dr rijal on team building workshop

My insights into team building developed by Dr C P Rijal for GIZ/INCLUDE- SCCI

WORKSHOP PROCEEDINGS ON TEAM BUILDING

PARTICIPANT HANDBOOK

BY C P RIJAL, PHD IN LEADERSHIP

ASSOCIATE PROFESSSOR OF MANAGEMENT SCIENCES

[Inside it: work groups and work teams, formation process, features, norms, requirements, tools and

techniques and relevant icebreakers]


Work team: where does it lie in an organizational process climate?

A systems model of organizational behavior and process climate comprises of the systematic portray of

various behavioral exchanges of behavioral constructs at individual, group and organizational systems

levels so as to assess the impact of such exchanges on expected organizational outcomes (Robbins,

Judge, & Sanghi, 2009). Building work team is one of the integral components of such a system.

According to Rijal (2011), leading an institution is highly dependent on how the institutional leadership

views and makes a vision for shared commitment from its all levels of operation – the individuals,

groups and super organo-structural systems.

Figure 1 best illustrates the relationship between various dependent and independent constructs at

different levels of OB analyses.

Figure 1: A systems approach to OB model

Adapted from: Robbins, Judge, & Sanghi (2009). Organizational Behavior. (13th

ed.). p. 37.

Organizational behavior can be viewed from different levels of analysis. At one level, the organization

can be viewed as consisting of individuals working on tasks in the pursuit of organizational goals. A

second level of analysis focuses upon the interaction among organizational members as they work in

teams, groups and departments. Finally, organizational behavior can be analyzed from the perspective of

the organization as a whole system. Formation of work teams serves as an instrumental component of

organizational systems process climate.

Group event for brain storming…

Now, you need to relate these things for your organization and replicate how each variable affects rest of

other variables and finally the organizational outcomes are impacted. A brainstorming session of 15

minutes to be followed by 3-5 minutes group presentation would be fair enough.

Individual Level Variables

Personal demography

Biographical characteristics

Values and norms

Attitudes

Personality

Perception

Skill competence

Learning

Individual decision-making

H u

m a

n

I

n

p u

t

s

Motivation

Group Level Variables

Communication

Work groups

Work teams

Interpersonal conflict

Group decision-making

Leadership

Systems Level Variables

HR policies/practices

Structure and design

Change and development

Organizational culture

Work stress

Power and politics

Strategic

thrusts

Change or

Transformation

Expected OB Outcomes

Increased productivity

Increased job satisfaction

Decreased turnover

Decreased absenteeism Feedback

Corporate

Citizenshi

p


Work Group

A work group may be defined as a collection of individuals, whereby the members accept a common

task, become interdependent in their performance, and interact with one another to promote its

accomplishment.

A group consists of a number of individuals working together for a common objective. Groups have

significant influence on an organization and are inseparable from it. They are useful for the organization

as they form foundation of human resource and its behavior.

Further, a group is defined as two or more individuals interacting and interdependent, who have come

together to achieve particular goal. Group work is often seen as a set of people working together to

achieve a common goal. To define a group, a group must have certain qualities. Common goal

performed by a set of people, task efficiency among the members, interpersonal relationship and

independence as well as interaction, binding with specified values and norms, similarity of interest on

common goals, and role differentiation among the members are some of the expected qualities of a work

group.

The study of group behavior is essential for an organization to achieve its goals. Individual and group

behavior may vary from each other. In 1920, Elton Mayo and his associates conducted the Hawthorne

experiments and came to know that the group behavior has great impact on organizational productivity.

The importance of group behavior has received more attention these days that ever before.

Human behavior consists of individuals, who move in groups. The knowledge of group and individual

behavior is necessary for a manager as he or she has to work according to prevailing group psychology.

A manager should also understand individual behavior in the context of group behavior.

The key parts of this definition are the concepts of interaction and influence, which also limit the size of

the group. It is difficult for members to interact sufficiently in a large group. Improving group

performance is the primary approach used by managers on their journey to organizational success.

Managers need groups to coordinate individual behavior in order to reach the organizational goals.

Groups can make a manager's job easier because by forming a group, the manager need not explain the

task to each and every individual. A manager can easily coordinate with the work of an individual by

giving the group a task and allowing them to coordinate with each other. But for a group to work

effectively, the interactions between its members should be productive. Therefore, managers must pay

attention to the needs of individuals.

Group event for brainstorming…

Discuss together and identify particular work groups a particular institution may promote for improving

its overall business/service and finally make a presentation of 3-5 minutes.

Reasons why people join groups

Now, a question arises – why do people join groups? The answer is apparent and multi-faceted one.

They join groups for personal security, enhancing own status, gaining self-esteem through professional

growth, being affiliated on power, and finally achieving specified goals.

The following discussions attempt to provide with more accounts on individual, interpersonal and

organizational motives of people joining groups:


Organizational motives to join groups: Organizations form functional and task groups because such

groups help the organization in structuring and grouping the organizational activities logically and

efficiently.

Personal motives to join groups: Individuals also choose to join informal or interest groups for

unimportant reasons. Since joining these groups is voluntary, various personal motives affect

membership.

Interpersonal attraction: Individuals come together to form informal or interest group, as they are also

attracted to each other. The factors that contribute to interpersonal attraction are sex, similar attitudes,

personality and economic standing. The closeness of group members also may serve as an important

factor.

Interest in-group activities: Individuals may also be motivated to join an informal or interest group

because the activities of the group appeal to them. Playing tennis, discussing current events or

contemporary literature, all these are group activities that individuals enjoy.

Support for group goals: The individuals may also be motivated goals by the other group members to

join. For example, a club, which is dedicated to environmental conservation, may motivate individuals

to join. Individuals join groups, such as these in order to donate their money and time to attain the goals

they believe in and to meet other individuals with similar values.

Need for affiliation: Another reason for individuals to join groups is to satisfy their needs for

attachment. Retired or old-aged individuals join groups to enjoy the companionship of other individuals

in similar situation.

Instrumental benefits: Sometimes a group membership is also helpful in providing other benefits to an

individual. For example, a manager might join a Rotary Club or Lions Club if the person feels that being

a member of this club will lead to important and useful business contacts or networking.

Importance of work groups

The concept of managing modern organizations makes efforts to introduce industrial democracy at

workplace. For this, the organizations use project teams and work committees where workers get due

recognition which results in their willing participation in decision-making.

The tasks in modern industries are becoming more complex, tedious and arid of repetitive nature. Work

committees, work groups and teams are formed to monitor the work. They also make the environment at

workplace livelier.

Groups help in making participative management more effective. A group can judge in a better way as

compared to an individual. Similarly, group think and group work yield results far above the concept of

individual think and individual decision making.

Groups of all kinds and types help by cooperating in all the matters related to production and human

relations to work effectively in the organization.

An individual cannot perform each and every task. Group effort is required for its completion. For

example, building a ship, making of a movie, construction of a fly-over, etc. may require a lot of group


effort, expertise and task commitment. All these require coordinated and unified efforts of many

individuals, working in a group.

While accomplishing tasks, all members of a group together use their creative and innovative ideas than

a single individual. In a group, individuals communicate with each other, discuss their work

performances and take suggestions from each other to make it better.

Group efforts affect an individual, his or her attitude and behavior. A group has the ability to satisfy the

needs of its members.


Can you recollect from your group members, a few group events that took place in their organization

and resulted in good results for the organization, and make a brief sharing of important incidents among

rest of groups?

Types of work groups

In an organization, mainly three types of work groups will remain in existence. Figure 2 provides with

detailed information about the types of organizational work groups.

Figure 2: Work Group Classification in an Organization

Functional or formal groups are the groups formed by the organization to accomplish different

organizational purposes. A formal group may be defined as any social arrangement in which the

activities of some persons are planned by others to achieve a common purpose. Mostly, the functional or

formal groups are permanent in nature. They have to follow rules, regulations and policies of the

organization as they are formed within the premise of such formal structural system.

Formal groups are deliberately created by the organization in order to help the organizational members

to achieve the organizational goals.

Such groups may include departments such as the personnel department, the advertising department, the

quality control department and the public relations department. Similarly, smaller units, independent

strategic business units (SBUs) and small size branches also may be considered as formal or functional

groups in an organization.


Tasks groups are the groups formed by an organization to accomplish a narrow range of purposes within

a specified time. These groups are of temporary in nature. They are mainly confined to develop the

solution to a problem or complete its purpose. Informal committees, task forces and work teams are

included in task groups. The organization after specifying a group membership, assigns a narrow set of

purposes, such as developing a new product, evaluating a proposed grievance procedure, etc. and the

designated members work together to perform the assigned task.

A group that is neither formally structured nor organizationally determined and it appears in response to

the need for social contact and is known as an informal group. It means that the informal groups are the

groups formed for the purposes other than the organizational goals.

