Using Teams in Organizations

Chapter 10
 Outsourcing teamwork
• Can improve teamwork, team diversity,
maximize resource usage, enhance creativity,
improve speed and reduce costs
• Can also harm teamwork by making
cooperation and communication more difficult
and reducing trust
Differentiation of Team and Groups
Team
• Integral part of the
management process
• Refers to people or animals
organized to work together
• Emphasize shared
leadership, mutual
accountability, and
collective work products
Groups
• defined as two or more
persons interacting and
interdependent
• Formal Group
• Informal Group
• Interacts primarily to share
information and to make
decision to help each
member perform within
the are of responsibility
• Emphasizes individual
leadership, accountability
and work products
 Job Categories
Conventional Work
Issue Teams
Groups

One of two broad

JOB CATEGORIES Many narrow categories
categories

Supervisor directly controls Team controls daily

AUTHORITY
daily activities activities

Depends on the type of Based on team

REWARD SYSTEM job individual performance and
performance, and seniority individual breadth of skills
 Reward systems
• Skill-Based Pay
– Requires team members to acquire a set of the core skills
needed for their particular team plus additional special
skills, depending on the career tracks or team needs
• Gain-Sharing Systems
– Usually reward all team members from all teams based on
the performance of the organization, division, or plant.
– Requires a baseline performance that must be exceeded
for team members to receive some share of the gain over
the baseline measure
• Team Bonus Plans
– Similar to gain-sharing BUT unit of performance and pay is
team
Benefits of Teams in Organization
Types of Benefit Specific Benefit

ENHANCED PERFORMANCE Increased productivity

Improved quality
Improved customer service

EMPLOYEE BENEFITS Quality of Work life

REDUCED COSTS Lower stress

Lower turnover
Absenteeism
Fewer Injuries

ORGANIZATIONAL Increased Innovation

ENHANCEMENTS Flexibility
 Costs of teams
• Are usually expressed in terms of the difficulty
of changing team-based organization
 Types of teams
• Quality Circles
• Work Teams
• Problem Solving Teams
• Management Teams
• Product Development Teams
• Virtual Teams
 Implementing Teams in Organizations
• Planning Change
• Making the Decision
• Preparing for Implementation
• Phases of Implementation
– Start up
– Reality and Unrest
– Leader – Centered Teams
– Tightly Formed Teams
– Self – Managing Teams
 Essential Team Issues
• Team Performance
• Start at the Top
 Potential Team Problems
• Changing Membership
• Social Loafing