Group Dynamics, Decision Making in Groups, Team Building & Effectiveness

Defining and Classifying Groups

Group:

 Two or more individuals interacting and interdependent, who have come together to
achieve particular objectives

Formal Group:

 Defined by the organization’s structure with designated work assignments establishing

tasks
(a) Command Group
 A group composed of the individuals who report directly to a given manager
(b) Task Group
 Those working together to complete a job or task in an organization but not limited by
hierarchical boundaries

Informal Group:

 Alliances that are neither formally structured nor organizationally determined

 Appear naturally in response to the need for social contact
 Deeply affect behavior and performance

Interest Group

 Members work together to attain a specific objective with which each is concerned

Friendship Group

 Those brought together because they share one or more common characteristics

Why People Join Groups – Social Identity

 Similarity
 Distinctiveness
 Status
 Uncertainty Reduction
Five Stages of Group Development Model

1. Forming

– Members feel much uncertainty

2. Storming

– Lots of conflict between members of the group

3. Norming

– Members have developed close relationships and cohesiveness

4. Performing

– The group is finally fully functional

5. Adjourning

– In temporary groups, characterized by concern with wrapping up activities rather

than performance

Critique of the Five-Stage Model

 Assumption: the group becomes more effective as it progresses through the first four
stages

 Not always true – group behavior is more complex

 High levels of conflict may be conducive to high performance

  The process is not always linear

 Several stages may occur simultaneously

 Groups may regress

 Ignores the organizational context

Group Properties

Group Property 1:Role

 A set of expected behavior patterns attributed to someone occupying a given position in a

social unit

Role Perception

 An individual’s view of how he or she is supposed to act in a given situation

Role Expectations
  How others believe a person should act in a given situation
 Psychological Contract: an unwritten agreement that sets out mutual expectations of
management and employees

Role Conflict

 A situation in which an individual is confronted by divergent role expectations

Group Property 2: Norms

 Acceptable standards of behavior within a group that are shared by the group’s members

Classes of Norms

 Performance norms - level of acceptable work

 Appearance norms - what to wear
 Social arrangement norms - friendships and the like
 Allocation of resources norms - distribution and assignments of jobs and material

Group Property 3: Status

Status

 A socially defined position or rank given to groups or group members by others – it

differentiates group members
 Important factor in understanding behavior
 Significant motivator

Status Characteristics Theory

Status derived from one of three sources:

 Power a person has over others

 Ability to contribute to group goals
 Personal characteristics

Group Property 4: Size

Size
  Twelve or more members is a “large” group
 Seven or fewer is a “small” group

Group size affects behavior

Best group sizes based on requirement:

Attribute Small Large

Speed X

Individual Performance X

Problem Solving X

Diverse Input X

Fact-finding Goals X

Overall Performance X

Group Property 5: Cohesiveness

Cohesiveness

 Degree to which group members are attracted to each other and are motivated to stay in
the group

Managerial Implication

To increase cohesiveness:

 Make the group smaller.

 Encourage agreement with group goals.
 Increase time members spend together.
 Increase group status and admission difficulty.
 Stimulate competition with other groups.
 Give rewards to the group, not individuals.
 Physically isolate the group.
Group Decision Making vs. Individual Choice

Group Strengths:

 Generate more complete information and knowledge

 Offer increased diversity of views and greater creativity
 Increased acceptance of decisions
 Generally more accurate (but not as accurate as the most accurate group member)

Group Weaknesses:

 Time-consuming activity
 Conformity pressures in the group
 Discussions can be dominated by a few members
 A situation of ambiguous responsibility

Group Decision-Making Phenomena

Groupthink

 Situations where group pressures for conformity deter the group from critically
appraising unusual, minority, or unpopular views
 Hinders performance

Groupshift

 When discussing a given set of alternatives and arriving at a solution, group members
tend to exaggerate the initial positions that they hold. This causes a shift to more
conservative or more risky behavior.

Group Decision-Making Techniques

Made in interacting groups where members meet face-to-face and rely on verbal and nonverbal
communication.

