UNIVERSITY OF LJUBLJANA

FACULTY OF ECONOMICS

THESIS

TINA PULKO

UNIVERSITY OF LJUBLJANA FACULTY OF ECONOMICS

THESIS

CHALLENGES OF INEXPERIENCED, SELF-

DIRECTED WORK TEAMS ON THEIR WAY TO THE HIGH PERFORMANCE

Ljubljana, June 2009 TINA PULKO

IZJAVA Študentka Tina Pulko izjavljam, da sem avtorica tega diplomskega dela, ki sem ga napisala pod mentorstvom profesorja dr. Roberta Kašeta in profesorja Johna Phelana, in da dovolim njegovo objavo na fakultetnih spletnih straneh. V Ljubljani, dne____________________ Podpis: _______________________________

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TABLE OF CONTENT

1 TEAM PERFORMANCE ...................................................................................................... 2

1.1 Work group and work team .......................................................................................... 2 1.1.1 Work group................................................................................................................ 2 1.1.2 Work team ................................................................................................................. 2 1.1.3 Team with the highest potential................................................................................. 4

1.2 Performance and high – performance team ................................................................ 5 1.2.1 Performance .............................................................................................................. 5 1.2.2 The evolution............................................................................................................. 5 1.2.3 High-performance team............................................................................................. 6

2 ANTECEDENTS OF THE TEAM PERFORMANCE......................................................... 8

2.1 Thompson’s model ......................................................................................................... 8

2.2 Hackman’s model........................................................................................................... 8

2.3 Yeatts and Hyten’s model ............................................................................................ 10

2.4 Katzenbach and Smith’s model................................................................................... 10

2.5 Lencioni’s model........................................................................................................... 11

2.6 Summary of models...................................................................................................... 12

3 TEAM DESIGN ................................................................................................................... 13

3.1 Task analysis ................................................................................................................. 13

3.2 People............................................................................................................................. 14 3.2.1 Matching members to the task ................................................................................ 14 3.2.2 Teamwork knowledge and experience .................................................................... 15 3.2.3 Personality............................................................................................................... 15 3.2.4 Size .......................................................................................................................... 16 3.2.5 Diversity .................................................................................................................. 17

4 TEAM PROCESSES............................................................................................................ 18

4.1 Goal setting ................................................................................................................... 18

4.2 Agreeing on common approach................................................................................... 19

4.3 Setting Norms ............................................................................................................... 20

5 INTERPERSONAL PROCESSES ...................................................................................... 21

5.1 Trust............................................................................................................................... 21

5.2 Conflict .......................................................................................................................... 22

5.3 Commitment ................................................................................................................. 23

5.4 Accountability ............................................................................................................... 24

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5.5 Orientation to results ................................................................................................... 24

6 ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT OF A TEAM .................................................................. 25

6.1 Reward system.............................................................................................................. 25

6.2 Education system.......................................................................................................... 26

6.3 Information system ...................................................................................................... 26

6.4 Expert coaching ............................................................................................................ 27

6.5 Corporate culture ......................................................................................................... 27

7 RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY.............................................................. 28

8. RESULTS ............................................................................................................................ 30

8.1. Team description ......................................................................................................... 30

8.2 Chronological development of the team..................................................................... 30 8.2.1 Getting started ......................................................................................................... 31 8.2.2 Pointless meetings ................................................................................................... 32 8.2.3 Making a first decision after a month and a half..................................................... 33 8.2.4 Getting down to work.............................................................................................. 33 8.2.5 New norms .............................................................................................................. 35 8.2.6 First breakthrough ................................................................................................... 35 8.2.7 Everything went back to “normal”.......................................................................... 36 8.2.8 Project is done ......................................................................................................... 36

9 DISCUSSION....................................................................................................................... 37

9.1 Primary research question and first subsidiary question......................................... 37 9.1.1 Influencing commitment ......................................................................................... 37 9.1.2 Unclear and inappropriate goals.............................................................................. 38 9.1.3 Norms not respected................................................................................................ 39 9.1.4 Procrastinating with decision .................................................................................. 40 9.1.5 Unproductive meetings ........................................................................................... 41 9.1.6 Bad performance management (confrontation of issues)........................................ 42 9.1.7 Spending time on creating excuses ......................................................................... 43 9.1.8 Peer evaluation ........................................................................................................ 43

9.2 Secondary subsidiary question findings..................................................................... 44

9.3 Premise and autonomy- related challenges................................................................ 46 9.3.1 Can a self-directed team have too much authority? ................................................ 47

9.4 Limitations of the study ............................................................................................... 50

CONCLUSION........................................................................................................................ 51

POVZETEK V SLOVENSKEM JEZIKU .............................................................................. 52

REFERENCES ....................................................................................................................... 57

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LIST OF FIGURES FIGURE 1: PERFORMANCE CURVE - THE EVOLUTION FROM A GROUP TO THE HIGH-PERFORMING TEAM 6 FIGURE 2: INTEGRATED MODEL OF TEAMWORK BY THOMPSON.............................................................. 8 FIGURE 3: TEAM BASICS BY HACKMAN .................................................................................................. 9 FIGURE 4: FACTORS AFFECTING WORK TEAM PERFORMANCE ............................................................... 10 FIGURE 5: TEAM BASICS ........................................................................................................................ 11 FIGURE 6: FIVE BASIC CHARACTERISTICS OF A HIGH-PERFORMING TEAM............................................ 11 FIGURE 7: TEAM DESIGN ....................................................................................................................... 13 FIGURE 8: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN GROUP SIZE AND PRODUCTIVITY ........................................... 17 FIGURE 9: RESULTS OF TAKING A SLOW OR A FAST START WITH VERY DIVERSE TEAMS...................... 18 FIGURE 10: SETTING DIRECTION ABOUT MEANS VERSUS ENDS............................................................. 19 FIGURE 11: O’GRADY MODEL ............................................................................................................... 45 FIGURE 12: DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SETTING BOUNDARIES AND CONTROLLING ................................... 48

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LIST OF TABLES TABLE 1: WHY SELF- DIRECTED WORK TEAMS ARE BETTER THAN TRADITIONAL TEAMS ....................... 4 TABLE 2: ESSENTIAL CONDITIONS FOR THE TEAM PERFORMANCE.......................................................... 9 TABLE 3: COMPARISON OF MODELS....................................................................................................... 12 TABLE 4: THE FUNCTION AND BENEFITS OF GOOD DIRECTION .............................................................. 18 TABLE 5: DISCOVERED CHALLENGES CATEGORIZED INTO STEPS ACCORDING TO O’GRADY MODEL.... 44 TABLE 6: RISKS AND GAINS OF HAVING OR NOT HAVING A CONTROL OVER THE TEAM ......................... 49

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INTRODUCTION A few years ago, organizations were encouraged to use group work and team work as much as possible regardless of whether an individual work could have been more efficient. Then it was discovered that in some situations better results will be accomplished by the individual over the team. In appropriate situations, where team work is the best answer, we can have a group of people with minimal interactions and bounding or we can have a team. We can also have a high- performance team. A high performance team is a team which is far more efficient and productive than any other type of team. This team is self managed, and there is no official leader. It has established norms, goals and everyone is in agreement of the mission statement. It also has some very outstanding characteristics such as: trust between team members, team members solve conflicts as they occur, they share commitment, and each member is accountable for results. Because of the above characteristics, the high-performance team delivers outstanding results. There are many models which offer insight into factors that influence team performance. Basically, they emphasize the importance of the team composition: matching task to the right people, and having a team that has the optimal level of diversity and size. Furthermore, they talk about the importance of the processes in the team such as setting appropriate goals, norms and agreeing on a common approach. Another important aspect is interpersonal relations introduced by Patric Lencioni, which compose of trust, conflict, commitment, accountability and attention to results. This list also needs to be supported by encouraging an organizational environment. Organizations need to offer an efficient reward system, education, information systems, expert coaching and a supportive organizational culture. Increasing competition in the business world demands cooperation in an organization. While studying at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada, I came across interesting information related to high-performance teams. An ordinary team can be led through certain steps, which, in 80% of cases, result in a team becoming a high-performance team. It is a model designed by Professor Shawna O’Grady after studying teams for 13 years. She was willing to share her knowledge with me in an interview. Designing high-performance teams in organizations requires drastic changes. Those teams are self-managed and organizations gradually become more successful to adapting to changes in their environment. Empowerment is becoming a key strategic component which can help organizations to quickly adapt to changes and turn all environmental threats to opportunities. It is vital that employees forget about the “control orientation” and switch into the “learner role” (Hirschhorn & Addison-Wesley, 1991, pp. 3). In my research, which was conducted through three months of observation of a team, as well as peer evaluation and secondary research, I have gathered that every team faces problems in a process of becoming a high-performance team. My research question was to identify

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common challenges that teams face, even when their composition is flawless and they have a supportive organizational environment. My intention was to offer an insight into how those challenges can be managed or even prevented. My goal was to offer a useful insight into how the team can be managed that it reaches a high-performing state. By using and respecting the given guidelines for becoming a high- performance team we can reduce the number of teams that fail dramatically. I also wanted to show further research possibilities with my premise that teams who are not familiar with the team structure, a structure which offers a lot of autonomy, will face some autonomy-related challenges. When teams are used to working in a very controlled environment, they usually follow orders from their management. In a more empowered structure, teams are controlled less and less. This has many advantages, such as more flexibility and greater work satisfaction, but it can also have many negative consequences if the team is overwhelmed by the feeling of freedom. In my research I tried to identify autonomy-related challenges of the team. I also tried to suggest solutions which find a balance between an optimal level of autonomy and control.

1 TEAM PERFORMANCE

1.1 Work group and work team

1.1.1 Work group

According to Katzenbach and Smith (1993, pp. 91) a work group is: “a group where [there] is no significant incremental performance need or opportunity that would require it to become a team. The members interact primarily to share information, bet practices, or perspectives and to make decisions to help each individual perform within his or her area of responsibility. Beyond that, there is no realistic or desirous ”small group” common purpose, incremental performance goals, or joint work products that call for either a team approach or mutual accountability” Thompson’s (2007, pp. 5) definition of a work group is quite similar: a working group consists of people who learn from one another and share an idea but are not interdependent. Group members usually share information and insights, make decisions, and might also help other members to do their jobs better. The main difference between a work group and the real team is that in a work group, group members focus more on individual goals and individual accountability. Therefore, members of the group are not working toward the same goal (Thompson, 2007, pp. 5).

1.1.2 Work team

A work team is an interdependent set of individuals who share common responsibility for their outcomes which affect the organization (Sundstrom, DeMeuse, & Futrell, 1990, pp.

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120). Interdependency happens when members cannot achieve their goals single-handedly, but must rely on each other in order to being able to achieve the shared objectives (Thompson, 2007, pp. 4). Typical work team is formed from a small number of people with complementary skills sets. Complementary skill set is only one source of interdependency; furthermore members are also interdependent with respect to information, and resources (Thompson, 2007, pp. 4). Besides interdependency, another important characteristic is commitment. Members are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and have a common approach. They also hold themselves mutually accountable (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 45). Teams usually have these following defining characteristics:

• They exist to achieve a shared goal (Alderfer & Smith, 1982, pp.38; Thompson, 2007, pp. 5; Katzenbach & Smith, 1999, pp. 45).

• Team members are interdependent (Alderfer & Smith, 1982, pp. 38; Thompson, 2007, pp. 5).

• Teams are bounded and stable over time (Alderfer & Smith, 1982, pp. 38; Hackman, 2002, pp. 41).

• Team members have the authority to manage their own work and internal processes (Alderfer & Smith, 1982, pp.38; Hackman, 2002, pp. 41).

• Teams operate in a social context – organization (Alderfer & Smith 1982, pp. 38).

• Team task (Hackman, 2002, pp. 41). Thompson (2007, pp. 9-13) defines four types of the teams: manager-led teams, self- managing teams, self-directing teams and self-governing teams. As mentioned above, one of the key characteristics of the team is autonomy to manage internal process inside of the team (Alderfer & Smith, 1982, pp. 38; Hackman, 2002, pp. 41). Some team structures allow more and some allow less autonomy. Manager-led teams are the most traditional form of the teams. Leader is responsible for setting the roles, goals, methods and the way that team will function. Team itself is only responsible for the execution of the given task. Control over team members is very high (Thompson, 2007, pp. 9).

Self-managing team or self- regulating team is a team where a manager determines the goal of the team, and the team has the power to manage methods to get to the goal (Thompson, 2007, pp. 9). In this team, the structure usually focuses productivity and quality improvement. Furthermore, employee job satisfaction is higher, contribution is better, there is less absenteeism and turnover (Yeatts, Cread, Ray, DeWitt, & Queen, 2004, pp. 216; Spreitzer, Cohen, & Ledford, 1999, pp. 535). A self-regulating team is also defined as a democratic form of work structure. Members get the responsibility and control of their jobs and the conditions surrounding them (Grayson,

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1992, pp. 22). Self-directing or self-designing teams determine their own objectives and the methods by which they will achieve them. They have the most potential for innovation. This type of structure also enhances the goal commitment and motivation, and provides the opportunity for learning and change (Thompson, 2007, pp. 11). Self–governing teams are usually responsible for executing the task, managing their own performance process, designing the group, and designing the whole organizational context (Thompson, 2007, pp. 12).

1.1.3 Team with the highest potential

There are several types of teams and not all of them reach the same performance level. Well designed and led self-managed and self-designed teams can outperform any other team structure (Hackman, 2002, pp. 34). Self-managed and self–directed work groups enable the improvement of the work life quality and organizational effectiveness. The structure of self-directing teams is able to respond quickly to the needs of the organization and workers. One of the biggest advantages is how decisions are pushed down to the lower levels where information is actually available and employees can react quickly (Grayson, 1992, pp. 22).

