Potential Problem in Teams

Question:

Select one of the given topic areas below to write your scholarly paper  (excluding the title page, bibliography and appendices). Please e-mail your professor an outline of this paper, prior to starting it. In addition to your primary text, you are required to use a minimum of 5 additional references from professional journals and books to produce your scholarly paper.

Answer:

The paper is a study on team development intervention. It will identify techniques of team development and how it is useful in building a team. The objective of this article is to recognized potential team problems and why some teams are not able to give optimal performance. It will identify ways of improving team efficiency and describe the process of team development. 

A team is the group of people working together to achieve specific goals. These are groups of people with complementary skill and committed to a common purpose. The team is the building block of modern organizational designs, and they are also studied for theoretical models. A team develops and flourishes when it enhances the effectiveness of team members by improving interpersonal skill, setting improved goals and role clarification. Team development is a successful process for effective changes in the team. A person leading the team gives specialized training to employees and analyzes each member's role. It involves improving communication and promoting cooperation among team member to increase organizational efficiency. Team development is a change program in the organization for maximum utilization of human resources .

Potential problem in teams

The problem is inherent in any team. A common problem occurs due to the difference in opinion and disagreement on different methods. When team members are not mutually accountable to one another for team goals, then group identity is lost. It leads to lack of commitment and conflict arises between team goal and member’s personal goal. There is difficulty in decision making as some members may not follow rules or stick to their arguments. Major teams face problem due to poor communication. The team members may not address their problem, or sometimes they agree to a view without honestly agreeing. It leads to heightened tension and aggressive behavior by individuals in the team. In the presence of conflict, an organization objective suffers due to poor attendance at work or low passion for work. Problems in the team also arise due to ineffective and weak leaders in the team who are not able to motivate team members . 

Team development process

Team dynamics was studied by Tuckman, and he proposed that every team goes through four stages of development. The fifth stage was added by Mary Ann Jensen. Tuckman believed that these stages were essential for the team to grow and function effectively. The first stage is the forming stage when members meet for the first time and share information about their background and experience in work. In this stage, the brief discussion is given to each member about the work they are required to do and the organization goals and objectives. Team leader’s role is crucial in this stage as they provide clear direction to the team. They have the responsibility of checking that all the team members are involved in fulfilling the goals .

 The second stage is storming stage when a team starts working together. There is competition among team members in this stage and difference of opinion also arises due to some conflict. Team leader tries to resolve conflict so that everyone works in a cooperative manner. This stage ends when members accept views and learns to work together. In the next stage which is norming, team overcomes all the resistance and become united for the fulfillment of common goals. Here employees follow the process and specific tools to get the work done. Team leader helps in this stage only when members get stuck somewhere. In the performing stage, there is more focus on performance and productivity as they give all their energy to the task. The final stage is the adjourning stage when a project comes to an end, and members separate for other works. This stage is mainly about evaluating the success of failure of the project and identifying best practices for future use .

Examples of effective team development in practical work environment

This paper will utilize Tuckman's theory to explain the evolution of the team and identify strategies for effective teamwork in the future. Inter-professional collaboration is also essential in health care sector. In this industry, the team of physician and health care works together in intensive care unit or during surgeries and operations. The medical environment is a very complex. In this industry, effective inter-professional teamwork is critical for delivery of high-quality patient care. The study will analyze whether implementation of specific care pathways will improve teamwork in clinical environment setting .

To evaluate the above facts, a randomized controlled trial was done in one particular hospital in Belgium. The health professional was divided into intervention and control for those caring for the patient with the femur fracture and patients with symptoms of the chronic pulmonary disease. The intervention group implemented the particular care pathway while the control group gave usual care to patients. The result was analyzed by team performance, process and outcome indicators. The result was analyzed by multi-level steps. There were about 30 teams, and it was found that intervention team scored better in patient management, the level of coordinated care and teamwork for better health intervention. The intervention groups were the more confident group, and they also showed a lower risk of burnout and high level of competency. The above example demonstrated that different strategies are beneficial for team development and getting maximum work output. Such approaches are taken by other sectors too to promote the production and the work efficiency of employees . 

Good examples of team development in the workplace

There are various ways by which team can be developed. The characteristics of effective teams are clear direction, experienced and knowledgeable members, systematic operating procedure, good interpersonal relationship and shared success and failures. This section will present some example on team development . A team is often held back by negative forces or conflicts between team members. In such situations, a team leader plans development activities to increase emotional intelligence of groups. The process can be done by encouraging the team to recognize their weakness regarding performance and communication skills. Individual members should take responsibility to change their own behavior or hone their abilities. Therefore, a group committing to changes can build a positive work environment .

The individual team has their own way of doing work. Certain behavioral norms of one team may differ from those of others. For example, there may be some team who gives a lot of importance to the attendance of all employees at the meeting, but they ignore the important part that is the completion of work on time. So the team leader or a manager has the role of changing this norms and giving work as the priority. They lay more efforts on importance things such as work output and improving professional skills of workers rather than focusing on trivial things .  

Various employees complain about communication problems in their team. So team meetings should regularly be held so managers regularly take feedback from team members, and they also explain inefficiency of any team member. They give suggestion to individual members on not repeating the mistakes and learning from it. There is problem solving session in which newest information is revealed; a problem is discussed, and the team gives suggestion to solve the problem .

The whole study summarized the problems faced by particular groups and how different strategies or techniques are useful in team development. It gave a theory on Tuckman's team development stages and how this trend is seen in practical life. The efficacy of team development strategy was showed by the study on inter-professional health care team working in hospitals setting. It also gave different examples on how to develop a team by taking specific steps.

Reference

Burke, W. Warner, and Debra A. Noumair. Organization development: A process of learning and changing. FT Press, 2015.

Carter, Louis, Dave Ulrich, and Marshall Goldsmith, eds. Best practices in leadership development and organization change: how the best companies ensure meaningful change and sustainable leadership. Vol. 18. John Wiley & Sons, 2012.

Deneckere, Svin, et al. "Better interprofessional teamwork, higher level of organized care, and lower risk of burnout in acute health care teams using care pathways: a cluster randomized controlled trial." Medical care 51.1 (2013): 99-107.

Dyer, William G., and Jeffrey H. Dyer. Team building: Proven strategies for improving team performance. John Wiley & Sons, 2013.

Fransen, Jos, Armin Weinberger, and Paul A. Kirschner. "Team effectiveness and team development in CSCL." Educational psychologist48.1 (2013): 9-24.

Fukuda-Parr, Sakiko, and Carlos Lopes, eds. Capacity for development: new solutions to old problems. Routledge, 2013.

McCaslin, S. E., and M. Young. "Providing Strategies for Education in Engineering for Virtual Team Development." Emerging Trends in Computing, Informatics, Systems Sciences, and Engineering. Springer New York, 2013. 85-94.

Richey, Rita C., and James D. Klein. Design and development research: Methods, strategies, and issues. Routledge, 2014.

Valentine, Melissa A., Ingrid M. Nembhard, and Amy C. Edmondson. "Measuring teamwork in health care settings: A review of survey instruments." Medical Care 53.4 (2015): e16-e30.

Zoogah, David B., Raymond A. Noe, and Oded Shenkar. "Shared mental model, team communication and collective self-efficacy: an investigation of strategic alliance team effectiveness." International Journal of Strategic Business Alliances 4.4 (2015): 244-270.

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