Week 7 Teams and Teamwork - BB Learn

BMG 735 Managing People in the Organisation
Mark McCrory MCIPD, CPsychol
Teams and Teamwork

Learning Objectives
• Explain what a work-team is and is not
• Understand the relationships between
team-working and team member well-
being, satisfaction and organizational
performance
• Understand the input factors influencing
the performance of teams
• Understanding the processes that affect
team performance
• Appreciate the distinct elements of team
performance
Defining a Team
• A team is a relatively small group of people working on a
clearly defined, challenging task that is most efficiently
completed by a group working together rather than
individuals working alone or in parallel; who have clear,
shared, challenging, team level objectives derived directly
from the task; who have to work closely and
interdependently to achieve these objectives; whose
members work in distinct roles within the team (though
some roles may be duplicated); and who have the
necessary authority, autonomy and resources to enable
them to meet the team’s objectives
(Woods and West, 2020, p414)
‘Real’ vs. ‘Pseudo’ team
• Real team - team members work closely and
interdependently towards clear, shared
objectives. Real teams also have regular and
effective communication, usually in the form of
team meetings, in which they reflect upon their
performance and how it could be improved.
• Pseudo team – labelled a team. members work in

close proximity to each other and have the same
supervisor.
Why Work in Teams
• Minimise risk to enact organizational strategy
• Quickly develop and deliver products and services
cost effectively
• Enable organizational learning
• Promote improved quality management
• Can undertake radical change
Input-Process-Output (IPO)
Model of Team Performance
(Woods and West, 2020, pg 420)

Team Inputs
Team Composition - Diversity
• Diversity (heterogeneity) can be
considered as:
▫ Information/Decision-making
▫ Social categorisation perspective

(van Knippenberg and Schippers, 2007)
• Impacts short-term or long-term

(van Knippenberg et al., 2010)
Personality in Teams
• Elevation – mean (average) personality
within a team
• Variability – how different team members

are within the team on personality
Personality in Teams
• Peeters et al (2006)
• Looked at the relationship of elevation and

variability of the big 5 traits with team
performance in professional and student teams
• Relationships for:
▫ Agreeableness and Conscientiousness
• No significant relationship for:

▫ Extraversion not related to team performance,
Emotional Stability; or Openness to Experience
KSAs for Teamworking
(Ellis et al., 2005; Leach et al., 2005; McClough & Rogelberg, 2003;
Morgeson, Reider, & Campion, 2005)
Organisational Support
• Appraisal and performance review
systems
▫ Team goals set rather than individual
▫ Team outcomes rather than individual
• Team reward
Team Inputs
Input-Process-Output (IPO)
Model of Team Performance
(Woods and West, 2020, pg 420)

Team Processes
• Are they known?
• Are they clear?
• Are there too many?
• Are they agreed?
• Are people committed to
them?
• Test –
▫ Get team members write
them down separately
Participation – Social Processes
• Failure to share information
• Conformity
• Dominant people
• Status/hierarchy
• Groupthink
• Idea generation
• Social loafing
Group Norms: Types
• Behaviours, attitudes and perceptions
that are approved by the group and
expected of its members
▫ Documented
 Written
▫ Explicit
 Expressed but not written
▫ Implicit
 Understood, but neither expressed nor
written
Hargie (2011)
Ringelmann
(1890s)
Participation - Reducing Social
Loafing
Make Individual
Contributions
more
Identifiable
Recognise
Valuable
Social
REDUCE
Individual Loafing
Contributions
Keep Group
Size at an
Appropriate
Level
Task focus
• Constructive controversy
“Controversy when discussed in a cooperative

context promotes elaboration of views, the
search for new information and ideas and the
integration of apparently opposing positions.”
(Tjosvold, 1991)
• Elaborating positions
• Search for understanding
• Integrating perspectives
Team Conflict
• Task conflict vs Interpersonal conflict
• Shaw et al (2011)
▫ Different types of conflict
 Team Performance
 Team Satisfaction
Reflexivity
• Extent to which team members
collectively reflect upon the team’s
objectives, strategies and processes, as
well as their wider organisations and
environments and adapt accordingly.
(Schippers , Dawson and West, 2012; Widmer,
Schippers and West, 2009)
• 3 stages:
1. Reflection
2. Planning
3. Adaptation
Team Outputs
Team building
• Team building:
▫ Objective: improving a team’s functioning (developing
interpersonal relations, clarifying roles, or solving existent
problems)
▫ Method: mostly games and physical exercises, as opposed to
sitting in a classroom and discussing a topic
▫ Location: usually a different one to where the team works (e.g.
in nature, external venue)
• Data from over 1500 teams showed:
▫ Improved positivity – trust, satisfaction, confidence
▫ Better interactions – communicate, coordinate and manage
conflicts better
• Team building activities focused on setting goals or
clarifying roles bring the most benefits
Klein et al. (2009)
Team Training
• Aims to improve how team members work with each other
while they try to solve their common task
▫ Simulations of common or upcoming team tasks
▫ Team reviews, discussions
▫ Analysing case studies
• 51 studies compared teams receiving teamwork training to
teams with no intervention, called a control group
• Teamwork training benefited team behaviours
• Teams performed better on their tasks after going through
teamwork training measured both objectively (e.g. number
of items produced) and subjectively (e.g. by external
raters)
McEwan et al.
(2017)
Learning Objectives
• Explain what a work-team is versus a group
• Understand the relationships between team-
working and team member well-being,
satisfaction and organizational performance
• Understand the input factors influencing the
performance of teams
• Understanding the processes that affect team
performance
• Appreciate the distinct elements of team
performance

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BMG 735 Managing People in the Organisation

Mark McCrory MCIPD, CPsychol

Teams and Teamwork

• Pseudo team – labelled a team. members work in

(Woods and West, 2020, pg 420)

▫ Social categorisation perspective

• Impacts short-term or long-term

• Variability – how different team members

• Looked at the relationship of elevation and

• No significant relationship for:

(Woods and West, 2020, pg 420)

“Controversy when discussed in a cooperative

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