Teamwork and Team Leadership

Table of contents

List of figures

1. Introduction

2. Teamwork
2.1 Definition Team
2.2 Special features of teamwork
2.2.1 Self-organization
2.2.2 Social team development and cohesion
2.3 Phenomena of teamwork
2.4 Team success

3. Composition of teams
3.1 Team size
3.2 Competencies and personalities of the team members
3.3 Roles

4. Team leadership
4.1 Definition and function of team leadership
4.2 The team leader
4.3 Leadership style
4.4 Leadership activities
4.4.1 Design
4.4.2 Organize
4.4.3 Implement
4.5 Team development and leadership
4.5.1 Forming
4.5.2 Storming
4.5.3 Norming
4.5.4 Performing

5. Conclusion

Bibliography

List of figures

Figure 1: Model of teamwork according to Högl and Gemünden

Figure 2: Team roles according to Belbin

Figure 3: Qualification of the team leader

Figure 4: Situational leadership according to Hersey and Blanchard

Figure 5: Concept of leadership activities

Figure 6: Phases of team development

1. Introduction

Since the mid-80s, group- and team-based forms of work have gained particular popularity due to changes in market and competitive conditions, a change in values and increased employee qualification.¹ People like to work in a team, because as a "zoon politicon" he also has the need for togetherness and social interaction in the world of work.² The high operational benefits of teamwork are reflected in the division of labor, effectiveness and efficiency, time and cost savings, and the flexibility, creativity and innovative capacity of the team generate great competitive advantages. However, if the hoped-for effects do not occur, the leadership is often identified as a problem area. Classic leadership research reaches its limits in team-oriented work, because team leadership is considerably more complex than leading individual individuals because it has to consider additional processes at the group level.³

The aim of this work is to shed light on the influencing factors on teamwork and to use them to show how team leadership must be designed in order to optimally contribute to team success. Therefore, under 2. Characteristics and phenomena of teamwork should first be examined and team success defined. This is significantly influenced by the variables "team composition" and "team leadership". While under 3rd the team composition is to be discussed, under 4th the team leadership is to move into the center of the considerations; the remarks there should also form the focus of the work.

2. Teamwork

2.1 Definition Team

The English term "team" can be translated as "team" or "group". In the specialist literature, the terms "group" and "team" are often used interchangeably, because some authors do not consider a scientific separation of these terms to be useful. However, there is agreement that a team is a further development of a group; every team is also a group, but not every group is a team.⁴ The organizational psychologist Lutz von Rosenstiel defines a group as a plurality of people who interact with each other over a longer period of time, developing different roles as well as common values and norms, striving for jointly defined goals and also having a strong sense of togetherness.⁵ Starting from the term "group", the team term can be defined.

A functioning team is a small working group that is supervised with demanding, complex assignments. The goals are defined jointly and pursued with great commitment. Each team member is jointly responsible for achieving them, which means a strong interdependence and requires an intensive and efficient interaction in which each other is accountable and the progress of work is continuously coordinated with each other.⁶ A high diversity of perspectives and competences, a clear distribution of roles, cooperation and participative decision-making processes enable the team members to work independently and to adapt flexibly to changing situations through continuous learning. A pronounced feeling of togetherness (group cohesion) is an expression of a special team identity and very high job satisfaction as a result of a working atmosphere based on partnership. The team members value and trust each other, communicate openly, recognize group dynamic dangers and conflicts and effectively counteract them.⁷ Teamwork and success are thus influenced by two relevant characteristics: task-related autonomy and social team development.⁸

2.2 Special features of teamwork

2.2.1 Self-organization

As an essential feature of teamwork, self-organization describes the degree of personal responsibility that a team assumes in the execution of its activity. The largely independent action and decision-making of the team refers to executing, planning, organizing and controlling activities. The prerequisite is a high degree of autonomy - the freedom from external control in the sense of self-determination - to expand the scope for action.⁹ Demonstrably, there are positive correlations between large scope for action and increased motivation and cohesion of the team, which are reflected in increased group performance.¹⁰

2.2.2 Social team development and cohesion

The German term "team development" means in the sense of team development the temporal development process of each team, which it automatically goes through in different phases from the moment of its creation. These temporal development phases characterized by different characteristics and behaviors - here referred to as social team development - can be described on the basis of phase models for group development.¹¹ The beginnings of such group development research date back to the 20s and 30s and culminated in the phase model developed by Bruce Wayne Tuckman, which still has great practical relevance today.¹² He described five characteristic phases of social team development: "Forming, "Storming", "Norming", "Performing" and "Adjourding".

