Team Organization & Success

I recently participated on a committee of 25 girls within my sorority. While our performance was not exactly the posterchild for successful teamwork, many of the aspects Bolman & Deal discussed in chapter 5 resonated with my experiences in that group, and I wanted to blog about those parallels this week as a way of reflecting on ways we might have collectively improved our outcome.

The structure of the committee was unique in that, among ourselves, we were a textbook example for B&D’s dual authority model. Another girl and myself were at the top of the hierarchy, having earned our position after applying and then being chosen democratically via a whole chapter vote.  As part of our leadership positions, we oversaw setting the committee goals, and then dividing the committee so that they could perform smaller tasks that were in line with those goals. All decision making, scheduling, planning, and budgeting responsibilities were also on our shoulders. What makes the structure unique is that, while we were internally dual-authority, our committee fit into a larger structure that can best be described by B&D’s all-channel network.

To give a brief background that might make this structure clearer, the all-channel network consisted of all members of the chapter. Each member was placed in a committee that was responsible for some portion of Panhellenic formal recruitment. The biggest of these committees was recruitment committee, and the smallest was the technology committee. Our committee, in charge of house and food, fell somewhere in the middle. Dual authority arose within our committee as a natural extension of the division of power, since I was responsible for food planning and preparation while my counterpart handled house logistics and décor. On the larger chapter scale, each committee was equally dependent on the others to perform their duties so that we would have a successful recruitment.

In discussing keys to successful teams, B&D reference The Wisdom of Teams in which Katzenbach and Smith highlight characteristics of high-performing teams. One of these characteristics that especially stood out to me was “high-performing teams are of a manageable size.” In the experience I introduced above, our committee was so large that, at times, it impeded our productivity. We simply didn’t have enough tasks to occupy each person at all times, and this resulted in people feeling like their time was not being valued, or like they weren’t being allowed to contribute to the larger goals of the all-channel network.

The frustration that resulted escalated group tensions, and created a separate set of issues that were outside the scope of responsibilities I had anticipated for my role. Admittedly, at times these tensions made me feel like an unfit leader because I didn’t know how to give people what they wanted. I didn’t have the authority to reshuffle committees, nor did I have enough responsibility within the scope of my job to create more tasks so that each person could feel needed. I focused on trying to shift group attitudes by being a positive team member and an appreciative leader whenever someone performed a beneficial task.  

Last week in class, Professor Arvan posed a question about the effects of frustration in the workplace on opportunism. While there was some class discussion over this, my experience with this group leads me to believe that frustration encourages opportunistic behavior. Whatever event that causes the frustration in the workplace provides the affected individual with some justification to perform the opportunistic action they may have talked themselves out of under calmer circumstances.

In my case, because people were frustrated their time was not being valued, they felt justified in disrespecting the time of myself, my co-leader, and the rest of the committee’s time. This manifested itself in people showing up late to meetings, ditching out early, or simply not showing up at all. The extent of our leadership didn’t afford us an effective method of rewards or punishment, and many people chose to accept this loose system of accountability as an opportunity to be self-serving.

B&D mention collective accountability as another key to success, and I would argue that this component is stronger in smaller groups, where each person feels like their presence is valuable. (Perhaps in a larger group with greater responsibility, collective accountability would be higher as well -- there's something to be said for a balance between team size and workload.) Collective accountability may also be tied to an increased likelihood for individual recognition. When someone in a small group is absent, the loss felt by the group is much greater. Both of these things relate closely to one's perception of their individual value within the group. B&D also pointed out the positive correlation between group size and organizational complexity, and I would certainly agree with their assessment that smaller groups are easier to manage.

Reflecting on my experiences, I think that, had our committee been smaller, we would have been more efficient. A smaller committee would have afforded my co-leader and myself more time to work towards greater ambitions, or even simply to fine-tune the group organization, because we wouldn’t have had to dedicate so much effort to micromanaging the smaller task teams or handling “HR issues”. While we ultimately still met our group goals, this first experience leading a large group* certainly taught me of the importance of organizational structure. I not only hope to pass that advice on to our successors, but I’m certain it will be valuable in my future leadership positions as well.

***large group in comparison to prior leadership experiences, where groups consisted of 3-8 individuals; I realize that each person's definition of group sizes may differ based on their experiences