Developing and Building Teams

(Leading Others dimension, Motivating Others facet)

Comptency Definition: Managing inertia and conflict during the formative stages of group functioning. Enhancing the performance of a group and the satisfaction of its members by promoting cooperation, trust, and confidence in the group.

Team building is an organizational development intervention that includes a planned activities to enhance functioning of existing and integrated teams.
The focus is primarily on tasks, but also deals with interpersonal and affective components of group work.
Roles of group members, group decision-making processes, individual functions, intragroup and intergroup communication, and influence tactics used by team leaders are analyzed.

Team building is often used in conjunction with other conflict management techniques (see the Resolving Conflict page for more) or to make groups more cohesive.

3 Types of Team Building:

Focus on individual. An example would be helping a newcomer adapt to the team environment and learn his/her role in the overall group.
Focus on the relationship between the existing team and the organization it is part of, often as a response to intergroup conflict within the organization.
Focus on behavior of the group as a whole. This is the most common, and it often involves changing task behavior, diagnosis of group mood, and interpersonal inventions aimed at improving communication processes.

When to Use Team Building:

Groups are faced with complex, unstructured, and interdependent tasks
Group communication problems are interfering with group effectiveness.
Increased quality of work atmosphere (a more positive working environment) and interpersonal interactions are desired.
There is a need to build consensus for team decision-making and goal-setting.
There is a need to accelerate group member socialization.

Models of Team Building:

Most of these models consider the context the team exists in, how long the team has been together, establishment of ground rules and other structural components for the team building intervention itself, and categorization of the team based on its primary functions (e.g. service team, management team).

Traditional Team Building Model involves 6 steps:

     1. Background research and data collection. Involves establishment of goals, including empowering the team.
     2. Start-up. An outside consultant meets with the team, establishes ground rules for future interactions and a trusting atmosphere.
     3. Group problem solving and process analysis. Involves exercises to improve decision-making, planning, and delegation skills.
     4. Open feedback. Discussion of what has been inhibiting team performance based on the exercises.
     5. Action planning. Team develops an action plan and assigns tasks to its members in order to complete the action plan.
     6. Leader of the team ensures that group members are performing the actions they committed to during the team building exercises.

Team Compilation Model.¹ Based on the type of interdependence of group members, which can be any of the following:

               1. Pooled interdependence: no need to coordinate with other team members. Each person makes a discrete, additive contribution.
                2. Sequential interdependence: each person makes a discrete contribution, but tasks must be done in a fixed, serial order.
                3. Reciprocal interdependence: individual contributions are bidirectional.
                4. Intensive interdependence: work is simultaneous and parallel, and can include all of the conditions for the 3 other types.

Phases of the Team Compilation Model include:

                 1. Team formation: addresses interpersonal uncertainty of a recently formed team or a newcomer joining an established team.
                 2. Task compilation: addresses task performance uncertainty.
                 3. Role compilation: individuals become aware of how their tasks and interpersonal behaviors affect other members of the team.
                 4. Team compilation: the team is now a network wherein each member knows his/her role and how it links to all other team members,
                      the group as a whole, and the organization.

Integrated Model of Group Development^2,3 has 5 stages:

                 1. Dependency, Inclusion, and Pseudo-work: social interaction, including simple chit-chat, which lays
                      the foundation for an effective team.
                 2. Counterdependency and fight: first team interaction characterized by conflict.
                 3. Trust and structure.
                 4. Work.
                 5. Impending termination: end of a temporary team.

                 This model is based on the early team building model developed by Tuckman⁴, which had these 4 phases:

                       Forming (same as Dependency, Inclusion and Pseudo-work above)
                       Storming (same as Counterdependency and fight above)
                       Norming (same as Trust and structure above)
                       Performing (same as Work above)

Woodman and Pasmore's Model⁴: focuses on group decision-making in the context of an organization, so it will only be briefly mentioned here. Its elements include:

             Directioning: determining what needs to be accomplished.
             Organizing: agreeing on how to use group resources to complete a task.
             Exploring: exploring alternative ways to perform the work.
             Converging: deciding on the best approach or solution.
             Executing: completing the work.

Woodman and Pasmore pay particular attention to group dynamic issues such as fit (membership and
belonging), power (influence and control), and affect (emotion).⁴

A Sampling of Specific Techniques:

Many different games, role-plays, and trust exercises are used in team building, including some exercises we think of as "children's games" like blindfolding one person and having the rest of the team help that person accomplish his/her task. Other common exercises are ropes courses, trying to make music with objects not normally considered instruments, or human chains.

The Nominal Group Technique (NGT).⁵ Individuals silently generate solutions to a problem in writing. Then each individual offers one idea from his/her list in round robin fashion. Ideas are recorded but not discussed. Once all ideas are written down, the group discusses the ideas, and anyone may criticize or defend any idea using the "30-second soap box" (a maximum of 30 seconds to argue for or against any idea). Then, group members anonymously vote using a weighted voting procedure (1st choice gets 3 points, 2nd choice gets 2 points, 3rd choice gets 1 point).

References

1 - Kozlowski, S.W.J., Gully, S.M., Nason, E.R., & Smith, E.M. Developing Adaptive Teams: A Theory of Compilation and Performance Across Levels and Time.

2 - Tuckman, B.W., & Jensen, M.A.C. (1977). Stages of Small-Group Development Revisited. Group & Organization Studies, 2(4), 419-427.

3 - Wheelan, S.A., Davidson, B., & Tilin, F. (2003). Group Development Across Time: Reality or Illusion? Small Group Research, 34(2), 223-245.

4 - Woodman, R. W., & Pasmore, W. A. (2002). The Heart of It All: Group- and Team-Based Interventions in Organization Development. In J. Waclawski & A. H. Church (Eds). Organization Development: A data-driven approach to Organization change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

5 - Kreitner, R., & Kinicki, A. (2004). Organizational behavior (6^th ed.) New York: Mc-Graw Hill/Irwin.

~ Contributed by Kirsten Gobeski

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