Teamwork
Organizations have been moving away from the use of bureaucratic systems of management towards the use of concertive control. This is because they are efficient, and improve the overall performance of a company. In addition, they have the effect of improving the productivity of a corporation. For these reasons, many managers in companies are favoring the use this method more than traditional management styles (Mcshane and Glinow 2009). However, self-managing teams are increasingly facing challenges. There exists many obstacles that hinder an efficient team and its maintenance. To this effect, it is vital to investigate the reasons for the difficulty achieving and maintaining teamwork.
Increasing Pressure
Despite expectations of many experts, teams increase pressure on employees. According to Barker (1993), concertive control, that is a norm in many self-managing teams, increase the control of employees than bureaucratic systems. That is interactions between team members seek to increase the control that they have for each member. In addition, groups require their members to perform in accordance with its norms and rules, which is an increase in pressure. Barker (1993) suggests that groups adopt a non tolerance approach towards rules and regulations. To this effect, while managers and supervisors allow employees to report at work few minutes late, groups do not have such flexibility (Baker 1993). Working in a team increases pressure on employees, which increases the difficulty of building teamwork.
Hiring more employees increase pressure on the new entrants to a team and derails the rest of the group. McShane and Glinow (2009) argue that it is difficult for a company using teams to inject new employees into a project. This is because of the fact that they have to learn the norms of that team, which is time consuming and pressurizes them into conforming to the norms of that group quickly. In effect, Experts argue that is a mistake to use new employees in team projects. An example is Apple Company, a leading electronics company, when they were developing Aperture (Mcshane and Glinow 2009). The company increased its engineers to complete the project on time, but instead it increased the delay and lead to the production of a substandard product. Fundamentally, using teamwork makes it impossible to hire new experts.
Negative Outcomes
Teamwork with an organization has the effect of leading conformity challenges. In an example, the Asch experiment, conducted by a psychologist Solomon Asch in 1950, proved that people will seek to be part of the group by agreeing to the rationale of that team (Hanayama and Mori 2011). That is instead of correcting mistakes that they observe in the activities of the group, they will accept them if the majority of that group do not notice that mistake. Conforming to the group increases the chances of error. Such a case is evident in Asch Experiment when the subjects choose the give the response that other people gave despite the fact that they were aware that it was wrong (Hanayama and Mori 2011). This has the meaning that using of groups increases the occurrence of errors.
In fact, when the desires of a group override that of an individual, there are instances of encouraging group think. Weick (1996) suggests that, in most cases, people will resist giving their opinion once they note that the groups’ desire is moving towards a set path. What this means is that individuals will not use their experience and expertise, but rather rely on the likings of the group. Completely, this leads to a reduction in creativity. That is teams within an organization reduce creativity capability by suppressing individual expertise (Weick 1996). Teamwork increases the risk of groupthink, and, in some cases, reduced creativity.
Communication
Communication is a challenge to effective team building. Many instances require that people working in a team are in different locations, and they do not have face to face meetings. This can have the effect of inadequate communication within the team and the resultant decrease in the effectiveness of the team. In other cases, people working in teams are not familiar with each other. This has the effect of leading confusion, and communication breakdown (Weick 1996). In effect, their compromise on the efficiency and response time of a team.
When there are poor communication channels, trust levels in a group decline. In the article “Organization to fight Fires”, firefighters working as a team died because they did not trust the person giving them directions of ways to survive in a huge fire (Weick 1996). Similarly, lack of trust implies that members of a team will not follow the advice of their leader in times of crisis. Reduced levels of trust in a team further deteriorate communication in a group. That is individuals are not willing to give opinions because of the knowledge that many members do not trust them (Weick 1996). In the case of the fire in the article, the individual that survived the fire because using the right strategy would not be willing to divulge such information in the future given the response. Essentially, a decrease in trust within a group undermines the progress of teamwork.
Process Losses
Teams add cost to the standard operations of a company. Mcshane and Glinow (2009) state that process losses are costs incurred by teams, not for purposes of the task, but rather in training of employees’ team building techniques. To improve the performance of a team, an organization has to invest in the training of both leaders and members of the team (Mcshane and Glinow 2009). Effectively, companies have to divert energy and time away from company activities. The effect of this is the possibility of a reduction in the profits of the company, which the stakeholders may not approve. Hence, company management may not be willing to indulge in such activities because of the implications. In fact, team building depends on the willingness of an organization to invest in it.
Conclusion
Teamwork is difficult to achieve and challenging to control. Evident from discussions contained herein numerous issues hamper the creation and sustainability of teamwork. One of them is the increasing pressure emanating from members of the group. That is teams instill strict norms that all members must follow, which is not favorable (Mcshane and Glinow 2009). Secondly, negative outcomes such as group thinking and conformity are common when using teamwork. In addition, communication breakdown decreases efficiency in groups. That is distance, and lack of familiarity with members of a group leads to lack of trust in a team. What is more, there is the cost of developing teams, which may have an implication on company finances.
Bibliography
Barker, J. R. 1993, Tightening the Iron Cage: Concertive Control in Self-managing Teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, Volume 38, pp. 408-437.
Hanayama, A & Mori, K 2011, Conformity of six-year-old children in the Asch Experiment without using confederates. Psychology, 2 (7), pp. 661-664.
Mcshane, S. L. & Glinow, M. A. Y. 2009, Team dynamics. In: Organizational Behavior. New York: McGraw-Hill Education, pp. 250-275.
Weick, K 1996, Prepare your Organization to Fight Fires. Harvard Business Review.