Brainstorming

 An idea-generating process designed to overcome pressure for conformity

Nominal Group Technique (NGT)

 Works by restricting discussion during the decision-making process

  Members are physically present but operate independently

Electronic Meeting

 Uses computers to hold large meetings of up to 50 people

Teams

Why Have Teams Become So Popular?

 Great way to use employee talents

 Teams are more flexible and responsive to changes in the environment
 Can quickly assemble, deploy, refocus, and disband
 Facilitate employee involvement
 Increase employee participation in decision making
 Democratize an organization and increase motivation

Differences between Groups and Teams

Work Group

 A group that interacts primarily to share information and to make decisions to help each
group member perform within his or her area of responsibility
 No joint effort required

Work Team

 Generates positive synergy through coordinated effort. The individual efforts result in a
performance that is greater than the sum of the individual inputs
Types of Teams

Problem-Solving Teams

 Groups of 5 to 12 employees from the same department who meet for a few hours each
week to discuss ways of improving quality, efficiency, and the work environment

Self-Managed Work Teams

 Groups of 10 to 15 people who take on the responsibilities of their former supervisors

Cross-Functional Teams

 Employees from about the same hierarchical level, but from different work areas, who
come together to accomplish a task

Virtual Teams

 Teams that use computer technology to tie together physically dispersed members in
order to achieve a common goal

Characteristics

 Limited socializing
 The ability to overcome time and space constraints

To be effective, needs:

 Trust among members

 Close monitoring
  To be publicized

A Team-Effectiveness Model

Key Components of Effective Teams

 Context
 Composition
 Process Variables

Creating Effective Teams: Context

Adequate Resources

 Need the tools to complete the job

Effective Leadership and Structure

 Agreeing to the specifics of work and how the team fits together to integrate individual
skills
  Even “self-managed” teams need leaders
 Leadership especially important in multi-team systems

Climate of Trust

 Members must trust each other and the leader

Performance and Rewards Systems that Reflect Team Contributions

 Cannot just be based on individual effort

Creating Effective Teams: Composition

Abilities of Members

 Need technical expertise, problem-solving, decision-making, and good interpersonal

skills

Personality of Members

 Conscientiousness, openness to experience, and agreeableness all relate to team

performance

Allocating Roles and Diversity

 Many necessary roles must be filled

 Diversity can often lead to lower performance

Size of Team

 The smaller the better: 5 to 9 is optimal

Members’ Preference for Teamwork

 Do the members want to be on teams?

Creating Effective Teams: Team Processes

Commitment to a Common Purpose

 Create a common purpose that provides direction

 Have reflexivity: willing to adjust plan if necessary
Establishment of Specific Team Goals

 Must be specific, measurable, realistic, and challenging

Team Efficacy

 Team believes in its ability to succeed

Mental Models

 Have an accurate and common mental map of how the work gets done

A Managed Level of Conflict

 Task conflicts are helpful; interpersonal conflicts are not

Minimized Social Loafing

 Team holds itself accountable both individually and as a team

Team building –

Team building begins with the understanding that work groups require time and training before
they develop into productive and cohesive units. There seems to be a learning curve in building
an effective team.

At first, some employees may be unwilling to join or buy into the groups. Only when they see
success and team satisfaction will this feeling change. Once established, some form of
accountability must be present.

Managers should expect to see some uncertainty in the team, which may last for up to two years
and during that time there may even be a dip in productivity.

Effective team building establishes a sense of ownership and partnership and allows members to
see the team as a unit and as attractive work arrangements.

Team building succeeds when individuals share collective intelligence and experience a sense of
empowerment and engagement. Team building involves rapid learning, which takes place when
there is a free-flowing generation of ideas.

Steps of training for team building

1. Establish credibility – The trainers must first establish their knowledge and
believability.
 2. Allow ventilation – The trainees must have their anxieties and unresolved issues cleared
before starting.
3. Provide an orientation – The trainers should give specific verbal directions and provide
clear expectations and model of behavior.
4. Invest in team process – early on, have the team identity its problems and concerns
5. Set group goals
6. Facilitate the group process
7. Establish intragroup procedures
8. Establish intergroup processes
9. Change the role of the trainers
10. End the trainers’ involvement

Teams also must be monitored and evaluated on a continuous basis. There are five key
areas –

(a) The team’s mission

(b) Goal achievements
(c) Feelings of empowerment
(d) Communication
(e) Roles and norms that are productive

Turning Individuals into Team Players

Selection

 Make team skills one of the interpersonal skills in the hiring process.

