What is a Group?
A group is:
- “two or more people who share a common definition and evaluation of themselves and behave in accordance with such a definition”
(Vaughan & Hogg, 2002, p. 200) - a collection of people who interact with one another, accept rights and obligations as members and who share a common identity.
Benefits of working in a Group
Some of the important benefits of working in a Group are listed below:
· The main benefit of working in a group is that member’s of the group can draw on each others knowledge and perspectives.
Group Development Model
The Forming – Storming – Norming – Performing is a model of group development, first proposed by Bruce Tuckman in 1965, who maintained that these phases are all necessary and inevitable in order for the team to grow, to face up to challenges, to tackle problems, to find solutions, to plan work, and to deliver results. This model has become the basis for subsequent models.
In the first stages of team building, the forming of the team takes place. The individual's behavior is driven by a desire to be accepted by the others, and avoid controversy or conflict. Serious issues and feelings are avoided, and people focus on being busy with routines, such as team organization, who does what, when to meet, etc. But individuals are also gathering information and impressions - about each other, and about the scope of the task and how to approach it. This is a comfortable stage to be in, but the avoidance of conflict and threat means that not much actually gets done.
The team meets and learns about the opportunities and challenges, and then agrees on goals and begins to tackle the tasks. Team members tend to behave quite independently. They may be motivated but are usually relatively uninformed of the issues and objectives of the team. Team members are usually on their best behavior but very focused on themselves. Mature team members begin to model appropriate behavior even at this early phase. Sharing the knowledge of the concept of "Teams - Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing" is extremely helpful to the team.
Supervisors of the team tend to need to be directive during this phase.
The forming stage of any team is important because, in this stage, the members of the team get to know one another, exchange some personal information, and make new friends. This is also a good opportunity to see how each member of the team works as an individual and how they respond to pressure.
Storming
Every group will then enter the storming stage in which different ideas compete for consideration. The team addresses issues such as what problems they are really supposed to solve, how they will function independently and together and what leadership model they will accept. Team members open up to each other and confront each other's ideas and perspectives. In some cases storming can be resolved quickly. In others, the team never leaves this stage. The maturity of some team members usually determines whether the team will ever move out of this stage. Some team members will focus on minutiae to evade real issues.
The storming stage is necessary to the growth of the team. It can be contentious, unpleasant and even painful to members of the team who are averse to conflict. Tolerance of each team member and their differences needs to be emphasized. Without tolerance and patience the team will fail. This phase can become destructive to the team and will lower motivation if allowed to get out of control. Some teams will never develop past this stage.
Supervisors of the team during this phase may be more accessible but tend to still need to be directive in their guidance of decision-making and professional behavior. The groups will therefore resolve their differences and group members will be able to participate with one another more comfortably and they won't feel that they are being judged in any way and will therefore share their own opinions and views...
Norming
The team manages to have one goal and come to a mutual plan for the team at this stage. Some may have to give up their own ideas and agree with others in order to make the team work. In this stage, all the team members takes the responsibility and have the ambition to work for the success of the goals of the team.
Performing
It is possible for some teams to reach the performing stage. These high-performing teams are able to function as a unit as they find ways to get the job done smoothly and effectively without inappropriate conflict or the need for external supervision. Team members have become interdependent. By this time they are motivated and knowledgeable. The team members are now competent, autonomous and able to handle the decision-making process without supervision. Dissent is expected and allowed as long as it is channeled through means acceptable to the team.
Supervisors of the team during this phase are almost always participative. The team will make most of the necessary decisions. Even the most high-performing teams will revert to earlier stages in certain circumstances. Many long-standing teams go through these cycles many times as they react to changing circumstances. For example, a change in leadership may cause the team to revert to storming as the new people challenge the existing norms and dynamics of the team.
Groups decision making
Groups decision making is decision making in groups consisting of multiple members. The challenge of group decision is taking into consideration the various opinions of the different individuals and deciding what action a group should take. There are various systems designed to solve this problem.
Groups decision making done by individuals with the following 3 contests :
1. Conformation: Group establishes Norms by overtimes these norms becomes as standards for conducts of behaviors of individuals in groups.
2. Superiority:
· Union derives strengths
· Problem solving skills
· Capacity to generate more ideas
· Better learning and recall
· Creative alternatives and solutions for complex problems
3. Risk shift or sharing: All the ricks will be shared my all group members.
Advantages of groups:
A major advantage of group decision making is that more information is brought to bear identifying and evaluating alternatives. The more diverse the group's composition, the more likely it is that creative ideas will be forthcoming.
Advantages
1. Diversity: Varied cultures, age groups, gender, etc all add to the diversity of group which gives us varied perspectives and enhances the kind of ideas the group can come up with.
2. Varied experiences: There are difference in fields of experience and amount of experience and there differences in the life experiences and the kind of experiences people have had even with the same problem. This pool of experience can be a great advantage.
3. Enhanced memory for facts: An individual may forget a particular piece of information, but as there are a number of people involved here, there is the combined memory of all members to recollect data.
4. Greater Acceptability of decisions: As everyone has made some contribution to the decision, people tend to be more accepting of the decision. Also those who may not have contributed still support it as "the group" has come to this decision.
5. Error detection: When there are many people working together, mistakes and errors that may have accidentally gone unnoticed and had serious consequences are spotted by other team members.
6. collective understanding: The members together come to a decision after much deliberation and discussions and so everyone has a better understanding of the course of action to be followed.
7. Less influence of bias: Individual biases can be challenged and individuals may have to recognize and eliminate them.
8. more creative solutions: With so many people involved, more creative and innovative solutions to problems may emerge than an individual may have been able to develop.