Table 1: Why self- directed work teams are better than traditional teams

Traditional work teams Self-directed teams Take directions Take initiative

Seek individual rewards Focus on team contributions Focus on blame Concentrate on solutions

Compete Co-operate Stop at present goals Continually improve and innovate

Demand more resources Work with what they have React to emergencies Take steps to prevent emergencies

Spend money to improve quality Save money by improving quality

Source: Elmuti. D., Self-managed work teams approach: creative management tool or a fad?, 1997, pp. 235.

When employees have more autonomy, they feel more involved and commitment starts to emerge (MacKenzie, 1979, pp.49). Some researchers see commitment as a fuel of high–performing teams.

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1.2 Performance and high – performance team

1.2.1 Performance

According to Thompson (2007, pp. 38) a performance criteria for a team consists from productivity, cohesion, learning and integration. His view of performance is very similar to Hackman’s opinion. Hackman (1989, pp. 6) believes that effectiveness can be explained by the three dimensional model.

1. First dimension is how the team’s output meets set standards of quality, quantity, and timelines of the people who receive the product of service. Thompson (2007, pp. 39) explicitly emphasizes that efficiency is the part of productivity and it needs to be taken into consideration at this point.

2. Second dimension is how working together makes the team even more cohesive also in the future. With different words; when Thompson (2007, pp. 40) talked to a manager in Societe Generale Bank, he said: “I ask myself whether I want to work with these people again. If the answer is yes, then the team was successful. If the answer is no, the team was not successful.”

3. Third Hackman’s dimension (1989, pp. 7) is a degree to which team helps individual

member to grow personally. Thompson (2007, pp. 41) uses the term learning. He claims that every individual needs the opportunity to grow and to reach a self-fulfillment. That is why successful teams need to be provided with challenges and opportunities.

4. The fourth dimension suggested only by Thompson (2007, pp. 41) is integration. How

well the team fits into the company’s structure, how the team is integrated with other teams in the organization, and is the team’s goals consistent with the larger organizational goal.

An opposing opinion is that defining the performance might be impossible. In many cases, there are no reliably objective measures of the team performance. If they are, they may have not been comparable across teams and across organizations (Cohen, 1994, pp. 9).

1.2.2 The evolution

How does a work group evolve into a high- performing team? “The team performance curve” shows how well groups and teams perform (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 85). On the curve we see five different stages of group and team work:

• Working group: no interdependency and common goal

• Pseudo-team: group where could be a need for the team performance, but the group

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has is not trying to work interdependently; it has no common purpose or performance goals. They sometimes might even call themselves a team, but they are the weakest formation and their sum of whole is less than potential of the individual parts.

• Potential team: a group with a significant potential for performance. But shared

purpose, goals and common work approach are not established.

• Real team

• High-performance team

Figure 1: Performance curve - The evolution from a group to the high-performing team

Source: Katzenbach and Smith, The wisdom of teams, 1993, pp. 93.

The figure above shows how many options for performance groups and teams have (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 93). The biggest performance gain happens between a potential team and a real team. The level of commitment that has to be made to move from a real team to a high-performing team is shown by the dotted line. In the next chapters, I am going to discuss all factors that influence the possibility of moving up on the performance curve from the stage of a real team to the stage of the high-performing team.

1.2.3 High-performance team

The high-performing team is the most evolved form of the team on the Katzenbach and Smith’s performance curve. If we want to achieve this state, we need to know what sets a high-performing team apart from the other forms of groups and teams. Kur (1996, pp. 28) defines a high-performing team as follows: “A high performing team (or organization) consistently satisfies the needs of customers, employees, investors and others in

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its area of influence. As a result, these teams frequently outperform other teams that produce similar products and services under similar conditions and constraints.” An important component of a high-performing team is commitment. Katzenbach and Smith (1993, pp. 65): “Behind a high-performance team lies a story of commitment. Like any real team, a high-performance team must have a smaller number of people with the required skills, purpose, goals, approach, and accountability […]. What sets apart high-performance teams, however, is the degree of commitment; particularly how deeply committed the members are one to another.” Because of the strong interpersonal commitment, commitment to the purpose becomes even bigger, goals are more ambitious and approach is more powerful. Mutual concern among members of the team enables growth and flexibility, and members also have more fun than in regular teams (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 66). Participative-management has emerged in last few decades and it talks about the importance of employee participation in decision making process (Kim, 2002, pp. 237). Organizations have to trust their employees and let them make important decisions. This will results in better effectiveness of the organization (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 8). One of the causes of commitment to the goals is also autonomy over decision making and creating meaningful tasks. Members coordinate easier and participate more if they are attracted to the task itself (Pearce & Ravlin, 1987, pp. 757). The next important characteristic of a high-performance team is shared leadership. Some authors believe how a leader can be any person inside the team who can provide the right environment for the team performance. Hackman (2002, pp. 33) suggests that the leader should not be a single person at one time. Instead, the leadership role must shift, as there is no room for official authority. Leadership is provided by any member who can ensure the right conditions for the team performance. Other authors support the idea of having a rotating leadership role on a timely basis. The leadership role should rotate among all team members. All team members must obtain a leadership role even if they are reluctant. If they do not, these weaker members will be left behind and stronger members will grow even stronger. The role of a leader has to be changed every specific period of time (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, pp. 39). I, however, disagree with the idea of having rotating leadership roles on a timely basis. The purpose of a self-directing team is to assign tasks to members according to their strengths. By forcing someone to take a role where he or she is weak, we influence the entire team’s well-being and performance. It is also impossible to predict the circumstances and shared leadership on a timely basis, and so does not provide the model for matching strengths of the individuals to the task according to the circumstances. We also lose a lot of flexibility and learning opportunities.

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2 ANTECEDENTS OF THE TEAM PERFORMANCE There are a number of models describing factors which influence team performance. In this chapter they are introduced and briefly described according to their authors.

2.1 Thompson’s model Thompson believes that team performance is influenced by the team context and essential conditions.

Figure 2: Integrated model of teamwork by Thompson

Team context Essential Conditions Team performance

Source: L. L. Thompson, Making the team: A guide for managers, 2007, pp. 23.

Team context consist form (Thomson, 2007, pp. 23-25): • Organizational context what is an organization with its reward system, informational

system, and educational system. • Team design refers to the structure of the team (roles, communication patterns,

composition, and training). • Team Culture consists from norms, roles, and patterns of behavior. As shown in the

chart, the team performance depends on the team formation and design, and on the organization.

2.2 Hackman’s model As shown on the figure, Hackman (2002, pp. 206) argues that essential conditions for high performance are: real team, compelling direction (a goal), enabling structure (size and diversity), supportive organizational context (informational system, reward system, educational system) and expert coaching.

Organizational context

Team Design

Team Culture

Ability: • Knowledge • Skills • Education • Information

Motivation: • Internistic • Externistic

Strategy: • Communication • Coordination

Productivity Cohesion Learning

Integration

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Figure 3: Team basics by Hackman

Supportive organizational context

Expert coaching Source: Wageman, Hackman and Lehman, Team diagnostic survey: Development of an Instrument, 2005, pp. 380 (author Hackman, 2002).

Hackman also gives some guidelines for setting the right goals, composing the right team and having a supportive organizational environment (Hackman, 2002, pp. 207):

• Direction has to energize, orient attention, and engage people. Well designed tasks will engage members and motivate them. Norms have to promote strategy planning for the tasks that need to be performed.

• Well-composed team is small and diverse enough to have the best use of talent. Organizational environment has to support the team with a reward system (rewards that fosters team cooperation), information system (system that enables good communication and ensures team to find the right means to the end goal regarding to the environment and opportunities), and education system.

Table 2: Essential conditions for the team performance

Compelling

direction Enabling team

structure Supportive

organizational context Team performance

process Energizes + Team task design + Reward system Effort Orients attention + Norms + Informational system Performance strategy Engages talents + Team composition + Educational system Knowledge and skill

Source: Hackman, Leading teams: Setting the stage for a great performances, 2002, pp. 206.

Enabling Compeling Structure Direction Real team

Team effectivenes

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2.3 Yeatts and Hyten’s model

Yeatts and Hyten (1998, pp. 25- 46) provided a synthesis of the several theories and models. They tested a combined model in practice and made their own theoretical model and found two factors influencing teams: work related factors and team member characteristics. Work related factors were already defined by Hackman (1988) and they have direct effect on team performance; they include team effort, knowledge, skills and procedures for doing the work, and also materials, space and equipment used. The second group of factors is the team’s interpersonal process. These factors directly influence the performance through work factors. Their model is very complex. Suggested factors are described in their figure.

Figure 4: Factors affecting work team performance

Source: Yeatts and Hyten, High- performing self-managed work teams: A comparison of theory to practice 1998, pp. 53.

2.4 Katzenbach and Smith’s model

According to Katzenbach and Smith (1993, pp. 9) all team basics are in their chart. Sides are

ENVIRONMENT Within the organization organizational culture, clear engaging mission, reward, training, information and performance management system, Management roles and support, supplier, customer, union support, available, appropriate resources  Outside the organization economy, technology, political system, legal, demography, education, social culture 

TEAM MEMBER CHARACTERISTICS  existing talent (knowledge, skill, ability) personality; values, interests, needs, and prejudices 

INTERPERSONAL PROCESS 

within the team & between the team & others(communication, coordination, cooperation, conflict, cohesion, trust) 

TEAM DESIGN CHARACTERISTICS 

goal clarity, challenge & priorities, job design, team size & composition,  decision‐making methods & process for identifying procedures, work norms, roles of team & team leader 

WORK PROCESS 

effort applied to tasks, talent applied, resources applied, work procedures  

TEAM PERFORMANCE customer satisfaction with productivity, quality, timeliness, costs economic viability 

FEEDBACK TO PROCESS & INPUTS 

DEMANDS OF TASKS 

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what the team can deliver, and the center can make that happen. Team members need to have certain skills, be accountable and committed in order to get performance goals, which are personal growth and collective work products.

Figure 5: Team basics

Source: Katzenbach and Smith, The wisdom of teams, 1993, pp. 8.

2.5 Lencioni’s model Lencioni (2003, pp. 35 – 40) focuses on interpersonal relationships inside the team. He believes the five conditions to success are trust, being able to have a constructive conflict, commitment to the common goal, accountability and focusing on common results. The team cannot move up the pyramid if bottom characteristic is not achieved.

Figure 6: Five basic characteristics of a high-performing team

Source: Lencioni, The trouble with teamwork, 2003, pp. 40.

SKILS ACCOUNTABILITY

COMMITMENT

PERFORMANCE RESULTS

COLLECTIVE WORK PRODUCTS

PERSONAL GROWTH

Specific goals Common approach Meabibgful purpose

Mutual Individual Small number of people

Problem solving Tehnical Interpersonal

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2.6 Summary of models Above I discussed several authors who provided different explanations and different models. Some similarities and also differences can be found among them as shown in the table below.

Table 3: Comparison of models

Author

Designing the team

Processes in the team

Performance measures

Thompson

Team context, and team design, organizational

context

Ability, Motivation, Strategy

Productivity, Integration, learning,

cohesion Hackman

Organization (reward, education, information,

training) Task matched with

skills of the members, team design (size,

diversity, interpersonal skills)

Knowledge, skill and effort by the team,

appropriate strategy (norms, goals)

Output meets the standard, good work

relations an growth of the individual members

Yeatts and Hyten

Team members characteristics, team

design and environmental design

Work related factors: include team effort,

knowledge, skills and procedures of doing the

work by Hackman (1988)

Interpersonal process; directly influence the performance through the work factors.

Personal growth, collective work

products

Katzenbach and Smith

Team design, team members

characteristics, task design, environment

Interpersonal process, work process, feedback

Output meets the standard, good work

relations an growth of the individual members

Lencioni Not applicable. Trust, commitment, conflict, accountability,

results

Tangible collective outcomes.

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3 TEAM DESIGN ”Management is needed to define tasks that need to be done, to form teams of members with complementary skills and personalities and then to empower the team to do its job.” Eggensperger (2004, pp. 59). Below is Thompson’s model (2007, pp. 80) showing a process of the team design. In this chapter I am going to focus on the team design, later on in next chapters I will cover processes inside the team and interpersonal processes, and at the end I will explain the organizational context.

Figure 7: Team design

Source: Thompson, Making the team: A guide for managers, 2007, pp. 80.

3.1 Task analysis People and the structure of the team are selected according to the task. That is why task analysis should be the first step when we need to design a team. When we evaluate the task we need to address some specific questions (Thompson, 2007, pp. 80):

• What work needs to be performed? How much authority does the group have to manage their work?

• What is the focus of work the group will do? What is the degree of interdependence among team members?

• Is there only one correct solution? Are team members interests aligned or competitive?

After these questions are answered, we can move on to in the process of the team design, where we focus on selection of the right people for the existing task.

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3.2 People

3.2.1 Matching members to the task

Yeatts and Hyten (1998, pp. 66) suggest using the following steps for matching the task to the members of the team:

1. Identify tasks 2. Identify characteristics and requirements of the task 3. Assess team member’s talents, values, interests, needs and prejudices 4. Match team members to task components

Members are matched to the task according to their talent, knowledge, skills, and ability. Skills, knowledge and abilities are needed for the team’s success. Team members should have the right skill set for the task to be able to accomplish it (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 68). Firstly, skills can be put into three categories (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 47):

• Technical and functional expertise: there is no use of having several experts with the same background in the same team

• Problem solving and decision-making skills: team needs people with those skills to function well

• Interpersonal skills: constructive conflict and effective communication depend on interpersonal skills; this also includes helpful criticism, risk taking, listening, support, and recognition.

