Introduction
Group behavior is an important part of every group dynamics and of course, group dynamics is an important role in turn, for organizations regardless of their type, whether it is a profit or a non-profit organization we are talking about. The perception about a specific behavior is constantly dependent upon the context in which it occurs (Robbins et al. 2010).
Actions and words are likely the elements that color up an individual’s behavior (Mayer, 2006) although there are other elements such as adaptive activities that may color up an individual’s behavior.
Questions
1. Five roles that I play in this society include being a student, a son, a classmate, a friend and being a Christian. These are the most significant roles that I play not one time, but every day in my life. Being a student requires an alert and inquisitive behavior. As a son, I of course, was raised the way how my parents believe how a son should be raised and that would most likely be based on the norms of our society. As a classmate, and as a friend, it requires me to be inquisitive and skeptical because in these 2 roles, I often have to engage in interacting with groups and most specially, brainstorming activities. Being a Christian is like being in a friendship group and it only requires me to be myself without any conformation demanded.
These 5 roles do produce conflicts at times. For example, I am a Christian and some of my colleagues are not. The norms that they grew up with basically differ with that of my norms and I find that as an important element as I would be frequently working with different task groups now and in the future. This conflict is usually resolved by paying respect to what others believe expecting that they would respect mine too.
2. It is important for a workforce or any team to have the same beliefs and perceptions because the more diverse a group is in terms of beliefs and religion for example, they would most likely end up immobile. Immobile in a sense that they cannot move freely because there will always come a time where conflicts between 2 or more diverse cultures conflict. They will always have to set adjustments and for that, it takes a lot more time to finish a task.
3. I prefer working as a part of team. One reason I do is because teams, provided that the members are carefully selected and organized in such a way that each member plays a specific complementary role, are more efficient than stand-alone workers. This reason, for me, is basically why corporations turn out to be more profitable than single-proprietorship businesses.
4. Teams do create conflict and for me, conflicts are bad because they could affect the way management is being handled and they also would likely affect the group performance as a while. Teams only create conflict the more diverse it becomes and the only reasons I find why managements allow teams is because teams do not really generate conflict unless they are too diverse for a team leader and even a higher management level personnel to handle. It is clear that it is highly unusual for an individual to be able to sacrifice his own beliefs and faith for the sake of his team and team members.
References
Meyer, J. (2006). Elements of Behavior. General Entomology. Accessed October 2011.
Retrieved from http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/course/ent425/tutorial/Behavior/index.html.
Robbins, S., Judge, T. & Campbell, T. Organizational Behavior. Foundations of Group
Behavior. Accessed October 2011. Retrieved from http://wps.pearsoned.co.uk/ema_uk_he_robbins_orgbeuro_1/151/38821/9938398.cw/index.html
