Virtual teams have been defined as teams that rarely meet face to face and mainly communicate via email, or chat. These types of teams usually follow an asynchronously type of work, and have defining characteristics, such as a distribution of members across time, geography or both (Corbitt, Gardiner & Wright, 2004). Organizations can benefit greatly [...]
The Ringelmann Effect, also known as social loafing, was named after Maximilien Ringelmann, a French agricultural engineer born in the 1860’s (Kravitz & Martin, 1986). When examining the efficiency of groups at completing basic agricultural tasks, Ringelmann noted that as group size increased, the performance per individual decreased (Kravitz & Martin, 1986). In his rudimentary [...]
Team building is the first step that needs to be taken when striving for developing high performance teams. A good amount of field research has showcased that team traits such as better interpersonal relationships, increased creativity, improved decision making and problem solving, are boosted through the practice of team –building activities. And this is reasonable, [...]
Beyond logistics In contemporary tech-driven, dynamic markets, jobs have become even more complex and agile. Agility requires collective intelligence, that is people working together in innovative -sometimes disruptive- ways. Indeed, firms’ revenue and sustained competitive advantage are now realized through teamwork, not 'lone wolfs'. What is more, organizational success is achieved not through any [...]
Diversity; a strategic choice As showcased earlier (see previous post on High performance teams) high performance teams function on the basis of twelve interrelated traits grouped into three higher order ‘families’: team culture, team structures, team processes. Zooming into our model, we highlighted that out of all three dimensions the very basis of a [...]
The benefits of team building to a business has long been proven, even if it isn’t always to everyone’s liking. It can be a highly effective way of generating and maintaining a positive working environment and getting staff to form new bonds with each other. Employees will learn more about their colleagues, including their [...]
Running up the steep hill As discussed in our previous thesis, it is key for managers to arm themselves with the knowledge of the team performance-team maturity relationship. In doing so, they are able to identify the nature of groups they are currently working with, as well as the team ‘archetype’ they should be aiming [...]
Why Teams? Change has grown to be one of a few constants for contemporary organizations (Elrod & Tippett, 1999). In today’s dynamic business landscape, a firm can no longer secure sustained competitive advantage by the employment of traditional strategies. Instead it is the organization’s resilience capacity (Lengnick-Hall & Beck, 2009), essentially its ability to adapt [...]
