Assignment task: After reading the post below respond to by applying your personal experience. Apply how your experience may support or detract from what this person recommended.
Conclude your post with what you would do differently if you had the opportunity to re-do the situation; include your reasons for a similar or different approach.
The Post to read: The most important thing here for Juan to do is to identify the most effective way of making his team effective. He can scan both the internal and external environment of his team and determine which actions need to be taken to help his team finish their project on time. There are three actions that Juan, as a team leader, can take here if he wants this project to be finished; He can allow each of the other 20 team members to assume an active leadership role, analyze their challenges for the project and form creative solutions to addressing each of those challenges; He can direct his focus on the need towards the accomplishment of the team's project goals while empowering his team to develop a sense of cohesiveness. He can do this by identifying problems between team members, such as the one team member who sends out unlimited emails to other team members that have the potential to increase interpersonal conflict within the entire team.
Tuckman (1965) used his group classification model to emphasize the importance of understanding interpersonal and task orientations in groups. Tuckman says that " the proposed distinction between the group as a social entity and the group as a task entity is similar to the distinction between the task-oriented functions of groups and the social- emotional integrative functions of groups" (p.385). Juan's responsibility here would be to find ways of building his team's cohesiveness and effectiveness in performing their assigned task on this team
He can try to address the internal task and relational problems of his team. He can find a skillful way of stopping one of the team members from sending unlimited emails to other team members or identifying the reasons why some team members have a sense of being overwhelmed and overworked. There is also the problem of team member connectivity which could potentially be related to members' unfamiliarity with virtual technology for purposes of this project or just a poorly functioning information communication system for the team. These issues can be causes of severe stress and interpersonal conflicts for members of his team in addition to undermining their effectiveness to perform this assigned task. Juan may need to identify how he can obtain external support for improving his team's virtual connectivity system.
Unified commitment here is very important. Each of these twenty team members should develop a sense of identity as members of this project team. They should know that each of them makes a unique contribution towards the success of the entire team. They should be proud of their membership on this team and commitment to their assigned task of developing a new property valuation and taxation enterprise software for the county. This would motivate them to excel in their assigned task while holding themselves accountable for maintaining a high standard of performance as they work on this project.
Juan should encourage his 20 team members to find ways of interacting with each other in non-formal ways outside their assigned task on this project. This would give them an opportunity to learn about each other's personal interests, education, family background and career goals. These group members need this kind of rapport and social intimacy to build lasting personal relationships that they need to accomplish their assigned team task.