Understanding Groups and Teams

Types of Groups and Teams

• Groups are two or more people who interact such that each person influences and is influenced by others.
• Coworkers may work together but not interact, so they are not a group.
• Teams are interdependent collections of at least two individuals sharing a common goal and accountability for their own and team outcomes.
• Workgroups are formal groups created by organizations.
  • Command (functional) groups are characterized by reporting relationships.
  • Affinity groups are relatively permanent collections of employees who meet to share information, identify opportunities, and solve problems.
• Teams are diverse and include many types.
• Informal groups are formed by members, including friendship groups (relatively permanent) and interest groups (shorter-lived).

Group Performance Factors

• The five key factors impacting group performance are composition, size, norms, cohesiveness, and informal leadership.

Managing Teams

• Team management involves understanding the benefits & costs of teams, promoting effective performance, and identifying/developing teamwork competencies.
• Benefits of teams include enhanced performance, reduced costs, & other organizational benefits (employee benefits).
• Costs of teams should also be understood.
• Top-management support, understanding time frames, and changing organizational rewards all promote effective performance in teams.

Decision Making

• Programmed decisions are frequent enough for rules to be developed. Non-programmed decisions require problem-solving.
• Certainty is when the decision-maker knows the outcomes of each alternative.
• Risk is when the decision-maker cannot know the outcome but can estimate the probabilities of various outcomes.
• Uncertainty is when the decision-maker has insufficient information to estimate probabilities or identify outcomes.
• Rational decision-making involves steps: identifying the problem, gathering information, developing options, analyzing options, choosing an option, implementing the chosen option, and evaluating the results.

Evidence-Based Decision Making

• Evidence-based decision making uses factual information to make effective decisions in a rational manner with greater conviction.

Behavioral Approaches to Decision Making

• The Administrative Model:
  • Satisficing: Choosing an acceptable alternative rather than the optimal one.
  • Intuition: Using past experiences to make quick choices.
  • Escalation of Commitment: Continuing a failing course of action.

Group Decision Making in Organizations

• Group Polarization: Group discussion strengthens initial inclinations.
• Groupthink: A poor decision-making process in a group where the group's desire for consensus overrides a critical evaluation of alternative ideas.

Enhancing Creativity in Organizations

• Preparation, Incubation, Insight, and Verification are steps in the creative process.

Understanding Groups & Teams

• Essential to understand the importance of groups/teams in organizations, difference between a group and a team, concept of synergy, and when teams are appropriate.
• Issues to contemplate when forming a group/team

Conflict

• There are two types of conflict and examples of each, and social loafing impacts in groups/teams, and how to reduce it.
• What factors increase or decrease counterproductive work behaviors (CWBs) in group scenarios will be considered.

Leadership

• Contrast leadership and management.
• Trait theory traits of leaders.
• Behavioral theories: Two main approaches.
• Transactional leadership and what it involves.
• Transformational leadership and what it entails.

This quiz explores the different types of groups and teams, including their definitions, characteristics, and performance factors. Learn about formal and informal groups, along with key elements that influence team dynamics and performance. Test your knowledge on effective team management strategies.