Teamwork in Management

Teamwork

Dr Thai Van Vinh

Part 3: Teamwork

¢ Team definition, types of team and team roles

¢ Team development

¢ How a good team can go bad

¢ How a team can go good

¢ Rules for participation in the team

¢ Useful skills for teamwork

¢ Behaviours that inhibiting team interaction

¢ Role of the team leader

« Team tasks and processes

¢« The management of multicultural teams 2

¢ Upon completion of this module, you should be

able to understand:

— the role of team in organisations, its development

cycle, skills for good teamwork

— The cultural factors that influence teams working in

organisations

— The importance of communication in the management

of teams

Together Everyone

Achieves More

“*Á wise man associating with the

vicious becomes an idiot; a dog

travelling with a good man becomes

a rational being”’

Arabic proverb

5

“*“Á team Is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable”’

McKinsey & Company

6

e Are ‘group’ and ‘team’ the same thing?

— A team may be a collection of people who must work interdependently to achieve a common goal or output

— Team members may differ from group members in that teams may experience more open and honest communication

— Team 1s defined as individuals with a shared responsibility for working together towards the attainment of a goal and customer outcomes that

® Some characterIstics of a team:

— aclear charter or reason for working together

— interdependence of team members, needing each other’s experience, ability and commitment in order

to arrive at mutual goals

— must be committed to the idea that working together

leads to more effective decisions than working in

isolation

— must be accountable as a functioning unit within a larger organisational context

Shared Values Common goals and focus Shared commitment Interpersonal relationship

Basis for Cooperation Mutual obligation

Trust

® Trust is a prerequisite for working effectively

in a team, but

— developing a climate of trust is a challenge

— The concept of trust can vary from culture to culture

e Cultures also have different assumptions as to

the purpose of groups and teams:

— to spread information and discuss problems, or

— to make decisions and take action, or

— to enable the creation of social relations 10

According to Robbins (2001) there are four types:

¢ Problem-solving teams: discuss regularly to

improve work processes and methods

¢ Self-managed teams: team members involved

directly 1n decisions made about work

¢ Cross-functional teams: members from different

departments, usually from same level in the

hierarchy

¢ Virtual teams: can do same as above, but can also

co-opt members from other organizations (suppliers,

°® Are formed where people are no longer co-located,

or necessarily operating in the same time or 1n a

shared process

¢ Core reasons for virtual teams include:

— Global operations make it impossible to meet in a physical sense;

— Teams involve members from multiple organisations as organisations increasingly work outside their own

boundaries;

— Virtual can be quicker;

— Virtual meetings have evolved with technology;

— The right people can be sourced when they are available,

¢ The role of the manager in building high-

performance team is to balance the requirements

of the task with those of individual organisational members and of teams

— One of the requirements for a successful team is a

clear role for all members

— A successful team requires members with different characteristics to perform different roles

13

e The successful team contains 8 process functions

Role name Role definition

company worker converter of concepts strategy and ideas into

rele vant plans for action chairperson charismatic steerer from non-productive - strife

towards focusing resources shaper forceful person who has the task in mind and

makes sure everyone else does it

plant the ideas person who finds new angles and

approaches to problems

resource investigator monitor-evaluator

team worker

completer-finisner

the Mr/Mrs Fix-it who has contacts and runs the

rele vant and irrelevant networks the standard setter who knows how it was and how It should be done

the person wanting to get on with the job without

the hassle of control issues

the actual completer of jobs and the one concemed wih fine details

e Itis unlikely that a team will contain eight people

that exactly ‘fit’ the eight functions

¢ Naturally, not every team needs to contain each

of the functions in the same measure

— whatever tasks the team 1s created to perform, to be

successful each of the functions needs to be

recognised

— conversely, an over capacity in a particular function leads to clashes and unproductive behaviour

— teams are inefficient when roles are absent or over-

represented, when the balance does not fit the task

¢ Cultural background may have an influence on

the choice of role in teams

— Some cultures may have a preference for certain roles, for example:

e Bringing up good ideas would be the domain of the

French,

e Structuring tasks would be that of the Germans,

e QObtaining necessary means to perform would be the task

of the Swedes

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Can we really deliver results?

Can I rely on the team?

Who are you?

What is expected of me?

