Vital Strategic Management Processes

Groupthink was created by Irving Janis in 1972. (Shore, 2010, p.3) He created this method to prevent teams from making bad decisions. Irving Janis went to Yale and began his research on groupthink there. At Yale, he researched why a team could make such an excellent decision one time and a horrible one the next time. (Shore, 2010, p.3) Since groupthink was created, it has been used in many instances without even knowing about it. Such as, the Cuban missile crisis, France’s defeat in the 1940 campaign, and the Challenger space shuttle incident.

Group members can achieve consensus in their decision making when they follow all of these steps except

We all took time to read each students case and formulate our own opinions and ideas before bringing them before the group. Each group was giving all the time they needed to prepare there discussions. We were able to reach consensus by listening to the opinions and feels and arguments of all other group members. We actively listened to each other point of view. After each group member spoke we discussed the reasons behind their answers.

Furthermore, research suggests that conflict in the decision making process promotes creativity amongst group members (Nemeth 1986), higher levels of commitment and satisfaction from group members (Peterson 1999), and group members become more knowledgeable about the interests of their co workers (Peterson 2007). In comparison to the first simulation, this result was evident in the second attempt. On the other hand, the decision making process was time consuming. Luckily, there were no time constraints, however, towards the end of the task, group members including myself, became tiresome and overworked. Eventually, I began to lose control of my group and those with the most useful information provided to them during the simulation began to

To add on to what Rachel said, groupthink can also occur if the leader is well respected or persuasive. It does have it pros and cons. If used properly the group can come to a solution with everyone contributing. It gives everyone of a sense if worth because they contributed. A con can be peer pressure as when everyone agrees on one solution. This leads mental inefficiency and decrease in moral judgement. As some patients may just go with everyone says in order to avoid conflict. If you want to avoid groupthink then you can have an outsider come in and question the views of the members or or assign the role of critical evaluator to each member of the group.

There are two threats to team effectiveness. First, the Asch effect, when an individual’s judgement is distorted by an incorrect but unanimous opposition, and second, group think, when a cohesive in-group members choose unanimity over appraisal of alternative courses of action (Kreitner & Kinicki, 2013, pp. 290, 292). Diversity is important to mitigate the Asch effect and group think.

When groups exhibit groupthink the end result is disastrous decision making. This was evident concerning the decision regarding postwar Iraq with all the looting. The self-censoring of doubts presented a false picture and only served to maintain a false unity that gave an illusion of unanimity. Placing direct pressure resulted in an estimate filled with data that was not iron clad. Instead of narrowing down on one course of action, as in

Throughout life there are many instances in which an individual has to work in a group to complete a task/project. The importance of group work is to have teamwork with each member of the group. Humans are driven to connect with each other and by working as a group ideas become much more enriched and the ideas or thoughts that each person ‘brings to the table’ each individual is able to add onto that idea or it can trigger one to think of something completely different.

Diversity is important to mitigate two threats to group effectiveness. First, the Asch Effect, distortion of individual judgement by a unanimous but incorrect opposition. (p. 290). Second, Group think, when in a cohesive in-group, members strive for unanimity and override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action. (p. 292).

First, I describe the concept of groupthink. According to one journal, ‘The concept of groupthink is quite popular nowadays and has considerable practical value, because it not only is at variance with research results that indicate the performance of highly cohesive groups (e.g., Keller, 1986), but also provides a detailed description of how an important problem in cohesive decision-making groups occurs’. (Joseph M, p.229). Groupthink sometime leads group big mistakes. If people consider things by a group, they may come to the wrong answer even though that thing is so simply when people think alone. It is because people tend not to doubt the result found by everyone and hesitate to raise an objection to the proposal. These tendencies are kinds of characteristics of groupthink. The former is illusion of unanimity and the latter is self censorship. Why that tendency is happened? In my opinion, people think in the back of their mind ‘I don’t have to take all responsibility because this conclusion

There are two threats to team effectiveness. First, the Asch effect, when an individual’s judgement is distorted by an incorrect but unanimous opposition, and second, group think, when a cohesive in-group members choose unanimity over appraisal of alternative courses of action (Kreitner & Kinicki, 2013, pp. 290, 292). Diversity is important to mitigate the risks of the Asch effect and group think.

An important part of our learning and growing experience must stem from our ability to analyze and reflect upon the groups that we have been members in. This reflection can define our understanding of the weaknesses both in ourselves and in the others within our group; and it can help to shape the way that we act in future groups. Adjusting ourselves to compensate for our weaknesses, based upon an honest and thorough examination of our actions within a group setting, is one of most important thing for any person to do. It is only through this evaluation that we can improve ourselves and our interactions with others. This paper will examine a group that was required to make an important decision about adding a new member

As people, when confronted with a problem where a solution must be found, our ideal situation is to come up with the best possible one. To do this, we ideally gather the most knowledgeable, intelligent individuals into a group and attempt to derive the best solution to the problem. With the collection of these people, one would think that finding the best possible answer to the problem would be a rather simple task. However, what has happened in many situations is the complete opposite. Rather than finding the best possible solutions, many ideal, cohesive groups arrive at the worst possible answer largely due to problems in communication within the group. This is what we call the radical theory of

Group setting can affect the quality of solutions. According to Tubbs (2012), “A clear finding of small group research is that groups have the potential to make better-quality decisions than the same individuals would make if working alone” (p.359). When a difficult problem arises, having multiple people work towards a solution instead of one individuals increases the chance of the problem being solved properly (Tubbs, 2012, p.360) Although the group must be prepared to accept the solutions. “For solutions to be effective, they must be of high quality and they must be accepted by those who must carry them out,” states Tubbs (2012, p.363).

If a group uses consensus, everyone gives something up and are not content with the result. Not everyone is satisfied in the end. An example of this is when Soledad Stephens, an Education Correspondent, states, "Everyone gives up something and no one likes the final result" (Stephens). An excellent example of people giving up something is when the lunch ladies in the schools need to use consensus, one picks ravioli the other picks hot dogs and they both decided to make ravioli hot dogs which ends up being a dreadful food choice. Clearly, not everyone always gets what they want and may also not be pleased with the result (Manny Ramirez).