Many researchers emphasize how important is to have different skill sets in the team. However, there is one controversial finding by Yeatts and Hyten (1998, pp. 68). If only one member has the certain skill to accomplish the task, the team will be less successful than when more members have the same skill. This is because the task cannot be done when the certain person is no present. In their research were the highest performing teams the ones where all team members had all skills necessary for accomplishing the task. Secondly, team member’s abilities have to be matched with the task which needs to be performed. In other words, team members have to have skills and abilities applicable to the task in order to make them feel how they are able to make an important contribution. If we do not establish that, the team can suffer from social loafing. Social loafing occurs when team members fail to put forth their best effort, because they believe their level of effort will not be comparable to others (Latane, Williams, & Harkins, 1979, pp. 823-832). People’s strengths are usually also their area of interest, which has a positive effect on the work process and performance (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 272). On the contrary, Robbins (1995, pp. 341) believes that social loafing can occur even when the task is provoking, involving, and a person has the authority to make a unique contribution.

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Best suggested solution for preventing the social loafing are team norms. Social loafing occurs very rarely when members believe that other members will not loaf. Skills, knowledge and abilities are closely linked to the organizational environment; providing training, feedback and having efficient reward system. They are also influenced by the team norms. Some norms enable learning environment, other do not. If we assess the team’s high performance also based on member’s growth (Hackman, 2002, pp. 41), the learning environment has to be provided. Coaching, feedback and performance management are discussed in the Organizational context chapter.

3.2.2 Teamwork knowledge and experience

Teamwork knowledge is an understanding of team processes; this understanding is different from individual to individual (Rentsch, Heffner & Duffy, 1994, pp. 451). Part of the team knowledge is based on past team experience. Teamwork knowledge can also be referred as a teamwork schema. A schema is knowledge structure combined from past experiences combined with a new information which facilitates the understanding (Poole, Gray, & Gioia, 1990, pp. 212). Rentsch, Heffner and Duffy (1994, pp. 451) discovered that more experiences mean more knowledge, and more experience individuals have better understanding of the team work than less experienced individuals. Some researchers do show how learning by doing benefits organization. Individual and team experience can speed up the process of task completion. Working with the same members will lead to more trusting environment and allocation of the tasks according to member’s strengths will be done sooner (Reagans, Argote, & Brooks, 2005, pp. 880).

3.2.3 Personality

Researchers vary a lot in their evaluation of how much personality really affects the team's success. Some say personal traits are not important, others claim certain personality trait does influence team effectiveness. Researchers also have different opinions on which personality traits actually affect the performance of the team. Rentsch, Heffner and Duffy (1994, pp. 451) suggest that teams with members who are unable to evaluate socially appropriate responses; do not know how to react on people’s needs and feelings, and have worse performance results. Personality traits cause difference in developing interpersonal relationships. Traits that influence cohesion are agreeableness, extraversion, and emotional stability. Highly disagreeable members can cause low performance, low cohesion, closed communication and less learning. There are findings how this consequence can emerge when

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only one member in the team is highly disagreeable (Barrick, Stewart, Neubert, & Mount, 1998, pp. 377 - 391). Costa and McCrae (1995, pp. 5-13) discovered five personality traits which make a person better team member: conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, openness to experience and emotional stability. Those traits can be a sign for a person who is more likely to be cooperative. Based on those findings only a few people can be put into the teams and be successful. The truth is that (Mohammed & Angell, 2008, pp. 651 - 677) that study revealed how the personality-performance relationship was not consistent across different tasks. There is no single optimal composition for teams. More than personal traits we have to look at the task itself and the team context when we design a team or measure the results.

3.2.4 Size

Team size of six to eight people appears to be the best size for high-level communication (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 85). There is more likely that team will become cohesive if smaller numbers of people are involved, because they will have an opportunity to get to know each other through communication (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 101). But Yeatts and Hyten (1998, pp. 94) do see some advantages in a large team. When a large team has norms about cooperative conflicts, best solutions are chosen in very large teams. If norms are not developed, team will face a competitive conflict which results in many negative outcomes. The norms established are more important than the team size. A team which is too large can start to form sub teams and usually communication between sub teams is not ongoing. Lack of communication and interpersonal interaction causes interpersonal conflicts. That is why coordination in large teams can be challenging (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 260). In very large teams diffusion of responsibility (Darley & Latane, 1968) may affect teams. Diffusion of responsibility is a failure to act in situations where others are involved. Each member may believe that others will take the needed action and he does not need to participate. Two things can happen: social loafing or sucker aversion. Sucker aversion happens when group members believe that others will not put their entire effort to enhance the group performance. That is why they also hold themselves back to avoid being the “sucker” who does all the work (Schnake, 1991, pp. 51). Psychologist Steiner (1972, pp. 96) researched the group size and productivity. Groups never perform at the level of their potential productivity. We have to look at the actual productivity. Every new person adds something, but less than a previous person in the team. This can be explained with an effect of social loafing— the larger the team gets, the less effort members will put into work (Thompson, 2007, pp. 31).

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Figure 8: The relationship between group size and productivity

Potential productivity

Process losses Actual productivity

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Number of members Number of members Number of members

Source: Steiner, Group processes and productivity, 1972, pp. 96.

3.2.5 Diversity

When team members are diverse, the potential to come up with new ideas will be greater, there will be more opportunities to learn, and more chances that some new knowledge will be formed (Molleman & Timmerman, 2003, pp. 109). Diversity is linked to cohesion. People who are similar are going to socialize more and reach cohesion faster. Also people who are similar to one another in their beliefs, values and attitudes will trust each other faster (Thompson, 2007, pp. 119). The challenge is because similarity enhances mutual liking and trust. This leads to the more open exchange of knowledge and expertise (Glaman, Jones, & Rozelle, 1996, pp. 211). We need to find a mix between members who are enough similar and enough different (Hackman, 2002, pp. 123). Only that way we will have both; different expertise and knowledge transfer. According to Scott-Ladd and Chan (2008, pp. 245) females are more likely to work collectively, with more emphasis on feelings or intuition and integrating learning. Males like the role of leader and they are better at solving problems. Mixed-gender teams might provide a better balance and more positive team experiences. According to Davison (1994, pp. 85): “The team basics of clarifying and agreeing a working method and performance goals, surfacing assumptions and differences, actively listening and participating are the same. In international teams, applying the basics before rushing to complete the task is all the more important. The differences in expectations and approach are likely to be far higher.” Watson, Kumar and Michaelsen (1993, pp. 599) support this theory; highly diverse teams will have slow start, but after a while they will be as efficient as homogeneous teams in their task performance. Diverse teams will experience more conflict. If very diverse groups are not properly managed, they will not reach their potential, but if diverse groups are managed properly, they can be better at generating ideas.

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Figure 9: Results of taking a slow or a fast start with very diverse teams

Source: Davison, Creating a High Performance International Team, 1994, pp. 86.

4 TEAM PROCESSES

4.1 Goal setting Short term goals have to be consistent with long term purpose otherwise teams lose track, team members become confused and they pull apart (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 49). Team has to know what performance criteria they need to meet and criteria needs to be tightly linked with their goals (Hirschhorn, 1991, pp. 18). Broad directives have to be transformed into measurable and smaller goals. Specific performance goals help them to be on track and check the accountability; when performing commitment will raise and performance will raise back. Celebration of those results in important to build commitment (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 49-56). Hackman (2002, pp. 61 - 72): self-directing teams cannot be successful if they do not have clear direction. By having a good direction we can energize the team members (we get commitment), we orient attention and action, and engage team member’s talents (engaging direction helps to get all the talents from all team members). Good direction has to be challenging, clear, and consequential. Goals need to be set high enough to challenge the team because they will influence the motivation and effort allocation of the members (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 245).

Table 4: The function and benefits of good direction

Attributes of good direction Functions Benefits Challenging Energizes Enhances motivation

Clear Orients Aligns performance strategy with purposes Consequential Engages Fosters full utilization of knowledge and skill

Source: Hackman , Leading teams: Setting the stage for a great performance, pp. 72.

The team takes the time to implement the “team basics”

The “expert” rushes the team

into the task

Performance level on the task

Time

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Having empowered employees who have autonomy of making decisions will result in committed workforce and good performance results (Pearce & Ravlin, 1987, pp. 757). This is the basic advantage of the self-directing team structure. But according to Katzenbach and Smith (1993, pp. 49-56) it is wrong to assume that a team will be more committed if it sets its own goals. This can cause more confusion and it is time consuming; because goals have to be collective and individual. Groups that fail almost never agree on that common purpose; that is why members can not set themselves specific and accountable goals. Performance can be equally high or even higher even when goals are set by the supervising manager. Because they can be more clear and commitment can be bigger when a person with authority assigns goals. Those goals can be also seen as a challenge from management (Locke & Latham, pp. 241). After all, most research still shows that commitment really is higher when teams are allowed to set their own goals because alignment with personal values and interests is greater when people can set their own goals (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 246).

4.2 Agreeing on common approach Teams have to agree on how they will work together to accomplish the common purpose. It is important that every team member put in the same amount of effort. Team members have to agree on all administrative part of the work: give tasks, agree on schedule, how the group is going to make decisions, and approach to getting the job done (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 65-60). Right use of procedures will make team more efficient: they will use less time, resources, people and help to save costs. High-performing teams usually seek for new ways to solve problems more efficiently and do not stick to the usual procedures. Effective team norms have to include repeated evaluation of procedure (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 71). The following matrix shows the best use of human resources according to specifying means versus ends.

Figure 10: Setting direction about means versus ends

Source: Hackman, Leading teams: Setting the stage for a great performance, 2002, pp. 73.

No Yes

Specify means?

Specify ends?

No Yes

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Isaken and Lauer (2002, pp. 78) believe that teams get to much guidance on how (means) and not enough on what (ends) and why. Unclear unspecified end can be the biggest under-utilization cause. They are not saying that teams have to get goals from the top, but organization should provide broad, clear and understandable direction. Agreeing on common approach can help improve coordination and reduce effort. Highly coordinated teams spent little time on delegating tasks and setting timelines, which leaves more time for team members to actually work (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 61). High trust and open communication can enable members to get the information quickly and to react quickly.

4.3 Setting Norms Core norms are necessary to regulate the behavior— they have to be clear and strong. Team that has clear norms spends less time arguing and puts more time and energy into completing tasks. Norms can have positive and negative impact on performance (Hackman, 1989, pp. 10). Norms have to be set carefully because they help to form a culture which is hard to change. If one time norm was to finish the task quickly and the other day to finish the task with great consideration of the quality, it is hard to change people’s behavior once norms are established (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 60). Norms define which behaviors are accepted in the team and which are not. Appropriate behaviors are encouraged and inappropriate behaviors are sanctioned (Hackman, 2002, pp. 105). Norm design is entirely up to team members, but they usually entail what team members perceive as extremely important. Team norms that address interpersonal relationships and tie that to performance have the biggest impact on the team performance. They usually address punctuality, communication, participation, and conflict management (Hackman, 2002, pp. 105). Hackman (2002, pp. 106) believes there are two basic norms that need to be addressed in the team and other norms can be set on top of them:

1. “Members should take an active, rather than a reactive, stance toward the environment in which the team operates, continuously scanning the environment and inverting or adjusting their performance strategies accordingly.

2. The behavioral boundaries within which the team operates should be demarcated, identifying the small handful of things that members must always do and those they must never do.”

Norms can be formed in various ways. They can be suggested by all individual members, they can be spontaneously evolved after time when team discovers what works the best (Hackman, 2002, pp. 105). Hackman also warns us how some counter-productive norms are formed during that time, because it is very hard to change norms once they are established.

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Sometimes teams can find it useful to add norms with time. Secondary norms are used to help regulating their interactions with each other. Those norms can be a respond on the existing problem with a certain team member and other members want to make sure they will not have to deal with it constantly (Hackman, 2002, pp. 105).

5 INTERPERSONAL PROCESSES Lencioni (2003, pp. 35-40) in his pyramid model defines five characteristics of a successful team: Trust, Conflict, Commitment, Accountability and Results. In the following section, I discuss the importance of every one of them. They have to be built in this chronological order in order to reach a high performing state.

5.1 Trust Sometimes authors talk about cohesion and trust together (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 97). Cohesion is a degree to which members of a team fell attracted to their team and compelled to stay in it. Cohesiveness can be team-oriented (members express concerns for team members, increases commitment) or task-oriented (members express concern for the task outcome) (Carron & Brawley, 2000, pp. 90). In high performing teams they found both high cohesiveness for task and high for team members. If only team-oriented cohesion can reduce time allocated to the task because members spend too much time on non-working related subjects. If cohesion is very low, members rarely ask for help (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 97). Team-oriented cohesion is influenced by the team size and task-oriented cohesion is affected by the clarity of goals. Team-oriented cohesion increases open communication. The danger is group think, when people agree rather than disagree with other members (Janis, 1983, pp. 8) and this can lead to polarization of decisions and decisions can become extreme (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 99). Some studies suggest that cohesion helps to minimize interpersonal conflict and increases task related conflict, and teams get more innovative (Ensley, Pearson, & Amason, 2002, pp. 380). Others believe that cohesion means expressing more opinions, which is why it also means more conflict (Tekleab, Quigley & Tesluk, 2009, pp. 23). In any case, a team has to know how to manage conflicts. Open discussion and finding the consensus are the best way and they help to build trust and strong interpersonal relationships. A team has to know how to deal with task conflicts, since there is a danger if the task conflict is not resolved properly it can blend to the relationship conflict and minimizes the cohesion. Team cohesion also influences the perceived team performance.

