Groups and Teams
Members of groups and teams need to work together all the time for them to achieve their goals. Coordination is vital for any group carrying out a common task because failure to coordinate leads to confusion. Team leaders should be able to steer groups effectively towards achieving intended goals. In the case of Mighty tech, the group was unable to achieve its goals in a timely manner because its members lacked coordination.
For instance, Ben and Beatrice disagreed on the approach to follow in order to complete the job in time (Wong 2009, p. 98). Beatrice felt that they needed to follow every detail carefully in order to complete the job in a professional manner hence defending her professional integrity. On the other hand, Ben felt that they should take an approach aimed at completing the task in time for his company to win the deal.
Personal interests affected the performance of this group hence costing the ABCIB the deal to fund the intended merger. Ben wanted to complete the task regardless of its accuracy so that his employer can have the deal. As a result, Ben knew that he was going to have enormous bonuses if the task yielded fruits (Slack and Parent 2005, p. 50). On the other hand, Beatrice wanted to carry out her job in accordance with the set principles of accounting. She wanted to ensure that the reputation of her employer remained unquestioned. If Bryce had made everything clear to all team members, things could be easier as they could have focused on completing the task in favor of ABCIB.
Team Effective Model (Input, throughput & Output)
The team effectiveness model gives details on stakeholders’ contribution to the accomplishment of set tasks. For instance, there is the input which comprises of skills brought in by employees. For instance, in the case of Mighty tech workers provided professional skills in auditing the firm. There was diversity inexperience, and this is the reason why each individual in the auditing team was allocated tasks in their areas of expertise (Romer and Wolfers 2009, p. 72). For instance, Ben and Beatrice were expected to audit Mighty tech’s accounting books to come up with its financial position. Bryce and Bill were supposed to lead the two teams in order to achieve those tasks in time. This means that they were to provide leadership skills in the team.
The organizational and group processes comprise the throughput. These processes provide a clear guide on what the team needs to do. For instance, performance standards are set by the company for the team. In this case, ABCIB had set standards to be followed by the audit team in ensuring that they get the real value of Mighty tech (Martin and Fellenw 2010, p. 60). Facilitation of the audit process also is constituted in the throughput since it is the organization that caters to the needs of the audit team. On the other hand, the team agrees on the approach or strategy to use, and their vision and all these factors constitute the throughput.
The output consists of task deliverables and innovative solutions achieved by the team. For this case, the output was supposed to be audit reports to be used by the ABCIB to guide on how much they have to use to finance the merger.
Motivations
Motivation is noteworthy because it instills morale in people to work more. Organizations that have motivational packages for their workers enjoy better results than those that do not have. In fact, happy workers end up directing all their focus towards achieving organizational goals. This translates to increased profitability and enhanced employee-management relations. In this case, the team failed to achieve its set goals because only one part was being motivated.
ABCIB had promised its workers generous bonuses if the deal was to be successful. This is the reason why Ben was ready to use any approach to ensure that the task is complete (Humphrey 2007, p. 105). On the other hand, Beatrice was working for her company and expected nothing more than her normal salary. This is the reason why she did not care about how much time she might take to complete and approve her task. If both sides of the team were motivated equally, the task would have been completed within the set deadline.
The problem with the team that was auditing Mighty tech was that they received orders from different points hence working from different principles. If the accounting firm had promised their workers something for the deal, chances of completing the task could be increased (Anson and Drews 2007, p. 76). This means that Bill and Beatrice could work in the same line of thought with other team members. Unfortunately, this was not the case as each employer had outstanding agreements with its own employees. At the end of the day, the team failed to complete its task on time as Beatrice insisted on ensuring that she did everything in the right manner.
