Team Learning
Team alignment is critical to ensure team effectiveness. An unaligned team could work extraordinarily hard and produce very little. Lack of team alignment results in wasted energy. Aligned teams produce extraordinary results through harmonizing energies and much less effort. Teams achieve alignment through a common purpose, shared vision, and knowing how to best support one another. This way, personal visions becomes team visions, which also allows for greater empowerment of team members.
Team learning is the process of team development and team alignment that increases team capacity, and it enables the team to operate as an effective unit. Team learning starts with team vision and continues to build upon it. The team as a unit is critical to allow for team decision-making, a staple of the modern business environment. Team learning comprises of three dimensions. First, teams need to possess insightful thinking about complex issues. Next, teams need to respond with an innovative and coordinated effort to address the issues. Finally, to execute the effort, coordination is needed across teams, which means team learning need to propagate throughout the organization. The way teams achieve this is through dialogue and discussion, the foundations of team learning (Senge, 2006).
Systems Thinking
Systems thinking is the process of seeing ‘the big picture’ instead of focusing on superficial symptoms. It represents a discipline by which we learn to recognize
1. System Thinking: System thinking is nothing but instead of focusing on only one particular issue, we have to analyze and try to understand the entire system on the whole. With this kind of analyzation, we can easily find a solution to the problem as the problems are not confined to only a particular area or time. We might find a solution for a particular issue, somewhere in the whole system by analyzing the entire system completely. We should try to relate the actions and the consequences on the whole as the issues occur at different time levels, not confined to only one particular time level. We have to have knowledge of the relation between different departments of an organization and the relation between them and the functionality between the departments as to how they are related in an organization. We generally focus on only one particular issue rather than seeing the bug picture and that shouldn’t be done. In system thinking we analyze the big picture.
Teams have become very common and effective since they have proven to be effective in areas as cost reduction, developing new and innovative products, and improving quality (Effective Human relation, 2008). Team development is supported, in fact, required by almost all managements today, but still it may take quite a long time for the members to learn the task and activities and to fit themselves in the particular environment. Team work may vary as the organization or company varies. Team work involves a lot of important aspects such as relationships, cooperation, learning, leadership etc. since a team works together in
With today’s fast moving pace there are many challenges we face that demands more non-linear system thinking instead of cause and effect linear thinking. In The Fifth Discipline, Peter Senge stated, “system thinking is a discipline for seeing wholes,” rather than reacting to a specific part or event. System thinking involves shifting from the linear to non-linear thinking and/or the rational to the intuitive or thin-slicing type decisions. System thinking is
“Teamwork is critical to successful use of talent, skills, knowledge and labor in a globally competitive marketplace. All members of a team and organization have something to share with others and something to learn” (Kaye, & Hogan, 1999). Combined “Learning Team D” has a lot of strengths some of the innate tendencies are that a majority of the team is tenacious. As a whole they seek to get things done quickly. The members all express confidence in their ability to achieve and make things happen. They are able to create a plan of action and follow-up routines. The team is able to take calculated risks when making decisions. The team is able to see things in black and white. This makes it easier for them to delegate and take charge when it is required. Members often downplay
The implementation of systems thinking can have both a positive and negative effect on staff, which varies from one member to another. If the process of implantation is handled correctly, the overall outcome will be positive. However, more established staff members may be reluctant to change; this will therefore have a negative impact. The introduction of system thinking will require new ways of thinking. Additionally, staff may require training, due to the fact that systems thinking is likely to involve a more collaborate approach to problem solving through teamwork, with which some may not be familiar with.
Teams are an integral component of organizational success. They take on many forms and functions and can have various structures. Teams also conduct a wide variety of projects with goals of innovation or mitigation. An example, from my experience, of a project that required the execution from a team was the establishment of a finished goods inventory program within a paper manufacturing company. A project of this magnitude required that a diverse and multifaceted team be assembled.
In the book the advantage by, Patrick Lencioni he talks about how he believes it is possible to build a better company. He believes that creating clarity is the second most important aspect of creating a successful and healthy organization also referred to as achieving alignment by an increasing number of business professionals. achieving alignment is a growing concern throughout the business world because it try to create clarity in so many different areas such as disorder, confusion, and infighting many professionals has reconciled all the benefits it is capable of bring to their organization if utilized properly and that is where the problem lies.
Systems thinking is the capacity to see the master plan and to recognize patterns as opposed to conceptualizing change as segregated events. System thinking requires the other four orders to empower a learning organization to be figured it out. Additionally system thinking demonstrates that there is no outside that the reason for your issues at a piece of a solitary system.
Systems theory is a perspective that places emphasis on understanding how people fit into their environments (Segal, Gerdes, & Sue, 2016). In systems theory if a specific person, let’s call them Greg, has one system that’s not functioning properly, then the rest of their systems will most likely not work as well (Segal, Gerdes, & Sue, 2016). Greg is homeless, and his family won’t
Team knowledge sourcing can, in fact, improve team creativity in several ways” (Khedhaouria & Ribiere, 2013, pg.311). Moreover, team learning and execution are often at odds. Still, team learning by its nature involves uncertainty, false starts, and occasional dead ends. Additionally, teams with learning orientation should gain motivation and dedication to learning are increasing progressively as they continue to work on their assigned projects. Team members with sincerity and inspiration to learn will certainly drive their quest for innovative
Learning teams consist of a small number of students grouped together, and working together on assignments during the duration of the course. According to University of Phoenix, Inc. (2006-2013), “By relying on others and having others rely on you, you will grow your collaborative skills”. This team encourages successful performance results, but successful performance can be hindered if team members do not equally contribute and work together. A collaborative team environment is the key for the complete success of the team. A collaborative environment can be
A system is a collection of elements that interact with each other over time to function as a whole. Systems thinking is a combination of the previous four practices: personal mastery, mental models, shared vision and team learning to dissect and examine the practices of the organization. I first heard learned about systems thinking five years ago when I started in the Hazelwood School District. Our district had just began our district wide professional development on systems thinking, but then we had a change in our superintendent in late August, just a few weeks after the start of school. With the change in district leadership, came a change in our district focus, and systems thinking was almost immediately abandoned. However, since revisiting it this semester, I can’t help but incorporate it into many of my daily
I will use the following Resources to go about accomplishing each objective. To increase my effectiveness in team learning, I can begin with reading and getting a better understanding of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People written by Stephen Covey. For example, in the fifth habit, Covey considers ways for effective communication. Coveys fifth habit concentrates on seeking first to understand, but in today's world, people expect to be understood first instead. It seems the majority of people have a reply before even giving a thought to understanding what is being said. To be an effective leader in team learning I must get into my employees frame of mind and think as they are thinking, this is called empathic listening. A strategy that I will enact to improve my team learning weakness, will be to use smaller, more diverse groups. This
Being apart of a learning team one can learn a lot of important elements that results from how a learning team might behave. By communicating together, a learning team can reach their desired goals and finish the assignment given to them. My learning team was able to overcome differences and work together as a team. By being able to have some trust and responsibility for each other we were able to remain successful by completed each task.
Systems thinking is a method of thinking that looks at the interconnectedness between different elements rather than a linear cause and effect approach and sees patterns of change rather than fixed “snapshots”. In essence it is a view on the “whole picture” (Anderson, R 1994).