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When individual members have a chance to express their own perspectives and in that way also affect a group decision, members will more openly accept the decision results (McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992, pp. 436). Accepted decision results will lead to even stronger cohesion. Trust is a team member’s readiness to rely on other members without controlling them (Schoorman, Mayer, & Davis, 2007, pp. 346-347). When team members trust each other several things happen (Yeatts & Hyten , 1998, pp. 103): they worry less about the members and place more effort into work itself, members are more willing to ask for the assistance or they allow person with more appropriate skills to do the task, that is how the optimal talent is placed on the right task. Furthermore, when members trust each other, they accept different viewpoints. They are not concerned that someone is suggesting a new idea for his personal benefits. Actions that increase trust (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, pp. 118): meaning what you say, being involved, not arguing too much, acting consistently, sharing information willingly, showing a willingness to be vulnerable, doing more that is required, believing that another person has your best interest in mind, being able to ask for help, maintain the level of honesty, exposing something personal about yourself, acknowledging someone else’s skill, taking risk first, reaching out to somebody who is distant and different. Willingness to be vulnerable is described by Lencioni (2003, pp. 36-38). He introduced a new term “vulnerability-based trust.” It means that members of a functional team have to know how to admit mistakes and weaknesses. They must be prepared to recognize when some members have strengths which exceed their own, they have to control their egos, admit weaknesses, speak openly when they disagree, confront behavioral problems directly, and put the team’s success beyond their personal desires. Trust is a foundation for the team to engage in the productive conflict. Being able to ask for help has many advantages. Interdependency is valued among people who trust each other, that is why nobody acts judgmental and nobody feels embarrassed when asking for help (Jones & George, 1998, pp. 541). Klaver (2005, pp. 16- 20) people do not ask for help if they fear rejection, loss of control and shame. With open communication we can overcome that and make asking for help a part of work environment. When team members ask for help there are several types of costs reduced: cost of fixing a problem instead of solving the problem immediately, cost of wasting time and being less efficient, cost of reduced productivity because strengths of members are not fully utilized, possibilities of development for the team is limited if members do not get the opportunity to grow, less team bonding, building expectation in the team that asking for help is not necessary, not asking for help is like a secret, an issue not resolved and it causes bad communication and artificial harmony.

5.2 Conflict Some authors (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 89) talk about conflict together with cooperation

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and collaboration. Cooperation and collaboration are very similar and they are defined as two or more people working together towards a common objective (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp 89). Conflict was first perceived as a disagreement which had negative consequences (lack of trust, cooperation) later on some ideas of good conflicts have emerged. Beneficial conflict, that is when two or more people have opposing ideas but they are open to understand each other’s views. The negative conflict was determined as a competitive conflict, where people fight to get the win over other ideas (Tjosvold, 1998, pp. 287). Competitive conflict is most likely to occur when several members could not agree on their strengths and are unable to decide who is going to perform the task (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 95). Non-beneficial conflict can be prevented by having strong norms, or when the team goals are very clear, so team member put their personal desires second and the team’s goals first (Tjosvold, 1998, pp. 304). Norms also should encourage cooperative conflict— when team members do not agree a variety of ideas are presented and that can lead to the best decision made (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 93). Groupthink (Janis, 1983, pp.8) is when team members are not open to offer alternative solutions. Teams cannot make the best decision in that kind of situation. Some teams avoid getting into the conflict, as task related conflicts then grow into relationship conflicts (Tekleab, Quigley & Tesluk, 2009, pp. 22). When members avoid addressing issues it is impossible to make a real commitment (Lencioni, 2003, pp. 38). Conflict is a lot about communication. Self-directed teams which have good communication in decision-making process and who gave the extra weight to the opinions of the biggest experts of the problem are far more successful than self-directed teams who have dominant members (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 69). When a team has an open, non-threatening communication more alternatives are discussed when making decisions. More information can assure that team will chose the best procedure (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 85). Open, ongoing, honest and regular communication has a positive effect— providing new information, reviewing past work and discussing the progress, not blaming anybody, and quickly conveying the information among every member. Open communication is important for learning from mistakes, for building trust and asking for help when it is needed (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 79).

5.3 Commitment Commitment can be explained as an effort put into the task (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 59). Effort is the amount of energy put into work, and it is tied to both commitment and motivation. There are two types of commitment: affective commitment is when the employee is emotionally attached to the company or the team, and continuance commitment is when the employee perceives costs of leaving the company (it is a need to have a job). Emotional commitment is the one which increases energy level put into the work and can provide better

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results (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 65). Most common causes of commitment (Pearce & Ravlin, 1987) are: autonomy over the decision making, meaningful tasks, desired rewards, and appraisal system that recognizes the individual’s contribution. Lencioni (2003, pp. 38 - 39) believes that because a team rarely has enough information to make smooth decisions and it is hard to reach consensus, commitment is hard to achieve. Some members will disagree with the idea and rather than confronting the idea, they will ignore it. Commitment has to be supported by trust (members have to be comfortable to speak out). Members have to be able to disagree and have constructive conflict in order to be able to commit.

5.4 Accountability ”Think, for example, about the subtle but critical difference between”the boss holds me accountable” and “we hold ourselves accountable”. The first can lead to the second; but without the second, there it can be no team,” (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 60). According to Katzenbach and Smith (1993, pp. 60) promises made have to be kept because accountability goes in hand with trust. By keeping promises we can trust other team members. They believe that accountability has nothing to do with shared purpose and common approach and performance goals. Accountability arises when members invest time, energy and action into achieving goals. Trust and commitment follow that. If goals are set clearly, people are held accountable and this in turn increases productivity. Everyone knows what his or her job is and what he or she should be doing. It is also easier to keep promises and satisfy the expectations of other team members. Some teams are unable to address the problems and usually start to gossip and build bad morale. Accountability has to be supported by clear goals and roles (Lencioni, 2003, pp. 39).

5.5 Orientation to results On this stage, the team has to do two things in order to be successful. Firstly, they need to pay attention to their performance. Katzenbach and Smith (1993, pp. 61): “Teams do not spring up by magic. Nor does personal chemistry matter as much as most people believe. […]. And focusing on performance- not chemistry or togetherness or good communication or good feelings- shapes teams more than anything else.” The debriefing process is very important, since it offers information about what the team is doing well and where it needs to improve. Team members learn and grow, and necessary changes are made. If the team does not pay attention to the results, they cannot reach a high-performance. Secondly, the team needs to work towards the same goal. Success is when the team reaches its

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goal by collaborative work. It is essential that members value the team’s goal over their personal desires (Lencioni, 2003, pp. 40).

6 ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT OF A TEAM Integration in the company context is the last dimension which affects the team’s performance. What can organization do to maximize the team performance? The company should provide appropriate resources for work, such as materials and space (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 69). Teams should have the appropriate resources. High-performance teams manage to use the right set of them, as they continuously evaluate the resources to make sure they are using the right resources according to their limitations. It is vital for the team to know which resources have to be applied to work in order to be successful. Organizations need to provide training in order to make sure that every team member has the knowledge to make the most efficient use of resources. Presence or absence of listed features has a huge effect on teams and their performance (Hackman, 1989, pp. 11):

• Reward system • Education system • Information system • Expert coaching (Wageman, Hackman & Lehman, 2005, pp. 378)

6.1 Reward system Organizations can influence the cooperation and conflict by having an effective reward system (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 91). A reward system has to be placed in the way that it rewards cooperation between team members (team based rewards) and individual performance. Awarding only the individual work can cause avoidance of cooperation and conflicts inside the team. Rewarding only teamwork causes that high-performers might withdraw their effort because their individual achievements are not recognized enough, and social loafing might occur (Heneman & Von Hippel, 1995, pp. 63). Reward allocation only on a team basis may encourage social loafing (Shepperd, 1995, pp. 75). Organization has to measure the performance in order to understand if team is providing satisfying results or not; every organization has to develop efficient appraisal and assessment systems, provide feedback and reward desired behaviors (Yeatts & Hyten,, 1998, pp. 123). Molleman and Timmerman (2003, pp. 93-113) have designed a performance management system based on performance indicators, innovation and the creation of knowledge. One of the team’s criteria for success is also growth of the members in sense of gaining knowledge from other members (Hackman, 2002, pp. 7). Creative work is more non-routine and a higher level of interdependency among workers is needed in order to find new ways to resolve

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problems. When learning and innovation are performance indicators, performance becomes much more a team issue than individual issue. And that is why performance management system has to be tightly connected to learning and innovation; being successful at non-routine and very interdependent tasks. Their model pays attention to processes, behaviors, attitudes and personal growth. It understands the critical presence of regular and ongoing feedback. This is a cyclical system that is composed of four stages: accountability, engagement, appraisal and reward. First goals are set. Secondly, engagement is reached through satisfying work more often than monetary rewards. Thirdly, feedback is provided in the appraisal stage. The final step is reward.

6.2 Education system Because self-directed teams do not have a direct supervision and are managing themselves, they have to examine data of their performance. Therefore a valid and comprehensive performance measurement system has to be established in the organization, and the team needs to have access to the data in order to understand their performance (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 136). Empowerment is a great advantage, but it can cause a lot of trouble when employees do not receive a proper training. Training needs to be regular, continuous, new skills have to be thought such as negotiating performance plans, decision making, conflict resolution, leadership, budgeting, and a technical expertise in several jobs. Teams need to know how to make decisions, how to solve conflicts and set team goals as well as how to self monitor and take responsibility for leading themselves (Randolph, 1995, pp. 29). Team members learn and grow also through feedback from their peers. Yeatts and Hyten (1998, pp. 138 – 141) suggest some characteristics of good feedback:

• Feedback has to be relevant to the team tasks • Feedback has to be easily understood • Feedback has to be updated as frequently as possible • Feedback has to be easily accessible by the team • Feedback has to be designed to still support the empowerment (not control)

The team that reviews its performance weekly as a part of regular meetings is going to be more successful. Members have to discuss the improvement and suggest new ideas, problem-solving activities has to take place before major damage is made. Again, in order to track the progress, goals have to be really clear.

6.3 Information system Communication inside the team, and between the team and company environment can also be interrupted when company does not provide enough communication devices (telephones, etc).

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Therefore company has to ensure the right information system to enable communication inside and outside the team (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 83). Furthermore, if communication system conveys distorted or inaccurate information, it can reduce the level of trust among team members (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 104). There are some differences noticed in the frequency of communication connected to expertise and years of doing the specific task. People who have more knowledge are more likely to communicate more and listen better, and people who have done the exact job for a few years are likely not going to communicate a lot (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 86). Organizations can provide communication training to help their employees actively listen and communicate (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 83).

6.4 Expert coaching Thompson (2007, pp. 20) defined that expert learning is when we are making sure that members do not make the same mistake again. Members should learn from their own experience. This is why mistakes should be allowed to be made. Coaching cannot correct badly chosen team design, but coaches can help teams to get the best performance according to the circumstances (Hackman & Wageman, 2005, pp. 279). Coaches can help in three different areas (Wageman, Hackman & Lehman, 2005, pp. 378):

• Effort – they help members to minimize coordination and motivation problems and to build commitment to the group and its task.

• Performance strategy – they help members to avoid sticking to unsuccessful routines

that may be inappropriate for their task or situation, and to develop innovative work procedures that fit well to task requirements.

• Knowledge and skill – they help members to avoid inappropriate assessing of

individual contributions and to share their strengths.

6.5 Corporate culture Corporate culture is the personality of the company (Sherriton & Stern, 1997, pp. 23). Sherriton and Stern (1997, pp. 27) believe that culture starts with the norms of the team and builds up through management environment (procedures in place), management philosophy and beliefs and values shared by all members of the organization. Culture is hard to change and it must support the way things get done. Companies need to provide environment which will support teams (Sherriton & Stern, 1997, pp. 35). The level of the team's autonomy should be aligned with the organizational culture (Tata, 2000, pp. 192). In other words, teams with high levels of autonomy are the most effective in companies with flexibility-oriented culture and structure (Tata, 2000, pp. 187).

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There are some things that can be changed in organizational culture in order to provide a good environment for the self – delegating teams (Sherriton & Stern, 1997, pp. 56-58):

• Hierarchy needs to flatten, boundaries between management and workers need to be reduced and status has to be a result of expertise on the certain problem and skills across the boundaries. Decision-making has to be decentralized.

• Fragmentation such as departments, divisions have to collaborate and have willingness to share information and resources.

• In the past independence and autonomy was encouraged. The real team work has to be interdependent while striving to reach the goal. Companies need to know which tasks can be efficiently done by individuals and which by the team work. Appropriate reward system needs to support this strategy.

• Cooperation is sharing information, resources, and recognition for a well done job. Organizations need to make sure that teams do not become solitary units fighting the rest of the organization for resources. Team culture needs to support internal and external cooperation.

• Organizations need to allow risk taking- they have to allow for learning new things, making mistakes and learning from them. New, creative solutions have to be encouraged.

7 RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY The intent of this chapter is to describe the purpose of the study, methodology, profile of the participating team, and team dynamics during the research. The purpose of the study was to explore the following research questions: What challenges will a newly formed and inexperienced self-directed team face, when the team composition is flawless (good size, diversity and skill sets) and the team has a supportive environment (available expert coaching)? Two subsidiary questions emerged from the primary research question:

1. How can those challenges be solved or prevented?

2. How can we manage an inexperienced self-directing team to get the team into the high-performing state?

The primary research question was investigated through the observation and peer evaluation; the first subsidiary question was addressed through secondary research, the second subsidiary question was addressed with the interview and secondary research.

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The main premise is: Inexperienced self-directing work team will face autonomy related challenges at the early beginning of familiarization with the new work structure, which will affect their performance. There is no evidence of how a new team structure and a changed level of empowerment can effect team performance and how experience influence the future performance of the team. My assessment is that team members, who had previous experience of working in a self-directing structure and this level of empowerment, will face fewer challenges than teams which have no experience. Therefore their overall performance will be better. Is it important that team has relevant experience according to the exact structure within which we want them to perform; because there might be some negative transfer of previous experiences in the different structure. For example, the team who used to work in very manager-led structure will feel overwhelmed by too much authority in the self-directing structure and will need much more time to deal with challenges than an experienced team who had worked in the same structure before. In models of factors which influence the performance we cannot find that experience of working in the same team structure affects the performance. But indirectly authors mention expert coaching, learning, knowledge, feedback, education. All of these help team members to familiarize with the new structure and develop practices that work better and better and consequently improve their performance. Methodology: Method used was an observation in setting. Observation lasted from the moment when the team was designed, to the completion of the project, which lasted three months. I participated in every team meeting and I had access to all meeting communication of the team through electronic mail. The criteria for assessing the data from observation was Lencioni's pyramid (2003, pp.40). According to Lencioni (2003, pp. 40) there can be five dysfunctions of the team.

