the Stages in
Order
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Storming: Conflict often emerges; sorting out roles
and responsibilities is often at issue
Adjourning: Group disperses after achieving goals
Forming: What are we doing here?, what are others
like?, what is our purpose?
Performing: The group devotes its energies toward
task accomplishment
Norming: Norms are agreed on and the group
becomes more cohesive
Punctuated Equilibrium Model
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How teams with deadlines are affected by first
meetings and crucial midpoint transitions
 Phase 1: first meeting to midpoint of existence,
little progress is made
 Midpoint Transition: need to move forward is
apparent
 Phase 2: decisions and approaches are played
out

Comparing Both Models
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Team Structure
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What is the ultimate team size?
Additive Task
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Disjunctive Task
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Team performance is dependent on the sum of the
performance of individual members
Team performance is dependent on the performance of the
best member
Conjunctive Task
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Team performance is limited by the performance of the
poorest member
Team Size
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As groups become larger, they suffer process losses
 Performance
difficulties that result from the problems of
motivating and coordinating larger groups
Diversity in Teams
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 Diverse
teams might take longer to do their forming,
storming and norming
 Diverse teams sometimes perform better when the task
requires cognitive, creativity-demanding tasks and
problem solving rather than routine work
Question
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When will teams perform better than individuals?
Teams vs. Individuals
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Group members differ in skills and abilities
Some division of labour can occur
Quiz Question
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One reason for members reporting less satisfaction in
larger groups is
A) individual members can identify less easily with the
success of the group.
B) opportunities for participation increase in larger
groups.
C) people are less inhibited about participating in larger
groups.
D) conflict and dissension are less likely in larger groups.
E) they have more time to develop friendships with other
group members.
Team Norms
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Acceptable standards of behaviour within a team
Agreed upon by members
Relate to
 Performance
 e.g.,
how hard to work
 Appearance
 Social interaction
 Allocation of resources
 e.g., assignments
Team Roles
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Positions in a group that have a set of expected
behaviours attached to them
Role ambiguity
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Lack of clarity of job goals or methods
Role Conflict

Exists when faced with incompatible role expectations

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Something unethical, demands in other roles at home
Both can result in job disatisfaction, stress reactions,
lower commitment, and turnover
Team Cohesiveness
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The degree to which a group is especially attractive
to its members.
Increase cohesiveness:
 Threat:
External threat to the survival of a group
 Success: Groups become more cohesive when they
successfully accomplish an important goal
 Size: Larger groups have a more difficult time
becoming and staying cohesive
 Toughness of initiation: Groups that are tough to get
into tend to be more attractive than those easy to join
Team Cohesiveness
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Consequences of Cohesiveness
 More
participation in group activities
 More conformity
 More success
 In
more cohesive groups, individual performance is similar
Question
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What is social loafing?
Social Loafing
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Members exert less effort when working in teams
than working alone
Factors that affect:
 Team
size (+)
 Team produces single output (e.g., report) (+)
 Interestingness of the task (-)
 Importance of objective (-)
 Value team membership and objectives (-)
How to Manage Social Loafing
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Discuss expectations
Make individual performance more visible
 Specialize
 Feeling

not be aware of poor performance
Make tasks more interesting and important
 Divide

that inputs are necessary for team success
Increase performance feedback
 Might
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tasks
tasks based on expertise and preference
Punishment warnings in advance (deter)
Question
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Why would you want to use groups to make
decisions rather than individuals?
Group Decision Making
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 Groups
or teams can make higher-quality decisions
than individuals
 Generate
 Increases
more ideas and evaluate them better
decision acceptance and commitment
Disadvantages
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Time
 Conflict
 Domination
 Groupthink
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Groupthink (Teamthink)
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The capacity for group pressure to damage the
mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral
judgment of decision making groups
Develops because of too much cohesiveness, concern
for approval and isolation of the group
E.g., video of Asch experiment
Video Clip
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
Challenger Disaster
Question
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Take a moment to think about three concepts from
the lecture that you can apply to your groups
Types of Teams
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Process-improvement teams
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Self-managed teams
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e.g., Teams in class
Cross-functional
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e.g., Team to improve efficiency of manufacturing a
product
e.g., Team with people from HR, marketing, accounting
Virtual Teams
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e.g., Team that spans the globe
Ultimate Student Chair
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Team Simulation Exercise
 Simulating a virtual, cross-functional team with a
very big challenge
 Form teams of 5 people
 Representing two separate offices of a full-service
consulting company
Ultimate Student Chair
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Client briefing details on handout
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20 minutes to prepare
Each team will have half of its members located on
one side of the room and can only communicate
with them via email.
Five minutes (max) to present your ideas
One or two people per team will present to class
Ultimate Student Chair
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How was the coordination among team members?
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and across offices, specifically?
How did you make decisions?
What did you do well / not so well?
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QUESTIONS?
Summary
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Team progress will depend on which stage team is in
Teams are not necessarily more effective than
individuals
 Require
management: Establish norms (expectations),
divide up labour/assign roles, build cohesiveness,
manage social loafing
Hopefully Together Everyone Achieves More (TEAM)
For Next Class
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
Read chapter 8 on influence, socialization, and
culture, and chapter 9 on leadership