High leader dependent

“ae

Source: Bruce Tuckman

Mutual trust and confidence is building

Our team role is clear and

challenging I’m starting to enjoy myself

Leader independent

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° Stage 1: The Undeveloped Team (Forming):

Give maximum support

— Facilitate “getting to know you” exercises, stimulating

greater personal knowledge

— Demonstrate openness by example

— Invite members to share their concerns and problems

— Encourage consideration of individual strengths and

weaknesses

¢ Stage 2: The Experimenting Team

(Storming): Encourage greater openness

— Begin to involve team members in review of team performance

— Build bridges between individuals

— Allow conflicts to surface

— Question decision-making and problem-solving methods

— Find opportunities to experiment

— Give high level of support

— Encourage individual team members to “air their grievances”

¢ Stage 3: The Consolidating Team (Norming)

— Develop problem-solving skills

— Develop decision-making strategies

— Develop a capacity for the team to compensate for individual weaknesses

— Encourage people to share strengths

° Stage 4: The Mature Team (Performing)

— Build bridges with other teams

— Clarify values

— Encourage informal communications

— Fight insularity

— Expose team functioning to external scrutiny

— Give minimal support

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¢ Free riding: Unevenly distributed work load

v Cure/solution: Talk openly and clearly about who is

doing how much work

¢ Team member clashes

v Cure/solution: Follow a mechanism for resolving

disputes

¢ Breakdown of communication

v Cure/solution: Establish personal relationships early

¢ Lack of respect

without mutual respect the team will under-perform Everybody

needs to earn their respect by paying attention to others 03

¢ Help resolve conflict

¢ Train others

¢ Fncourage high performance goals

¢ Tell the truth, even when it’s disagreeable

¢ Ask questions

¢ Promote real participation

¢ People are far more likely to be committed to an

agenda they helped create e¢ To maintain participation in teams, leaders need

to:

— Keep the process and ‘rules’ for involvement simple;

— Acknowledge that individuals will improve as they learn from their involvement in the process;

— Accept many values and beliefs cannot be immediately translated into dollar or budge “bottom

line’ outcomes;

— Acknowledge individual and group cultural

equal

Consensus, not majorities get results Agenda hidden, is everybody’s loss Silence is not golden

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¢ Rule9 Emotive arguments are for wimps

¢ Rule 10 Digressions waste time

¢ Rule 11 Empathise and learn

¢ Rule 12 Ask questions when in doubt

¢ Rule 13 Long-windedness often confusing

¢ Rule 14 Exiting is disruptive

¢ Rule 15 Repetition, if unnecessary, means

memory loss

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V Listening - it is important to listen to other

people's ideas When people are allowed to freely

express their ideas, these initial ideas will produce other ideas

Y Questioning - it is important to ask questions,

interact, and discuss the objectives of the team

VY Persuading - individuals are encouraged to

exchange, defend, and then to ultimately rethink

their ideas

VY Respecting - it is important to treat others with

respect and to support their ideas 28

v Helpins - it is crucial to help one’s co-workers,

which is the general theme of teamwork

v Sharing - it is important to share with the team

to create an environment of teamwork

Y Participating - all members of the team are

encouraged to participate in the team

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overcome

Late arrival Late involvement Confirm importance of

Believes they are the meeting/ team

key participant Challenge time planning

Does not have ‘time’

for team meetings

Personal time more vital that team time

outside group setting

Confirm agenda and meeting

Give them role ¡in next

meeting that requires their

Never attends full

meeting/ team activities Never completes’ or

Set time requirements and

commitments from all in team

Set tight agendas and Keep to them

Give key role in follow up or

actioning team plans Challenge priorities outside the group

Agree on commitments

® Se{ øOals or obJecfIves

¢ Make clear the role each person will play in the

accomplishment of the task

e Plan work in advance to be accomplished by the

follower

e Organise resources

¢ Communicate job priorities

e Sets timeline for future work

e Determine methods of evaluation for follower

performance

¢ Show or tell a follower how to do a specific task

¢ Check to see if work is done properly and on time

¢ Encourage a follower that he/she can do the task

¢ Communicate information about the total

¢ Adler with Gundersen (2008, 2002) noted

differences between task-oriented cultures and

relationship-oriented cultures when international

team members first meet:

— Those from task-oriented cultures (e.g Germany, the US) spent little time getting to know each other before getting down to business

— Those from relationship-oriented cultures (e.g

Latin America, Middle East) spent much more time establishing a personal relationship

— It may be more difficult for such teams to build strong relations than single-culture teams

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e Some managers will appeal to the professional

culture of its members to bring an international

team together

e Other managers will emphasize the

communication between the actors, such as

making the unspoken explicit, rules explicit

¢ Multicultural groups with the most harmonious

relations appear to be those whose members:

— have the same status

— do not have contradictory interests

— do not feel that their identity is threatened 34

¢ Time the Key factor

— Time needed for a group to develop a real team spirit, otherwise the team manager loses credibility and

ability to mobilize all team members

— The members of a cross-cultural team must be given enough time to gain a clear perception of the project

they are undertaking

— Time needed for every individual to grasp exactly the purpose of their work, the exact goal and period of time These elements can then be incorporated into

¢ Working in a team

implies change not only

in the way of doing but

also in the way of thinking

e This teamwork pre-

supposes the creation of

common values and ideas, a delicate process

in multicultural teams

and organizations