1. Absence of trust – Are team members honest and respectful? 2. Fear of conflict - Did team members deal with the conflict? 3. Lack of commitment - How committed were team members? 4. Avoidance of accountability - How many excuses were there? 5. Inattention to results - Did the team reach the desired goal?

Peer evaluation was also used to check the situation of observed characteristics and to address two criteria of effectiveness (O’Grady, 2008): satisfaction with the outcome and satisfaction with interpersonal relationships (O’Grady, 2008; Hackman, 2002, pp. 7). The third assessment would be comparison of the team’s mark on a project to the average mark of the class as comparison to the standards (Hackman, 1990, pp. 6; O’Grady, 2008). Unfortunately, the team tailored the results of their report and presentation. Their performance was assessed only

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according to the report and presentation, so the comparison would not give credible results.

8. RESULTS

8.1. Team description The team had five members, three females and two males. All team members had the same educational background of the commerce program. Their age ranged from 20 to 23. They were from three different nationalities: two members were from North America and two from Europe. Their areas of free time interests were much dispersed and did not overlap. They received in class learning about team basics: trust, conflict, commitment, accountability and focus on results. They also received short guidelines about how norms, goals and mission should look like. When they were put together in a team, they did a fifteen minute “get to know each other” exercise, which helped the team to get familiar with their team member’s background. They got accurate information and expectations from the professor. Their task was a real-life project for the leadership class and they were graded as follows: the project was worth 35 % of the final mark; 30% was based on the team assessment of presentation and final report, and 5 % was based on individual performance assessed by the peer evaluation. The team was formed by the professor. The professor had an individual meeting with every single member in order to get to know all individuals. They were matched without their awareness based on gender, and nationalities to create a diverse team. They have never worked together before. Furthermore, they did not even have any social contact before the research. Teams did not have to deal with the team design, which was the most optimally chosen by the professor. The only directive provided by the professor was to make a positive change in the local community and to present the project finished or not finished in the class at the end of the semester, which was in three months. Team had all characteristics of a real self-directing team. Members had autonomy to decide what project they are going to do, how they are going to do it, and when. They had to set their own norms, goals and mission, and agreed on all team and interpersonal processes. They had the power of selecting their own ends and means. The team was inexperienced working in a self-directing structure. Individuals were used to being delegated about what to do and sometimes even how to do it. There was no formal leader.

8.2 Chronological development of the team I have split the team dynamics into the eight most critical steps. Below, they are described in a

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chronological order.

8.2.1 Getting started

The team set following norms, goals and mission by itself on their first meeting: Written norms set by the team:

All meetings start on time and occur on a regular basis. Meetings should be productive and be ~1.5h. Members come prepared for meetings. All members need to be present when important decisions are made. No face book or email during meetings. Meetings will follow an agenda. Everyone contributes. Members respect one another. Everyone listens to one another. Set goals and timelines. Set early deadlines in case there are unanticipated delays. Everyone is aware of deadlines and will keep them. Announce travel plans early. Responsibility and accountability for actions. End each meeting with an overview of everyone’s responsibilities and prepare an

agenda for the next meeting. Reply to emails within 24 h.

Written goals set by the team:

To make all important decisions by consensus. Equally participate to planning and execution of the project. To insure all team members build personal relationship among each other during entire

project. To promote personal growth and development. To achieve a minimum mark of 100%. To raise a minimum of $1 500.

Written mission set by the team:

To learn and develop with the team while successfully strengthen the relationship between university students and local community, and at the same time helping individuals to improve the quality of their lives. The problem was because norms, goals ant the mission statement were set at their first meeting and they have never changed any of it. Even when they started a new project, their goal was still to collect $1.500, what was the specific goal for their first project.

The team faced some difficulties with choosing the project. They selected one, but never started to work on it. After the first week members were struggling to find a suitable project.

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It seemed like too much authority was their biggest burden at the beginning, and decision-making process was really poorly handled. They also had serious trouble with a meeting attendance. Members did not notify other members in advance. The influence of two members who have been missing the meetings was very high because of their previous very good reputation among other students in general. Other three members have lost a great deal of trust just at the early beginning. Their suggested solution was to confront those two members and if that will not work, to ask the professor to facilitate. The team had a lack of self-confidence, trust and commitment. No one actually liked the first project. The team did not build trust, did not face conflicts (everyone agreed on the project that they actually did not like), there was no commitment, huge avoidance of accountability (three of five team members said: “I did not want to do this project anyway!”), no results were discussed. The team held very unproductive meetings. Nobody really wanted to take any responsibility. It seemed like other members were almost relieved when a member did not show up nor did a task which would enable them to move forward. Excuses such as: “We cannot do that, if he did not call that person…” meetings were without agenda and got sidetracked over and over again. It often happened that a few meetings went by before a single decision was made. They did not respect goals and no changes were made to norms when they changed the project. Norms were not taken seriously. The team thought it was just the list that needs to be put together for the professor. They tried to think what he wants them to write down and what sounds nice. They were not set as a guidelines and nobody felt engaged. The team had serious trouble with deciding on goals, processes and they skipped the step of putting together a good foundation of norms.

8.2.2 Pointless meetings

Lack of trust was huge in the first month. When some members did not confirm their attendance at the meeting by e-mail, other members were often asking themselves: “Will they show up?”

When choosing a project, members kept avoiding responsibility: “That will never work. That takes too much time. We do not have that much time.”

Nobody came prepared for the meetings. After one hour of brainstorming, the team left the meeting without any useful idea. There was no agenda and no minutes were taken.

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The only surprising thing that happened was when a team member confronted members who were not attending on a regular basis. She spoke out how she feels uncomfortable because people just do not show up and how she feels that they need to communicate more and how everyone should attend. Some promises were made and later on broken, which further destroyed the possibility of evolving trust among members.

Norms were still not respected and the team has slowly started to form implicit or silent norms, which were very counterproductive. One of them was: “It is okay if you do not show up for the meeting and if you do not answer any emails?”

8.2.3 Making a first decision after a month and a half

After a month and a half of not being able to make a decision, the team finally discovered that members should come prepared for their meeting. Meetings were still without an agenda, and very unproductive. The team’s mentality was: “We are probably the worse team ever.” Lack of self-esteem and trust was visible in the communication. Members who felt they were in the minority addressed their thoughts very carefully. “I am not willing to commit,” said at least two members. But this idea was repeated over and over again when the first member tried to express himself and his indifference towards the project. Sucker aversion quickly took place. The “agreement” was pushed exactly by that member who was the least willing to commit. Nobody confronted the decision and the project was chosen by the criteria: what takes the least time and effort and shows some decent results. Member’s enthusiasm and commitment were appropriate to that. Roles were finally assigned and the workload was distributed equally. The project was changed, but no new goals were set and no timeline was formed. Team still did not set clear goals and roles.

8.2.4 Getting down to work

Team did not have a physical space to hold a meeting; no one booked a room. Preparation for the meeting was poor again, and the meeting went on without an agenda. The team set a meeting with the professor, without knowing what they wanted to talk about. The team had problems with planning; they were making decisions without covering the basics. Meetings were a big confusion, as there were no timelines. No clear roles and responsibilities, no meeting structure, no agreement on processes. Meetings were not productive; members were jumping from one topic to another without making any conclusions or solving any problems.

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Confusion was also with roles: “Who is doing this?” And by the e-mail: “Can everyone please make ANY sort of poster promoting the book drive and/or exchange, print off 30 copies, and put them up around TOMORROW.” Sometimes members were so confused about the roles and they also did not trust each other, that task was done by two people. They had two advertising Facebook groups instead of one, three types of posters and two types of book markers. The professor suggested that the team conduct a survey; the team did a small survey and tailored the results. Survey showed there is no need for their project. “The project was easy and not time consuming, so we are going to do it anyway,” pointed out the least committed member who was pushing all the ideas. Without a plan and clear roles, no one took the responsibility. They were often making things in vain:” Maybe we should tailor the flyers to be just a generic 'book swap' so that something happens and is 'successful' whether we get permission from the Commerce Office (in time) or not?? I don't want to advertise something that can't happen.” This is an example of how they were preparing for advertising before they even got the permission, it is hard to follow small and organized step if you have not decided on them yet. The team had major problems discovering the method to get to their goal, and their goal was not set clearly. The team was dealing with problems when they became unavoidable, and all the thing were falling apart. Because overall commitment was so low, eventually nobody cared if a member did a good or poor job, no one was held accountable. Norms established were permitting skipping a meeting and shutting off the phone when you were supposed to deliver a result. No conflicts emerged. No conflicts were resolved. Members probably felt like they are not committed and they are not contributing, so it does not matter if everyone did the same thing. A few times questions as: “What do we do next? Is this the end of the project?” popped up every time when they faced an obstacle. And they went on unanswered. Communication got even worse and effected coordination. One member was supposed to pick up the books, she did not: “Hi, I haven't heard form Ann today, nor Mark. I am afraid we should do it another day. Please get back to me ASAP”. Library staff waited for them. A person, who should get the permission to put the bookshelf in the room, just did not respond to any calls, emails. Overall members were angry and confused: “In the future... emails cannot be exchanged at 5pm for a 6pm meeting... I think a phone call would be a better means of communication... and we could have made a much better decision ... as now we have broken a promise to Kingston public libraries to pick up the books... which isn't really cool considering they have been nothing but generous to us... Someone please explain what we are to do now? Am I still making a portal post for Monday? How about booking a table..?” This led so far that at the end nobody was doing anything because they were not able to rely on their team mates anyway, so why bother.

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Disorganized not clearly defined processes and interdependency that go hand in hand do not turn out well.

8.2.5 New norms

Canceling attendance before the meeting and being late for twenty minutes went away without sanctions from other team members. Doing nothing at all and canceling things at the last moment was happening all the time. Still meetings went on without an agenda, no clear goal or roles were set. Mistakes made in past in the process were still going on and nobody noticed because there were no reviews. Members were not passionate, engaged, or committed. The easiest way out was still the common norm of all members.

Members literally asking for feedback of other members do not receive any answer.

8.2.6 First breakthrough

After two months the team still operated without any timelines, clear roles, goals or processes and meetings were still held without an agenda. That caused the team coming back to the problems that were already addressed but never solved. And those problems were growing. They were stopping at irrelevant points without having basic things solved.

Commitment can be shown with this sentence: “I don't give a shit what will happen after we get a grade.”

But the team finally discovers that they have no goal:” What is our goal? What is this project about? Should we change it?” Doubts about the idea came up again; members discovered that nobody is actually committed.

The team for the first time started to write down assigned tasks, roles and setting timelines. First time accountability is clearly set. Even agenda for the next meeting was set. For the first time they actually talked about how things are not working for them and they even showed an attempt of making their performance better.

They discovered how their communication is inefficient. Believing more frequent meetings can solve that, they set a few additional meetings.

No one thought about the norms, they were violated even at this meeting, one person was not attending and the cell phone was used by other two members.

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Members after the meeting confessed they feel much better about their project and the team. And they clearly expressed willingness to commit more.

8.2.7 Everything went back to “normal”

The first meeting after the meeting where some attempt to set things right everything went back to “normal.” Not a single member showed up on time. Two members did not attend at all, one sent a brief message a few minutes before the meeting and other member did not make any effort to communicate to others. Other three members came with assigned tasks done. They did not use the agenda set on the previous meeting and had no idea what to do:” So, did anyone do anything? Oh, yes, when do we want to meet next time to discuss everything?” Decisions were postponed again and the meeting lasted for five minutes.

8.2.8 Project is done

The project itself was very simple and it was done with two weeks delay. This was the last meeting to discuss results and prepare report. No one showed up on time. When members started to enter the room, they were asking themselves:” Did anyone sent an email to confirm?” One member came prepared and has done a lot of work for presentation. Other members were surprised and impressed. That member actually ignored all long talks how something will be done, and took action.

This meeting had no agenda again: “What are we doing?” The team was discussing results and they devoted the most of their time discussing how they can adapt their report to please the professor. The meeting already lasted for 40 minutes before anything was resolved. The team was occupied with booking a room for next meeting, without knowing what that meeting will be for. This was their usual way to postpone the decisions and work.

One of their key comments about their work together:” It is hard because people didn't really like the project and commit.” And: “If one person could not do it everything stopped.”

To look at the goals and norms after three months of team functioning together: Goals:

To make all important decisions by consensus Equally participate to planning and execution of the project To insure all team members build personal relationship among each other during entire

project To promote personal growth and development To achieve a minimum mark of 100% To raise a minimum of $1 500

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Norms: All meetings start on time and occur on a regular basis. Meetings should be productive and be ~1.5h. Members come prepared for meetings. All member need to be present when important decisions are made. No Face book or email during meetings. Meetings will follow an agenda. Everyone contributes. Members respect one another. Everyone listens to one another. Set goals and timelines. Set early deadlines in case there are unanticipated delays. Everyone is aware of deadlines and will keep them. Announce travel plans early. Responsibility and accountability for actions. End each meeting with an overview of everyone’s responsibilities and prepare an

agenda for the next meeting. Reply to emails within 24 h.