Informal groups form when individuals are drawn together by friendship, by mutual interests or both.

Most often, the formation of such groups takes place spontaneously. The network of persons and social

relations which is not established or required form an informal organization represents an informal

group and is formed by the employees themselves at the workplace while working together. The

organization does not take any active interest in their formation, or it may not even notice such a

formation.

In many instances, informal groups are very effective and powerful. These groups work as an informal

communication network forming a part of the grapevine to the organizations. They are also like a

powerful force, which an organization cannot avoid. Some managers consider them to be harmful to the

interest of an organization. They suspect their integrity and consider as a virtual threat. Some managers

do not consider them as threat and seek the help of such group members in getting the organizational

tasks accomplished.

Following sub-section provides with additional information on different types of informal groups:

Interest groups are the groups formed to attain a common purpose. Employees coming together

demanding the payment of bonus, increase in salary, medical benefits and other facilities are a few

examples of interest groups.

Membership groups are the groups of individuals belonging to the same profession and knowing each

other. For example, teachers of the same faculty in a university may form an association of their

interests.

Friendship groups are the groups of individuals belonging to same age group, having similar views,

tastes and opinions. These groups can also be formed outside the plant or office and can be in the form

of clubs and associations.

Reference groups are the groups where individuals shape their ideas, beliefs, values, etc. taking in

reference of some other groups working outside of the organization and such a system of benchmarking

of better aspects of organizational operations, of course, contributes significantly for the betterment of

an organization.


Make a brief review of various work groups and work teams within Surkhet Chamber of Commerce and

Industries.


Process of group formation

As presented in figure 3 below, the entire process of group formation and performance may be studied in

the form of a five-stage proposition.

Figure 3: Group Formation Process

Adjourning/Mourning

Completion, ending or

evolution

Performing

Achieving the purpose

Norming

Agreeing purpose and

conduct

Storming

Resolving differences

Forming

Initial meeting together

Stages of Group Formation & Performance

In pre-stage I, the members are almost unknown about the purpose and they are working in their own

ways and directions. At the same time, someone may take some sort of initiative and communicate it

with the other closer circle members, who in turn, may like the idea and they form a group at stage I

which is considered as the ‘Forming Stage’ of group process. Similarly, in the key subsequent three

stages, storming, norming and performing takes place. Finally, the work groups are dissolved after

attainment of the specified group purpose or task. Adjourning need not necessarily take each of the

group members back to Pre-stage I stage of the group process since the members by now might have

connected with other informal relationships as a result of themselves working together during the

previous stages of group process.

Forming stage solicits the initial entry of members to a group. In this stage, the members pay attention

on each member’s concerns in respect with getting to know each other, discovering what is considered

acceptable behavior, determining the group’s real task, and defining group rules.

Storming stage includes a period of high emotionality and tension among group members and the

members’ concerns include formation of coalitions and cliques, dealing with outside demands, clarifying

membership expectations, dealing with obstacles to group goals, and understanding each member’s

individual interpersonal styles.

Norming stage is the point at which the group really begins to come together as a coordinated unit and

starts exhibiting its structural system. At this stage, the members’ concerns include how to hold the


group together, dealing with divergent views and criticisms, and dealing with a premature sense of

accomplishment.

Performing stage marks the emergence of a mature, organized, and well-functioning group. At this

stage, the members deal with complex tasks and handle internal disagreements in creative ways. Primary

challenge is to continue to improve relationships and performance.

Adjourning stage is particularly important for temporary groups. A well-integrated group is able to

disband when its work is finished and the members will be willing to work together in the future.

Characteristics of a well matured group

As groups pass through the stages of development to maturity, they begin to show signs of role

structure, behavioral norms, cohesiveness and informal leadership as the behavioral characteristics.

Role structure is the active functional part that an individual plays in a group to reach its goals. Each

member of the group acts differently in respect with leading, performing in group, maintaining group

interaction within and beyond the group structure, and so on. As a result, some individuals lead the

groups, some focus on the group tasks, some interact with other groups, and so on. Role structure is the

set of defined roles and interrelationships among those roles that the group members define and accept.

The failure in role development results in role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload. Managers have

to take steps to avoid role ambiguity, role conflict and role overload.

Behavioral norms are the formal and informal bindings created to govern the behavior of each member

and the group at large. Although informal groups may not always have specific immediate goals to

accomplish, they must have some goals over a period of time. Group goals are mostly temporary and

can change in accordance with the needs of the group members and the developments happening in the

governing environment.

The attainment of such goals depends on the extent of cooperation with management, maintenance of an

efficient communication system and satisfaction of the needs of group members.

Informal leadership is another happening feature of a work group. Each informal group has one or more

leaders. These leaders come forward on the basis of acceptance of all the group members. Each informal

group has one primary leader apart from the secondary leaders. The primary leader has more influence

on group members than any other person within the group structure.

Cohesiveness is defined as the attractiveness or intactness of the group members towards the group. It

also emphasizes on the group ability to satisfy its member needs. Group cohesiveness helps the group

members to work more consistently and make greater contribution for the achievement of organizational

goals. It is also psychologically more satisfying to all of its members.

Basically, there are four principal consequences of group cohesiveness – i. ability of a group to retain its

members, ii. power of the group to influence its members, iii. degree of participation and loyalty of

members, and iv. feeling of security on the part of the members.


Critically analyze the shared characteristics of a work group well known to you and share with rest of

members.


Group structure

Group structure in inevitable to shape the behavior of its members, predict the behavior and guide the

performance of the group as a whole. Groups of 5-7 members exercise the best elements of both small

and large groups. Social loafing is a tendency for individuals to expend less effort when working

collectively than when working individually. Thus, there should not be more than expected or required

membership in a group.

Some of the key elements of group structure are size and composition, roles, norms, and status.

Size is the number of persons in group which affects group behavior and composition is degree of

similarity or difference among group members. Size and composition determines large or smaller

groups.

Roles deal with what people do. Role is a set of position related expected behavioral patterns or tasks of

each member in a social unit. Such roles may be of two types – task oriented, and relationship oriented

roles.

The norms are the acceptable standards of behaviors shared by group members. Norms influence the

behavior of group members that apply to all group members. Basically, performance norms, appearance

norms, social arrangement norms, and resource allocation norms are the key types of group norms.

Status is a socially defined rank given to each group or group members by others. Status of a person or

group may be symbolic and/or equity-based.

Despite a number of very much functional structural patterns of a group, it also naturally faces a

character of diversity. Group ability to manage diversity will result in high performance. On the other

hand, failure may be witnessed as a result of communication gap, felt interpersonal differences, lack of

personal skill competencies, and frequent interpersonal and group conflicts.


You are going to perform a recreational program here tomorrow. Work in your group to decide up on

size of membership with assigned roles and duties, guiding norms. Then make a short presentation.

Norms and cohesiveness in groups

Group norms generally refer to group behavior directed by set of rules and regulations and standards in

more formal setting, and also the member beliefs, attitudes, traditions and expectations shared by group

members as part of informal structuring of the group.

In other words, group norms are rules or guidelines of accepted behavior which are established by a

group and used to promote, monitor and control the behavior of its members.

The primary objective of group norms is to help achieve stated objectives of the group, leading to

organizational success. The norms can be in the form of social or fairness in nature. Norms define

boundaries between acceptable and unacceptable behaviors. The norms make the members to identify

themselves with roles, duties, dos and don’ts while working in a group. Norms play a significant role in

disciplining the members of a group to make them to work regularly and properly. Rationalized

execution of group norms reduces absenteeism and employee turnover. The members of the group are

expected to follow the norms strictly to make the group function in a more organized way.


The group norms may be further categorized in two key forms – i. behavioral norms, and ii. performance

norms.

Behavior norms are the rules and regulations and standards that define how individuals should act while

working in group. For example, attending the committee meeting only after reading the reports to be

'discussed' - may be a group norm of a task force. ‘Greeting every customer with a smile’, may be a

performance norm established at Hotel Annapurna. These norms tend to reflect motivation and

interpersonal commitment to the organization, and therefore, tend to result in high level of performance.

On the other hand, the performance norms are the rules or understandings that tend to standardize the

employee output and number of hours worked. Defined work hours, timing of commencement and

closure of the day’s operation, expected per capita output in a defined period of time, etc. are the

examples of performance-based norms.

Now, the question arises, why should we enforcement the group norms? Groups do not always have the

time or energy to regulate each and every action of the group member every time something goes

wrongs. Only those behaviors that sound to be important by group members should be brought under

control. Rest of things should be governed by the defined system of the group operation.

Groups, like individuals, try to operate in such a way that they maximize their chances of task success

by minimizing the chance of task failure. Groups want to facilitate their performance and tend to

overcome barriers to reach their goals. Moreover, groups want to increase morale and prevent any

interpersonal discomfort to their members.

