Work Teams

Management

Work Teams:

A team can be defined as a group whose members have complementary skills and are committed to a common purpose or goals which they hold themselves mutually accountable.- Smith & Katzenbach.

All groups are not team but all teams are some kind of group. A group is unit of some individuals that interact with each other and psychologically aware that they are a group. A team is a group that works for institutional objectives and influence each other. This is the basic qualification of team. In groups performance of employee depends upon particular individual but in team success depends upon all the members.

Types of teams:

Generally all organizations have three different kinds of teams. These are discussed as following.

Problem solving team: A team that is created for resolving a particular problem in an organization is called problem solving team. There are many kind problems that are being faced by management in the organization on daily basis. Usually problem solving teams have 5-10 members and it is formed to work on the problems related to overall functions of an organization. Members of team investigate the problem and discuss the possible solutions. When team reaches a conclusion it recommends the potential solutions to the management consist of some modifications.

Self managed team: Self managed teams are the highly integrated teams of several skilled employees those are trained and are given responsibilities and authority to complete the tasks of their area. These teams are self directed groups and there is no intervention from the top management in their working. These teams can plan organize and control themselves for the tasks allotted to them. Success of such teams depends upon the members and these members must be selected carefully. Activities of these teams may include work schedule, deciding work pace designing appraisal process etc.

Cross functional teams: The team that is composed of people from various different functional areas is called cross functional team. The members of these teams are from different functional areas like finance marketing, operations and quality control. These teams are focused on a specific objective of the organization. These teams may or may not be controlled by top management. Generally cross functional teams are self directed. The members of the team are employees of the same level taken from different departments.