Goals achieved: NONE Norms respected or reorganized: ONE

9 DISCUSSION

9.1 Primary research question and first subsidiary question The primary research question was: What challenges will a newly formed and inexperienced real self-directed team face, when the team composition is flawless (ideal size, diversity and skill sets) and the team has a supportive environment? First subsidiary questions: How can those challenges be solved or prevented? Below are my findings on primary research question, combined with the answer to the first subsidiary research question.

9.1.1 Influencing commitment

Challenge: Early at the beginning a single team member told the team how he is not willing to commit, performance of the team went down. After a while other members were saying the same thing and acting the same way. Symptoms:

• Low commitment can result in putting more energy into concerns than executing the work (Becker-Reems, 1994, pp. 69).

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• One low committed team member can start to encourage other team members not to commit and sucker aversion emerges (Thompson, 2007, pp. 33).

• All team members might start to blame each other for the failures and they do not try to seek for the solution (Tjosvold, 1986, pp. 299). There is an example statement from one of team members during the meeting: „There is no problem with the project, problems are with team members. “

Solution: Commitment can be gained through having the right goal (Hackman, 2002, pp. 207). High-performing teams have a strong commitment to the task and to the members (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, pp. 9).

9.1.2 Unclear and inappropriate goals

Challenge: Team had unclear and inappropriate goal. They struggled to define their common goal. The criterion of choosing a project was to pick something easy which gives decent results. They also failed to break the final goal down into the smaller goals. They thought there is an easy way out because no specific processes were acquired and they could set their own goal. Members believed that with a little effort and no commitment the team still can get satisfying performance. Some symptoms of badly chosen and unclear goal:

• Problems with commitment. • Because the selected project was not divided into smaller goals, team faced

coordination problems and they were not able to set clear rules about processes and roles. Goals provide the direction for team design and task distribution. Unclear goals can be the cause of work distribution confusion or inefficient workload distribution (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 247). They also can enable to hold people accountable for their tasks (Lencioni, 2003, pp. 38)

• Poor accountability. • Unclear goals can cause poor interpersonal relations. Lack of clear goal can cause that

people perceive someone’s suggestions as a way to gain personal benefits what will led to the poor trust (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 121). Poor performance and bad communication can result in having various interpersonal conflicts (Lencioni 2003, pp. 38).

Teams can make a mistake of having a one major goal and no small and measurable goals on their way to the final objective. Yeatts and Hyten (1998, pp. 121) discovered that a lack of measurable goals will lead to bad performance. The team will spend a lot of time trying to find their goals, and not on actual execution of the tasks. Not breaking the goals into small goals and not celebrating achievements can influence the commitment and team’s perception of being able to accomplish the desired task. As it happened to the observed team, their perception and prediction of their success was very pessimistic: “We are the worst team ever”. Group potency defined by the Shea and Guzzo (1987, pp. 25) is the belief of group members

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that the group can be effective in achieving their goals. The research done by Jordan, Field and Armenakis (2002, pp. 140 -143) shows how it is more important for team’s success if the team is thinking how they can do it than cohesion itself or actual ability of the team. Solution: Team has to change and clearly define the goal and break it into the smaller goals. Self-directed teams cannot be successful if they do not have clear direction. Good direction attracts team member’s commitment, orients attention and action, and engages team member’s talents. And good direction has to be challenging, clear, and consequential (Hackman, 2002, pp. 207). The team chose the “easiest” project, but they forgot that goals need to be set high enough because they will influence the commitment and effort allocation of the members (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 245). Effective goal setting can be improved by effective meetings (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, pp. 70).

9.1.3 Norms not respected

Challenge: Team failed to set relevant norms, this is why they were not respected and they were replaced by some counter-productive norms without the team even being aware of it. Ground rules have to be made and agreed on by all team members. This is the only way we can ensure the long term buy-in from all team members. Symptoms: Norms influence every process in the team. By having efficient norms, most of the challenges could be prevented. Solution: Ryner (1996, pp. 77) believes if the solid and clear set of norms is not established at the beginning, norms will develop itself with time. Those are not controlled and can be counterproductive. Team has to consciously select rules by which they want to operate. Ryner suggests that core norms has to include how meetings has to be most effectively conducted, how decisions can be most effectively made, how leadership is shared among the members, and how a constructive feedback is given inside the team. On the other hand Hackman (2002, pp. 105) suggests that norms can be formed spontaneously after time when team discovers what works the best. But he also gives a warning that this option should be reconsidered, because at the beginning members tend to focus more on interpersonal relationships and avoid conflicts. In any case, when norms are established on purpose or not, they are really hard to change (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 60) that is why I believe no team should leave norm formation to the coincidence. Decision supported by every team members will engage everyone more than decision made by one person. The same thing is with norms. Norms supported by every team member will engage everyone. If decision is accepted and one team members does not like it, the team members should inform group from the beginning if there were other options. Openness of

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one member will foster openness of other members and decision made will be respected by every individual (MacKenzie, 1979, pp. 49).

9.1.4 Procrastinating with decision

Challenge: The team has been caught in a circle of continuous debates without actions being set or taken. Also a lot of time was spent on endless debates and members were not able to see the relevant information or they were avoiding taking any further steps into implementation of the project. Symptoms:

• No decisions made. Some teams avoid making the decision, until is too late (Ryner, 1996, pp. 109). Often the consequences of not making the decision are worse than making any decision.

• No actions taken: avoidance of accountability and avoidance of responsibility “We are still waiting for…” or “It is too late/ too time consuming to do it anyway,” those and similar statements prove that members are avoiding responsibility.

• Lack of commitment. • Motivational drop. • No trust. • Closed communication; common information effect, and having a dysfunctional

decision-making climate. • Unclear decision –making process.

Solution: It is hard to make decision, when the primary goal is very unclear and inappropriate. Some avoidance of making decisions or taking actions is a consequence of not having a compelling, energizing and clear direction, which would engage members and make them more interested to achieve it (Hackman, 2002, pp. 207). This challenge is also lot about the lack of trust among team members. Strong norms can help foster the trust by ensuring that members, who volunteer for a certain task, will also provide results. Norms shape accepted and unaccepted behavior and those individuals, who act in a predictive way, will be trusted more. People trust others based on assumptions that these others will behave in a certain way (Mayer, Davis, & Schoorman, 1995, pp.714).” Team members did not trust that other members will do their part of the task, that is why they avoided taking any responsibility and they were not accountable. Social loafing and sucker aversion were present in the team. Those would occur very rarely when members believe that other members will do their assigned tasks (Robbins, 1995, pp. 341). In order to contribute, team members have to have a clear idea what is their role and what are the expectations of other members. Having an action plan, what, when, whom and resources needed, can help members keep accountable (Ryner, 1996, pp. 156). On the other hand sometimes members are afraid to take responsibility, because they can fail the team. Team

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members should establish a culture, where mistakes are allowed to be made and taking more responsibility can also be encouraged by a good incentive system in the organization (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, pp. 13). MacKenzie (1979, pp. 49) suggests that consensus should be used for reaching the decision as well as clear procedures of decision making process should be known an accepted by everyone in the team. Decision making process has to be efficient. Starting with brainstorming and discussion, narrowing down to the solution reached by a consensus (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, pp. 70). Decisions reached by consensus have in general support of those who helped reaching it. Those people are also willing to take more responsibility Consensus can be made if everyone is aware of the rules: no one should accept the decision he or she might not like (MacKenzie, 1979, pp. 49). Teams that fail to disagree and express their different views will revisit the same issues over and over again (Lencioni, 2003, pp. 38). That is why open communication is so important. Team that have good communication in decision-making process are far more successful than teams who have dominant members (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 69) because open communication means that more options are being discussed and more information evaluated so the team will more likely choose the best procedure (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 85).

9.1.5 Unproductive meetings

Challenge: First problem was attendance. Individuals skipped meeting many times without making any effort to communicate their absence in advance. It happened more than often that question: “So, what are we doing today?” came out at the beginning of the meeting. At one meeting only after first five minutes all attending members discovered that they do not have anything to discuss at that time. The team usually brainstormed their ideas, but no one actually came prepared, what affected meeting productivity. Sidetracked conversations were a big part of the usual meeting routine. Symptoms:

• Poor interpersonal relations (lack of trust). • Inefficient task distribution and decision-making process (lack of accountability). • Motivation and commitment are dropping.

Solution: When a team norm is powerful enough, deviant behaviors are rare in the team; such as being late for the meeting or not attending the meeting (Hackman, 2002, pp. 105). My opinion is that members did not think they will miss anything if they skip a meeting because there were so many meetings where nothing happened. Lencioni suggests (2005, pp. 10) that meetings can be perceived as unnecessary evil, if they are not properly structured. They should have made it clear what meeting was for and what was expected of every participant. Agenda has to be set in advance (Ryner, 1996, pp. 78). If the agenda is known in advance,

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team members will likely come more prepared to the meeting. Ryner (1996, pp. 78) suggests that the best way to plan the meeting is a PATIO process. Purpose, agenda, time, information and outcome should be written down to prevent the team to be sidetracked and not efficient. Poorly planned meetings will give poor results. The effectiveness of the meeting itself highly depend on the fact how well participants are going to be prepared for the meeting. Interruptions will happen in every meeting, team members have to know how to get immediately back on track in order to keep the meeting productive (Ryner, 1996, pp. 122). Some other suggestions for affective meeting from MacKenzie (1979, pp. 47): members should pay attention to real and “hidden agenda,” carefully listen and observe also non-verbal behavior. His suggestion is also to address those hidden agendas if members can spot it. If there is missing information and there are unresolved issues, team members should assign one or more people to obtain the data for the next meeting.

9.1.6 Bad performance management (confrontation of issues)

Challenge: The team was facing same problems over and over again; attendance, poor communication, unclear goal and roles, etc. Their performance was not improving. Symptoms:

• Making a mistake without learning from it. • Avoiding to give feedback because of the conflict avoidance.

Solution: Review of results has to be a regular practice in order to assure the performance. Many teams make mistakes of not going back, reviewing the tasks, methods and outcomes. Team has to make sure that they are in charge of monitoring their progress and correcting the mistakes made on their way to the goal. If they do not pay enough attention to their outcomes on their way, they can get badly sidetracked and their performance will not improve if they stick to the processes which do not work. In self-directed teams every member gives feedback. Feedback should be constructive to help correct negative behaviors, develop new capabilities and reinforce the desired actions (Ryner, 1996, pp. 112). Disruptive team members have to receive feedback, otherwise their behavior will continue in it will in a long run have a negative impact on the team effectiveness. Members have to understand that very rarely someone is destructive and difficult on the purpose. By addressing the issue, member can receive the training (if the case is lack of knowledge), or misunderstanding can be solved. Feedback should be immediate with a goal of open dialogue not a punishment (Ryner, 1996, pp. 109). Open communication is important for learning from mistakes and for building trust (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, pp. 79). Some teams avoid getting into the conflict; task related conflicts then grow into relationship conflicts (Harrison et al., 1995, pp. 25). When members avoid

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addressing issues there is impossible to make a real commitment (Lencioni, 2003, pp. 38).

9.1.7 Spending time on creating excuses

Challenge: Team was spending a lot of time trying to find out what would professor like to hear, instead of looking for ways to actually solve their issues. Symptom:

• When results have to be explained to the supervisor, teams usually devote a lot of time to finding the explanation for their supervisor. Usually they spend even more time on that than they do on actually solving their performance issues (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, pp. 70).

Solution: Having open, non judgmental communication, appropriate performance management: appraisal and reward system. Mistakes have to be allowed as a part of organizational culture (Harrington –Mackin, 1996, pp. 13).

9.1.8 Peer evaluation

Peer evaluation findings are a bit more optimistic than my observational findings. I used five point scales ranging from; 1 is rarely, 2 is sometimes, 3 is most of the time, 4 is usually and 5 is always. Questions covered all observation areas: respect, support, trust, communication, commitment, accountability satisfaction with results and satisfaction with interpersonal relationships. Trust: Range of trust was from never (1) to always (5) according to different team member; it was clear how subgroups inside the team started to form. On average team members trusted others most of the time (3). Communication: In general team believed their communication was always perfect (5). I think this result is based on their perception of having good communication. They taught a good communication is only about listening at the meeting and not interrupting other person when he speaks. I made this conclusion because in the open-ended question some members complained about the communication and not getting any response. Furthermore, when question varied and it addressed how many times team members dealt effectively with conflict, the answer was most of the time (3). Support: Team members only sometimes (2) felt supported by their team members. One individual also made a comment how members were too different to support and respect each other. Respect: It is interesting how members felt more respected but less supported by their mates. The overall felt respected most of the time (3).

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Commitment: Team members were committed most of the time (3). Accountability: Team members were accountable most of the time (3). Satisfaction with results: Half of the members were satisfied with the project outcome, but everyone believed it could be better. Interpersonal relationship satisfaction: The question was if team members would want to work with other members of the team again. It was again very noticeable how sub groups of two were formed. Every team member would change at least a half of the team. Additional comments:

• Team members addressed the poor communication issue and how e-mail communication was not working at all.

• They expressed concern with process of getting to their goal. • They expressed opinion how their different schedules affected commitment of the

members. I believe this is external attribution effect (Shmitt & Branscombe, 2002, pp. 620); where a team explains something as a force outside their control. Because this was truly a simple matter of a failed commitment.

• One team member commented on how this form of teamwork is a good way to be “pushed to achieve a goal”.

• One member raised concern how she was overly judged for missing many meetings. She felt her behavior was the same as others who completely got away. There was no discussion about her attendance at any meeting. Because conflicts were not addressed some people perceived things were worse than they actually were.

It was interesting how the two international students were ranged lower in every single characteristic. It was probably because team was not functioning together a long time and liking based on similarity was still strong. I believe team members were not completely honest in their responses. Limitations of peer evaluation and research are discussed further in chapter 9.4.