The behaviors of the team members that make the individual phases recognizable will be explained in more detail later under 4. At first, only the aspect of social group development is of interest here. This reaches its highest level in the "performing" phase, in which group cohesion is also most pronounced. Group cohesion is the inner cohesion of the team. It is the most significant indicator of the level of group development and the measure of the emotional attachment of the members with demonstrable positive effects on group performance.¹³ The strength of group cohesion is therefore an indicator of how much the members value the group, feel committed to the group norms and want to remain in the group. Components that influence group cohesion are the attractiveness of the members, their spatial proximity, the frequency of interactions, the identification with the goal and a challenging task, as well as the size of the group and the group pride. A high level of cohesion implies a high level of team success and is particularly beneficial when difficult performance goals are being pursued.¹⁴

2.3 Phenomena of teamwork

When working in groups, various phenomena can occur, which can have an advantage, as well as a detrimental effect on group performance. The main reason for such group effects are information and motivation gains or losses.

A detrimental effect on team performance is caused by information losses, such as those that occur, for example, in "group think". Here, the extreme sense of togetherness, time pressure and the intensive search for a uniform decision lead to a distorted information processing and thus to bad group decisions.¹⁵ In addition, disadvantages due to loss of motivation are also conceivable. Well-known is the "social loafing", in which a single group member in the group unconsciously exerts less effort than with their own service provision. "Free riding" is a conscious form of motivation and performance reduction of a team member who assumes that his own results are unimportant for the group result and relies on other members. With the "succer effect", the motivation of a team member decreases because he observes the free rider behavior of other members and "no longer wants to be the stupid one".¹⁶

Positive effects based on motivation gains are the promotion by better partners (Köhler effect) or by co-actors ("mere perence" effect), the sacrifice of a member for a bad group ("social compensation") or the increase in performance through competition with other groups ("social labouring").¹⁷

The biggest advantage of teamwork is the positive synergy effect. When teams develop their full performance potential, the synergy effect means that the result is more than the sum of its individual parts.¹⁸ The constructiveness and efficiency of the entire team are therefore far above the total result of the individual team members. Different knowledge and skills are combined in such a way that a result with greater benefit for the organization is created.¹⁹

2.4 Team success

The performance of a team and the quality of teamwork are measured by team success. More generally, "success" refers to the extent to which a particular goal has been reached. From the company's ultimate goal – profit maximization or cost reduction – the special task of the team can be derived, which is to be fulfilled in this respect with the greatest possible productivity, i.e. effectively and efficiently.²⁰ Taking into account the influence of group dynamic processes, the assessment of successful teamwork must also include the social and cognitive level of the team. Team success thus consists beyond its productivity in the greatest possible satisfaction of the members and in continuous learning through self-critical questioning of previous problem solutions and strategies.²¹

Figure 1: Model of teamwork according to Högl and Gemünden

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthaltenSource: Högl, M., Gemünden, H., 2001, Management von Teams, p. 47

The group or team collaboration model in Figure 1 illustrates the variables that influence team success. Based on this, the influence of team composition and leadership on team performance will be presented.

3. Composition of teams

For team performance, team composition is of great importance. Not only the team size, but also the personality and character traits of the members, as well as the resulting distribution of roles, have a decisive influence on whether positive group dynamics and optimal work performance can be achieved.²²

3.1 Team size

How many people are needed for a team depends first of all on the amount of work to be mastered. The team should be equipped with sufficient personnel capacity to ensure long-term performance. In addition, however, it should be noted that with increasing team size, the team organizational effort increases considerably and the output of the team decreases significantly. The reason for this is that the relationships between the team members become more and more complex with the increasing number of people, with the result of unwanted group formation and increased potential for conflict.²³ The satisfaction in the community and the identification with the result decrease. In addition, team size has a significant influence on the social loafing phenomenon, according to which the commitment of individual members tends to decrease with increasing size. The optimal number of team members should be between 3 and 9, and ideally 5 - 7 people.²⁴

3.2 Competencies and personalities of the team members

True to the motto "A group is as strong as its worst link", it goes without saying to pay attention to professional and social skills when selecting the team members.²⁵ In addition, members should have a special preference for teamwork. The term "ability to work in a team" describes the ability of individuals to participate productively in teamwork or to lead teams.²⁶

In addition to the competencies of the individual team member, his character dispositions are also important for a successful team result. The "Big Five" of personality traits that Costa and McCrae identified in their five-factor model (1985) are neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, tolerability, and conscientiousness. Extraversion and compatibility are the most important characteristics of teamwork.²⁷

Whether the character traits in the team should be rather homogeneous or rather heterogeneously distributed with regard to group performance depends on the respective work assignment and cannot be defined universally. A homogeneous distribution of characteristics increases the satisfaction of the members through positive group processes and promotes a good group climate, because it promotes social and task-related cohesion.²⁸ Heterogeneity of personality traits means lower job satisfaction, lower cohesion and thus higher fluctuation in the group. On the other hand, a heterogeneous distribution of properties favors group performance, especially when problems have to be solved, new ideas found or complex decisions made. In teams with a special distribution of roles, the abilities of the group members should correspond to their respective roles, i.e. be heterogeneous.²⁹

