Team management

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Team management is the ability of an individual or an organization to administer and

coordinate a group of individuals to perform a task. Team management involves
teamwork, communication, objective setting and performance appraisals. Moreover, team
management is the capability to identify problems and resolve conflicts within a team.
There are various methods and leadership styles a team manager can take to increase
personnel productivity and build an effective team. [1]

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1 Elements of a healthy and successful team

1.1 Cohesive leadership
1.2 Effective communication
1.3 Common goal
1.4 Defined team roles and responsibilities
2 Methods of team management
2.1 "Command and Control"
2.2 "Engage and Create"
2.3 "Econ 101"
3 Problems in team management
3.1 Absence of trust
3.2 Fear of conflict
3.3 Lack of commitment
3.4 Avoidance of accountability
3.5 Inattention to results
4 Resolving problems through team management
4.1 Building trust
4.2 Appraisals
4.3 Team-building activities

4.3.1 Back to Back Drawing

4.3.2 The Human Knot

5 Leadership styles in team management
5.1 Autocratic
5.2 Democratic
5.3 Laissez-Faire
6 See also
7 References

Elements of a healthy and successful team[edit]

Cohesive leadership[edit]
In any functional team, cohesion amongst team leaders and decision makers is vital.
Cohesive leadership means that team leaders are acting together as a unit and making
decisions as a leadership team instead of each branching off into their own work and
operating individually. This will ensure that the team will be steered in one direction
instead of multiple due to team leaders not being concise and consistent with their
instructions. Cohesive leadership will require team leaders to have strong communication
skills. [2]

Effective communication[edit]
There must be an effective channel of communication from the top to the bottom of
the chain of command and vice versa. An effective channel of communication will allow
messages to be transferred accurately without delay to the intended recipient, this will
speed up decision making processes and the operations of the team. Furthermore,
effective communication will increase the flexibility of an organisation and cause it to be
less susceptible to changes in the external environment; as a faster decision making
process will allow organisations a longer time period to adapt to the changes and execute
contingency plans.[2]

Common goal[edit]
When team members first come together they will all have different ideas, however the
key to a successful team is the alignment of objectives within the team. It is essential that
the team leader sets a common goal the entire team is willing to pursue. This way, all the
team members will put in effort in order to attain the goal. If there is not a common goal,
team members who disagree with the objective in hand will feel reluctant to utilise their
full effort, leading to failure to achieve the goal. In other cases, team members might
divert themselves to other tasks due to a lack of belief or interest in the goal. [3]

Defined team roles and responsibilities[edit]

Poorly defined roles is often the biggest obstacle to a successful team. [4] If team members
are unclear of what their role is, their contributions towards the team will be minimal,
therefore it is the team leaders duty to outline the roles and responsibilities of each
individual within the team and ensure that the team is working together as an integral
unit.
In a successful team, a team leader will first evaluate the mission of the team to
understand what is needed to accomplish the task. Then, they will identify the strengths
and weaknesses of their team members and assign roles accordingly. Lastly, they must
ensure that all team members know what each others responsibilities are to avoid
confusion and to create an effective channel of communication. [5]

Methods of team management[edit]

"Command and Control"[edit]
The method Command and Control as an approach to team management is based on
the concept of military management. Command and Control was a commonly used
system in the private sector during the 20th century.[6] In this method, the team leader
instructs their team members to complete a task and if they refuse, they will yell or punish
them until they no longer refuse and comply with the instructions. The team leader has
absolute authority and utilises an autocratic leadership style.There are considerable
drawbacks to this team management method. Firstly, the team morale will be lowered
due to team members being constantly belittled by the team leader at the slightest
mistake; punishments will also lead to a lack of confidence in team members resulting in
poor performance. Second, in modern organisations roles are often specialised, therefore
managers will require the expertise of the employee, elevating the value of the employee.
Implementing the Command and Control team management method will lead to a high
rate of employee turnover. In addition, in large organisations managers dont have the
time to provide instructions to all employees and continuously monitor them, this will
impede an organisations performance as managers are not spending time on their core
responsibilities.[7]

"Engage and Create"[edit]

Due to the limitations and ineffectiveness of Command and Control, managers
developed an alternative management strategy known as Engage and Create. In this
method team members are encouraged to participate in discussions and contribute.

