Tuesday, May 5, 2020

Group Work A Personal Analysis

Question: Discuss about the Group Workfora Personal Analysis. Answer: Dynamics of the Group I worked in a group in my company that can be called as a functional group in terms of group dynamics. This group was created by the organization to achieve some particular goals within a specific timeline. Normally, functional groups do exist after the accomplishment of goals and objectives (Levi, 2015). However, our functional group was asked to help the customer service department that was overwhelmed by the complaints of the consumers about a new product that the company launched. There were 20 members in my group with a formal social structure. We all had the common goal that was to deliver additional support to the customer care executives of the company. Information Sharing Process My group was working to provide additional support to the customer service department; however, we did it under a separate supervisor and not directly under the customer service department. Within my group, information sharing process mainly included four methods which are hereby mentioned below. Face-to-face meeting: This method was considered as the most safe and efficient method of information sharing (Hogg Terry, 2014). In meetings, all the group members could easily share their knowledge and could ask questions. On the other hand, the supervisor could easily convey his message to all the members of the group at a time through this method of information sharing. However, as we were working as separate group, we never got the chance to conduct meeting with the employees of customer service department. This, from my point of view was a major problem with this method. E-mail: E-mail was another process that was used to share information. Sometimes when it was not possible to conduct meetings, our supervisor placed information in an e-mail and sent it to the group members (B?l?u Utz, 2016). However, this method also a major disadvantage. When the supervisor was not available, we used to mail him to have advices related to our work. At that time, we had to wait until he called or sent an e-mail in response to our questions. Forums: Forums are the newer form of information sharing method. Generally, forums are useful in organization that have large number of employees and work groups (Li, 2014). However, for our group, the organizations developed a forum where were allowed to share information in a central webpage with controlled access (Park et al., 2014). We had to log into the forum and then we could talk to each other by posting information and question in the forum. This was a very helpful method as multiple people could see any information and could response at a time. Conference calls: Conference calls were also used as an additional method of sharing information (Park Nam, 2015). Just like the face-to-face conversation, it allowed everyone to ask questions and get answers during the call. On the other hand, another advantage of this method was that group members did not have to present in the same building or location. Generating Ideas While generating ideas in the group, brainstorming method was used vastly. According to Wilson (2013), brainstorming is mostly a group idea-generation method that helps to find a solution for any specific problem by creating multiple solutions. There are mostly two types of brainstorming methods, which are individual brainstorming and group brainstorming. In our group, group-brainstorming method was implemented where we could take the advantage of complete experience and creativity of all team members. On the other hand, this process also helped every member of the group to feel that they have contributed to the solution. It also helped the group members to understand that others also have creative ideas to offer. This increased the sense of respect in the group. Positive Behaviors Positive behavior in our group was a critical ingredient is that helps to establish a successful team. According to Ashkanasy and Dorris (2017), positive behavior that is shared with other group members can attract a healthier group dynamics. Some positive behaviors that were present in my group were positive conflict resolution, support to the peers, active listening, contribution of knowledge and analyzing the tasks. As all the group members were working to achieve a common goal, a sense of teamwork was there in the first place. All the group members used to help each other in difficult situations. Group conflicts were there, but it never hampered the group dynamics as our supervisor implemented appropriate conflict resolution skills to handle and eliminate any negative effects of group conflict. Negative Behaviors Some major examples of negative behaviors in a group can include blocking ideas of other group member, wasting time of the group, failing to stay on tasks and unsatisfied performance (Samnani et al., 2014). Initially none of these problems hampered the group dynamics. However, later the management of my organization declared that after the completion of the project, group members with superior performance would be able to get additional payments. After this declaration, individual needs became more important than group needs. Group members who used to help others in difficult situations stopped to do so. Members of the group started to improve their individual performances. Some group members also tried to block the ideas of the others. In this situation, some of the group members became de-motivated as they started to think that they are not going to get any additional payment like others. Those group members started to arrive late in the workplace that dampened the energy of the gr oup. On the other hand, group members who thought that their performance is better than other group members started to ignore group process and strategies. They also refused to participate in some brainstorming sessions as they thought that other group members would steal their ideas. Besides, they also started to dominate the other group members that also hampered the environment of teamwork in the group. Because of these negative behaviors, in the end, the outcomes of the group were not satisfactory. Some group members did receive additional payments, but overall all the objectives of our group was not accomplished. References Ashkanasy, N., Dorris, A. (2017). Emotions in the Workplace.Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior,4(1). B?l?u, N., Utz, S. (2016). Information sharing as strategic behaviour: the role of information display, social motivation and time pressure.Behaviour Information Technology, 1-17. Hogg, M. A., Terry, D. J. (Eds.). (2014).Social identity processes in organizational contexts. Psychology Press. Levi, D. (2015).Group dynamics for teams. Sage Publications. Li, G. (2014). Information sharing and stock market participation: Evidence from extended families.Review of Economics and Statistics,96(1), 151-160. Park, J. H., Gu, B., Leung, A. C. M., Konana, P. (2014). An investigation of information sharing and seeking behaviors in online investment communities.Computers in Human Behavior,31, 1-12. Park, S., Nam, T. J. (2015). Product-personification method for generating interaction ideas.International Journal on Interactive Design and Manufacturing (IJIDeM),9(2), 97-105. Samnani, A. K., Salamon, S. D., Singh, P. (2014). Negative affect and counterproductive workplace behavior: The moderating role of moral disengagement and gender.Journal of business ethics,119(2), 235-244. Venkataramani, V., Labianca, G. J., Grosser, T. (2013). Positive and negative workplace relationships, social satisfaction, and organizational attachment.Journal of applied psychology,98(6), 1028. Wilson, C. (2013).Brainstorming and beyond: a user-centered design method. Newnes.

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