Team Development And Leadership : Example Of Unhealthy Agreement Within A Team

Members fail to communicate their desires and/or beliefs to one another, and, most importantly, sometimes even communicate the very opposite of their wishes based on what they assume are the desires and opinions of others. People make incorrect assumptions about consensus. Based on inaccurate perceptions and assumptions, members make a collective decision that leads to action. It is in the action that it becomes apparent that the decision is contrary to individual desires. Members experience frustration, anger, and dissatisfaction with the organization. Often this leads to the forming of sub-groups that take combative or blaming positions toward each other.

In the article “The Stanford Prison Experiment”, the author Philip Zimbardo tells an experiment that ran by a professor who wants to find how could a prison environment influence people in it. According to what the authors describes, the experiment is getting more and more out of control. Prisoners are getting tame and keepers are getting bossy which forces the team to stop the experiment in 6 days instead of 14 days. At the end, the author claims his idea about the experiment that he is surprised by how people can change in a special environment. As for me, this article gives me an idea that in some special situation, such as the prison environment in this article, groupthink is something unavoidable and uncontrollable.

A team is a type of organizational group with independent members. They share common goals and work together to meet these goals (Northouse, 2016). The organization where I work has teams at various levels for maximizing the success. These teams include, core teams, coordinating teams, patient aligned care team (PACT), contingency teams, ancillary teams, support and administration teams (Veterans Health Administration [VHA], 2015). Some of these teams have interdepartmental members while others have intradepartmental staff. Successful teams have a concrete blueprint and that contributes to their effective functioning. There are several factors that affect these teams irrespective of the level. The factors comprise the presence of a clear task, separation from non-team members, authority, and stability. The factors like working conditions, team process and bridging the gaps are concerns for the executive level. The complexity of the task, individual skills and their diverse specializations affect the selection of the team members. The team’s meaningful interactions decide their success. Independent teams can help promote friendly competition within the organization and lead to better staff performance. An efficient leader can design and launch an effective team through careful planning and selection of the right members. He/she keeps the factors that affect the success of the team in mind when designing the teams. The patient care units

The Family Health Center is a clinic that is under the umbrella of Bear Valley Community Hospital, a small rural hospital. The hospital is located in a ski resort town in the mountains above San Bernardino County. The next closest medical facility is an approximate hour drive on curvy mountain roads. The hospital is a standalone hospital, not associated with any other hospitals or chains. Bear Valley Community Hospital provides emergency room services, has eleven acute beds and a skilled nursing facility. Bear Valley Community Hospital accepts a wide variety of insurances and sees all ages and types of patients. The Family Health Center has a variety of specialty providers, as well as family practice. They have doctors with specialties in internal medicine, family practice, obstetrics/gynecology, pain control and chiropractic services (Family Health Center, n.d.). There is a telemedicine program that currently provides psychology services through telemedicine (Family Health Center, n.d.). There are several Family Nurse Practitioners and a Pediatric Nurse Practitioner (Family Health Center, n.d.). As a result they see patients from pregnancy through adulthood. The clinic sees patients of all socioeconomic levels and accepts

More specifically, whenever a group making policy displays most of the symptoms of Groupthink then "we can expect to find that the group also displays symptoms of defective decision-making. Seven such examples are as Janis states:

15. As the decision to launch a new product to prevent tooth decay was being debated, one of the product development specialists commented, “What a great product! We have created something that will help Americans maintain the enamel on their teeth. I don't know why those health critics are accusing us of putting a potentially harmful product out on the market. After all, our goal is to help people, not to hurt them. We're interested in doing what is in the best interest of the public.” She has demonstrated which of the following symptoms of groupthink?

If a group of individuals do not understand others who makes dangerous decisions and gives others unrealistic solutions,

Claudia Chow Myers English 104 15 October 2014 What is Groupthink? Groupthink is a decision-making mechanism characterized by self-deception that occurs within a group. Typically, members of that group follow orders with no questions asked and suppress their own ideas to not upset the consensus.

Groupthink is described as a mode of thinking in which group member’s premature striving for agreement somehow overrides their ability to realistically appraise alternative courses of action. After having watched “Bush’s War” I feel groupthink did in part play a significant role in the decision making process leading up to the war on Iraq. Members of cohesive, like-minded groups that share and cling to the same assumptions and beliefs while disregarding opinions and information to the contrary are more susceptible to groupthink. This kind of group cohesiveness was apparent within the Bush Administration where several key members steadfastly held onto the same assumption and course of action without logically

running one group for six months or longer seems quite exorbitant! The theme of this book was based on an organizational approach to effective team building skills. The fable began by giving a brief background of the cooperation, DecisionTech, Inc. which was what this story was centered around. There was a new CEO, of the corporation, Kathryn, and her main task was to create effective teamwork among her staff who were the key leaders of this company. After observing the interaction and dialogue of all team members for several weeks, she finally decided to call an off-site meeting and invited her staff members to attend. The meeting was to take place just far enough to where

The term groupthink in this report is defined as, the social psychological phenomenon that results in groups during pressure situations. This social psychology theory is broken down into eight signs. Illusion of invulnerability, Collective rationalization, Belief in inherent morality, Stereotyped views of out-groups, Direct pressure on dissenters, Self-censorship, Illusion of unanimity, Self-appointed “mindguards”. According to research conducted by Irving Janis, there are three conditions to groupthink. The first, "high group cohesiveness" which is the direction for a group to be in unity while working towards a goal, or to satisfy the emotional needs of its members. Secondly, the structural faults such as insulation of the group, lack

Avoidance of accountability – with no commitment team member have a hard to calling others out, when their action are not productive.

Groupthink theory often occurs without the group’s realization. Irving Janis formed 8 different symptoms that indicate groupthink. The first of these symptoms is illusions of vulnerability. This occurs when members of the group are overly optimistic and believe that nothing negative will arise from their decision. Janis describes it as taking great risks and acquiring the attitude of “everything is going to be OK, because we are a special group”. Secondly we have belief in inherent morality. This symptom is characterized as the groups thought that they could do no wrong. They believe that they have high morality, that they are right in all situations and they ignore the ethical consequences that could arise because of their decisions. As the third

Often, unethical human behavior is not intentional, but is coincidentally based on boundaries such as individual knowledge, organizational unanimity, and societal acceptance of policy. On an individual level, although unbeknownst to the individual, humans make decisions based on the best outcomes for themselves, which may result in unintentional and unethical degradation of a fellow human. Further, an organizational setting will compound individual ethical dilemmas as internal groups working together seek acceptance through groupthink, which is the tendency of a work group to come to an agreement

The topics discussed by Northouse, Kouzes, and Posner are team leadership. Team leadership are work units that have are interdependent and share common goals (Northouse,2016). In this week?s unit, team leadership will be explained through the Hill Model for Team Leadership and how it applies to team effectiveness. Furthermore, virtual and non-virtual team will be compare and contrast and how to create cohesiveness. Team leadership theory is the key to developing success high performing teams.