Team Introduction
Team Name
The name of the company is Lions Share, Inc. To create the name, we sought a title representing power, prestige, and legacy together with experience and skills. We decided that a lion, a strong and gracious animal, would be the best representation of what the company is. Furthermore, among other names that we considered, a lion also seems to be a perfect representation of reliability and excellence, and commitment to products and customers.
Setting Up a Virtual Team
The team’s vision is to create a company that will provide new and unique products to the world, influence technology, and ensures that products’ quality is incomparable to that of other products, which will not be able to compete with our company’s offer. The team’s goals are to provide consumers with high-quality computers to meet their everyday needs and ensure that the company’s products are budget-friendly and have slow but sustained growth. The roles are divided as follows: the President and VP of Marketing are JO, VP of Business Analytics and VP of Manufacturing is NP, VP of Accounting and Finance and VP of Business Analytics is AA, and VP of Manufacturing and VP of Sales Management is BK.
The team will have the authority to execute all major operations such as choose and implement marketing techniques, ensure that manufacturing is perfect, affect accounting and finance and adjust it to the company’s goals, etc. Each decision regarding a specific process will be made by the appropriate VP. The team is expected to deliver a new line of budget-friendly, quality, and highly competitive products in the market. The exact end of teamwork remains to be unknown, as the team’s responsibility is not only to regulate business processes but also to rule the company, leading to its success. As long as the company exists, so does the team. To measure the team’s success, metrics regarding customer satisfaction, product purchases, the company’s position in the market, and customer retention will be measured. Major milestones include designing, manufacturing, and releasing the product, while major risks are the number of strong rivals in the field, high entrance bar, and the availability of substitute products. To sustain team commitment, we will work on conflicts, expand team-working and social skills, and create an organizational culture where the respectful sharing of feedback is encouraged.
Individual Introductions
My name is JO, and I am currently employed as a materials specialist and also working on an auto detailing business. I have worked as an IMRL Manager (logistics and inventory management). My career goals are to have a few investment properties and grow my detailing business with sustainable success. I am the President and VP of Marketing; the board of directors voted for me to accept this role, which, I believe, fits me perfectly because the assessment shows that my top two traits include being a visionary and an action-taker. The assessment also stressed my skills with technology, tools, or machinery and my people skills. These traits will allow me to help the team produce new and unique products and expand Lions Share Inc.’s influence in the technology world.
I am BK, a U.S. Army veteran who specialized in helicopter repair and eventually worked myself into the role of Crew Chief. I currently work for ASTRA/CFX logistics as a Production Manager; my job duties include the running of a multi-million dollar facility and around 60 employees. My manufacturing background and experience with lean manufacturing techniques will help our company grow at an efficient and sustainable pace and provide customers with quality not present on the market today. I will become the VP of Manufacturing for Lions Share Inc. My experience with manufacturing determined my role in the team. The career discovery assessment demonstrates that I am an active leader who prefers to do something rather than talk and who can work both with technology and people. I plan to use these skills to create sustainable manufacturing and operate teams effectively and respectfully, increasing the engagement of team members.
My name is NP; I work as a Human Resource Adjudicator for a company called Aramark. I am also a sales manager for Best Buy. My career goal is to become a Director for an organization and lead it to greatness. As the VP of Business Analytics, I will utilize my great leadership, verbal and written communication skills, and my acute knowledge of quantitative data analysis to assist the organization in its mission and goal. My assessment results indicate that I am a mentor and a visionary who likes to help and support people and look out for their needs. To ensure high performance, we will build a committed, shared leadership and collaborate and utilize our resources. As a mentor, I will be helpful to the team in work and conflict regulation.
High Performing Teamwork
To ensure high-performing teamwork, Thomas–Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument can be used. The instrument aims to assess the team members’ behavior in conflict situations, consisting of five modes: competing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding, and accommodating (Trainer, 2010). It will be useful to ask team members to undergo the assessment to not only determine what modes they use to regulate conflict but also to understand how these modes can be adjusted to make teamwork more efficient and conflict less likely or with fewer negative outcomes.
Another step of the effectiveness plan is to utilize Tuckman’s theory of team development. According to this theory, each team undergoes “five stages of team building: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning” (Tuckman & Jensen, 1997, p. 420). The theory emphasizes that teams may fail at the first or, more likely, the second step if the leader is unaware of the processes or cannot handle them. During storming, team members can challenge the leader’s authority or are unable to perform assigned tasks correctly. To overcome this potential problem, team conferences, workshops, and discussions dedicated to conflict resolution will be implemented.
To resolve potential conflicts, four stages of integrative thinking can also be used. The first stage will assist the team in determining the opposing ideas related to the issue (Riel & Martin, 2014). The second stage is to deeply examine the two sides of the problem to understand how they can be used in the future. The third stage is to seek better answers generated by or hidden in the two ideas. At last, the fourth stage is to evaluate the solution and see whether the team is confident in it or not. The advantage of this approach is that it can help address both issues in the team and those related to business processes.
References
Riel, J., & Martin, R. (2014). Integrative thinking 2.0: A user’s guide to your opposable mind. Rotman Management, 1, 4-9.
Trainer, J. (2010). The Thomas–Kilmann conflict mode instrument. Web.
Tuckman, B. W., & Jensen, M. A. C. (1977). Stages of small-group development revisited. Group & Organization Studies, 2(4), 419-427.