This is only the norms that will help groups meet these aims of performing successfully and

continuously keeping high morale. Conditions where group norms will be strongly enforced may include

– i. if the norms facilitate group success or ensure group survival, ii. if the norms simplify or predict

regarding the behavior which is expected from group members, iii. if the norms emphasize the roles of

specific members within a group, and iv. if the norms help the group to solve the interpersonal

problems themselves.

The norms of one group cannot be easily mixed with another group. Some differences are primarily due

to the difference in structure of the groups. However, even very similar work groups may develop

different norms and they will be unique from another work group norm. The members of one group may

be friendly with their supervisor whereas those of another group may not necessarily be required to act

so.

There should exist the power to force a certain degree of norm conformity in each group. There are

several factors that consist of norm conformity. For example, some groups may exert more pressure for

conformity than others because of the personalities of the group members. Similarly, the history of the

group and its members also plays significant role in norm conformity. For example, if the group has

always been successful by following certain behaviors, new group members are also asked to follow the

same. If the group was not successful in the past, a new group member may have greater freedom to

exhibit other behaviors whereby influencing the existing members to act that way.

Group cohesiveness is the attractiveness of the members towards the group or resistance of the members

leaving it. It refers to the intactness or attachment of members with the group. Cohesiveness is

understood as the extent of liking each member towards others and how far everyone wants to remain as

the member of the group.


Attractiveness is the key to cohesiveness. Cohesiveness is the extent to which group members are loyal

and committed to the group and to one another. In a highly cohesive group, the members will work well

together, support and trust one another and will be generally effective at achieving their chosen goals.

A group that lacks cohesiveness will not be very much coordinated. Its members may not necessarily

support to each other and they may face difficulty in reaching their goals.

It is the manager’s role to develop an understanding of the factors that increase the group cohesiveness.

If a manager is more successful in this function, group cohesiveness will boost and lead to task

achievement.

Effective management of group cohesiveness will yield high morale of the members; there will be less

evident of conflicting views, which decreases the chances of in clash among the views of group

members at the workplace or elsewhere; individuals of cohesive groups have less anxiety at the

workplace; members of cohesive groups are regular at their work; cohesiveness increases productivity;

and organizations gain from the members of cohesive groups because they communicate better, they

share ideologies, and respect opinions of fellow employees.

To increase group cohesiveness, the managers should strive for enhancing the group competitiveness,

raising interpersonal attraction, bringing in the system of favorable evaluation by external agencies,

promoting the culture of prior agreement on goals, and initiating more frequent interactions among the

members of the group and beyond.

On the other hand, a few obstacles to group cohesiveness include larger group size, disagreement or

incompatibility on goals, negative competitiveness between group members, domination by one or more

members of the group, unpleasant interpersonal experiences, and repeated task failure.

Finally, work groups are instrumental in promoting effective socialization and education of members. A

work group also enables people to develop a sense of identity and belongingness, and to deepen

knowledge, skills, and values and attitudes about each other and the organization, at large. Formation of

work groups is more favourable in situations that place relationships as important elements of

organization. By means of effective group performance, individuals can form collective working circles

and grow, and people find help and support to each other by creating a number of social settings by

allowing the wisdom and interpersonal dignity to flourish.


How do you visualize the group cohesiveness in a well known work group? What are the areas that such

a group must improve so as to improve overall group performance?

What is a team?

A work team may be defined as a group of individuals who cooperate in completing a set of tasks.

Mostly, a work team is formed in temporary or ongoing task basis by allowing a group to perform on a

problem or issue where members work together to identify problems, form consensuses about actions to

be taken, and implement the most viable ones. The main purpose of forming a work team is to achieve a

common goal. It may not be feasible to form work teams in all organizations or in all types of

businesses.


Forming a team involves a greater deal work which is more than just throwing several people together

and assigning them a goal. Effectiveness of a team begins to diminish over 12 members. An ideal size is

typically centered around 6 and can drift as high as 9. When formal groups are established with large

numbers, they inevitably partition into subgroups. When considering the size of a team, a firm must also

be conscious of the necessity of assembling a diversity of skills and functional expertise in the team.

Types of work teams

Teams can perform a range of things and they can produce different products or services, negotiate

deals, coordinate projects, offer advices, make collective decisions, and implement them. On its

discourse to team function, different tasks require different types of teams. Among the numerous types

of work teams, some of the key types include problem-solving teams, self-managed work teams, cross-

functional teams, and virtual teams.

Problem solving teams represent the group of 5-8 employees from the same department who meet for a

few hours each week to discuss ways of improving quality, efficiency, and the work environment. For

example, a team of technical experts may be assigned to identify and seek for strategies to resolve a

particular technical problem in a small car prototype.

On the other hand, the self-managed work teams represent 6-10 people who take on responsibilities of

their former supervisors. In business organization, such teams are highly useful in developing new

products and services as well as taking a revisit on organizational strategies. Such team is also known as

autonomous work team, with almost complete autonomy in determining how a task to be done.

Similarly, the cross-functional teams are those in which the employees from about the similar

hierarchical level, but different work areas or departments, who come together to accomplish a task. For

example, while opening a new chain of restaurants in Nagarkot, the New Orlen’s Restaurant, Thamel

may assign a team of about four senior employees to undertake overall responsibility of starting up the

new chain unit. These teams are also known as integrated work teams comprising groups that

accomplish many tasks by making specific assignments to members and rotating jobs among them as the

tasks require.

Finally, the virtual teams are those that use information communication (ICT) enabled technologies to

tie together, at the same time being physically dispersed, and perform the team works. Tele-commuting,

tele-conferencing, video conferencing, video-chat, etc. are some of the modes of contacts established

among the members of the virtual teams.

Entrepreneurial team: group of individuals with diverse expertise and backgrounds.

Quality circles: comprise small groups of employees who work on solving specific problems related to

quality and productivity, often with stated targets for improvement.

Putting the team together

Forming a team involves a great deal more than just throwing several people together and assigning

them a goal. Effectiveness of a team begins to diminish over 12 members. Ideal size is typically around

6 - 9. When formal groups are established with large numbers, they inevitably partition into subgroups.

When considering the size of a team, a firm must also be conscious of necessity of assembling a

diversity of skills and functional expertise.


Self-reflection event…

Work individually to explore more prospects of promoting work groups and work teams for different

purposes in your organization and make a brief presentation for all participants.

Groups vs. teams

Quite often we get confused on differentiating between work groups and work teams. There is an easy

example to show the difference between these two.

For example, say, a total of four members of a batch of graduates were assigned to prepare and make a

presentation on the theme -- Work Teams. All members worked separately after allocating at least two

sub-topics to each member. On the very day of presentation, only three members out of four were

present with their works well prepared and separately saved in personal drives. Ravi, who remained

absent on that day, was supposed to make the introductory presentation. Thus, the rest of the members

asked for an excuse of his part as they had no idea about what to present for that particular part. As the

presentation commenced, Hary’s file did not open due to some technical problem. When Mahesh’s turn

came, the instructor asked a question to Hary from Mahesh’s part of presentation and Hary replied that

he was not prepared on that particular issue as it was not in his share of preparation. Finally, somehow

the presentation was over.

Next was the turn of presentation by Anila, Rahul and Mariya, who all worked on the theme -- Work

Groups. The members came up with a single file of presentation document worked by each member on

assigned sub-topics and merged in a single file and collectively refined. As Anila was commencing the

presentation, Rahul was called up for an immediate meeting with the CEO of an organization where he

was doing his final year Internship Project. He asked for excuse with the rest of his members and the

instructor also permitted for his early departure from the presentation session. A big surprise to all the

people attending the presentation session was that Anila and Mariya handled each issue as such that

people even could not notice any effect of Rahul’s absence during the presentation. These two girls

handled each sub-topic so very well and they were finally appreciated by all for such a marvelous

presentation.

Can you guess which of these tasks would you like to associate with work team and which one with

work group? And why?

To be precise to compare and contrast between work groups and work teams, following readings will

serve the purpose:

1. The primary goal of work group is to share information, whereas the work team aims to

collective performance.

2. Normally, the work group in action generates almost neutral and sometimes negative synergy

effect, whereas work team-based performance always generates positive synergy effect on

overall performance.

3. In work groups the individual members are held accountable for the task assigned to each of

them and in the case of work teams, individuals as well as the team as a whole take

accountability.

4. In a work group, the members exhibit random and varied skill competencies to solve the

problems assigned to them, whereas the members in a work team complement their task skills

and come up with high performance achieved through collective efforts.


To sum up, a work group is a group that interacts primarily to share information to make decisions to

help each group member perform within his or her area of responsibility, whereas a work team refers to

a group of people whereby the individual efforts result in performance that is greater than the sum of the

individual inputs.