9. shared responsibility: There are a number of people involved, so no one person has to shoulder the burden of work or of single-handedly making a decision.
10. motivational effect: The group decision making may even have a motivational effect on the team if the team is a successful one.
11. simplifies complex decisions: Many complex decisions can be made by the group decision making process which an individual may not have been able to tackle.
12. More information and knowledge are available
13. More alternatives are likely to be generated
14. More acceptance of the final decisions is likely
15. Enhanced communication of decision making may result
16. Better decision generally emerge
DISADVANTAGES.
There are many potential disadvantages to group decision-making. Groups are generally slower to arrive at decisions than individuals, so sometimes it is difficult to utilize them in situations where decisions must be made very quickly. One of the most often cited problems is groupthink. Irving Janis, in his 1972 bookVictims of Groupthink,defined the phenomenon as the "deterioration of mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment resulting from in-group pressure." Groupthink occurs when individuals in a group feel pressure to conform to what seems to be the dominant view in the group. Dissenting views of the majority opinion are suppressed and alternative courses of action are not fully explored.
Research suggests that certain characteristics of groups contribute to groupthink. In the first place, if the group does not have an agreed upon process for developing and evaluating alternatives, it is possible that an incomplete set of alternatives will be considered and that different courses of action will not be fully explored. Many of the formal decision-making processes (e.g., nominal group technique and brain-storming) are designed, in part, to reduce the potential for groupthink by ensuring that group members offer and consider a large number of decision alternatives. Secondly, if a powerful leader dominates the group, other group members may quickly conform to the dominant view. Additionally, if the group is under stress and/or time pressure, groupthink may occur. Finally, studies suggest that highly cohesive groups are more susceptible to groupthink.
Group polarization is another potential disadvantage of group decision-making. This is the tendency of the group to converge on more extreme solutions to a problem. The "risky shift" phenomenon is an example of polarization; it occurs when the group decision is a riskier one than any of the group members would have made individually. This may result because individuals in a group sometimes do not feel as much responsibility and accountability for the actions of the group as they would if they were making the decision alone.
Decision-making in groups is a fact of organizational life for many individuals. Because so many individuals spend at least some of their work time in decision-making groups, groups are the subjects of hundreds of research studies each year. Despite this, there is still much to learn about the development and functioning of groups. Research is likely to continue to focus on identifying processes that will make group decision-making more efficient and effective. It is also likely to examine how the internal characteristics of groups (demographic and cognitive diversity) and the external contingencies faced by groups affect their functioning.
Teams:
Group effort = sum of individual efforts
Teams effort > sum of individual efforts
Characteristics of Effective Teams
1. There is a clear unity of purpose.
There was free discussion of the objectives until members could commit themselves to them; the objectives are meaningful to each group member.
2. The group is self-conscious about its own operations.
The group has taken time to explicitly discuss group process -- how the group will function to achieve its objectives. The group has a clear, explicit, and mutually agreed-upon approach: mechanics, norms, expectations, rules, etc. Frequently, it will stop to examined how well it is doing or what may be interfering with its operation. Whatever the problem may be, it gets open discussion and a solution found.
3. The group has set clear and demanding performance goals
for itself and has translated these performance goals into well-defined concrete milestones against which it measures itself. The group defines and achieves a continuous series of "small wins" along the way to larger goals.
4. The atmosphere tends to be informal, comfortable, relaxed.
There are no obvious tensions, a working atmosphere in which people are involved and interested.
5. There is a lot of discussion in which virtually everyone participates,
but it remains pertinent to the purpose of the group. If discussion gets off track, someone will bring it back in short order. The members listen to each other. Every idea is given a hearing. People are not afraid of being foolish by putting forth a creative thought even if it seems extreme.
6. People are free in expressing their feelings as well as their ideas.
7. There is disagreement and this is viewed as good.
Disagreements are not suppressed or overridden by premature group action. The reasons are carefully examined, and the group seeks to resolve them rather than dominate the dissenter. Dissenters are not trying to dominate the group; they have a genuine difference of opinion. If there are basic disagreements that cannot be resolved, the group figures out a way to live with them without letting them block its efforts.
8. Most decisions are made at a point where there is general agreement.
However, those who disagree with the general agreement of the group do not keep their opposition private and let an apparent consensus mask their disagreement. The group does not accept a simple majority as a proper basis for action.
9. Each individual carries his or her own weight,
meeting or exceeding the expectations of other group members. Each individual is respectful of the mechanics of the group: arriving on time, coming to meetings prepared, completing agreed upon tasks on time, etc. When action is taken, clears assignments are made (who-what-when) and willingly accepted and completed by each group member.
10. Criticism is frequent, frank and relatively comfortable.
The criticism has a constructive flavor -- oriented toward removing an obstacle that faces the group.
11. The leadership of the group shifts from time to time.
The issue is not who controls, but how to get the job done.
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1. Task Force - a temporary team assembled to investigate a specific issue or problem. 2. Problem Solving Team - a temporary team assembled to solve a specific problem. 3. Product Design Team - a temporary team assembled to design a new product or service. 4. Committee - a temporary or permanent group of people assembled to act upon some matter. 5. Work Group - a permanent group of workers who receive direction from a designated leader. 6. Work Team (also called Self-Directed Work Team or Self-Managed Work Team) - an ongoing group of workers who share a common mission who collectively manage their own affairs within predetermined boundaries. 7. Quality Circle (today also under various other names) - a group of workers from the same functional area who meet regularly to uncover and solve work-related problems and seek work improvement opportunities. |
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