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Organizational
Behavior, 8e
Schermerhorn, Hunt, and
Osborn
Prepared by
Michael K. McCuddy
Valparaiso University
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.


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COPYRIGHT
Copyright 2003 © John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.
Reproduction or translation of this work beyond that permitted in Section
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& Sons, Inc. The purchaser may make back-up copies for his/her own use
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programs or from the use of the information contained herein.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 10

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Chapter 10
Teamwork and High
Performance Teams
 Study questions.
– What is a high performance team…and what
is teamwork?
– What is team building?
– What can be done to improve team processes?
– How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 10

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What is a high performance
team…and what is teamwork?
 A team is a small group of people with

complementary skills, who work actively
together to achieve a common purpose for
which they hold themselves collectively
accountable.
 Teams are one of the major forces behind
revolutionary changes in contemporary
organizations.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 10

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Slide 5

What is a high performance
team…and what is teamwork?
 Types of teams.
– Teams that recommend things.
• Established to study specific problems and

recommend solutions to them.

– Teams that run things.
• Have formal responsibility for leading other
groups.
– Teams that make or do things.
• Functional groups that perform ongoing tasks.
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Slide 6

What is a high performance
team…and what is teamwork?
 The nature of teamwork.
– Team members actively work together in such

a way that all of their respective skills are
utilized to achieve a common purpose.
– Teamwork is the central foundation of any

high performance team.
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What is a high performance
team…and what is teamwork?
 Characteristics of high performance teams.
– High performance teams:
• Have strong core values.
• Turn a general sense of purpose into specific

performance objectives.
• Have the right mix of skills.
• Possess creativity.

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Slide 8

What is a high performance
team…and what is teamwork?
 Diversity and team performance.
– To create and maintain high performance
teams, the elements of group effectiveness
(Chapter 9) must be addressed and
successfully managed.
– Diverse teams:
• Improve problem solving and increase creativity.
• May struggle in the short term.
• Have strong long-term performance potential.
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Slide 9

What is team building?
 Team members and leaders must work hard to

achieve teamwork.
 Team building helps in achieving teamwork.
 Team building.
– A sequence of planned activities designed to gather

and analyze data on the functioning of a group and to
initiate changes designed to improve teamwork and
increase group effectiveness.
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What is team building?
 How team building works.
– Five step process.
• Problem or opportunity in team effectiveness.
• Data gathering and analysis.
• Planning for team improvements.

• Actions to improve team functioning.
• Evaluation of results.
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What is team building?
 Approaches to team building.
– Formal retreat approach.
• Team building occurs during an offsite retreat.

– Continuous improvement approach.
• The manager, team leader, or members take
responsibility for ongoing team building.
– Outdoor experience approach.
• Members engage in physically challenging
situations that require teamwork.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Increased emphasis on teams and

teamwork:
– Presents challenges to people accustomed to

more traditional ways of working.
– Creates complications due to multiple and
shifting memberships.
– Requires team leaders and members to deal
positively with group dynamics issues.
– Requires ongoing team building.
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Slide 13

What can be done to improve
team processes?
 New member problems.
– New members are concerned about issues of:
• Participation.
• Goals.
• Control.
• Relationships.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 New member problems — cont.
– Behavior profiles of coping with individual

entry problems.
• Tough battler.
• Friendly helper.

• Objective thinker.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Behavior profiles for coping.
– Tough battler.
• Is frustrated by a lack of identity in the new group.
• May act aggressively or reject authority.
• Seeks to determine his or her role in the group.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 10

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Behavior profiles for coping — cont.
– Friendly helper.
• Is insecure, suffering uncertainties of intimacy and

control.
• May show extraordinary support for others, behave

in a dependent way, and seek alliances.
• Needs to know whether she or he will be liked.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Behavior profiles for coping — cont.
– Objective thinker.
• Is anxious about how personal needs will be met.
• Acts in a passive, reflective, and even single-

minded manner.
• Concerned with fit between individual and group
goals.

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Slide 18

What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Task and maintenance leadership.
– High performance teams require distributed

leadership.
• The team leader and team members share in the

responsibility of meeting task needs and
maintenance needs.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Task activities.
– The various things members do that contribute directly
to the performance of important group tasks.
– Task activities include:
• Initiating discussion.
• Sharing information.
• Asking information of others.
• Clarifying what has been said.
• Summarizing the status of a deliberation.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Maintenance activities.
– Support the group’s social and interpersonal
relationships.
– Maintenance activities include:
•
•
•
•

Encouraging the participation of others.
Trying to harmonize differences of opinion.
Praising the contributions of others.
Agreeing to go along with a popular course of
action.
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Slide 21

What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Groups members should avoid the following

disruptive behaviors:
– Being overly aggressive toward other members.
– Withdrawing and refusing to cooperate with others.
– Horsing around when there is work to be done.
– Using the group as a forum for self-confession.