More comparison on WG-WT

According to Dumaine (1990) well designed teams may be the productivity breakthrough of the

decade. This comment culminated systematic interest in groups and their impact on productivity begun

with the Hawthorne studies (Roethlisberger, & Dickson, 1939). Since that time, through intuitive

responses to experience and systematic collection of empirical data, groups played an important role in

the study of organization behavior and performance. Throughout the last half of the 20th

century,

academicians extolled groups while practitioners used groups more widely than ever before (Brown,

2000). The 21st century began with an even wider use of groups and concern for teamwork.

An increasing body of literature differentiates between the groups and teams suggesting that teams are

more effective. There are, therefore, opportunities for performance improvements.

Katzenbach and Smith (1993) provide a clear distinction between work groups and teams. A work group

is a collection of people working in the same area or placed together to complete a task. The group’s

performance is the result of people coming together to share information, views and insights. The focus

of groups is individual performance and actions within are geared toward it.

All teams are groups, but teams are a special subset of groups. A team is a small number of people with

complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, set of performance goals, and approach

for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. Teams require individual and mutual

accountability where groups do not.

One common characteristic is accountability. Based on the definitions above, however, group members

are concerned with and are measured by individual accountability. Team members hold themselves to

be mutually accountable. Likewise, both groups and teams have a sense of shared purpose (Katzenbach,

& Smith, 1993). The group’s purpose is essentially that of the organization while the team's purpose is

jointly determined and planned with management (Zenger, & Associates, 1994).

All groups have formal rules and norms. Leaders of work groups are most often managers based on

hierarchical positions. Teams have a leadership role shared by team members (Katzenbach, & Smith,

1993). Katz (1997) describes a high performing team as one that is empowered, self-directed, and

cross-functional to have complementary skills. Further, team members are committed to working

together and achieving their agreed upon common goal. They work collaboratively by respecting team

members. Such high-powered teams result in on-going learning as team members collaboratively work

and agree upon problems. Moreover, these teams exude creativity in reaching their goals and producing

their joint outputs. Teams performing at this level resemble communities of practice (Lesser, & Storck,

2001; Stewart, 1996; & Wenger, 1998). Teams have collective work products requiring joint

contributions of members (Katzenbach, & Smith, 1993) while typical work group members produce

individual work outputs.

These characteristics suggest that groups are focused to accomplish imposed tasks under the strong

management of a supervisor. Individual performance and evaluation is the basis for determining

success. Thus, groups can be very useful and important to organizations as they can complete critical

tasks. Teams are also important and can perform at higher levels than typical work groups


(Majchrzak, & Wang, 1996; & Mulvey, Veiga, & Elsass, 1996.) This higher performance level is the

result of a greater synergy resulting from collaboration and jointly produced outputs rather than a

pooling of individual outputs (Katz, 1997). The more informal environment within which team

members work, and which also allows for communities of practice to develop resulting in on-going

learning and creative applications, enhances the vitality of teams.

Zenger and Associates (1994) suggest several differences in the environments of typical work groups

and teams. In the typical work environment a manager determines and plans the work for subordinates

and the jobs (tasks) are narrowly defined, whereas in the team environment the manager collaborates

with subordinates as peers and jointly establishes and plans the work. Thus, the skill set required is

broader, providing for individual growth and development, often accomplished within the context of

cross training and working directly with other team members. Moreover, this learning process is

continuous and is part of the culture of the unit. Because joint accountability exists, people work

together, rather than working individually on specific tasks as happens more traditionally. Rewards are

based on individual performance in typical environments where the managers determine the best

processes to be used. In team environments, however, rewards are based on both individual

performance and the individual’s contribution to the team’s overall performance while all members are

directly involved in continuous improvement.

Group learning reflection event…

Try to figure out five key differences between work groups and work teams. And make a brief

presentation of about 2-3 minutes.

What is meant by team building?

According to Business Dictionary (2012), team building is a philosophy of job design in which

employees are viewed as members of interdependent teams instead of as individual workers.

Team building refers to a wide range of activities, presented to businesses, schools, sports teams,

religious or nonprofit organizations designed for improving team performance.

Team building is pursued via a variety of practices, and can range from simple human bonding exercises

to complex simulations and multi-day team building retreats designed to develop a team (including

group assessment and group dynamics), usually falling somewhere in between.

Team building is not to be confused with "team recreation" that consists of activities for teams that are

strictly recreational. Team building can also be seen in day-to-day operations of an organization and

team dynamic can be improved through successful leadership. Team building is an important factor in

any environment, its focus is to specialize in bringing out the best in a team to ensure self-development,

positive communication, leadership skills and the ability to work closely together as a team to problem

solve.

Work environments tend to focus on individuals and personal goals, with reward and recognition

singling out the achievements of individual employees. Team building can also be referred to the

process of selecting or creating a team from scratch.

A few quotes on team building

Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence wins championships -- Michael Jordan.


You will find men who want to be carried on the shoulders of others, who think that the world owes

them a living. They don't seem to see that we must all lift together and pull together -- Henry Ford.

The leaders who work most effectively, it seems to me, never say 'I.' And that's not because they have

trained themselves not to say 'I.' They don't think 'I.' They think 'we'; they think 'team.' They understand

their job to be to make the team function. They accept responsibility and don't sidestep it, but 'we' gets

the credit.... This is what creates trust, what enables you to get the task done -- Peter Drucker.

Individual commitment to a group effort - that is what makes a team work a company work, a society

work, a civilization work --Vince Lombardi.

Teamwork is the ability to work together toward a common or shared vision and it is also the ability to

direct individual accomplishments towards organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allows common

people to attain uncommon results -- Andrew Carnegie.

I don't believe in team motivation. I believe in getting a team prepared so it knows it will have the

necessary confidence when it steps on a field and be prepared to play a good game -- Tom Landry.

Now, you should speak…

Make a definition of a work team and share with rest of people. No comments, please!

The goal of team building

There is a two-fold goal of team building – i. to increase the team understanding of team dynamics, and

ii. to improve how the team works together.

Working as a team incorporates group accountability rather than individual accountability and results in

a collective work product (Hackman, & Craig, 2009). Team building encourages the team approach to

working on a project. There are many advantages to this approach. These advantages include the

following:

Increased flexibility in skills and abilities

More productive than work groups with individual mindset

More beneficial in times of organizational change

Encourage both individual and team development and improvement

Focuses on group goals to accomplish more beneficial tasks

Improved range of team building objectives such as collaboration, communication and

increased creative or flexible thinking.


Work in your group to explore at least three goals of a real life work team that you know the best and

share it with rest of members present in the program.

Fundamental team dynamics

When assembling a team, it is very important to consider the overall dynamics of the team. According to

LaFasto and Larson (2001), when building a team, five dynamics are fundamental to team success:

1. The team member: Successful teams are made up of a collection of effective individuals. These

are people who are experienced, have problem solving ability, are open to addressing the

problem, and are action oriented.

2. Team relationships: For a team to be successful the members of the team must be able to give

and receive feedback.


3. Team problem solving: An effective team depends on how focused and clear the goal of the

team is. A relaxed, comfortable and accepting environment and finally, open and honest

communication are required.

4. Team leadership: Effective team leadership depends on leadership competencies. A competent

leader is -- focused on the goal, ensures a collaborative climate, builds confidence of team

members, sets priorities, demonstrates sufficient ‘know-how’ and manages performance through

feedback.

5. Organizational environment: The climate and culture of the organization must be conducive to

team behavior. Competitiveness should be discouraged and uniformity should be encouraged -

this will eliminate conflict and discord among team members.

Norms of the team

There are basically two ingredients of a successful team – i. team contents, and ii. team process. The

team must consider the team contents (goals and outcomes expected). The team must also carefully

shape and monitor the team process to be used to accomplish the goals. The team process includes how

the team members --

interact and communicate with each other,

communicate with employees not on the team, and

will be responsible and accountable for moving the project forward and accomplishing the

goals.

To govern both the team contents and team processes, team norms or ground rules are established by

means of equal participation of all members of the team. Once the norms or ground rules are set through

a shared discussion, all members must agree to abide with them.

Here are a few sample norms to govern the team contents and team processes:

1. What about use of cell phones during team work proceedings?

2. Treat each other with love, care, dignity and respect.

3. Maintain transparency and avoid hidden agenda.

4. Be genuine with each other about ideas, challenges, and feelings. Communicate such things

openly and accept others’ views wisely. Practice being open-minded.

5. Trust each other. Have confidence that issues discussed will be kept in confidence.

6. When a lead member opens up a space in which you may have information, feel free and

comfortable asking for what you need.

7. Practice a consistent commitment to sharing all the information you have; share the complete

information that you have up front.

8. Listen first to understand; listen before you speak; do not be dismissive of the input received

when others listen; do not be defensive with your colleagues.

9. Rather than searching for the guilty, give your colleagues the benefit of the doubt; have a clean

slate process.

