Industrial and Organizational Psychology

Work Groups and Work Teams

Copyright Paul E. Spector, All rights reserved, March 15, 2005

 Introduction
• When coordinated activity is
required
• Five important group and two
important team concepts discussed
• Roles
• Norms
• Group cohesiveness
• Group conflict
• Process loss
• Team commitment
• Team mental model
 Learning Objectives
• Define work groups and work teams and
note the distinction between them.
• Explain the five important group and two
important team concepts.
• Summarize the findings on group
performance.
• Talk about the advantages and disadvantages
of group diversity.
• Describe the procedures that can be used to
enhance work group and team performance.
 Working Together
• Work group: Collection of people who interact
and share some interrelated task goals and
resources
– E.g., University professors
– Not all groups are teams, thus can do their
jobs without others; team concepts may not
apply
• Work team: Type of work group that:
– Is interdependent & coordinated
– Has specified role for each member
– Accomplish common goals and objectives
– E.g., surgical team, dentist and his/her
assistant
– All teams are groups; not effective without
rest of the group
 Types of Teams
• Different team types for different purposes
– Project teams, production teams, virtual
teams, etc.
• Virtual teams communicate via e-mail,
instant messaging, telephone, web-cameras
and other technologies.
– Not an all-or-none phenomenon;
• Being geographically separated vs.
being located close to each other;
• Frequency of using tools determine
the level of virtualness; may meet in
person sometimes or not
 Virtual teams
• Advantages
– Flexibility (can reduce family-work conflict)
– Experts from around the word
– Members be assigned to multiple teams
• Disadvantages; compared to face-to face
– More communication problems, low member
motivation, feelings of isolation, low trust
– Face-to face more effective:

• Lower performance, lower satisfaction,

more time to complete tasks
– Suffer from time differences, cultural
differences, language barriers
– Organizations not give training although it
works

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPVTLroz2Ck
Virtual teams
Group/Team Concepts;
 Group/Team
Concepts; Roles
Formal Vs. Informal Roles
• Formal roles; part of the formal job
description by the organization .
– Evident in title (e.g., president, manager,
foreman, etc.)
• Informal roles arise out of group interaction
– E.g., some member in charge of sending
flowers/greeting cards on appropriate
occasions.
– Informal roles may supersede formal
ones.
• E.g., with formal title of supervisor
but another person the actual leader;
• In combat teams, lower ranking
experienced sergeant rather than the
higher-ranking inexperienced
lieutenant
 Group/Team
Concepts; Roles
• In some, roles are specialized
– E.g., surgical team; little overlap
between different roles due to
training and credentials
• In others, roles change,
responsibilities rotate over time
– E.g., in a faculty, the members
taking turns for being a
chairperson
Group/Team • Unwritten rules of behavior
accepted by members
Concepts; – From how to dress and speech to
how hard everyone works.
Norms – Impact conformity, team
decision making, performance,
OCB.
• Work groups often have production
norms.
– Who work above or below will
be pressured to conform to the
group standard.
– Even under a piece rate system,
conformity reduces their wages.
• Sacrifice opportunity to make
more money to keep from
violating the norm
 Group/Team Concepts;
Norm Violations
• Inform; nonconformist is reminded of
the norm. “You know, our uniforms are
supposed to look clean.”
• Scold; nonconformist may be scolded.
“That uniform looks filthy. When are
you going to wash it?”
• Punish; “It’s your turn, but because your
uniform’s so dirty, we decided to let
Ralph do it.”
• Ostracize; group will give up on a
nonconformer.
– No one in the group will have
anything to do with him/her.
 Group/Team Concepts; Norms
• Use production norms to enhance productivity.
– Difficult to change group norms; must
structure the changes
• Group incentive system, in which all
members of the group are rewarded if
the group reaches some performance
standard
– Doesn’t always work.
• Group goal-setting can raise
performance standards.
– Group members should
participate in goal-setting so they
will commit themselves to the
group goal.
 Group/Team Concepts; Group
Cohesiveness
• Sum of forces attracting group members, keeping
group together.
– Members stronger motives to remain in group.
• Cohesive groups enforce norms more strongly.
– Violation of norm be threatening to group’s
existence
– Higher importance, higher pressure
• Dependent on their jobs economically
• Work group as important as family.
– Usually have production norms; high as well as
low
• Meta-analysis by Beal et al. (2003);
Cohesiveness is more likely to result in high
than low performance
– Members of cohesive work groups have higher
team performance.
 More Team
Concepts

• Team conflicts
– Cooperative vs.
competitive conflict
• Process loss
• Team commitment
• Team mental model
 Team
conflicts
• Cooperative conflict; when team
members openly share conflicting
views, respect each other’s opinions,
and focus on finding an acceptable
solution.
– Relates positively to performance.