Training

 Individualistic people can learn

Rewards

 Rework the reward system to encourage cooperative efforts rather than competitive
(individual) ones
 Continue to recognize individual contributions while still emphasizing the importance of
teamwork
Theoretical Perspectives

Motivational and emotional perspectives

Groups, from a motivational perspective, are a useful means of satisfying psychological needs’
groups with greater resources, offer members food shelter and other essentials for survival.
Groups offer protection from harm. Groups by their nature, create a sense of belonging for their
members by accepting and supporting them, are a source of prestige and esteem.

Emotions too, play a role in prompting individuals to seek membership in groups rather remain
alone. The impact of emotions on individuals is cultural specific.

Behavioral perspective

Behaviorism – A theoretical explanation of the way organism acquire new responses to

environmental stimuli through conditioning (learning).

Social exchange theory – An economic model of interpersonal relations that assumes individual
seek out relationships that offer them many rewards while exacting few costs.

Group members contribute their time and personal resources to their group in exchange for
direct, concrete rewards, such as pay, goods, and services as well as indirect socio emotional
rewards such as status and admiration.

System theory perspective

A systems approach assumes groups are complex, adaptive, dynamic systems of interacting
individuals. The members are units of the system who are coupled one to another by
relationships. Just as system can be deliberately designed to function in a particular way, groups
are sometimes are created for a purpose, with procedures and standards designed with overall
goal of the system in mind. Groups can, however, be self crating and self organizing system for
they may develop spontaneously as individuals begin to act in coordinated and synchronized
ways.
System theory provides a model for understanding a range of group-level processes, including
group development, productivity, and interpersonal conflict.

Cognitive perspective

Cognitive processes – Mental processes that acquire, organize, and integrate information.
Cognitive processes include memory systems that store data and the psychological mechanism
that process this information.

Self reference effect – the tendency for people to have better memories for actions and events
that they are personally connected to in some way.

Group reference effect – The tendency for group members to have better memories for actions
and events that are related in some way, to their group.

Cohesion and development

Social cohesion is unity based on attraction “the number and strength of mutual positive
attitudes among the members of the group”.

Interpersonal attraction

Group –level attraction

Social attraction

Task cohesion – a shared commitment among members to achieve a goal that requires the
collective effort of the group

Collective cohesion – member’s identification with the group; unity based on shared identity
and belonging

Emotional cohesion – The emotional intensity of the group and individuals when in the group.
Structural cohesion – The unity of a group that derives from the group’s structural integrity,
including normative coherence, clarity of roles, and strength and density of relationships linking
members

Bases of power

Reward – The capacity to control the distribution of rewards given or offered to the target.

Coercive – The capacity to threaten and punish those who do not comply with requests and
demands

Legitimate – Authority that derives from the legitimate right to require and demand obedience

Reference – Influence based on the identification with, attraction to and respect of others.

Expert – Influence based on others’ belief that the power holder possesses superior skills and
abilities

Informational – Influence based on the potential use of informational resources \, including

rational argument, persuasion, or factual data.

Power tactics

Bully

Complain

Consult

Criticize

Demand

Discuss

Disengage

Inspire
Instruct

Punish

Reward

Social loafing – The reduction of individual effort exerted when people work in groups
compared to when they work alone.

Ringelmann effect – The tendency, first documented by Max Ringelmann, for people to become
less productive when they work with others; this loss of efficiency increases as group size
increases but at a gradually decreasing rate

Reason –

Coordination

Motivation losses

Cures for social loafing

Increase identifiability

Minimize free riding

Set goals
 Leadership

Leadership

 The ability to influence a group toward the achievement of goals

Trait Theories of Leadership

 Theories that consider personality, social, physical, or intellectual traits to differentiate

leaders from nonleaders
 Not very useful until matched with the Big Five Personality Framework
 Essential Leadership Traits
 Extroversion
 Conscientiousness
 Openness
 Emotional Intelligence (Qualified)
 Traits can predict leadership, but they are better at predicting leader emergence than
effectiveness.

