“The five dysfunction of a team, a leadership fable”, gives an overview of what happens in most organizations. In the scenario presented by the characters in this book, it is clear that the attitude of a leader will always have an effect on those that he leads. The first reason why teams fail to function as expected is lack of trust. Trust is needed for cohesion within the team. In a team scenario, trust involves beliefs by team members that the actions of a specific member are well intended.
This leads to openness among team members who will have no need to hide anything from the group. Lack of trust can lead to costly consequences to the team and the organization (Lencioni, 2010). A team that lacks trust among members needs to be heavily supervised since members are always reluctant to meet and to share ideas.
Another sign of a dysfunctional team is the fear of conflict. Conflict can be productive in some cases. It can help to strengthen relationships as well as lead to improved decision making. However, this conflict should not be political but ideological. A good conflict should produce excellent output without leaving the conflicting parties with hard feeling towards each other.
An effective team will engage in conflict during heated debates but there is no residual left after the debate since they know that the discussion is for the good of the team (Harris and Sherblom, 2010). The teams that avoid conflicts and especially ideological conflict do so with the aim of avoiding hurting the feelings of the teammates. However this mostly leads to personal attacks which cause more pain than ideological conflict. There is also the notion that conflict leads to the wastage of time. However ideological conflict saves time.
A team can also fail to perform well due to lack of commitment. A functional team makes decision and moves to implement the decisions. All members work as a team in the implementation process including those whose ideas had been rejected by the team. However, dysfunctional teams lack commitment to the group and the decisions that are made by the team (Lencioni, 2011).
The main reasons for this dysfunction are the need for teams to reach consensus on various issues and the requirement for certainty of issues. A lot of time is usually wasted by teams as they try to get as much information as possible with the view of making optimal decisions.
Avoidance of accountability is also an indicator of a failed team. The avoidance of accountability involves team members’ unwillingness to correct negative behaviors of the fellow team members which might have negative effects on the team. Another dysfunctional characteristic of a team is the inattention of the team members to team results (Lencioni, 2011). Therefore, this means than the concern of the team members is not in the team. The five dysfunctions of a team relates to the organization theory in a number of ways.
This model analyses the behavior of each member of the team and the effects of such a behavior to the team. It also looks at the collective behavior of the team as a consequence of the behavior of each member of the team. The model also looks at the roles played by the team leader in shaping the behavior of the team. This is at the heart of the organization theory (Richard, Murphy and Willmott, 2010).
Managers in an organization have the role of shaping the behavior and attitude of employees toward achievement of certain goals. Failure to achieve this is always blamed on the management. This is also the case in the five dysfunctions of team which considers the failure of teams to be the responsibility of team leaders.
References
Daft, R., L., Murphy, D., J. and Willmott, H. (2010). Organization Theory and Design. Andover: Cengage Learning EMEA.
Harris, T., E. and Sherblom, J., C. (2010). Small Group and Team Communication. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, Incorporated.
Lencioni, P., M. (2010). The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable. New York: John Wiley and Sons.
Lencioni, P., M. (2011). The Five Temptations of a CEO: A Leadership Fable. New York: ReadHowYouWant.com.