Furthermore, they are advised to engage with other team members to build a stronger
sense of teamwork and unity. This will lead to increased productivity and accountability of
each team member, driving the team towards success.[6]

"Econ 101"[edit]
In the Econ 101 method of team management, the team leader makes the baseline
assumption that all team members are motivated by reward in the form of money, and
that the best way to manage the team is to provide financial rewards for performance and
issue punishments for failure. This method of team management uses material gains in
the place of intrinsic motivation to drive team members. This is similar to Taylors theory
of Scientific Managementwhere he claims the main form of motivation for employees is
money.[8][9] The main drawback of this method is that it does not take into account other
forms of motivation besides money such as personal satisfaction and ambition.
Moreover, by using reward and punishment as a method of team management it can
cause demotivation as everyone is motivated by different factors and there is no one way
to satisfy all team members, the negative effect is further compounded by punishment
leading to demoralisation and lost of confidence.[7]

Problems in team management[edit]

Absence of trust[edit]
In Patrick Lencionis book The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, the absence of vulnerabilitybased trust where team members are comfortable being vulnerable with each other,
trust each other to help when asking for guidance, and are willing to admit their mistakes
within a team is detrimental to a team. Team leaders have to assist each other when
they are vulnerable and also allow team members to see their vulnerable side, which is
contradictory to the orthodox belief. If a team lacks vulnerability based trust, team
members will not be willing to share ideas or acknowledge their faults due to the fear of
being exposed as incompetent, leading to a lack of communication and the hindering of
the team.[10][11][12]

Fear of conflict[edit]
Contrary to the general belief, conflict is a positive element in a team as it drives
discussion. The fear of conflict is the fear of team members to argue with one another
and the fear of disagreeing with the team leader. If team members hold back and are
afraid of confronting the leader or their teammates, then the concept of a team is nonexistent because there is only one person who contributes and no new ideas are
generated from discussions.[10]
The fear of conflict in a team stems from an absence of trust, more specifically
vulnerability based trust. If team members are afraid to be vulnerable in front of one
another, disputes can be manipulative and a means to overthrow and shame the other
team member. However, if team members trust each other and are comfortable being
vulnerable in front of one another, than debates can be a pursuit of a better and more
effective method to achieve a task.[10][11][12]

Lack of commitment[edit]
When team members dont provide input on a decision, it shows that they do not agree or
approve of the decision, leading to a halt in team activity and progress. Furthermore
when team members dont express their opinions, views and potential ideas are lost,
hurting the project and the company.[10][12]

Avoidance of accountability[edit]
The avoidance of accountability in a team is the failure of team members to be
accountable for the consequences of their actions. When team members do not commit
to a decision, they will be unwilling to take responsibility for the outcomes of the decision.
[10]

In addition, if a lack of trust exists within the team then there will be an absence of peer to
peer accountability; team members will not feel accountable towards their team members
and hence will not put effort into their tasks. The team must trust and hold each other
responsible so that the intention will always be for the benefit of the team and for the
team to succeed.[10]
Team leaders who are afraid of confrontation might avoid holding team members
accountable when in fact they have made a mistake. Team leaders must develop the
confidence to hold team members accountable so that they will feel the sense of
responsibility and entitlement to the team, and learn from their mistakes. If not, then
errors will not be corrected and might lead to worse problems, causing a defective team.
[10][12][13]

Inattention to results[edit]
If team leaders and team members do not hold each other accountable then they will not
be concerned about the outcome of the team and whether they have achieved their goal,
as they do not have a drive to obtain great results. Inattention to results causes a loss of
purpose and brings into question the existence of the team. [10]

