Chapter 14 Teams & Teamwork

The team effectiveness equation states that:

Effectiveness = Quality of inputs + (Process gains - Process Losses)

Although team process is important, the heart of teamwork is having the right inputs.

FALSE

Emotional conflict involves disagreements over goals, resources, rewards, policies, procedures, and job assignments.

FALSE

Norms develop early and remain constant during the life of the team.

FALSE

Quality circles are a form of self-managing teams.

FALSE

Team cohesiveness is always a good thing.

FALSE

Teams are usually only good for their members, not for the organizations they work for.

FALSE

The performing stage is of critical interest to managers during team development because a "failure" here can be a long-lived detriment to the team's performance future.

FALSE

__________ conflict involves disagreements over goals, resources, rewards, policies, procedures, and job assignments

Substantive

Avoidance and confrontation are forms of lose-lose conflict.

TRUE

For teams to be effective, you have to start with a firm foundation and quality inputs.

TRUE

Teams can be more pain than gain.

TRUE

The conflict management style of compromise may be used to arrive at temporary settlements of complex issues or to arrive at expedient solution when time is limited.

TRUE

The decentralized communication network works well for tasks requiring creativity and problem-solving.

TRUE

The longer the teams work together, the better they perform. Even bad sports teams start winning more games if the same team stays together.

TRUE

The purpose of cross-functional teams is to "knock down the walls" that tend to separate departments and seek integrative solutions.

TRUE

The team effectiveness equation makes it mathematically clear that process gains must outweigh process losses in order for there to be a chance of team effectiveness.

TRUE

A team performing very creative and unstructured tasks is most likely to succeed using ________.

a decentralized communication network

Smoothing, or playing down the conflict and seeking harmony among parties, is also known as

accommodation

When people are highly cooperative but not very assertive in a conflict situation, the likelihood is that they will be using which conflict management style?

accommodation

One way for a manager to build positive norms within a team is to ________.

act as a positive role model

Since positive performance norms are instrumental in achieving high performance, all of the following would support positive performance norms EXCEPT:

allowing the leader to make individual decisions to avoid conflict.

In a __________ communication network, communication flows only between individual members and a hub or center point.

centralized

A basic rule of team dynamics might be stated this way: The greater the ________ in a team, the greater the conformity to norms.

cohesiveness

The degree to which members are attached to and motivated to remain part of a team is called __________.

cohesiveness

The interpersonal conflict management style with the greatest potential for true conflict resolution is ________.

collaboration

Which conflict management style involves working through conflict differences and solving problems so that everyone wins?

collaboration

A _______ is a type of small team that meets for a specific purpose outside of their regular job assignments.

committee

The conflict management style of __________ may be used when quick and decisive action is vital or when unpopular actions must be taken.

competition

__________ is a disagreement over issues of substance and/or an emotional antagonism.

conflict

Which of the following is NOT a conflict management style?

confrontation

A __________ is comprised of members from different functional units who regularly work together to share information, explore new ideas, "knock down walls" and solve specific problems.

cross-functional team

In a __________ network, all members can communicate directly with each other.

decentralized

Charlie is a real jokester. He likes to clown around during strategic planning meetings. His behavior causes some of the other team members to just sit back and "enjoy the show." Charlie is engaging in __________.

disruptive behavior

__________ is when any and all members contribute helpful task and maintenance activities to the team.

distributed leadership

In the open-systems model of teams, the ________ is an important input factor.

diversity of membership

Which of the following is a form of a quality circle?

employee involvement team

Which of these are groups of workers who meet on a regular basis with the goal of applying their expertise to continuous improvement?

employee involvement team

All of the following are symptoms of groupthink EXCEPT:

fearing competitors are stronger and smarter.

________ teams include departments, teams, work units, and divisions.

formal

Departments, teams, work units, and divisions are all __________.

formal teams

A group that is officially designated for a specific organizational purpose is called a(n) __________.

formal teamwork

Karen is part of a project team where members are introducing themselves and establishing ground rules. This illustrates which stage of team development?

forming

The proper order of stages in the team development process is:

forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning.

How do you build a team that has the right behaviors?

give regular feedback

All of the following are expected advantages of self-managed teams EXCEPT:

greater diversity

When individuals hold back views and prematurely strive for consensus or unanimity to avoid disagreement, what may be occurring?

groupthink

_______________ is the tendency for highly cohesive teams to lose their evaluative capabilities.

groupthink

Teams that continually perform at very high levels are likely to do so because they __________.

have synergy

_____________ teams are those whose members are quite dissimilar to one another.

hetero

What are the characteristics of an effective team?

high levels of task performance, membership satisfaction, and future viability

Groupthink is most likely to occur in teams that are ________.

highly cohesive

An unofficial group that emerges from spontaneous relationships among people with common interests is called a(n) __________.

informal group

Advantages to virtual teams include all of the following EXCEPT:

it is harder to keep a record of team activities.

An action taken by a team member that supports the emotional life of the group is called a(n) __________ activity.

maintenance

When two or three individuals "railroad" a decision on a group, the method used was decision by:

minority rule

The team development stage in which members begin to operate as a unit with shared rules of conduct is the __________ stage.

norming

The major input categories required for effective teams are _______, nature of task, membership characteristics, and team size.

organizational settings

Members of a team become more motivated and better able to deal with conflict during the ________ stage of team development.

performing

Teams that are more mature, organized, and well-functioning are in which stage of team development?

performing

Dr. Gaines is a professor at Frost University. At the beginning of the semester she forms her class into self-managing teams. All of the following are responsibilities of self-managing teams EXCEPT:

performing only one job

Tony is part of a team that has been brought together to complete a specific task. When the task is completed the team will disband. Tony is part of a(n) _________.

project team

The team effectiveness equation states that Effectiveness = __________ + (Process gains - Process Losses).

quality of inputs

One of the recommended strategies for dealing with a group member who engages in social loafing is to ________.

redefine tasks to make individual contributions more visible

Teams that have the authority to make decisions about how they share and complete their work are called __________.

self-managing teams

Sue was assigned to do a team project as part of her college management course. However, she quickly learned that if she did not participate, the other team members would pick up her share. Sue is guilty of __________.

social loafing

The best way to try to increase the cohesiveness of a team would be to ________.

start competition with other groups

Sheri is experiencing frustration with her team. It seems as though the team members are often in disagreements over goals, resources, rewards, policies, procedures, and assignments. What is Sheri's team experiencing?

substantive conflict

In their research on the success rates for heart surgeons in different hospitals, researchers concluded that:

surgeons who work more with a given surgery team experience better patient success rates than they do with teams that they work less with.

The creation of a whole that exceeds the sum of its parts is called:

synergy

Which of the following is not a stage in the team development process?

taming

A team member who does a good job at summarizing discussion, offering new ideas, and clarifying points made by others is providing leadership by contributing ________ activities to the group process.

task

The key outputs sought from effective teams include:

task performance, member satisfaction, and team viability.

A collection of people with complementary skills who regularly interact to pursue common goals is called a(n) __________.

team

A set of collaborative activities to gather and analyze data on a team and make changes to increase its effectiveness is called __________.

team building

Carol understands that when building a team, one must consider the mix of skills, experiences, backgrounds, and personalities of the team members. Carol understands the importance of managing

team diversity

The way team members work together to accomplish tasks is called __________.

team process

The three output goals that an effective team should accomplish are task performance, member satisfaction, and __________

team viability

The process of people actively working together to accomplish common goals is called __________.

teamwork

A ________ decision is one in which all members agree on the course of action to be taken.

unanimous

Competition and compromise are forms of which type of conflict?

win-lose