3.3 Roles

Over time, roles emerge that are taken over by the team members. The sociologist Ralf Dahrendorf defines the social role as a bundle of binding norms of behavior that the bearer of the role has to fulfill. The resulting role expectations, which are placed on the role holder, refer to role behavior and attributes (appearance, character) and entail sanctions in the event of non-fulfillment. The role thus describes the position of the owner in a social structure.³⁰ A clear distribution of roles simplifies team action by limiting the complexity of cooperation on several levels. Roles give the individual personal identity, make communication more predictable and ensure stability in the group field. They fulfil a general social orientation function, because they create security of expectation for a regularly predictable behavior as a prerequisite for continuously predictable interactions in the team.³¹

The English scientist Dr. Meredith Belbin investigated the effects of different personality types on team performance in the 70s. Based on the different characteristics of the different personalities, he developed a model from nine different team roles (see Figure 2). According to Belbin, teams work effectively when they consist of a variety of heterogeneous personality and role types.³²

Figure 2: Team roles according to Belbin

Abbildung in dieser Leseprobe nicht enthalten

Source: Dick, R., 2005, Teamwork, Team diagnosis, Team Development, p. 27

4. Team leadership

4.1 Definition and function of team leadership

The leadership researcher Rolf Wunderer defines leadership as "goal-oriented social influence to fulfill common tasks in or with a structured work situation."³³ Such a goal-oriented influence on attitudes and behavior is mutually realized with the introduction of teamwork or interactions in and between groups. At this point, the traditional perception of leadership is changing, because leading a team is considerably more complex than leading individuals.³⁴ As a critical prerequisite for sustainable team success, team leadership consists in a kind of service for service creation, problem solving, team development and team maintenance. It must take into account the special characteristics of a team, its task-related autonomy and group dynamics.³⁵

[...]

¹ cf. Pietruschka, 2003, p. 1

² cf. Gebert, 2004, p. 23; Pietruschka, 2003, p. 8; Rosenstiel, 2003, p. 368; Lumma, 2000, p. 12

³ cf. Wegge, 2004, p. 197/198

⁴ cf. Pietruschka, 2003, p. 4; Rosenstiel, 2003, p. 384; Schuler, 2006, p. 582

⁵ cf. Rosenstiel, 2003, p. 376; Schuler, 2006, p. 581; Kriz, 2002, p. 17

⁶ cf. Dick, 2005, p. 3; Schuler, 2006, p. 582

⁷ cf. Kriz, 2002, p. 24

⁸ cf. Pietruschka, 2003, p. 26

⁹ cf. Pietruschka, 2003, p. 5; Velmerig, 2004, p. 108

¹⁰ cf. Schuler, 2006, p. 594

¹¹ cf. Dick, 2005, p. 8

¹² cf. Stumpf, 2003, p. 35

¹³ cf. Pietruschka, 2003, p. 16; Schuler, 2006, p. 593

¹⁴ cf. Schuler, 2006, p. 593; Wegge, 2004, p. 136; Staehle, 1999, p. 283

¹⁵ cf. Staehle, 1999, p. 291; Wegge, 2004, p. 80

¹⁶ cf. Gebert, 2004, p. 83; Dick, 2005, p. 19; Wegge, 2004, p. 85

¹⁷ cf. Dick, 2005, p. 16; Wegge, 2004, p. 62

¹⁸ cf. Kriz, 2002, p. 11, p. 24

¹⁹ cf. Lumma, 2000, p. 14

²⁰ cf. Wegge, 2004, p. 109

²¹ cf. Gebert, 2004, p. 24; Staehle, 1999, p. 349

²² cf. Wunderer, 1993, p. 107

²³ cf. Gebert, 2004, p. 113; Niermeyer, 2008, p. 63

²⁴ cf. Gebert, 2004, p. 113; Rosenstiel, 2003, p. 377

²⁵ cf. Stumpf, 2003, p. 6

²⁶ cf. Velmerig, 2004, p. 75

²⁷ cf. Schuler, 2006, p. 567

²⁸ cf. Gebert, 2004, p. 123; Schuler, 2006, p. 563, p. 565

²⁹ cf. Schuler, 2006, p. 565, p. 587; p. 588; Wegge, 2004, p. 127

³⁰ cf. Dahrendorf, 2010, p. 35

³¹ cf. Stahl, 2002, p. 295, p. 296

³² cf. Dick, 2005, p. 26, p. 27

³³ cf. Wunderer, 1993, p. 24

³⁴ cf. Wegge, 2004, p. 197

³⁵ cf. Velmerig, 2004, p. 175