Resolving problems through team

management[edit]
Building trust[edit]
An approach to resolving fundamental trust problems within teams is to build trust
amongst team members. A team leader can build trust by persuading team members to
ask questions and seek guidance from other team members, so that they are more
familiar and comfortable in being vulnerable with one another, questions such as May
you teach me how to do this or You are better than me at this. However, in order to
achieve vulnerability based trust within the team the team leader must be vulnerable first,
if the team leader is unwilling to be vulnerable, nobody else in the team will be willing to
follow.[10]

Appraisals[edit]
Appraisals can be a way for team members to provide feedback to one another or for
team members to provide advice to the leader. This will allow individual members of the
team to reflect on their performance and aim to do better by amending their mistakes;
furthermore appraisals create an environment where the chain of command is nonexistent and team members can be honest towards one another. This is effective in a
way that the team can provide progressive feedback towards other members and can
advise the leader on how he or she can improve their leadership. After each member
reads their appraisals, they will understand how they can strive to improve, benefitting
the team in reaching its objectives. The commonly used forms of appraisals
are performance appraisals, peer appraisals and 360 degree feedback.[14]

Team-building activities[edit]
Team-building activities are a series of simple exercises involving teamwork and
communication. The main objectives of team building activities are to increase the trust
amongst team members and allow team members to better understand one another.[15]
Back to Back Drawing[edit]
A team building activity where two members of a team sits back to back. One member is
given a picture while the other is given a blank piece of paper. The member with the
picture has to describe to the other member what the picture includes and the other
member has to sketch what is described. At the end of the game, both members
compare the picture and the drawing to see how closely similar they are. This game aims
to improve verbal communication between team members.[15]

The Human Knot[edit]

A team building activity where team members stand in a circle and grab hold of the hands
of other participants that are not immediately next to them. The objective is to unravel the
circle of entangled hands. This game, through the physical touch between team
members will allow them to feel more comfortable with each other. Furthermore this
game can improve the verbal and physical communication between team members and
enable the team to identify which communication process is the most effective within the
team.[16]

Leadership styles in team management[edit]

Autocratic[edit]
Autocratic leaders make their own decisions without consulting employees or other team
members. They hold absolute authority over the team and team members are expected
to obey and comply with the decision that is made by the leader. Autocratic leaders use
one way communication, which is that they will instruct team members without expecting
feedback in return. The benefit of this leadership style is that decisions can be made
quickly, especially if the team is in crisis, considering the views of all team members will
be time consuming and impractical. However, this can lead to over dependency on the
team leader as all decisions are made by him or her and it can also lead to a low team
morale as the input of team members are not valued. [17][18]

Democratic[edit]
Democratic leaders will consult with employees before proceeding to make a decision.
Democratic leaders will take on a two way communication approach where team
members can provide input and voice out their opinions aside from the team leader
issuing instructions. Team leaders who take on this leadership style will require excellent
communication skills to express to the team members what is expected of them and to
respond to and understand their concerns. The benefit of this leadership style is that
team members will feel more valued, leading to an overall increase in productivity in the
team. However, a drawback is that since employees have a greater involvement in
decision making it might slow down the decision making process.[18][19]

Laissez-Faire[edit]
Laissez faire is a leadership style where the team leader will allow the team members to
carry out their duties on their own and at their own pace. There is little to no management
and authority implemented by the team leader. This style of leadership is applicable to
product design or advertising teams where flexibility and freedom provides a more
suitable environment to stimulate creativity and is expected to generate positive results.
The benefit of this leadership style is that team members who do not like to be controlled
and closely monitored can prosper and fulfil their potential as this is the environment in
which they function best. The limitation of laissez faire is that team members might make
poor judgements due to a lack of supervision and they might not work as hard because of
the absence of a superior.[18]

See also[edit]

Socionics

References[edit]
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[Online]. [Accessed 15 October 2014]. Available
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^ Jump up to:a b Spolsky, J. 2006. Three Management Methods (Introduction).
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