– Talking too much about irrelevant matters.
– Trying to compete for attention and recognition.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Roles and role dynamics.
– A role is a set of expectations associated with
a job or position on a team.
– Performance problems occur when roles are
unclear or conflictive.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Roles and role dynamics — cont.
– Role ambiguity — occurs when a person is
uncertain about his/her role.
– Role overload — occurs when too much is
expected and the person feels overwhelmed
with work.
– Role underload — occurs when too little is
expected and the person feels underutilized.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Roles and role dynamics — cont.
– Role conflict — occurs when a person is
unable to meet the expectations of others.
– Forms of role conflict.
• Intrasender role conflict.
• Intersender role conflict.

• Person-role conflict.
• Interrole conflict.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Norms:
– Represent beliefs about how group or team members
are expected to behave.
– Are rules or standards of conduct.
– Clarify role expectations.
– Help members to structure their behavior
– Help members to gain a common sense of direction.
– Help to reinforce group or team culture.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Key norms that can have positive or

negative implications.
– Performance norms.
– Organizational and personal pride norms.
– High-achievement norms.
– Support and helpfulness norms.
– Improvement and change norms.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Team cohesiveness.
– The degree to which members are attached to

and motivated to remain a part of the team.

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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Members of highly cohesive groups:
– Value their membership.
– Try to maintain positive relationships with other

members.
– Are energetic when working on team activities.
– Are not prone to absenteeism or turnover.

– Are genuinely concerned about team performance.
– Tend to satisfy a broad range of individual needs.
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Slide 29

What can be done to improve
team processes?
 High team cohesiveness occurs when:
– Members are similar in age, attitudes, needs, and
backgrounds.
– Group size is small.
– Members respect each others’ competencies.
– Members agree on common goals.
– Members work on interdependent tasks.
– Groups are physically isolated from others.
– Groups experience performance success or crisis.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Rule of conformity in group dynamics.
– The more cohesive the group, the greater the
conformity of members to group norms.
– Positive performance norms in a highly
cohesive group have a positive effect on task
performance.
– Negative performance norms in a highly
cohesive group have a negative effect on task
performance.
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What can be done to improve
team processes?
 Cohesiveness can be increased or decreased by

making changes in:
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–

Group goals.
Membership composition.
Member interactions.
Group size.
Competition within and between teams.
Rewards.
Location.
Duration.
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Slide 32

How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Problem-solving teams.
– Employee involvements teams include a wide
variety of teams whose members meet
regularly to collectively examine important
workplace issues.
– Quality circle.
• A special type of employee involvement team.
• Team meets periodically to address problems

relating to quality, productivity, or cost.
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How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Cross-functional teams.
– Consist of members representing different

functional departments or work units.
– Used to overcome functional silos problem.
– Used to solve problems with a positive

combination of functional expertise and
integrative systems thinking.
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Slide 34

How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Virtual teams.
– Members meet at least part of the time
electronically and with computer support.
– Groupware facilitates virtual meetings and
group decision making.

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Slide 35

How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Key advantages of virtual teams.
– Brings cost effectiveness and speed to
teamwork.
– Brings computer power to information
processing and decision making.
 Key disadvantage of virtual teams.
– Direct personal contact among members
suffers.
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How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Self-managing teams.
– Small groups are empowered to make the decisions
needed to manage themselves on a daily basis.
– Teams make decisions on:
• Scheduling work.
• Allocating tasks.
• Training in job skills.
• Evaluating performance.
• Selecting new team members.
• Controlling quality of work.
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Slide 37

How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 How self-managing teams work.
– Are permanent and formal elements of the
organizational structure.
– Team members assume duties otherwise
performed by the manager or first-line
supervisor.
– The team should include between 5 and 15
members.
– Members rely on multiskilling.
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How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Benefits of self-managing teams.
– Productivity and quality improvements.
– Production flexibility.
– Faster response to technological change.
– Reduced absenteeism and turnover.
– Improved work attitudes.
– Improved quality of work life.
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Slide 39

How do teams contribute to the high
performance workplace?
 Operational difficulties for self-managing

teams.
– Impact on supervisors and others accustomed

to a more traditional way of working.
– Self-managing teams are not appropriate for

all organizations.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 10

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