Teamwork: Roles and Responsibilities

• The unit of competency is "Work in Team Environment".
• The module is "Working in Team Environment".
• This module aims to equip individuals with the skills, knowledge, and attitudes needed to identify roles and responsibilities within a team setting.
• The nominal duration is 16 hours.

Learning Outcomes

• Describe and identify team roles and responsibilities in a team
• Describe work as a team member

Assessment Criteria

• Identify the role and objective of the team.
• Identify the team parameters, relationships, and responsibilities.
• Describe individual roles and responsibilities within the team environment.
• Indicate the roles and responsibilities of other team members
• Identify reporting relationships within the team and external entities.
• Understand the use of communication and interactions
• Know how to complement team activities and objectives
• Report information using standard operating procedures.
• Contribute to the development of team work plans.

Building Relationship and Teamwork

• A team consists of individuals working together for common objectives, setting aside individual autonomy when needed.
• A team is defined as a group of people working together to achieve common objectives and willing to forego individual autonomy to the extent necessary to achieve those objectives.
• The smallest team comprises two people.
• Teamwork involves members developing a common, constructive, and cooperative work style
• An organization is effectively a network of teams, both temporary and permanent.
• Members should share objectives and wholly commit to them when joining a team.
• Joining a team implies agreeing to the team's objectives as a condition of membership.
• A leader is essential to decide the degree of autonomy team members will have, ensuring commitment and using consultation for problem-solving and negotiations.

Skills for Teamwork

• Listening: Pay attention to others' ideas to generate more ideas
• Questioning: Interact and discuss team objectives through questions
• Persuading: Exchange, defend, and rethink ideas
• Respecting: Important in treating others with respect and to support their ideas.
• Helping: Crucial to help one's coworkers, which is the general theme of teamwork.
• Sharing: Important in sharing with the team in order to create an environment for teamwork.
• Participating: All member of the team are encouraged to participate in the team.
• Communication: Essential communication include skills to use effective communication channels

Team Roles (Meredith Belbin's 9 Roles)

• These roles are proposed to be present in successful teams.
• Coordinator (or Chairperson): Possesses a clear view of team goals and invites contributions, is disciplined, confident, mature, summarizes views, and makes decisions.
• Shaper: Drives progress and challenges others and prepared to take charge.
• Plant: Offers original ideas and challenges traditional thinking while providing new insights and ideas for change..
• Resource Investigator: Connects the team to external resources, bringing in information and support.
• Implementer: Turns ideas into manageable tasks and plans, is logical, disciplined, hardworking, and methodical.
• Team worker: Aware of team members' needs and concerns, promotes harmony, and reduces conflict.
• Completer: Ensures deadlines are met by communicating a sense of urgency and checking details.
• Monitor Evaluator: Sees all options, has a strategic perspective, and accurately judges situations.
• Specialist: Offers specialized skills and knowledge but may have a narrow perspective.
• Finisher: Sticks to deadlines and likes to get on with things.

Team Roles and Responsibilities

• Critical is the active participation of each team member for the team's success.
• Be enthusiastic and committed to the team's purpose.
• Be honest and keep any confidential information behind closed doors.
• Share responsibility to rotate through other team roles like facilitator, recorder, and timekeeper.
• Share knowledge and expertise and not withhold information.
• Ask questions, even seemingly "dumb" ones. Often the new perspective of "inexperienced" team members can provide insight.
• Fulfill duties in between meetings.
• Respect the opinions and positions of others on the team, even if the person has an opposing view or different opinion.

Individual Responsibilities

• Executive sponsor: Defines the team's charter approved by a strategy council, which in turn controls/supports cross-functional teams and recruits the team's coordinator.
• Coordinator/Chairperson/Leader: Recruits members to join the team, greets members as they arrive, calls the meeting to order at the appointed stat time, controls the order of events and proposes meeting agenda topics and how much time should be devoted to each topic.
• Facilitator: Interrupts the meeting to remind the group about a process concern, evaluates norms and methods used during a meeting and coach individuals, to mediate any conflicts.
• Team members: Notifies Coordinator about not being able to attend a meeting, brings individual calendars/schedules/distributions received /personal notes to meetings.
• Timekeeper: Brings a timer to meetings
• Scribe: Brings large format papers and dry-erase pens to meetings.
• Note taker: Brings blank note paper and writing.
• Librarian: brings team's archive binder to meetings.
• Publisher: Sends invitations to those invited to the meeting
• Technician/Facilities Manager: Brings extra bulbs and other supplies to the meeting.
• Presenter(s): Bring presentation materials.

Communication Process

• Communication can take on many forms including gestures, facial expressions, signs, vocalizations (including pitch and tone), in addition to speech and written communication.
• Effective communication is an essential component of organizational success whether it is at the interpersonal, intergroup, intra group, organizational, or external levels.
• Communication is non-verbal meaning attributes meaning non-verbal parts such as bodies, language and tone.
• Communicate with team members.

Being a Good Team Member

• Address issues with the person directly rather than isolate from the group.
• It's okay to acknowledge your group losses respect if one's constantly blaming others for not meeting deadlines.
• Support teammates' ideas.
• Don't brag about your success; let your work speak for itself, and acknowledge thanks when receiving praise.
• Actively engage in the conversation
• Share suggestions, ideas, solutions and proposals with your team members.

Team Structure/Team Roles

• Increased trust and openness occurs between the team through high interaction among the team members
• Interpersonal skills is a must
• Individual Responsibility means fulfilling social pressure or personal needs.
• Teams are more efficient and achieve more accurately that an individuals
• Teams require technical skills- People with problem solving and decision making skills- teams need someone with feed back and conflict resolution skills
• No team can achieve performance- potential without improving all three types of skills.

Intra-Group Development

• Include team building, goal setting development, inter relations among the team members.
• Defining the goals and prioritizing can bring a better surface
• Review your performance to achieve your goals.
• Can identify roles and previous ambiguities.

Inter-Group Development

• Seeks to change attitudes, stereotypes and perceptions.
• Focus on problem solving.
• Resolve the conflict and develop solutions.

Essential Team Roles

• Involving role a team member may motive others by getting team involved in a program- asking other team members stimulates involvement.
• Listening role team members should be nodding, lean forward and show the are being heard
• Supportive Role team members should strengths their confidence
• Compromising role should give team problem solving.

Group Planning and Decision Making

• Identify the types of group decision making
• Learn procedures in effective discussion

Effective group discussion requires a few procedures

• Identify the situation, analyze find courses determine what is deserving of what.
• Establish a criteria action that will lead to workable solution for example: Time, Money etc
• Conduct research through observations and experiments to have valid conclusion.
• Evaluate propose the solution

Types of Group Decision-Making

• Abstract
  • Managers use action planning, goal setting and problem solving
• Decision By Lack of Response (The "Plop" Method)
  • Suggesting something ideas and someone else suggests other ideas
• Decision by Authority Rule
  • Have a power structure with an chairman to have the final voice.
• Decision by Minority Rule
  • Where one to three people influence and there are actions but has no consent in majority.
• Decision by Majority Rule (Voting and Polling)
  • Is familiar through are political system

The Better Way

• Is the system for coming to a group decision based on effectiveness, time constraints etc,
• States communication must be clear and concise in what they are stating.
• A "sense of meeting" avoiding voting.
• Identify the problem, how to take action and experience it.

Steps in Group Decision Making

• Identify the problem.
• Clarify what the problem is.
• Analyze the cause.
• Solicit alternative solution to the problem.
• Selecting one or more alternatives for action. Plans for implementation and evaluation and accountability.