• Competitive conflict; when individuals

promote their own views, have little
regard for others’ opinions, and try to
get their own position adopted.
– Relates negatively to performance.
 Process Loss
• Group time and effort expended on activities not
directly related to task accomplishment.
– Group maintenance functions.
• Enforcing norms,
• Resolving conflict among members, or
• Socializing (meals, conversations) to
maintain relationships that build group
cohesiveness leading to efficient group
functioning
• Some process loss necessary
• Groups vary in process loss.
– Some, a lot of conflict that takes time to resolve
– Others run smoothly, devote more effort to
tasks.
 Team Commitment
• Strength of individual’s involvement in team.
Comprises;
– Acceptance of team goals,
– Willingness to work hard for the team,
– Desire to remain on the team (low turnover).
– Research; related to performance, coworker and
supervisor satisfaction, organizational
commitment, general job satisfaction, and team
satisfaction.
• Individual feelings towards the group
– Cohesiveness; attraction of all members to the
group
– Cohesive teams have committed members, non
cohesive groups may have committed members
 • Shared understanding among team members of the
task, team, equipment, and situation.
– Better mental models better team performance.
• Members know how to coordinate their
efforts with one another

Team • Reduce errors and conflicts due to

misunderstandings

Mental • Divided into two types

– Taskwork model concerns the nature of the job

Model that needs to be done

• E.g., surgical team performing the surgery

jointly; mental models not necessarily
identical but compatible.

– Teamwork model shared conception of team

and how team members are to work together;
how to coordinates efforts with each other
Group and Team Performance

• Performance in the presence of

others; Triplett (1897)
– Social facilitation
– Social inhibition
• Group vs. individual performance on
tasks
– Additive tasks
– Nominal group
• Social loafing
– Identifiability reduces social
loafing
 Group and Team
Performance
• Zajonc (1965) noticed that the type of task
determined if performance was enhanced or inhibited
– The presence of others increases physiological
arousal, which has effects on task performance
– Social facilitation
• When task is simple or well-learned
• E.g., for simple arithmetic, bicycle riding for
a bicycle racer, presence of others improves
performance
– Social inhibition
• When task is complex or new
• E.g., physics problem, bicycle riding on the
first day, performance is decreased
 Group vs. individual
performance on additive tasks
• Additive task
– Total output sum of individual group members’
outputs. E.g., the total output of cashiers in a
supermarket
• A nominal group; a non interacting group
– Comparing output of an interacting group to
total output of an equal number of individuals
who did not interact
– Finding: nominal groups do as well and usually
better than interacting groups
– Explanations: Process loss (Group members
might interfere with each other) or social
loafing ( people do not put forth as much effort
in a group)
How Does Group Compare To Individuals?

Additive task (Kravitz and Martin, 1986) rope pulling

Number of people Predicted force of pull Actual force of pull

1 1 1
2 2 1.86
4 4 3.08
8 8 3.92
 • Social loafing; Demonstrated for many tasks
– Explanation; Diffusion of responsibility
by increasing size or decreasing own
effort to match others
– Can be reduced by letting group members
know their individual output is being
Group and assessed.
– May be partly cultural, as it is found in
Team cultures where individualism is
Performance emphasized.
• The emphasis is on the individual
rather than the society
• Eagly (1989); Chinese management
trainees, who came from a
collectivistic culture, where emphasis
is placed on the group/society, did not
demonstrate social loafing
 Group and
Team
Performance
• Brainstorming is a group
technique for generating ideas or
solutions to problems, in which the
group is to generate ideas without
being critical or judgmental.
– Suppose to inspire each other
– Brainstorming groups, though
popular, are not superior to
nominal groups.
• Process loss; reduced effort,
time spent listening to others
rather than generating ideas.
• Or social anxiety about
expressing ideas
 Group and Team
Performance;
Brainstorming
• Electronic brainstorming groups, where ideas are
entered on computer, may be as good as or better
than nominal groups-not supported.