9.2 Secondary subsidiary question findings The second subsidiary question is: How can we manage an inexperienced self-directing team and get the team into high-performing state? All described challenges in the sections 8.1 affect five basic interpersonal processes in self-directed teams. In the table it is shown on which step they occur.

Table 5: Discovered challenges categorized into steps according to O’Grady model

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Steps in O'Grady model Challenges found in research Step 1

TRUST and RESPECT • Influencing commitment

Step 2 CONFLICT & COMMITMENT (Clear mission, goals and norms)

• Unclear and inappropriate goals • Norms not respected

Step 3 ACCOUNTABILITY (Leadership and organization)

• Ineffective decision-making process and procrastinating with decision

• Unproductive meetings Step 4

INATENTION TO RESULTS (Auditing/debriefing)

• Bad performance management (confrontation of issues)

Step 5 PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

• Spending time on creating excuses

As Lencioni (2006, pp. 6) discovered; if there is no trust, conflict cannot occur, without open communication team cannot set engaging goal. Furthermore, without engagement people will not want to participate and be accountable. Inattention to results happens when ego needs of individuals are put before the team’s goal. If all that happens, and there is no review to correct the performance, at the end of the project we will have a poorly performing team. Model based on Lencioni’s pyramid was developed by Professor Shawna O’Grady at the Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. The model is used also in team of MBA students. Queen’s University has currently the number one MBA program in the World outside the USA. Professor O’Grady addressed all possible problems in her model in order to help self-directed teams reach high-performing state. How this model can help with improving interpersonal relationships and changing the regular self- directing team into a high–performance tam is discussed further on.

Figure 11: O’Grady model

Step 1: Develop respect among team members (members have to be Supportive and Effective) Step 2: Align purpose (Mission, Goals, and Norms) Step 3: Clarify roles and Processes and Organization of the team

Step 4: Build in Auditing through Team Debriefing Step 5: Results tied back to the performance management system and rewards

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Synergy Success

Source: © S. O’Grady, 2008.

Step 1: Team members can respect each other when they are willing to recognize each other’s strengths. Members have to be supportive and effective; meaning that all members must put in the equal amount of effort. In my research this did not happen, that is why sucker aversion emerged. This is the step where trust is formed. Lencioni’s advice (2002, pp.16): building trust takes time. Members should be as open-minded as possible and share personal information. Step 2: All team members have to agree on suitable and clear goals, norms, and mission. This is the step where we need to have open communication that commitment can form. Lencioni’s advice (2002, pp. 16): making everyone aware that conflict is not taboo. Sometimes it is impossible for everyone to be completely satisfied with the decision. We should try to achieve the buy-in from everyone somehow. Sometimes setting timelines sometimes can help to get faster decisions and commitment, because a team is force to make immediate decision. Step 3: Team has to clearly define roles and processes that individuals can be held accountable for their tasks. Lencioni’s advice (2002, pp. 16): Peer pressure, holding each other accountable helps. Step 4: Team has to regularly review their performance. They have to review basics; norms, goals and mission and make necessary changes. When they change goal, they have to adjust also processes and assign new roles. This never happened in the team that was part of the research. Step 5: Performance management system and rewards have to support desired behaviors, give feedback and provide coaching. Lencioni’s advice (2002, pp. 16): have clear goals and reward expected behaviors. Step 6: Success! Steps from one to five are enabling all five characteristics to help the team succeed. When following those steps a team will face a lot less challenges. Self-directing structure can provide great results, but we must not forget that inexperienced self-directing teams do need some non- delegating guiding.

9.3 Premise and autonomy- related challenges Premise developed from the primary research question was that inexperienced self-directing work team will face autonomy related challenges at the early beginning of familiarization with the new work structure, which will affect their performance.

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My definition of inexperienced work teams takes into consideration the structure of the team and the amount of the autonomy that the structure has. I define inexperienced work team as a team who can have previous team experience, but has no experience with working in a new structure, in my research that is a self-directing structure. There are not many authors who would directly discuss how previous teamwork experience can help to improve team’s performance. Experiences with the teamwork are not directly part of any model who describes performance related factors. Indirectly all authors emphasize the importance of feedback, learning, interpersonal skills and coordination skills, and expert coaching. Researchers frequently use the terms autonomy and empowerment interchangeably. Both refer to the concept of giving teams increased opportunity to decide on their own courses of action (Stewart, 2006, pp. 34) During my research observation I have discovered many characteristics which support the premise. Inexperienced self-directed work team was overwhelmed by the “freedom” and had difficulties deciding on their goals, norms, roles and processes. The team tried to find the easiest way to satisfying results. By trying to do this, some fatal errors were made and their performance was poor. The performance of the team did not reach a high-performing level. According to Thompson’s (2007, pp. 39):

• Members did not grow personally, there was no knowledge transfer. • Cohesion was very low (according to the peer evaluation every team member would

change at least half of members in the team). • I could not evaluate the project mark, because the assessment criterion was not

credible. • No integration was necessary.

9.3.1 Can a self-directed team have too much authority?

Challenges in the team related to having too much autonomy: In my research the team failed to set clear goals, roles and processes. They also failed to set the right timelines and allocate resources. Solution: Ryner (1996, pp. 30) thinks that some constraints or boundaries that should be pointed out when self-directed team with no experience is formed: timeline (specify constraints), resources (specify maximum of available resources), equipment, authority (what is team’s responsibility), philosophy (management principles under which team must work), budget, location/physical space, safety, and legal/legislative constraints.

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Harrington-Mackin (1996, pp. 9) claims team needs to know what empowerment is and what is not. Empowerment is not having freedom whenever you want; giving people tasks you do not want to do, disregarding organizational policies, ignoring commitments, and avoiding accountability. Ryner (1996, pp. 30) mentions the term team maturity gauge; it assesses experiences of the team and the team’s capability of working as a self-directed unit. He believes the certain abilities need to be demonstrated by the team such as; knowing the relevance of the information and making the decision based on that, recognition how their actions influence the whole organization environment, understanding and willingness to fully meet customer needs, capability to identify and solve the problem, capability to improve with time and give constructive feedback to other team members, and willingness of the full engagement of the entire team. To assure the good start of the team, supervisor should not control the team, but adjust its boundaries in order to fit the team’s maturity.

Figure 12: Difference between setting boundaries and controlling

Source: Ryner, Team traps, 1996, pp. 33.

In my opinion an inexperienced self-directed team can have too much authority. It was hard for members to switch from a delegating structure to the structure where you are responsible for everything. Autonomy is not only freedom; it is also a lot of responsibility. Empowerment can be misunderstood or abused; employees with poor decision-making

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process and lack of judgment can make very bad decisions (Elmuti, 1997, pp. 235-236). Even bigger problem is when employees have trouble seeing limits of their autonomy (Sirkin, 1993, pp. 58). We can use boundaries and slowly start to add more responsibilities so individuals can get used to it, we also can manage the process with providing enough coaching. It is very dangerous to give an inexperienced team as much power as they need and move away. Like in the research, team faced some challenges which conveyed into interpersonal conflicts. After that, it is very hard to overcome the loss of trust. On the other hand we have to be careful not to suppress the engagement and creativity if boundaries are too strict. The research by Bacon, Stewart and Silver (1999, pp. 481) showed that goals and processes need to be clearly introduced to get the team to high-performance. They believe that the hardest part is to set goals and processes which are not too narrow to suffocate creativity and not to broad to cause confusion. Like in the table below, we cannot have high-performing team if we control it. It might be stressful and unproductive in the short term, but as soon as team members learn how to deal with it, there can be some great results (Hirschhorn, 1991, pp. 96).

Table 6: Risks and gains of having or not having a control over the team Risks Gains Learner role “Egg on your face” in the short

run Accurate information Improved performance

Control Role Less ability to improve performance

Feel in control in the short run

Source: Hirschhorn & Addison-Wesley, Managing in the new team environment, 1991, pp. 97.

Ongoing coaching is necessary (Wageman, Hackman & Lehman, 2005, pp. 378), but the team has to get extended training even before it starts to function. My guess is that the researched team might have set irrelevant norms because there were some examples shown in the class, but nobody actually understood the purpose of the norms. They were perceived as “something we need to hand in to the professor and we can forget about it”, not as a helping framework for work and interpersonal processes. When the concept of norms is introduced to the inexperienced self-directing team, we have to make sure that members clearly understand the purpose of norms and see them as a helpful tool which can be very destructive when wrongly managed. The team was not used to having a broadly defined direction and not a specific goal. That is why it took them quite a lot of time to figure it out, and they still failed to do it properly. By having a good feedback system and by reviewing results, team would have made some

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changes. That is why team also has to receive more training on goal setting and performance management. The same goes to all other processes including decision-making, and having more productive meetings. Members can learn from their mistakes and get more experienced, they just need to know what tools to use to look back at their results and what to look at. The researched team was trying to make some attempts to improve the situation, but they were not sure what is wrong. They set new agenda, they defined roles, but they did not revisit the norms. Nothing functioned. Frustration was even bigger. A lot of teams who were in the same class were saying at the end of the project how they finally understand it. They never took time to review what was going on until they had to write a report. At that point everything became clear. That is why I believe that an inexperienced self-directed team makes a lot more mistakes than an experienced self-directed team. I doubt that any of teams would consciously do the same mistake again. Their performance would improve because they would be able to focus more on tasks than solving unmanageable interpersonal problems. They would also know what to change if they spot a certain symptom, so that would not grow into a big problem. The same discovery was made by the Watson, Kumar and Michaelsen (1993, pp. 599). They were comparing the performance of homogeneous and diverse teams over the time and fond that both groups experienced process and performance improvements during the course of the study. They got clear evidence that the performance characteristics of newly formed groups are unquestionably different from those of longer-term groups. Researching the effect of experience was not their primary study intention, but they strongly suggested that some researches should be made. To conclude, implementation of empowered team structure and development into high-performing unit takes time, training, communication and a lot of hard work and support (Elmuti, 1997, pp. 238). In any case, some in depth research should be conducted in order to discover whether experience of working in the certain team structure help to improve the team performance.

9.4 Limitations of the study There are some limitations of this research. Only one team of five people was examined; the sample is too small to generalize. There was no control team to compare efficiency according to dealing with autonomy challenges among inexperienced and experienced team. Peer evaluation results might be biased. My thesis co-mentor was the team’s professors and I think the team did not perceive the questionnaire as anonymous. Questions that I used were mostly close-ended. When assessing peer evaluations it came clear that open-ended questions

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would be much more rewarding, since team members were more than willing to “complain” about their issues. They were writing comments next to close-ended questions. I also discovered that most of them did not have an idea what good communication is, how support looks like and did not understand several other characteristics. I should have used operational definitions to assure members would really understand what I was trying to measure. Scale used in the questionnaire had five points, this might have caused result tendency towards the middle. There was no real organizational context, examined team members were students and not employees. Research lasted a short period of time, and it is hard to get a real high-performing team in three months. Finally, research is based on internal self-perception and it was not validated by any outside source.

CONCLUSION My research shows many possible challenges that teams face while trying to function or trying to become a high- performing team. Even if the team composition is optimal and team has a supportive environment, things can still go wrong when it comes to processes inside the team and interpersonal relations. Both affect the team performance and have many devastating side effects. The observed team had trouble with trust, managing conflict, commitment, developing accountability and they do not pay enough attention to results. All this characteristics which are mandatory in order to reach a high – performing state, are a part of Lencioni’s pyramid. They are also a part of O’Grady model, which clearly shows how we need to manage them and how we can manage them in order to establish a successful team. Challenges as trouble with disrespect, having unclear goals and norms, having ineffective decision – making process and unproductive meeting, being unable to have efficient and beneficial performance management system and spending time on creating excuses, are only few challenges that teams face. All of them are preventable and manageable. Research findings showed a possibility for a new hypothesis, which could be tested in the future research. Team members, who are inexperienced working in a team structure which offers a significant level of autonomy, face challenges related to overwhelming feeling of freedom. The research findings supported my premise that inexperienced teams will face autonomy – related challenges, which will overall have a negative impact on the team’s performance. Empowerment is crucial and it is mandatory if we want to create a team structure which can reach a high – performance. That is why further research on the correlation between teamwork experience and the team performance should be conducted. We need to get a better insight into what actions should be taken in order to make the transition from manager- led team to self- directing teams smoothly and efficiently, what would benefit both, organizations and teams.