10. Support each other; do not try to pull their legs down; remember, all of you will sink, if a

member plunges into water from the boat.

11. Avoid territoriality; think instead of the overall good for the company, our employees, and our

customers.

12. The discussion of issues, ideas, and direction will not become a personal attack or return to haunt

you in the future.

13. Managers are open, communicative, and authentic with each other and their teams.

14. It is okay to not know the right answer, and to admit it. The team can find the answer; practice

and experience humility; each of us may not have all the answers.


15. Make sure that the problems are presented as such that promotes mutual discussion and

resolution.

16. It is safe to be wrong as a manager. Thoughtful decision making is expected.

17. Own the whole implementation of the product, not just your little piece; recognize that you are

part of something larger than yourself. Be responsible to own the whole picture.

18. If you commit to doing something – do it. Be accountable and responsible to the team.

19. It is okay to be the messenger with bad news. You can expect a problem solving approach, not

the allegation.

20. Be logical; not the intuitive!

21. Promise to come prepared to your meetings and projects so that you demonstrate value and

respect for the time and convenience of others.

22. Strive to continuously improve and achieve the team's strategic goals. Do not let ineffective

relationships and interactions that affect team work.

23. Expend the effort to practice all of these norms and to care enough about the team and its work

to confront each other, with care, compassion, and purpose, when a team member fails to

practice these norms.

24. Frequent walk-ins and walk-outs?

25. Taking notes? Requesting for sources of learning?

Teams cannot work effectively to accomplish their goals if they do not establish norms by which they

will operate. Group norms are not designed to cover every conceivable situation in which a team might

become involved they address only those situations which are significant to the team. Not all norms

apply to every team member.

Conformity to the norms: Individuals conform to the team norms for a variety of reasons. People

generally feel more comfortable in groups whose members share some common personal factors.

Intelligence is also an important factor in group conformity. Situational factors are also integral part in

the team concept. Such factors include the size of the group.

Team work event for you all…

Work in your group to establish at least five ground rules that should be applied throughout these

proceedings, and a member of your team should make a short presentation at the end.

When an individual confirms to abide with the team norms, it is known as conformity to norms.

Individuals conform to team norms for a variety of reasons. People generally feel more comfortable in

groups whose members share some common personal factors. Intelligence is also an important factor in

group conformity. Situational factors are also integral part in the team concept. Such factors include the

size of the group, nature of the job, task efficiency and interpersonal relationship. Are you ready to

provide with conformity to your two-day working norms for this training program?

Leadership roles in team building

According to Hackman and Craig (2008), successful team leaders frequently show these:

1. Successful team leaders are usually goal-oriented to keep the teams on track.

2. They must promote a safe environment where members can openly discuss issues.

3. A leader must build confidence amongst members by building and maintaining trust and offering

the members responsibilities.

4. A leader should be technically competent in matters relating to team tasks and goals.


5. It is important for a team leader to set a manageable list of priorities for the team to keep

members focused.

6. Finally, leaders should offer clear performance expectations by recognizing and rewarding

excellent performance, and provide feedback to others.

Generic roles of all team members

The members of a work team may play multi-facet roles for an organization. Some of the major roles

that a team may play include as follows:

Linking: work teams may play a linking role by coordinating and integrating with each other and finally

promoting functional linkages of the organization with the rest of the stakeholders.

Creator: A work team may initiate collective ideas among the team members and finally come up with

creative ideas to do business or solve a problem

Promoter: A work team first champions better and innovative ideas and then takes necessary initiative

for their implementation.

Assessor: The members of a work team collectively and closely offer insightful analyses of the situation

and decision alternatives so as to come to a logical end of a problem.

Organizer: a functional work team better provides with organized and structured study of a problem and

comes up with a more sustainable arrangement of resources and organizational processes for the

betterment of the institution at large.

Producer: An effective work team provides with direction and follow-through various stages of

organizational process climate to produce the best institutional results.

Controller: A work team systematically and scientifically examines the various facets of any problem,

performs detailed analyses and comes up with effective rules and enforces for their implementation.

Maintainer: A more effective work team provides with strength to fight the external battles to maintain

the organization’s status in the market place.

Advisor: Each member of a work team as well as the team as a whole serves as an advisor to the

organization, and thus encourages the organization for search and use of more relevant information and

decision rationalization at strategic and functional levels.

Self-learning reflection event…

Complete the following table:

My individual competencies as a productive team

member…

My individual competencies as a visionary team

leader…

1.

1.

2.

2.


Basic considerations to be made in building teams

Successful team building that creates effective, focused work teams requires attention on a number of

aspects including clarity of clarity of task expectation, context, commitment, competence, character,

control, collaboration, communication, creative innovation, work design, management of team process

climate, and member composition. These facets are also known as the requirements of high performing

work teams.

Clarity of task expectations includes the explanation on a number of issues. These issues include

whether the top management or executive leadership clearly communicated its expectations for the

team’s performance; if the team members understand the goals and expectations; the main reason behind

formation of the team; if the organization is demonstrating constancy of purpose in supporting the team

with resources of people, time and money; whether the work of the team receive sufficient emphasis as a

priority in terms of the time, discussion, attention and interest directed its way by executive leaders.

Clarity of contexts is another premise of building successful teams and a more complete explanation of

context should involve diagnosis on these questions:

1. Do the team members understand why they are participating on the team?

2. Do they understand how the strategy of using teams will help the organization attain its

communicated business goals?

3. Can the team members define their team’s importance to the accomplishment of corporate goals?

4. Does the team understand where its work fits in the total context of the organization’s goals,

principles, vision and values?

Basic elements that comprise effective contexts for the team performance include adequate resources,

effective leadership and trustworthy climate, effective organizational structure and design with ample

amount of task autonomy, skill variety, task identity and task significance, and effective performance

evaluation and reward system.

Exploration of shared commitment is very much essential in forming a quality and conscious work team.

Proper exploration on following issues is more preferable while forming an effective work team:

1. Do the team members want to participate on team adventures?

2. Do the team members feel the team mission is important?

3. Are the members committed to accomplishing the team mission and expected outcomes?

4. Do the team members perceive their service as valuable to the organization and to their own

careers?

5. Do the team members anticipate recognition for their contributions?

6. Do the team members expect their skills to grow and develop on the team?

7. Are the team members excited and challenged by the team opportunity?

The assessment of each member competence is another secret of success of high performing work

teams. Adequate analyses should be made on whether the team feels that it has the appropriate people

participating for achieving the stated goal. Similarly, each member should have a feeling that its

members have the knowledge, skill and capability to address the issues for which the team was formed.

Each member should also know that they may require a significant amount of support from outsiders

and they should be ready to do so when and where necessary.

In addition to above stated requisites, we should also check in the each member’s knowledge on team

charter required to execute the team goals. We should be firm on the issues that each member of the

team has taken its assigned area of responsibility and collectively designed relevant mission, vision and


strategies to accomplish the mission. We should also be firm that each member of the team and the team

as a whole has defined and communicated its goals, its anticipated outcomes, expected contributions,

timelines, and the measures of both the outcomes of its work and the process the team will follow to

accomplish the task.

Besides this, we should also establish appropriate control mechanism to leverage the team performance.

The team should have enough freedom and empowerment to feel the ownership necessary to accomplish

its charter. At the same time, the team members should be able to clearly understand their boundaries

and proximities they are supposed to go in pursuit of solutions.

Forming a work team means promoting collaboration among different individuals. Before proceeding

with its assigned tasks, each member of the team should understand the team and group process, know

very well the various stages of group development and each member should be able to closely assess

and make sure that each member is capable of working together effectively, interpersonally. All team

members should understand the roles and responsibilities of the team as a whole and the roles and

responsibilities assigned to individuals as well. The team as a whole should be ready to take effective

approaches to problem solving, process improvement, goal setting and measurement jointly by means of

interdependence and cooperation to accomplish the team charter.

Like in any other business functions, communication plays very much crucial role in team formation

and performance. Each member of the work team should be clear about the priority of his or her job

tasks. In addition, there should be an established method for the teams to give feedback and receive

honest and timely performance feedback. For the work team to perform more successfully the

organization should provide important business information regularly and each member of the team

should understand the complete context and reason of their existence.

Inculcating and promoting creative innovation and creative tension is another effective trick of forming

and working with high performing work teams. Since one of the core jobs of a work team will be to

bring in creative changes in business and the organization at large, the organization should really be

interested in change, it should value creative thinking, unique solutions, and new ideas. It should also

reward people who take reasonable risks to make improvements. Also the people who fit in and

maintain the status quo should be adequately and timely rewarded to boost up the morale of high

performing members. From time to time, the organization should provide the training, education, access

to books and films, and field trips necessary to stimulate new thinking.

