Reinvigorating Mature Teams
Mature teams are particularly prone to suffer from groupthink. Members begin to believe they can read everyone's mind so they know what everyone's thinking. As a result, team members become reluctant to express their thoughts and are less likely to challenge each other.
Another source of problem for mature teams is that their early success is often due to having taken on easy tasks. Is normal for new teams to begin by taking on those issues and problems that they can handle most easily. But as time passes, the easy problems become solved and the team has to begin to confront more difficult issues. At this point, the team has typically developed entrenched processes and routines, and members are reluctant to change the perfect system they have already worked out. The results can often be disastrous. Internal team processes no longer work smoothly. Communication bogs down. Conflicts increase because problems are less likely to have obvious solutions. And team performance can drop dramatically.
What can be done to reinvigorate mature teams? We offer four suggestions:
Prepare members to deal with the problems of maturity. Remember team members that are not unique; all successful teams have to confront maturity issues. They shouldn’t feel let down or lose their confidence in the team concept when the initial euphoria subsides and conflicts surface.
2. Offer refresher training. When teams get into ruts, it may help to provide them with refresher training in communication, conflict resolution, team processes, and similar skills. This can help members regain confidence and trust in one another.
3. Offer advanced training. The skills that worked with easy problems may be insufficient for more difficult ones. So mature teams can often benefit from advanced training to help members develop stronger problem-solving, interpersonal and technical skills.
4. Encourage teams to treat their development as a constant learning experience. Like TQM, teams should approach their own development as part of a search for continuous improvement. Teams should look for ways to improve, confront member fears and frustrations, and use conflict as a learning opportunity.
Teams And Total Quality Management
One of the central characteristics of total quality management (TQM) is the use of teams.
The essence of TQM is process improvement, and employee involvement is the linchpin of process improvement. In other words, TQM requires management to give employees encouragement to share ideas and act on what they suggest. As one author put it, None of the various TQM processes and techniques will catch on and be applied except in work teams. All such techniques and processes require high levels of communication and contact, response and adaptation, and coordination and sequencing. They require, in short, an environment that can be supplied only by superior work teams.
Ford began its TQM efforts in the early 1980s with teams as the primary organizing mechanism. Because this business is so complex, you can’t make an impact on it without a team approach, noted one ford manager. In designing its quality problem-solving teams, Management identified five goals. The teams should
Be small enough to be efficient and effective.
2. Be properly trained in the skills their members will need.
3. Be allocated enough time to work on the problems they plan to address.
4. Be given the authority to resolve the problems and implement corrective action.
5. Each has a designated champion whose job it is to help the team get around roadblocks that arise.
At Amana, cross-functional task forces made up of people from different levels within the company are used to deal with quality problems that cut across departmental lines. The various task forces Each have a unique area of problem-solving responsibility. For instance, one handles in-plant products, another deals with items that arise outside the production facility, and still, another focuses its attention specifically on supplier problems. Amana claims the use of these teams has improved vertical and horizontal communication within the company and substantially reduced both the number of units that donate to meet company specifications and the number of service problems in the field.
Teams and workforce diversity
Managing diversity in teams is a balancing act. Diversity typically provides fresh perspectives on issues, but it makes it more difficult to unify the team and reach agreements.
The strongest case for diversity in work teams is when these teams are engaged in problem-solving and decision-making tasks. Heterogeneous teams bring multiple perspectives to the discussion, thus increasing the likelihood that the team will identify creative or unique solutions. Additionally, the lack of a common perspective usually means diverse teams spend more time discussing issues, which decreases the chances that a weak alternative will be chosen. However, keep in mind that the positive contribution that diversity makes to decision-making teams undoubtedly declines over time. Diverse groups have more difficulty working together and solving problems, but this dissipates with time. Expect the value-added component of diverse teams to decrease as members become more familiar with each other and the team becomes more cohesive.
Studies tell us that members of cohesive teams have greater satisfaction, lower absenteeism, and lower attrition from the group. Yet cohesiveness is likely to be lower on diverse teams. So here is a potential negative of diversity. It is detrimental to group cohesiveness.
The relationship between cohesiveness and group productivity was moderated by performance-related norms. we suggest that if the norms of the team are supportive of diversity, then a team can maximize the value of heterogeneity while, at the same time, achieving the benefits of high cohesiveness. This makes a strong case for team members to participate in diversity training.
Conflict Process
The conflict process consists of five stages are:
Potential opposition or incompatibility.
Cognition and personalization.
Intentions.
Behaviour.
Outcomes.
Potential Opposition or Incompatibility
It includes the presence of a condition that creates opportunities for conflicts to arise. The conditions that can cause conflict are of 3 types.
(a) Communication: Insufficient exchange of information and noise in the communication channel are all communication barriers and create conditions for conflicts. Potential for conflict increases when either too little or too much communication takes place. The channel for communication also has an influence on the conditions causing conflict.
(b) Structure: Size and specialization act as a force to stimulate conflict. The larger the group, the more specialized their activities, and the greater the likelihood of conflict. Tenure and conflict are inversely related. There is increased conflict when group members are younger and when turnover is high.
Groups within organizations have diverse goals. E.g.: The quality control department is concerned with improving the quality of products while the marketing department is concerned with selling large no of goods and increasing revenue. This diversity of goals also is a source of conflict.
(c) Personal variables: This includes the value systems each person has and the personality characteristics each possesses. Differences in value systems are a source of conflict, as they result in disagreement between members of the group.
Cognition and Personalization
This step in the conflict process is important because it is the step the parties decide what the conflict is done. Awareness by one or more parties about the existence of conditions that create opportunities for conflict to arise is called perceived conflict. Emotional involvement in the conflict creating anxiety, frustration and enmity is called felt conflict. Positive emotions help in finding solutions to solve conflicts while negative emotion enhances the conflict.
Intentions
These are the decisions to act during the conflict. There are five conflict-handling intentions. They are:
(a) Competing: (assertive and unco-operative): It is a desire to satisfy one's own interest regardless of its impact on the other party. It includes the desire to achieve one's own goal at the sacrifice of others'' goals, attempting to convince others that your conclusion is correct and attempt to make someone else accept the blame for the problem.
(b) Collaborating (assertive and cooperative): It is a desire to satisfy all the parties. It includes attempting to find a win-win situation that allows both parties' goals to be achieved.
(c) Avoiding (unassertive and uncooperative): It is a desire to suppress a conflict. It includes ignoring the conflict and avoiding others with whom one disagrees.
(d) Accommodating (unassertive and cooperative): It is a willingness to place the opponent’s interest above one's own. It includes sacrificing one's goal to maintain the other party’s goals.
(e) Compromising: It is a situation in which each party is willing to give up something. There is no clear loser or winner.
Behaviour
In this stage, each party’s intentions are implemented. This is an interactive stage.
Conflict at the lower part of the continuum is small conflicts. Conflicts in the upper part of the continuum are highly destructive. Strikes, riots, and wars fall in the upper range.
Outcome
The action-reaction between conflicting parties results in two kinds of outcomes.
(a) Functional outcomes: Conflict results in improved performance of the group. It improves the quality of decisions, brings about creativity and innovations, and encourages interest and curiosity among group members.
(b) Dysfunctional outcomes: It reduces the effectiveness of the group. It is a result of uncontrolled opposition. It leads to the destruction of the group. It reduces group communication and group coordination.
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