• Results from research on electronic brainstorming

– Social anxiety less important than process loss
in limiting performance of interacting groups
• No difference between anonymous and non
anonymous virtual teams – thus social
anxiety not problem
– How virtual teams may produce better in part
because do not have to wait for others to speak
thus output decreased when they had to take
turns entering their ideas on the computer
– Support for process loss
 • Paulus (2000); basic idea that group
members inspire one another may be
correct but group process gets in the way
– Shown exposure to other’s ideas
help generating more ideas
Group and
– A procedure whereby people first
Team get together in group to discuss
Performance; ideas
Brainstorming • Then work alone to generate
options
– Evidence; the initial group sessions
helps facilitate the subsequent
solitary session and results in
increased performance
 • Brainstorming beyond work group and
organization
• Crowdsourcing: type of brainstorming in
which someone sends invitation to a group
of people inside and/or outside of
organization asking for ideas about a
Group and stated issue or topic
Team – Large no of people can be invited
electronically
Performance;
• Seeber et aş. (2020); used it to develop
Brainstorming Artificial Intelligence
– Crowdsourced the problem to a group
of scientists with expertise in the area
to identify a list of research issues that
need need to be explored
– Gives a roadmap
 Group Problem Solving

Finding the solution to a Performance of groups as good

problem as or better than best member
For tasks to find solution, group can
Correct answer (correct solution vs. be a good choice
number of reasonable solutions)
• Performance = Time to find
solution
Multiple suitable answers
• Performance = Time to find
suitable solution
 Group Decision Making

• In many organizations, groups make at least

some of the decisions.
– Unimportant (the color of new
stationary) vs. important (closing the
plant, laying off all the workers)
• Even in autocratic organizations, the decision
maker usually consults with a group.
• The decisions made by groups are not
necessarily the same ones individuals would
make, and sometimes the process of group
decision making goes wrong.
 Group Decision Making
• Evaluating quality of decisions is not easy or
straightforward
– Depends on the values of the person and the
chosen criterion
• E.g., downsizing and laying off people;
good for stockholders whose stocks will
gain value, poor for employees who lose
their jobs
– Thus, evaluate against the objective meant to
achieve;
• Good if the company becomes financially
healthier
• Decision-making involves some risk because
outcomes aren’t certain.
• Are groups riskier or more conservative than
individuals in their decisions?
 Group Decision Making

• Group polarization
– Group decisions are more
extreme than individual
means
• Groupthink
– Groups make decisions
that individuals know are
poor
– Various methods to avoid
groupthink
– Research is not supportive
• Team innovation
• Team KSAOs
 • Group polarization; Group decisions are
more extreme than individual means
Group Decision – Group decisions differ from individual
decisions, but the direction of the
Making difference varies.
– Decide based on the odds of success
– Usually, the majority decisions prevails
 Group polarization

• E.g., Suppose the problem is to decide

how low the risk of death should be
before someone agrees to elective
surgery.
– Individuals would make some
decision alone, and then be placed in
groups to discuss the problem again.
– In most studies the group decision is
more extreme
• Either riskier or more cautious--
than the mean individual opinion.
 Group Decision
Making; Group
polarization

• Majority position holds more weight than the

minority position, and the group shifts toward
the majority view.
– If the majority favors a risky choice, the
group decision will be riskier than the
average of individuals’ opinions;
– If the majority favors caution, the group
decision will be more cautious.
– This deviation from the group mean is
called group polarization.
• Possibly those with minority views
conform to the majority, who are
likely to think they are “right”
because others agreed with them
Group Decision Making
• Sometimes group decision making goes
wrong.
• Groupthink occurs when groups make
decisions that individual members know
are poor ones.
– Famous examples: Ford’s production
of the Edsel; the invasion of Cuba at
the Bay of Pigs; escalation of the
Vietnam War; and the disastrous final
launch of the space shuttle Challenger.
 Group Decision
Making; Groupthink

• According to Janis, groupthink is likely

to occur
– In cohesive groups
– With strong leaders
• “the emperor’s new clothes”
– When pressures toward conformity
and harmony take precedence over
sound decision making,
– Especially when the decision-
making group is isolated from
outside ideas and influences.
 Group Decision Making;
Groupthink
• Avoiding groupthink:
– Group leader should try not to control the
decision alternatives
• S/he should serve as an impartial
moderator instead.
– At each step, group members should
critically evaluate alternatives and seek
information that might support or reject each
alternative.
• Specifically, groups should regularly
break down into smaller groups to
discuss critical issues, and
• Members of decision-making groups
should discuss the issues with
subordinates.
 Group Decision Making;
Groupthink
• There are very few good tests of the
groupthink model.

– The limited existing literature is not

supportive of Janis’ work.

– For example, group cohesiveness is not

essential for groupthink to occur.