Similarly, the organizational process climate should support for team process climate for effective team

results. Each member of the work team should precisely understand the common purpose, specific goals,

team efficacy and interdependence, conflict levels and tendency of social loafing to avoid any unwanted

circumstances hindering the team performance.

Finally, team composition is another equally important element contributing to team efficacy. Selection

and development of each member should be made keeping in view the range of task efficiency and task

variety sought by the team purpose. By maintaining proper fitness of the member ability, personality,

roles, and preferences, we can form a more functional work team. In addition to this, we should also

provide adequate concern over diversity, size of the team and member flexibility.

Take for an example, a team-based management situation and try to explore following inquiries in

reflection with the basic considerations as discussed above


1. Clear expectations: Has executive leadership clearly communicated its expectations for the

team's performance and expected outcomes? Do team members understand why the team was

created? Is the organization demonstrating constancy of purpose in supporting the team with

resources of people, time and money? Does the work of the team receive sufficient emphasis as a

priority in terms of the time, discussion, attention and interest directed its way by executive

leaders?

2. Context: Do the team members understand why they are participating in the team? Do they

understand how the strategy of using teams will help the organization attain its communicated

business goals? Can team members define their team's importance to the accomplishment of

corporate goals? Does the team understand where its work fits in the total context of the

organization's goals, principles, vision and values?

3. Commitment: Do team members want to participate on the team? Do team members feel the

team mission is important? Are members committed to accomplishing the team mission and

expected outcomes? Do team members perceive their service as valuable to the organization and

to their own careers? Do team members anticipate recognition for their contributions? Do team

members expect their skills to grow and develop on the team? Are team members excited and

challenged by the team opportunity?

The depth of the commitment of team members to work together effectively to accomplish the

goals of the team is a critical factor in team success. The relationships team members develop

out of this commitment are the key in team building and team success.

You need to answer a series of questions to assess the commitment level of team members

to work on a team.

Team choice: Do the team members want to participate on the team? Do they perceive

that they had a choice about working on a particular team?

Tapping into an employee's commitment is much easier if they are participating by

choice. When possible, I recommend voluntary team participation. On all social teams

and work teams that are ancillary to an employee's core job, employees should choose to

participate.

Even participation on a mandatory team garners more commitment when the employees

on the team are empowered to set direction, establish goals, and make choices.

Work is mission critical: Do team members believe the team mission is important? Are

members committed to accomplishing the team mission and expected outcomes?

Team members want to feel as if they are part of something bigger than themselves. They

need to understand where their team mission falls in the bigger organizational scheme,

the overall leadership vision. Team commitment comes from team members knowing the

expected outcomes and where the outcomes fit in the whole organization's strategic plan.

Team members feel valued: Do team members perceive their service as valuable to the

organization and to their own careers? A double win is accomplished if team members

find themselves valued by the organization and also receiving ancillary benefits. These

can include growing and developing their skills and career by participating in team.


Making new contacts and perhaps, finding new mentors who are committed to their

growth, is a plus point.

Challenge, excitement and opportunity: Are team members excited and challenged by

the team opportunity? If so, the chances of their commitment to the process and the

outcomes are magnified.

Recognition: Does your organization have a track record of providing recognition for

successful teams and their projects. Almost everyone likes some form of recognition.

Make sure recognition is available at successful milestones, too.

4. Competence: Does the team feel that it has appropriate people participating? (As an example, in

a process improvement, is each step of the process represented on the team?) Does the team feel

that its members have the knowledge, skill and capability to address the issues for which the

team was formed? If not, does the team have access to the help it needs? Does the team feel it

has the resources, strategies and support needed to accomplish its mission?

5. Charter: Has the team taken its assigned area of responsibility and designed its own mission,

vision and strategies to accomplish the mission. Has the team defined and communicated its

goals; its anticipated outcomes and contributions; its timelines; and how it will measure both the

outcomes of its work and the process the team followed to accomplish their task? Does the

leadership team or other coordinating group support what the team has designed?

6. Control: Does the team have enough freedom and empowerment to feel the ownership

necessary to accomplish its charter? At the same time, do team members clearly understand their

boundaries? How far may members go in pursuit of solutions? Are limitations (i.e. monetary and

time resources) defined at the beginning of the project before the team experiences barriers and

rework?

Is the team’s reporting relationship and accountability understood by all members of the

organization? Has the organization defined the team’s authority? To make recommendations? To

implement its plan? Is there a defined review process so both the team and the organization are

consistently aligned in direction and purpose? Do team members hold each other accountable for

project timelines, commitments and results? Does the organization have a plan to increase

opportunities for self-management among organization members?

7. Collaboration: Does the team understand team and group process? Do members understand the

stages of group development? Are team members working together effectively interpersonally?

Do all team members understand the roles and responsibilities of team members? Team leaders?

Team recorders? Can the team approach problem solving, process improvement, goal setting and

measurement jointly? Do team members cooperate to accomplish the team charter? Has the team

established group norms or rules of conduct in areas such as conflict resolution, consensus

decision making and meeting management? Is the team using an appropriate strategy to

accomplish its action plan?

8. Communication: Are team members clear about the priority of their tasks? Is there an

established method for the teams to give feedback and receive honest performance feedback?

Does the organization provide important business information regularly? Do the teams

understand the complete context for their existence? Do team members communicate clearly and


honestly with each other? Do team members bring diverse opinions to the table? Are necessary

conflicts raised and addressed?

9. Creative innovation: Is the organization really interested in change? Does it value creative

thinking, unique solutions, and new ideas? Does it reward people who take reasonable risks to

make improvements? Or does it reward the people who fit in and maintain the status quo? Does

it provide the training, education, access to books and films, and field trips necessary to stimulate

new thinking?

10. Consequences: Do the team members feel responsible and accountable for team achievements?

Are rewards and recognition supplied when teams are successful? Is reasonable risk respected

and encouraged in the organization? Do team members fear reprisal? Do team members spend

their time finger pointing rather than resolving problems? Is the organization designing reward

systems that recognize both team and individual performance? Is the organization planning to

share gains and increased profitability with team and individual contributors? Can contributors

see their impact on increased organization success?

11. Coordination: Are teams coordinated by a central leadership team that assists the groups to

obtain what they need for success? Have priorities and resource allocation been planned across

departments? Do teams understand the concept of the internal customer—the next process,

anyone to whom they provide a product or a service? Are cross-functional and multi-department

teams common and working together effectively? Is the organization developing a customer-

focused process-focused orientation and moving away from traditional departmental thinking?

12. Cultural change: Does the organization recognize that the team-based, collaborative,

empowering, enabling organizational culture of the future is different than the traditional,

hierarchical organization it may currently be? Is the organization planning to or in the process of

changing how it rewards, recognizes, appraises, hires, develops, plans with, motivates and

manages the people it employs?

Does the organization plan to use failures for learning and support reasonable risk? Does the

organization recognize that the more it can change its climate to support teams, the more it will

receive in pay back from the work of the teams?

Be simply good enough to be great! Now, it makes the twelve Cs of effective work teams…How good

are you in respect with these 12 Cs of effective team building? Please make a self assessment here:

SNo Name of the C Description of my Cs

1

2

3

4


5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

Can you tell us what are the areas that you think you are strong and what are the areas that you need to

work hard to improve so as to transform yourself as a good team player?

A few tips for team building

What would you do, if you were to address a real but critical issue? What about performing project

reviews before planning for next term investment? And what, if you were planning for expanding the

business coverage? Finally, how would you respond to a situation whereby the organization has

achieved the success beyond expectation?

Similarly, do you ever picture your group off at a resort playing games or hanging from ropes when you

think of team building? Naturally, many people perceive building this way. At the same time, the people

are equally surprised why such wonderful sense of teamwork, experienced at the retreat or seminar, fails

to impact long term beliefs and actions back at work…Any reason? Please discuss with your peer

members.

It may not be possible to build teamwork by “retreating” as a group for a couple of days or occasions

each year. We must start thinking of team building as something we are bound to do every single day or

moment!

Promote teams to solve real work issues and to improve real work processes. Provide training in

systematic methods so the team expends its energy on the project, not on figuring out how to work

together as a team to approach it. Ask your teammates on how to respond in a highly declining market

segment of your company offering. They will, of course, come up with a solution that you had not

imagined.


Conduct periodic department meetings to review projects and progress, to obtain broad input,

and to coordinate shared work processes. If team members are not getting along, examine the work

processes they mutually own. The problem is not usually the personalities of the team members. It is

the fact that the team members often do not agree on how they will deliver a product or a service or

the steps required to get something done. Proper facilitation would serve the purpose better way.

Bring in the fun and shared occasions into the organization’s agenda. Hold corporate family

dinner; take the team to a sporting event; may be, Friday evening disco after a hefty week work;

sponsor dinners at Guranshe hillside resorts; go hiking or rafting in Bheri river; hold a fortnightly or

monthly company performance review; sponsor sports teams and encourage cheering team fans. Just

celebrate every occasion that brings in return to individuals and organization, at large.

