Understanding Work Teams

心碩一 賴柏瑞

Why have team become so popular ? More effectively and efficiently Flexible, and responsive to

changing events more Quickly assemble, deploy, defocus,

and disband Employee participation in

operating decision Increase employee motivation

Difference between groups and teams

Work group Performance is merely

the summation of each group member’s individual contribution

Work team Performance is greater

than the sum of the individual inputs

Generate greater ouputs with no increase in inputs

Positive synergy , joint effort

Types of teams-1 Problem-solving

teams Typically composed of 5-

12 employees from the same department

Discuss ways of improving quality, efficiency, and work environment for a few hours

Rarely have the authority to unilaterally implement any of their suggested actions

Types of teams-2 Self-managed work team

Perform highly related or interdependent jobs and take on many of the responsibilities of their former supervisor

Involve in planning work , assigning tasks, making operating decisions, taking action on problems, working with customers, even select own members and evaluate each other’s performance

Sometimes have higher absenteeism and turnover rates

The effectiveness of these teams depends on the strength and make-up of team norms

Types of teams-3 Cross-functional teams

Teams made up of employees from the same hierarchical level but different work areas

Use this form of team to coordinate complex projects

Early stages of development are often time-consuming, as members learn to work with diversity and complexity. It takes time to build trust and teamwork among people from different backgrounds

Types of teams-4

Virtual teams Not face-to-face Use computer technology to tie

together in order to achieve a common goal

Less social rapport and direct interaction among members

Members tend to be more task oriented and exchange less social-emotional information

Members report less satisfaction with the group interaction process

Characteristics of effective teams

Context Composition Work design Process

Context Adequate resource Leadership and structure Climate of trust

Reduces the need to monitor each other’s behavior Allows a team to be willing to commit to its leader’s goals and

decisions

Performance evaluation and reward systems

Reward systems must reflect team performance Reinforce team effort and commitment

Composition Abilities of members

Technical Problem-solving and decision-making interpersonal

Personality of members Conscientious Openness agreeable

Allocation of roles Diversity of members

Member believe others have more expertise, they will work to support them, leading to more effectiveness

Size of teams The most effective teams have 5-9 members Excess members cohesiveness and mutual

accountability decline social loafing increase Member preferences

Work design

Skill variety Task identity Task significance Work-design characteristics motivate

because they increase members’ sense of responsibility and ownership of the work and because they make the work more interesting to perform

Process

Common plan and purpose Successful team put more time into discussing, shaping, and

agreeing on a propose Reflexivity reflect on and adjust their plan when necessary

Specific goals Difficult goals have been found to raise team performance for

which they’re set Team efficacy Mental models Conflict level

Task conflicts Relationship conflicts

Social loafing Need to hold members accountable at both the individual and

team level

Turning individuals into team players

Selection Training Rewarding

Need to balance selfless contributions to the team

The intrinsic rewards from teams

Teams aren’t always the answer

Work can be done better by one person

Does the work set of goals for the people in the group that is more than the aggregate of individual goals ?

Whether team fir the situation ? The members of the group are interdependent ?

Global implications Extent of teamwork

32% US workers report their organization has a high level of teamwork

Individual contributions is still a heavy role Self-managed teams

Special care needs to be taken when introducing self-managed teams globally

Team cultural diversity and team performance

Newly formed culturally diverse teams underperform homogeneous team

Need more time to learn how to work together

Thx and next chap.