• Yet, diversity may work

– Provide different perspectives on a

problem and its solution
 Team
Innovation
• Organizations find themselves in a
rapidly changing and competitive
world that requires them to adapt
and change

– Much of the change occurs at

the level of work teams that
implement new innovations in
the workplace
 Team Innovation
Response to external factors
(changing environment)
Teams willingness to try
Response to internal factors
new things (organizational constraints, work
load)

Innovation varies across Discussion about how to do and

how to be better works the best
teams

Cooperative conflict
Open discussion among members
Optimal team conditions Take time to critically discuss how
to improve
 Team KSAOs

• Whether special team KSAOs determine

– A person being good team member
– Whether levels of team KSAOs
relate to better performance
• Some individual KSAOs work
also for team performance; e.g.,
the mean cognitive ability in a
team, higher the better
 Team
KSAOs
• Additional team KSAOs relate to team
performance for both selection and training of
members
• Several team KSAOs identified :
– Good team member has knowledge of
teamwork; how people can work together as
a team and develop good working
relationships
– An effective team member has good social
skills; communicating and influencing
others
– Certain personality characteristics make a
person particularly suited to teamwork;
being a collectivist
 Differences among people in a group

• Cognitive diversity
• Knowledge, skill and values
• Demographic diversity
• Age, ethnicity, gender, nationality
Group
Inconsistent results (Jackson et al.,
Diversity 2003)

Subjective diversity

• People’s feeling of being different

from others
• Distinct from objective diversity
 Group Diversity
• Shemla et al. (2016); Subjective diversity can be more important
than objective diversity
– People can be different but still can see as similar in
important aspects
– True for both cognitive and demographic diversity
• Type of diversity and nature of the task
– Cognitive diversity to be helpful for team innovation, but
demographic diversity is not
– Demographic diversity helpful when there need to get
perspectives of a diverse population of potential clients or
customers in marketing situations
 Group Diversity
• Context is important to consider
– Diverse groups best when the job
required coordination and worst when
did not require coordination
(individual tasks)
– Members of diverse teams most
satisfied if they had group goals, not
diverse satisfied with individual goals
– Can have negative effects when jobs
are independent or goals are not
linked, because no motivation to get
along with each other.
 Group Interventions

• How should we work with groups?

– Increase cohesiveness
• Encourage formation of work groups
• Assign group tasks
• Give group rewards
• Allow employees to select coworkers
– Make group and organizational goals
compatible
• Group rewards & profit sharing
• Participation
• Autonomous Work Teams
– Fewer supervisors (act as coaches)
– Similar performance, but greater job
satisfaction
• Quality Circles
• Team building activities
 Autonomous Work Teams
Alternative to traditional Effects of autonomous
factory arrangement teams versus traditional
• Teams assemble entire • Similar performance
product • Non-manufacturing
• Many assembly teams better job
• Same number of performance
assemblers in teams • Cost savings for
• Fewer supervisors (act supervision
as coaches) • Greater job satisfaction
• Job enrichment
 Autonomous Work Teams

Not suitable for all situations The employees may need more
training
Surrendering some individual autonomy
Best suited to tasks that require a high
level of interdependent effort
Members may end up doing what they do
the best-prob with job enrichment
To work better when novel and disruptive
events, supervisor should intervene with
supportive coaching
 Quality Circles
• Group intervention that gives employees the
opportunity to have input into issues at work
• Employees meet to make recommendations about
product quality and production efficiency
• Periodic meetings during work time
• First level employees closest to the work
– Better knowledge about the procedures and
the problems
• Allow employee participation
• In theory, employees should benefit by greater
participation, and the organization should benefit
by better production procedures.
 Quality Circles
• Mixed results on effects
• Positive effects on group members
– Enhanced productivity
– Greater job satisfaction
– Fewer absences
• Health circle: adaptation of the quality
circle idea that focuses on employee
health
– Research has found positive results for
employee health and well-being and
implementation
 Team Building

• Activities designed to improve team functioning

– Task oriented (aim to improve how to accomplish
team tasks) vs.
– Interpersonally oriented; Aimed at better
communication and less conflict
• Three characteristics
– Planned activity with exercises or experiences
– Conducted by a facilitator or consultant
– Existing work team
 Team Building
• Members discuss problem and produce solutions
– Trainer facilitate discussion, asking directed
questions to members, summarizing and reflecting
back what group pointed out
• E.g., “Ellen , why don’t you seem to get
information needed?”, “I guess everyone feels
uninformed about decisions”.
– Should help people to raise issues, identify
problems, discuss possible solutions, mediate
conflict
• Generally positive results
– Better team performance, more efficient team
coordination, enhanced team skills by members,
and better attitudes about teams
– Task oriented better although both are effective