Use icebreakers and teamwork exercises at meetings. Culture of sharing importantly interesting

home stuffs right before commencing the day work by means of standing meeting brings in freshness

in the thought pattern of people. Similarly, use of interesting ice-breakers before starting meeting

helps gain constructive attention of each member.

Teamwork icebreaker game

This fun game requires each one of you to work as a team. It provides you with quick energy boost and

information about how well the team or teams can work together.

The main goal of the Game is to get each group to complete a task within a specific amount of time, and

see which team can complete an assigned task the fastest.

Sample tasks to try:

Build a house of card using 10 cards.

Form a line according to height (tallest to shortest or shortest to tallest).

Think up and write down 20 words that start with the letter "T".

Create and write down 5 questions that have the same answer.

Debriefing: one person from each team should describe the strategy they used to work together and

accomplish the task. Also talk about the secret of success, or reason of failure.

Celebrate team successes publicly. Buy everyone the same t-shirt or hat. Put team member names in

a drawing for company merchandise and gift certificates. You are limited in teamwork only by your

imagination.

Please take care of issues and embed teamwork accordingly. To your surprise, people will come up with

unexpected results, with empowered collectivism, connectivity as well as organization-wide

trustworthiness. What would you expect more than this? Team culture, enables individuals to contribute

more than they ever thought possible, alone.

Five teams every organization needs

Teamwork, effective work teams, and team building are popular topics in today’s organizations.

Successful teamwork fuels the accomplishment of institution’s strategic goals. Effective work teams

magnify the accomplishments of individual employees and enable them to better serve customers.

http://humanresources.about.com/od/glossaryi/g/what-is-an-ice-breaker.htm


To be more effective, teams require resources, especially, time. The work teams are most effective

when:

a diverse group of employees is able to participate,

they limit the number of teams on which any one employee may participate,

the teams establish a regular meeting schedule,

they require periodic team goal setting,

minutes or notes are posted from team meetings or projects, and

they strengthen themselves by regularly adding newer members.

There are five work teams that every organization needs. One may observe many different approaches to

team roles and responsibilities. Different organizations may also group responsibilities differently. For

example, they may ask the safety committee to take on employee wellness responsibilities in one

organization. The team may refuse, preferring instead to add environmental responsibilities. With this in

mind, these are the five teams most frequently recommended.

1. Leadership team: Often an organization’s senior managers or department heads, the leadership

team is the group that must pull together to lead the organization. The leadership team is

responsible for the strategic direction of an organization, The leadership team plans, sets goals,

provides guidance to, and manages the organization.

2. Motivation or employee morale team: Known by different names in various organizations, the

Employee Morale Team plans and carries out events and activities that build a positive spirit

among employees. The team’s responsibilities can include activities such as hosting employee

lunches, planning company picnics, fund raising for ill employees, and fund raising for

philanthropic causes. The team leads the celebration of company milestones, employee

birthdays, and the arrival of new babies. The team sponsors company sports teams. All people in

organization can have fun with this team as the team’s only limit is the imagination of the team

members.

3. Safety and environmental team: The team ensures the safety of employees in the work place.

The team takes the lead in safety training, monthly safety talks, and the auditing of

housekeeping, safety, and workplace organization. Recycling and environmental policy

recommendations and leadership are provided by the team as well.

4. Employee wellness team: The wellness team focuses on health and fitness for employees. Most

popular activities include walking clubs, running teams, and periodic testing of health issues

such as high blood pressure screening. The wellness team can sponsor whole person wellness

activities such as how to make a budget or lunch and learns about investment products – not

investment advice.

5. Culture and communication team: The team works to define and create the company culture

necessary for the success of the organization. The team also emphasizes on two-way

communication in organization to ensure employee input up the chain of command. The team

may sponsor the monthly newsletter, a weekly company update, quarterly employee satisfaction

surveys, and an employee suggestion process.

You can start several company teams, such as these, and nurture their success. When employees see

successful teams, more employees become interested in serving on the teams. The teams make the


company a better place to work and provide the opportunity for real employee involvement and

commitment.

Teams create a difference in the workplace whether they are ongoing teams or a team that was formed to

accomplish a single purpose. Successful teams help you build a true sense of teamwork across your

organization. Please try to start with these for awesome success.

Food for group think…

Please work collectively to determine the various types of work teams that Surkhet Chamber of

Commerce and Industries can promote.

Building a team culture

In a teamwork environment, people understand and believe the value of collaborative culture and act

with right amount of thinking, planning, decision-making, and taking actions better way. People

recognize, and even assimilate, the belief that none of us is as good as all of us.

It is almost impossible to think of a work place without teamwork. These days, almost all organizations

in the developed economies such as schools, family startups, and other formal organizations emphasize

winning, being the best, and coming out on top. Workers are raised in environments that emphasize true

teamwork and collaboration. Organizations are working on valuing diverse people, ideas, backgrounds,

and experiences.

But ours’ is a different case. We have miles to go before valuing teams and teamwork will be the norm.

We can, however, create a teamwork culture by doing just a few things right. In fact, they are hard

things, but with commitment and appreciation for the value, we can create an overall sense of teamwork

in our organizations.

Here are a few suggestions to transform into a team culture --

Promote a sense of organization-wide dependence and belongingness. People feel at ease in

working in work teams once they realize that each individual is differently important and valuable

for the betterment of the organization.

Communicate the clear expectation that teamwork and collaboration are expected. No one

completely owns a work area or process all by self. People who own work processes and positions

are open and receptive to ideas and input from others on the team. It is one of the key duties of

executive members to communicate their expectation on teamwork and collaboration.

Modulate the teamwork by interpersonal interaction. You, as an executive member of the

organization, must maintain teamwork even when things are going wrong and the temptation is to

slip back into former team unfriendly behavior. Open communication among peer workers and

rest of people in organization helps smoothing many critical problems.

Maintain visibility of the identity of a teamwork culture. Formally write down the mission,

vision, goals, objectives, value systems and working principles and formally share and publish

them through multi-media, including physical visibility at workplaces. Knowing about one’s own

organization and its culture is in fact, a matter of pride for each employee.

Reward and recognize the teamwork. The lone ranger, even if she is an excellent producer, is

valued less than the person who achieves results with others in teamwork. Compensation,


bonuses, and rewards should be dependent on collaborative practices as much as individual

contribution and achievement.

Tell important stories and folklore that people discuss within the company to emphasize

teamwork. Remember, the year the key manufacturing team reduced production wastage scrap

by 25 percent, and tell the employees how they were rewarded. Promote a sense of learning about

a team concept that the people who "do well" and are promoted within the company are team

players.

Induce a robust performance management system by placing emphasis and value on

teamwork. Quite often the 360 degree feedback is to be integrated within the system. Self-

appraisal and peer evaluation systems are getting wider attention these days globally.

Team work to promote team culture…

Take for an example, an organization at risk of losing its business and going to be closed. Suppose you

are assigned with a responsibility to bring this organization out of present crises. Propose with your plan

of action how you would work by establishing and promoting a team-based culture. You will be given

maximum 25 minutes to prepare and 5 minutes to make a presentation.

Assessment and feedback

In the organizational development context, a team may embark on a process of self-assessment to

measure its effectiveness and improve its performance. To assess itself, a team seeks feedback from

group members to find out both its current strengths and weakness.

To improve its current performance, feedback from the team assessment can be used to identify gaps

between the desired state and the current state, and to design a gap-closure strategy. Team development

can be the greater term containing this assessment and improvement actions, or as a component of

organizational development.

Another way is to allow for personality assessment amongst the team members, so that they will have a

better understanding of their working style, as well as their team mates.

A structured team building plan is a good tool to implement team bonding and thus, team awareness.

These may be introduced by companies that specialize in executing team building sessions, or done

internally by the human resource department.

Risks of team building

The major risk of team building is that a team member may become cynical of the organization. This

could happen as a result of the organization holding team building events outside of the normal context

in which the organization usually functions lower. For example, if an organization hosts team building

events when individual goals and efforts are the norms with the organizational culture, the team building

event will have no lasting impact.

It is crucial to follow up a team building event with meaningful workplace practice. If the team members

do not see an improvement within an organization as a result of team building events, members may

view such events as a waste of time. This may lead to loss of trust in the organization, harm motivation,

as well as decrease employee morale and production (Heathfield, 2012).


Managerial implications of work teams

The essence of work team management is largely related with the institutional management. Adequate

knowledge of team management serves instrumental for all managers to effectively higher, develop and

reward the employees in various operational departments in an organization. Similarly, when the

problems are worsening and they are spreading beyond the reach and control of key management

positions in an organization, it is always advisable to have a problem solving team to take care of such

situations. Effective team management also serves as a cure to the tendency of social loafing by different

employees. Work team-based culture may serve more effective in creating organization-wide strategic

as well as functional ownership across the departments, managerial levels, and also among different

individuals working in an organization.