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POVZETEK V SLOVENSKEM JEZIKU V svojem diplomskem delu sem poskušala ugotoviti, s kakšnimi težavami se pri svojem delovanju srečujejo samovodeni timi. Predlagala sem nekaj rešitev za težave, ki sem jih identificirala v trimesečnem opazovanju tima in ugotovila, kolikšno vlogo pri uspešnosti tima igrajo predhodne izkušnje članov tima z delom v določeni timski strukturi, glede na količino avtoritete, s katero člani tima lahko razpolagajo. Razlika med skupino in timom je v tem, da gre pri timskem delu za več sodelovanja in več soodvisnosti med člani tima. Da pa bi dosegli visoko uspešnost tima, je potrebno iti še korak dlje, in sicer imajo v tem tipu tima, ki dosega najvišje možne rezultate, ponavadi člani tima več avtoritete in svobode kot v običajnih timih (Pearce & Ravlin, 1987, str. 757). Veliko svobode pri odločanju predstavlja veliko možnost za presežke, lahko pa tudi velike težave, če tim ni pravilno usposobljen. Tim naj bi bil uspešen pri svojem delovanju, če zadosti štirim dimenzijam. Tri izmed njih je definiral Hackman (1989, str. 7). Prvič: rezultat delovanja mora zadostiti določenim stinardom kvalitete, kvantitete ali časa, ki ga zahteva tisti komur je rezultat namenjen. Drugič: člani tima postajajo z delom v timu bolj in bolj povezani. Tretjič: člani tima napredujejo, osebnostno rastejo in se učijo od ostalih članov tima. Četrto dimenzijo je definiral Thompson (2007, str. 41), in sicer pravi, da je pomembno tudi to, kako tim sobiva z organizacijo, v kateri deluje. Obstaja več modelov, ki navajajo dejavnike, ki vplivajo na uspešnost delovanja timov. Thompson (2007, str. 23-25) je mnenja, da na uspešnost vplivajo: sama organizacija, v kateri tim deluje, kompozicija tima in pa kultura tima. Hackman (2002, str. 206) pravi, da je za uspešno delovanje tima najbolj pomembno to, da ima tim skupen cilj, ki je privlačen za vse člane tima, hkrati pa mora biti tim sestavljen tako, da je sploh sposoben doseči zastavljeni cilj. Tim mora imeti podporo celotne organizacije v smislu, da organizacija nudi izobraževanje, dober informacijski sistem in dober sistem nagrajevanja. Katzenbach in Smith (1993, str. 9) sta mnenja, da morajo člani tima imeti določene sposobnosti, morajo biti odgovorni in predani

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skupnemu cilju, da lahko dosežejo uspešno delovanje. Yeatts in Hyten (1998, str. 25- 46) sta naredila precej kompleksen model, ki je povzetek večih obstoječih modelov in zajela veliko število dejavnikov. Najbolj sta poudarila, da na uspešnost tima vplivajo djavniki, o katerih je govoril že Hackman pa tudi sami odnosi med člani znotraj tima. Največ pozornosti sem posvetila modelu Lencionija (2003, str. 35 – 40), ki se osredotoča na mehki del medčloveških odnosov znotraj tima. Pravi, da visoko uspešen tim nastane, ko gredo člani skozi pet stopenj piramide, pri kateri naslednja stopnja ne more biti uresničena, če ni tista pred njo. Člani tima morajo najprej zgraditi zaupanje, nato morajo imeti dovolj odprto komunikacijo, da sproti rešujejo morebitne konflikte. Ko pridejo tako daleč, se pojavi prava predanost skupnemu cilju, člani pa postanejo vse bolj pripravljeni prevzeti odgovornost in delujejo v skupno dobro, egoistični cilji se podredijo želji po uspehu tima. Oblikovanje tima Preden tim lahko začne funkcionirati kot celota, ga je potrebno sestaviti. Avtorji, med njimi tudi Thompson (2007, str. 80), pravijo, da je sprva potrebno definirati naloge, ki jih bo tim opravljal, nato pa je potrebno poiskati ljudi s karakteristikami, ki ustrezajo nalogam. Pri tem gre najbolj omeniti znanje, sposobnosti spretnosti, nekateri avtorji pa poudarjajo tudi pomen osebnostnih lastnosti (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 59). Šele nato začnemo graditi na procesih, ki se dogajajo znotraj tima.

• Znanja, izkušnje, spretnosti in sposobnosti posameznikov Po analizi naloge moramo najti ljudi, ki čim bolj ustrezajo opravljanju določene naloge. Najti je potrebno posameznike, ki imajo ujemajoča tehnična znanja za reševanje problema, ki imajo ustrezne spretnosti za reševanje problemov, pa tudi ljudi, ki s poznavanjem medosebnih odnosov znajo pravilno ravnati v primeru konfliktov, znajo sprejeti in dati kritiko in nasploh nuditi podporo ostalim članom tima (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, str. 47). Velika večina strokovnjakov se strinja, da je v timu potrebno imeti ljudi s čim bolj raznolikimi spretnostmi, znanjem in sposobnostmi, ki se med seboj dopolnjujejo. Zanimala me je tudi vloga izkušenj s timskim delom pri uspešnosti delovanja tima. Rentsch, Heffner in Duffy (1994, str. 451) so ugotovili, da več izkušenj s timskim delom pomeni tudi boljše poznavanje timskega dela, posledično pa to prinaša manj zapletov in več rezultatov pri timskem delu.

• Osebnost posameznikov Še vedno ni popolnoma jasno, kako posameznikova osebnost vpliva na uspešnost tima. Rentsch, Heffner in Duffy (1994, str. 451) pravijo, da osebe, ki nimajo občutka, kako reagirati na čustva in potrebe ostalih ljudi, timu prinašajo slabše delovne rezultate. Costa in McCrae (1995, str. 5-13) pa sta identificirala pet lastnosti, ki naj bi olajšale timsko delo: vestnost, ekstravertiranost, doslednost, odprtost za nove izkušnje in emocionalno stabilnost. Vsekakor se je potrebno zavedati, da določene osbnostne lastnosti lahko delujejo pozitivno pri

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določenih nalogah, pri drugih pa ne. Zato je potrebno poudariti, da smo vsi ljudje lahko dobri člani tima, če smo pravilno izbrani v tim glede na nalogo, ki jo tim opravlja (Mohammed & Angell, 2008, str. 651 - 677).

• Velikost tima Najprimernejši naj bi bili timi z enomestnim številom članov (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 85). Najboljše odločitve se ponavadi sprejmejo v malo večjih timih (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 94), zato tim ne sme biti premajhen. Res pa je, da je v manjših timih lažje doseči dobro komunikacijo med vsemi člani tima in posledično boljšo kohezivnost (Yeatts & Hyten , 1998, str. 101). Prav težava z oslabljeno komunikacijo v velikih timih je problem, da ponavadi pride do medosebnih konfliktov (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 260). Pride lahko tudi do pojava izogibanja odgovornosti, ko člani tima prenašajo odgovornost eden na drugega in nihče ne prispeva svojega deleža (Darley & Latane, 1968). Dokazano je namreč, da se produktivnost tima ne povečuje premosorazmerno s številom njegovih članov, ampak celo začne upadati zaradi razpršene odgovornosti, če je tim prevelik (Steiner, 1972, str. 96).

• Različnost Večja pestrost ponuja več možnosti za generiranje novih idej, pa tudi za medsebojno učenje znotraj tima (Molleman & Timmerman, 2003, str. 109). Po drugi strani pa večja medsebojna drugačnost pomeni tudi to, da imajo člani tima manj skupnega in to predstavlja nevarnost. Ker so si ljudje, ki so si manj podobni, ponavadi manj všeč, si zaradi tega tudi manj zaupajo (Glaman, Jones, & Rozelle, 1996, str. 211). Potrebno si je vzeti čas in zgraditi temelje, da vsi člani tima vedo, kašna so pravila igre in kakšna so pričakovanja (Davison, 1994, str. 85). Ko se enkrat zavedamo tega, je le še potrebno najti pravilno stopnjo pestrosti v timu, da so si vsi posamezniki dovolj podobni, da radi sodelujejo in hkrati dovolj različni, da se lahko drug od drugega učijo. Procesi v timu Procese v timu sem razdelila na medsebojne procese in na delovne procese (postavljanje skupnih ciljev, dogovarjanje o načinu dela in postavljanje norm):

• Postavljanje skupnih ciljev Dober skupni cilj mora članom tima predstavljati izziv, ki jih bo motiviral, mora biti jasen in razdeljen v manjše cilje, ki si morajo logično slediti (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 245). Ti manjši cilji morajo biti merljivi, da lahko tim oceni svojo uspešnost in tudi pravočasno ukrepa, če ne zadosti pričakovanjem (Hirschhorn, 1991, str. 18).

• Dogovor o načinu dela Tim se mora dogovoriti o načinu dela, ki jih bo pripelja do cilja. S tem, ko postavijo jasna pravila o pristopu k doseganju cilja, si olajšajo koordinacijo, porabijo manj sredstev, časa in energije za doseganje istega cilja (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 61).

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• Postavljanje norm Norme so osnova za delovanje tima. Tim jih mora postaviti sam, izbrane morajo biti skrbno in vsi člani tima se morajo z njimi strinjati, saj so prav one tiste, ki uravnavajo vedenje posameznikov znotraj tima (Hackman, 2002, str. 105) in jih je zelo težko spreminjati (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 60). Medsebojni procesi v timu Pri medsebojnih procesih sem se osredotočila na Lencionijevih (2003, str. 36-38) pet pogojev, ki morajo biti izpolnjeni, da tim doseže visoko učinkovitost:

• Zaupanje Zaupanje je pripravljenost, da se zanesemo na nekoga, ne da bi ga nadzorovali (Schoorman, Mayer, & Davis, 2007, str. 346-347). Zaupanje lahko člani tima pridobijo na več načinov: s tem, da sodelujejo, se ne zapletajo prepogosto v koflikte, so v svojih dejanjih predvidljivi, pokažejo ranljivo plat, naredijo več dela kot bi bilo potrebno, so iskreni in pripravljeni pomagati (Harrington-Mackin, 1996, str. 118). Ko tim enkrat pridobi zaupanje, se posamezniki manj posvečaju ukvarjanju z medsebojnimi odnosi in več delu (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 103).

• Sprotno reševanje konfliktov Konflikt je neskladje mnenj, lahko je pozitiven ali pa negativen. Pozitiven konflikt se nanaša na konflikt o nalogi, ki daje kreativne in inovativne kompromise. Negativen konflikt pa se osredotoča na neskladja med osebami, kar pa lahko predstavlja problem, ker si nasprotujoče si osebe dokazujejo le to, kdo bo prevladal in ne upoštevajo, katera rešitev je najboljša za tim kot celoto (Tjosvold, 1998, str. 287).

• Predanost Predanost lahko razložimo kot energijo, ki jo posameznik vloži v določeno nalogo oziroma v doseganje cilja (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 59). Kot že omenjeno, lahko predanost oseb pridobimo s povečanjem količine avtonomije, s privlačno nalogo ali ciljem, ali pa s ponujeno nagrado (Pearce & Ravlin, 1987).

• Prevzemanje odgovornosti Cilji morajo biti jasno postavljeni in naloge jasno razdeljene, potem se morajo člani tima potruditi, da se držijo izrečenih obljub in da v delo vložijo dovolj energije, da zadovoljijo pričakovanja svojih kolegov v timu (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, str. 60).

• Rezultati Vsi člani tima si morajo prizadevati k skupnemu cilju in svoje egoistične težnje temu podrediti (Lencioni, 2003, str. 40). Tim mora redno preverjati, ali dosegajo zastavljene rezultate in pravilno ukrepati, če temu ni tako (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, str. 61).

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Organizacija Tim je neposredno povezan z delovanjem organizacije. Organizacija lahko optimalno okolje za delovanje tima vzpostavi z dobrim sistemom nagrajevanja, ki v pravi meri nagradi tako individualno kot timsko delo (Heneman & Von Hippel, 1995, str. 63). Pomembno je tudi ponujeno izobraževanje in usposabljanje. Hkrati pa so ugotovili, da je za pravočasen in nemoten prenos informacij zelo pomemben tudi dober komunikacijski sistem (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998, str. 83). Raziskava Tim, ki je bil predmet raziskave, je imel težave pri vseh petih procesih, ki jih je Lencioni (2003, str. 36-38) omenil kot pomembne za doseganje visoke uspešnosti:

1. Vzpostavljanje zaupanja Prvi korak modela rešuje problem nezaupanja in medsebojnega nespoštovanja. Tim je zaradi enega samega nepredanega člana počasi popolnoma zgubil zaupanje in predanost vseh članov.

2. Sprotno reševanje konfliktov Tim je imel težave z nejasasnimi in neprimernimi cilji, pa tudi z nespoštovanjem norm. Z odprto komunikacijo je potrebno pristopiti k obojemu: postavljanju ciljev in norm, samo tako lahko dosežemo predanost celotnega tima. Če člani tima ne bodo imeli občutka, da so imeli možnost sodelovati pri nastajanju obojega, ne bodo zares motivirani.

3. Predanost Če pričakovanja in cilji niso jasni, je težko sprejeti odločitev (Hackman, 2002, str. 207), kar se je dogajalo tudi raziskovanemu timu. Prav tako zaradi nejasnih ciljev nihče ni mogel biti zares predan nalogam.

4. Sprejemanje odgovornosit Jasni niso bili cilji, pa tudi ne vloge posameznikov. Ker ni bilo prav nobene predanosti, so se vsi spretno in z lahkoto izogibali vsakršne odgovornosti (Ryner, 1996, str. 156).

5. Rezultati Tim je iskal izgovore za svojo neučinkovitost in prirejal podatke, ko je bilo treba rezulate predstaviti zunanjim ljudem. Težave zaradi avtonomije Tim je imel težave s postavljanjem ciljev, norm, vlog in z razporejanjem sredstev. Nekateri avtorji (Ryner, 1996, str. 30) predlagajo, da se timu postopoma dodeljuje več odgovornosti, da ima čas pridobiti potrebne izkušnje.

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Glavne napake, ki so se pojavljale v timu, so bile zaradi nerazumevanja namena norm in ciljev, tim pa je taval v temi tudi zato, kr ni poznal orodij, kako se rešiti iz začaranega kroga. Tim je potrebno naučiti, kako postaviti cilje, kako preveriti ali so na pravi poti in kako sprejemati in dajati povratne informacije. Pomoč zunanjega strokovnjaka, ki lahko svetuje in situacijo vidi neobremenjeno, je zelo dobrodošla, če tim tej osebi zaupa. Potrebno se je zavedati, da večina timov pri svojem delovanju naleti na težave. Visoko uspešni timi nastanejo prav zaradi velike avtonomije, ki ponuja možnost, da si tim sam postavi cilje, ki so mu blizu in doseže višjo raven predanosti in s tem v doseganje ciljev vloži več energije kot katerikoli drug tim. Pa tudi zaradi tega, ker timi sami lahko najdejo najučinkovitejšo pot do tega cilja. Tim za visoko učinkovitost potrebuje veliko avtonomije, vendar pa hkrati potrebuje tudi usposabljanje in izkušnje, da se pot proti vrhu ne konča kot že zelo zgoden polom.

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