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Communicating in Groups & Teams (Chapter 9) (Terms/Definitions…
Communicating in Groups & Teams (Chapter 9)
Key Ideas
The Nature of Groups and Teams
What is a group?
I
nteraction
- Without interaction, a collection of people isn't a group.
Interdependence
- When people don't need one another, they are a collection of individuals and not a group.
Time
- Groups who work together for length of time begin to take on characteristics.
Size
- Most experts on the field set the lower limit of group size at three members.
What makes a group a team?
Clean and inspiring shared goals
A results-driven structure
Competent team members
Unified committment
Collaborative climate
Standards of Excellence
External support and recognition
Principled leadership
Characteristics of Groups & Teams
Rules and Norms
:
Rules
are official guidelines.
Social norms
govern how we interact with one another.
Procedural norms
guide operations and decision making.
Task norms
govern how members get the job done.
Patterns of Interaction
: All-channel network. Wheel network. Chain Network.
Roles
: The patterns of behavior expect of members. [Formal roles, informal roles, task roles, social roles, dysfunctional roles]
Leadership and Communication
Understanding leadership
Trait Theories
: A school of thought based on the belief that some people are born to be leaders and others are not.
Leadership styles:
Authoritarian leadership- A style in which the designated leader uses coercive and reward power to dictate the group's action. Democratic- A style in which the leader invites the group's participation in decision making. Laissez-faire leadership- A style in which the designated leader gives up his or her formal role, transforming the group into loose collection of individuals. Servant leadership- A style based on the idea that a leaders job is mostly to recruit outstanding team members and provide the support they need to do a good job.
Examples
Size- For example, the only ways two people can resolve a conflict are to change each other's minds, give in or compromise.
Individual Goals- For example, your primary motive for joining a class study group would probably be to master the course material and you'd volunteer to help in a local health clinic to make difference in your community.
Punctuality- For example, a cultural norm in our society is that meetings should be begin at the scheduled time, yet the norm in some groups is to delay talking about real business until 10 or so minutes into the meeting.
All-channel network- For example, Emails are handy way to handle this.
Terms/Definitions
Virtual Groups- People who interact with one another via mediated channels without meeting face-to-face
Group Goals- Goals that a group collectively seeks to accomplish
Individual Goals- Individual motives for joining a group
Hidden Agenda- Individual goals that group members are unwilling to reveal.
Social Loafing- The tendency of some people to do less work as group member than they would as individuals
Gate Keeper- Person in a small group through whom communication among other members flows.
Transformational leaders- defined by their devotion to help a team fulfill an important mission.
Emergent leader- A member who assumes leadership roles without being appointed by higher-ups
Experiences
An experience I had with social loafing was in my physics class. A guy in my group knew that we were gonna be in groups to he decided to not participate at all and let all of us do the work.
I have many virtual groups when I played minecraft back in middle school. We would skype and have video calls even when no one has ever met in real life.
An experience I had with having group goals is when I was apart of an executive board in a club called Key Club and our motive was to serve our community and push members on the club to volunteer.
Curiosity Questions
What surprised me most was how many characteristics that make a group a team. Yet these are very accurate characteristics. I simply just thought it was team work but there is much more than just participation.
What concerned me most was how is mentioned that some leaders are so concerned with looking good personally that they try to do nearly everything themselves. I am concerned with this because of how accurate it is for my workplace. When this happens, it doesn't do any good for the company itself.
What I'd like to know more about are more examples we use in real life of the different patterns of interaction. Such as all-channel, wheel network and chain network. When do we use these?