Cross-functional skill requirements, member diversity, varying and changing needs of younger

workforce worldwide are some of the challenges facing the managers who are supposed to take up team

initiatives.

Outcomes of effective team management

Individual efficacy results in team efficacy that results in higher level of organization-wide productivity.

Effective team management would result in employee loyalty and interpersonal relationship. Through

team-based endeavors, each member and the team as a whole become more responsible and accountable

in each stage of organizational process climate and they collectively promote better organizational

citizenship. Process and task ownership, high degree of professionalism and quality organizational work

life are other equally important outcomes of effective team management in an organization.

What next?

We are now towards the end of our two-day program. Now, you all should work in groups of 4-6

members and try to figure out a few areas of mutual concern between SCCI Executive Team and

Secretariat Team so as to promote a culture of team building and management of SCCI through a more

collaborative team approach whereby involvement and participation of members of both the teams

would be emphasized. Each group should work for establishing a plan of action with areas requiring

mutual work, working strategies, working principles, values, norms and operating standards. Also

establish certain measures how you would confirm whether such an approach has created positive

impact on overall institutional performance.

Powerful tools and techniques of team building

To be administered online using www.prenhall.com/sal login facility.

Team work icebreaker games

1. Line-up

This icebreaker game begins when the group is divided into groups of eight or more. Once groups are

divided, the leader then instructs the groups to line-up in order of height, shoe size, or some other light-

toned denominator to keep the game fun for all. When the group has lined-up in a particular order, they

are then supposed to clap to let the leader know that they are done. The first group to clap wins that

round. This is a good way to learn something you never would have thought to ask about someone.

2. Constructive feedback

This icebreaker begins when you ask for a volunteer to come to the front. Position the volunteer facing

the audience and place an empty cardboard box behind them, but not directly behind them. Have 30

pieces of crumpled paper within arm-reach of the volunteer. It is the group's responsibility to give the

volunteer hints on how to get the wads of paper into the box without turning around. Example "a little

http://www.prenhall.com/sal


bit more to the right". When that person has gotten 3 pieces into the box successfully, then find another

volunteer and continue.

3. Animals

The objective of this icebreaker is to get acquainted with others. Write the name of some distinctive

sounding animals on slips of paper. Create 5 to 10 slips for each animal. Hand the slips out and ask the

participants to find all the same animals without talking. This makes for a fun way to get acquainted.

4. Shared interests

1. Divide the meeting participants into groups of four or five people by having them number off.

(You do this because people generally begin a meeting by sitting with the people they already

know best.)

2. Tell the newly formed groups that their assignment is to find ten things they have in common, with

every other person in the group, that have nothing to do with work. (I tell people no body parts (we

all have legs; we all have arms) and no clothing (we all wear shoes, we all wear pants). This helps

the group explore shared interests more broadly.

3. Tell the groups that one person must take notes and be ready to read their list to the whole group

upon completion of the assignment.

4. Ask for a volunteer to read their whole list of things in common first. Then, ask each group to

share their whole list with the whole group. Because people are your best source for laughter and

fun, the reading of the lists always generates a lot of laughter and discussion. You can also catch

the drift of the conversation in the small groups based on the transitions made from item to item.

This takes 10 – 15 minutes, depending on the number of groups. To keep the activity to ten minutes,

after seven minutes of brainstorming together, I usually tell the groups that the lists they have created are

perfect, no matter how many items they have, and debrief.

5. Ball Game

Ask all of the participants to stand in a circle. Make sure they are not too far apart or too close together.

Give one person a small ball (tennis balls work well) and ask them to throw it to someone else in the

circle. The person who catches it says their name and throws it to another person who does the same. As

the ball moves around the circle, everyone in the group gets to learn one another’s name. Much more fun

than name tags!

If the group already knows each other, turn it into a teambuilding exercise by asking everyone to call out

these things instead of their name:

Their favorite color

One thing they like about their job

A one word description of themselves

Make it more fun by timing the exercise and seeing how fast the participants can get the ball around the

circle.

6. Talk show icebreaker

For this icebreaker game, you will want to start by splitting your group into pairs.

Ask each person to find a semi-private spot and interview their partner. One acts as a talk show host and


the other acts as a guest. The talk show host has to find out two interesting facts about the guest.

Afterwards, the partners switch roles and repeat the activity.

After a few minutes and a lot of chatting, you can ask everyone to gather into a large group once more.

Then, have each person (briefly) present the two interesting facts that they learned about their partner.

7. Person-job-group-organization fitness game

Step I: This game requires all participants to be divided into two teams in respect with diversity.

Step II: In each group, 50% of the participants’ left hand should be tied with his/her body using a nylon

rope, and 50% of their two legs should be tied.

Step III: Facilitator tells them what is expected from each team is making as many paper airplanes as

possible and flying them to a pre-allotted destination. Make sure that the destination points should be

located at same distance with similar ground clearance for both the teams. The facilitator also allows

each team for about 2 minutes to establish their group working norms and principles.

Step IV: Approximately 50 pages of A4 sized paper is given to each group and the facilitator asks both

the groups to start their work. The groups should be given about 2 minutes time to perform and once the

whistle blows, all members should stop where they are and the game is over.

Step V: Finally, all the airplanes flown up to the respective team’s destination point, with good condition

should be counted and winner should be declared.

Step VI: Debriefing on secrets of success or reasons of failure, and relevance of this game in respect

with person-job-group-organization fitness.

8. Other additional games… go on enjoying as and when introduced, expect more of them,

please…


References Brown, N. W. (2000). Creating high performance classroom groups. New York: Falmer Press.

Business Dictionary (2012). What is team building?. BusinessDictionary.com. Retrieved on 27 June, 2013. Available at:

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/team-building.html.

Creative Team Building Activities and Exercises. Managerial Skills. Retrieved on 27 June, 2013. Available at:

http://www.managerialskills.org/team-building-activities.

Dumaine, B. (1990). Who needs a boss? Fortune, 125 (May 7), 52-63.

Hackman, M. Z., & Craig, E. J. (2009). Leadership: A Communication Perspective. (5th

ed.). Long Grove, Illinois: Waveland

Press, Inc. ISBN 978-1-57766-579-3.

Hackman, M. Z. & Craig, E. J. (2008). Leadership: a communication perspective. (5th

ed.). Long Grove, Illinois: Waveland

Press, Inc. ISBN 978-1-57766-579-3.

Heathfield, S. M. (2012). Keys to Team Building Success. Retrieved on 27 June, 2013. Available at:

hppt://www.humanresource.about.com/od/involvementteams/a/team-building.htm.

Katz, R. (1997). How a team at Digital Equipment designed the 'Alpha' chip. In R. Katz (Ed.), The human side of managing

technological innovation (137-148). New York: OxfordUniversity Press.

Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (1993). The discipline of teams. Harvard Business Review, 71 (March-April), 111-146.

LaFasto, F. M. J. & Larson, C. (2001). When Teams Work Best. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Lesser, E. L., & Storck, J. (2001), Communities of practice and organizational performance. IBM Systems Journal, 40 (4),

831-841.

Majchrzak, A., & Wang, Q. (1996). Breaking the functional mind-set in process organizations. Harvard Business

Review, 74 (September-October), 93-99.

Mulvay, P. W., Veiga, J. F. & Elsass, P. M. (1996). When teammates raise a white flag.

Academy of Management Executive, 10 (1), 55-64.

Rijal, C. P., (2011). Leadership Readiness: A Road to Total Quality Management (TQM) Implementation. Lambert Academic

Publication: Germany.

Rijal, C. P., (2004). Leadership Readiness to Implement Total Quality Management (TQM) in the Nepalese Secondary

schools. Unpublished doctoral dissertation research; Kathmandu University, School of Education: Kathmandu.

Robbins, S. P., Judge, T. A., & Sanghi, S. (2009). Organizational Behavior. (13th

ed.). New Delhi: Pearson Education.

Roethlisberger, F. J., & Dickson, W. J. (1939). Management and the worker. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Stewart, T. A. (1996). The invisible key to success. Fortune, 134 (August 5), 72-76.

Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of practice. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Zenger, J. H., & Associates. (1994). Leading teams. New York: McGraw-Hill.

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/team-building.html

http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/team-building.html

http://www.managerialskills.org/team-building-activities/

http://www.managerialskills.org/team-building-activities

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Standard_Book_Number

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/978-1-57766-579-3

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Standard_Book_Number

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/978-1-57766-579-3

http://humanresources.about.com/od/involvementteams/a/team_building.htm

dr rijal on team building workshop

Business

organizational systems

organizational members

organizational process

formation of work teams

dr c p rijal

group event

level of analysis

systems approach