Communication and Decision Making
In any team, communication is essential for the accomplishment of tasks being undertaken. Communication enables team members to update each other on the progress hence ensuring that they are all working in the right direction. This includes consulting from one another to ensure that all tasks run as expected hence avoiding instances where some individual’s tasks are declined by the team. In addition, decision-making should be centralized to certain team members to avoid confusion (Draft 2010, p. 82). This means that there should be one point of command charged with following up on all members.
In the case of Mighty tech, the team lacked proper communication and this adversely affected the intended output. For instance, there was an instance where Bryce tried to contact Bill to ask him to convince Beatrice to have the task signed off in vain. If there were convenient communication channels, the team could have achieved its task in time. On the other hand, decision-making was left to the individual, team members hence leading to conflicts (Barlett and Chase 2004, p. 102). For instance, Beatrice made her own decision on the approach to use which was extremely opposed by Ben. If there was a centralized decision-making organ, the approach could have been agreed upon by the entire team hence avoiding conflicts.
Conflicts and Negotiation
Conflicts are normal wherever there is a group of people and measures should be taken to handle them whenever they arise. Teams are not exceptional and proper conflict resolution measures should be put in place to avoid time wastage due to conflicts. Negotiations should be encouraged in teamwork since they can help in reaching agreements acceptable to all members. Any team that does not embrace negotiations ends up with a lot of disagreements leading to conflicts.
In this case, there were several conflicts, and they led to the team’s failure to complete its task in time. For instance, during a team meeting, there was an instance where Beatrice and Ben had differed exposing to other team members the existence of a conflict between them. Team members did nothing to curb the upcoming conflict which affected their timings (Chelladurai 2006, p. 84).
If the team wanted to give negotiations time, it could have saved the situation by bringing both Beatrice and Ben to a negotiating table. By doing this, they could have helped them to reach an agreement on the approach to use hence speeding up the process and completing the task in time. Negotiations could have helped Beatrice to understand why Ben preferred an approach that could have led to quicker completion of the task. Team members are to blame for the failure to meet the set deadline since they took no action after learning that there were disagreements between Beatrice and Ben concerning the approach to be used.
Evaluation
Evaluation is beneficial whenever a task is being carried out by many people. This means that team members should come up with ways of evaluating their progress to make sure that all members proceed at the same pace. Evaluation helps team members to identify those among them who may be in need of assistance in carrying out their designated tasks.
In the case of Mighty tech, members failed to evaluate their progress even though they used to meet once a week. This led to their failure to accomplish their objectives despite some members having completed their parts. If they conducted a task evaluation, they could have identified differences between Ben and Beatrice that delayed the entire process (Chelladurai 2008, p. 64). The issue with these two people was small and could be resolved through intervention from all group members. In addition, evaluation helps in determining areas that need to be given more attention due to their complexity. This may help team members to come up with ways of accelerating tasks that are slow in order to meet their set deadlines.
References
Anson, W. & Drews, D. C. 2007. The Intangible Assets Handbook: Maximizing Value from Intangible Assets. American Bar Association, New York.
Barlett, P. F. and Chase, G. W. 2004. Sustainability on campus: stories and strategies for change, MIT Press, London.
Chelladurai, P. 2008. Measures of organizational effectiveness of Canadian national sport organizations, Human Kinetics, New Boston.
Chelladurai, P. 2006. Human resource management in sport and recreation, Human Kinetics, Boston.
Draft, R. L. 2010. The Leadership Experience, 5th ed, South-Western College Publishing, Boston.
Humphrey, H. J. 2007. Issues in contemporary athletics, Nova Publishers, Sydney.
Martin, J. and Fellenw, M. 2010. Organizational Behaviour & Management, Cengage, New York.
Romer, D. H. and Wolfers, J. 2009. Brookings Papers on Economic Activity: Spring 2009, Brookings Institution Press, Washington.
Slack, T. & Parent, M. M.2005. Understanding sport organizations: the application of organization theory, New York: Human Kinetics.
Wong, G. M. 2009. The comprehensive guide to careers in sports, Jones & Bartlett Learning, London.