Behavioral Theories of Leadership

 Theories proposing that specific behaviors differentiate leaders from nonleaders

 Differences between theories of leadership:

Trait theory: leadership is inherent, so we must identify the leader based on his or her traits

Behavioral theory: leadership is a skill set and can be taught to anyone, so we must identify
the proper behaviors to teach potential leaders

Important Behavioral Studies

Ohio

• Initiating structure

• Consideration
Michigan

• Employee-oriented

• Production-oriented

Contingency Theories

 While trait and behavior theories do help us understand leadership, an important

component is missing: the environment in which the leader exists
 Contingency Theory adds this additional aspect to our understanding leadership
effectiveness studies
 Three key contingency models for leadership:
 Fiedler’s Model
 Hersey and Blanchard’s Situational Leadership Theory
 Path-Goal Theory

Fiedler Model

 Effective group performance depends on the proper match between leadership style and
the degree to which the situation gives the leader control.
 Assumes that leadership style (based on orientation revealed in LPC questionnaire) is
fixed

Considers Three Situational Factors:

 Leader-member relations: degree of confidence and trust in the leader

 Task structure: degree of structure in the jobs
 Position power: leader’s ability to hire, fire, and reward

For effective leadership: must change to a leader who fits the situation or change the
situational variables to fit the current leader
Positives:

 Considerable evidence supports the model, especially if the original eight situations are
grouped into three

Problems:

 The logic behind the LPC scale is not well understood

 LPC scores are not stable
 Contingency variables are complex and hard to determine

Situational Leadership Theory

A model that focuses on follower “readiness”

 Followers can accept or reject the leader

 Effectiveness depends on the followers’ response to the leader’s actions
  “Readiness” is the extent to which people have the ability and willingness to accomplish
a specific task

Ability to follow Willingness to Follow Leadership Behavior

Unable Unwilling Give clear and specific directions

Unable Willing Display high task orientation

Able Unwilling Use a supportive and participatory

style

Able Willing Doesn’t need to do much

Willing Unwilling

Able and willing Able and unwilling

Able

Unable and willing Unable and unwilling

Unable

House’s Path-Goal Theory

 Builds from the Ohio State studies and the expectancy theory of motivation
 The theory:

 Leaders provide followers with information, support, and resources to help them
achieve their goals

 Leaders help clarify the “path” to the worker’s goals

  Leaders can display multiple leadership types

Four types of leaders:

 Directive: focuses on the work to be done

 Supportive: focuses on the well-being of the worker

 Participative: consults with employees in decision making

 Achievement-Oriented: sets challenging goals

Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) Theory

In-Group

• Members are similar to leader

• In the leader’s inner circle of communication

• Receives more time and attention from leader

• Gives greater responsibility and rewards

Out-Group

• Managed by formal rules and policies

• Receive less of the leader’s attention / fewer exchanges

• More likely to retaliate against the organization

Charismatic Leadership
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How do charismatic leaders influence followers?

Inspire followers to transcend their self-interests for the good of the organization

Transactional

•
Contingent Reward

Management by Exception (active)

Management by Exception (passive)

Laissez-Faire

Transformational

•
Idealized Influence

Inspirational Motivation
 • Intellectual Stimulation

• Individualized Consideration

Authentic Leaders

• Authentic leaders know who they are, what they believe in and value, and act upon those
values and beliefs

Leadership in teams

McGrath’s Critical Leadership functions

Monitor Executive Action

Internal Diagnosing group Taking Remedial action
deficiencies
External Forecasting environmental Preventing deleterious
changes changes

Leadership decision – 1 Should monitor the team or take action

Leadership decision – 2 Should I intervene to meet task or relational needs

Leadership decision – 3 Should I intervene internally of externally

Guidelines for leading teams

 Emphasize common interests and values

 Use ceremonies, rituals, and symbol to develop collective identification
 Encourage and facilitate social interaction
 Tell about group activities and achievements
 Conduct process analysis sessions
 Hold practice sessions under realistic conditions
 Increase incentives for mutual cooperation
 Use after activity reviews to facilitate collective learning by team