Managing Work Groups and Teams: Skill-Building Exercise

In building a new group, what are some ways that you might best ensure that the group has high performance norms? Check all that apply.

-Create a reward system that incentivizes high performance -Select people with a history of high performance

Which of these observations is correct? Check all that apply.

-In some cases, managers may want to resolve or eliminate conflict. -In some cases, managers may want to control conflict. -In some situations, managers may want to stimulate conflict.

Exercise Overview Interpersonal skills refer to the ability to communicate with, understand, and motivate individuals and groups. Implicit in this definition is the notion that a manager should try to understand important characteristics of the work group(s) being supervised. Diagnostic skills help managers visualize and understand the most appropriate response to a situation. This also relates to assessing how various things are related to one another. This exercise will give you insight into the importance of both interpersonal and diagnostic skills as they relate to managing groups and teams in organizations.

Exercise Background In other cases managers are promoted, transferred, or reassigned to a different job and take over an existing group or team. At one extreme they may inherit a highly functional and productive group; at the other extreme they may inherit a group that is dysfunctional and that has a lot of internal problems. And, of course, there are many potential possibilities between these two extremes. Therefore, it is important that managers have the skills needed to carefully assess the current dynamics of a group in order not to create problems where none exists or to solve problems that do exist. The questions that follow focus on different scenarios in which such insights may be needed.

Your organization has an executive committee that oversees corporate policies. The group has a chair who schedules meetings and sets agendas. There is also a recording secretary who takes notes and maintains records. In addition, another member of the group serves as a liaison to the board of directors. Which group characteristic does this description best reflect?

Role structure