Self-Directed Work Teams

Firstly, the top management team who are the individuals with the highest ranking with senior managerial responsibility in an organisation. The directors of Virgin translate the policy into targets, purposes, and collaborative enterprise that is carefully planned and designed to achieve a particular aim. It makes resolutions that affect people in the organisation. Secondly, a self-managed team, it is the group of employees that is accountable for the producing of the most parts of a product or a service delivering. A self-managed team carry out assisting tasks for example, arrangements and scheduling the sequence of industrial and managements of annual leave and absence, e.g cockpit flight crew. Thirdly, work team who works on recurring duties for example, virgin flight engineers. They are the most useful team where the career signification changes considerably and workers with restricted skills and a particular set of tasks are not able to conquer. Finally, the cross functional teams, it is the group of individuals with multi functional skills working toward a mutual purposes. Sometimes it includes individuals from different departments such as finance and marketing. In addition, it includes individuals from all scales of an organisation for example, cockpit crew and air traffic control

Part of being a manager for a company is managing teams. These teams can be created for many different reasons and can have various goals put upon them. Companies want managers that are capable of constructing teams that can effectively meet goals and set standards. The four types of work teams most commonly found in organizations are: problem-solving, self-managed, cross-functional, and virtual. In completing the simulation for this course, I will use cross-functional work teams as a foundation for my investigation of effective team management.

The members in this type of team collaborate to share in management and decision-making roles, while maintaining accountability for organizational responsibilities under their direction. Although, this team method system may not be suited for all companies, in order for self-directed to be successful, managers and supervisors will need to become facilitators or coaches. Proper planning and communication plays a vital role in this transition, as is examined in the case study presented.

Many organizations today believe that the use of work teams will allow them to produce better products and provide better services, faster, and at lower costs. Using a work team approach can reinvigorate productivity and service provider motivation, and better position an organization to deal with a rapidly changing environment. However establishing effective work teams is not something that comes easy. Though, the benefits of effective work teams within an organization are very substantial, it takes alot of hard work and dedication on the part of management and team members to develop, implement and maintain effective work teams.

Modern views on teamwork also consider the satisfaction of the workforce by becoming more autonomous and reducing hierarchical structures (Ovretveit et al, 1997).

Presently, “though independence may not be synonymous with behavioral autonomy, which also requires independent decision making in addition to demonstrating behavior independently, both concepts indicate the ability to complete tasks without proximity, guidance, prompting, support, or advice from others” (Hume, et al., 2014, pg.103). Furthermore, a leader who is constantly looking over the shoulder of his team members is little more than a babysitter. Moreover, independent teams necessitate resources, and specifically, employee time. Therefore, leaders should present their teams with reasons and opportunity so teams can stretch out on their own and even lead others.

The issue of team self-management is one of great interest in today’s complex environment, it seems many businesses are restructuring themselves in an attempt to “modernize” and stay relevant. Some of the most successful organizations in modern times were nothing more than an idea a decade or two ago, with names like Facebook and Zappos. Part of this successful “startup culture” includes decentralization of decision-making, often leading to a more flexible and employee friendly work environment. More traditional organizations are taking note of this trend and studying it or implementing it themselves.

The self-directed work team is an autonomous work unit capable of self-management. Such team has little need for direct supervision from managers; rather, the manager’s role is to meet the need of the team through the provision of resources, training and encouragement (Douglas & Gardner, 2004). The team is typically comprised of 5 to 15 members who are responsible for performing and managing all or most aspect of a set of interdependent work tasks (Yeatts and Hyten, 1998). In order to overcome the competitive challenge for production efficiency and effectiveness, organizations have focused on

In any group or team there are always challenges to face but in today’s world, more company’s are moving to group or teams as a way to handle large projects along with promoting more diversity in the workplace. “A group is defined as two or more individual interacting and independent, who have come together to achieve particular objectives” (Stephen Robbins, 2007 p.1). Groups and teams are becoming more popular because the idea is that more heads are better, and the quality of work improves with group and teams working together on a

Originally thought of as a management fad, self-managed teams in an organization have become an increasingly common and accepted practice (Blackwell, Gibson & Tesone, 2003). What may have started from an innovative way to reduce management positions and increase employee involvement has now evolved into a crucial strategy to increase organization effectiveness and efficiency. However, many organizations are faced with the daunting task of determining the logistics of the team. The inability to effectively determine these important factors have resulted in many organizations failing in their mission to effectively utilize this concept (Elmuti, 1996).

Accordingly, the concept of self-managed work teams has increasingly been – in today’s globally competitive environment – receiving attention from both academics and organisations as a promising new tool in management (Manz 1992; Druskat & Wheeler 2004). The concept of self-managed work teams describes the set of

Self-directed work teams which help the individual franchisees that contribute to the company. This directive brings out self-management responsibilities in the individual franchisees.

Socio-technical system theory is the main theory of the self-directed work teams. It is a theory stating that effective work sites have joint optimization of their social and technological systems, and that teams should have sufficient autonomy to control the key variances in the work process.The main feature of self-directed work team is that much of the responsibility and authority usually vested in the supervisor is transferred to the team members (Fisher, 2000; Orsburn and Moran, 2000; Yukl, 2010). Besides, self directed work teams is considers as the most advanced form of empowerment (Fisher, 2000). He claims empowerment is the function of four variables. People need formal authority, resources like budget, equipment, time and training relate to this authority, accurate information and sense of accountability for the work they execute to be empowered. Quinn and Spreitzer (1997) said that enpowerment can be approached from a mechanistic or an organic view.According to the mechanistic approach empowerment

What are the advantages and disadvantages of working in teams? By reference to relevant theory show how can the disadvantages be reduced or avoided.

Due to the fact Dalman and Lei are spending a lot of time solving problems that the location mangers should be resolving; they are considering implementing a self-managed team approach for the organization. Of course, there are disadvantages but some of the advantages of self-manage teams are they promote empowerment; increased employee commitment; build better customer satisfaction; quality control; team members could be cross-trained to do all jobs. Dalman and Lei could share their knowledge on how the business operation is to function and why certain things are done a particular way. Self-managed teams are trending today, but a team would not be able to assume all those responsibilities at once. Team members would have to be trained on the various supervisory routines in their daily functions. In order to implement this process Dalman and Lei must ensure the expectations and parameters to work in are clearly defined, training is conducted, methods for reviewing and evaluating progress are in order, and goals are set so that the team members can take responsibility for addressing issues and providing solutions that work. If implemented successfully, Dalman and Lei would be able to devote more time to focus on growing Sandwich Blitz, and their team will take on