Management > Work Teams

How do you explain the rapidly increasing popularity of work teams in countries such as the United Sates and Canada, whose national cultures place a high value on individualism?

 

Work teams becoming more and more popular around the world, even in countries where cultural traditions put great emphasis on individual goals and achievements. Managers have to realize that teams are usually superior to individuals in terms of the variety of skills, judgment and experience.

Many organizations have to go through a restructuring process if they want to compete more effectively and efficiently in today’s highly competitive business environment. This restructuring usually involves the creation of teams to better utilize employee talents and skills. Teams are proved to be more flexible and responsive to the changing environment than traditional departments and other forms of permanent groupings. Teams can also be assembled, deployed, refocused, and disbanded as needed. In addition one of the most important aspects of working in teams from the workers perspective is that teams can serve as the source of job satisfaction. Teams therefore can provide management to enhance employee involvement, increase employee morale, and promote workforce diversity.

Traditionally, businesses in the United States or Canada, promoted the idea that employees should act individually, rather than act as members in a group. This is where individualistic values are being held in a higher rank as opposed to collectivism. Collectivism can be seen in countries around the world, such as Japan and China. Many North American companies have also adapted this approach, because they realized that groups have bigger potential in terms of solving problems. Managers therefore spend a significant portion of their times on meetings, where they make decisions in accord with those affected by these decisions. Working in groups however has some drawbacks in addition to their many advantages. As we’ve seen in earlier chapters, working and making decisions in teams can be rather time consuming, groupthink may occur that leads to a distorted result.

I think that after the initial process of decision making is over, the work itself is going to be a lot more effective and efficient. Working in groups can be in a form of work groups or work teams. Work groups are those in which members interact primarily to share information and to make decisions that will in turn enable them to perform their jobs better. The performance of a work group is a mere summary of all the members’ individual contribution. A work team, as opposed to the work group, is a team, where members engage in collective work jointly creating a positive synergy. Their individual efforts result in a higher level of performance. This difference between the two forms of groups is the main reason of why management in many companies has restructured work processes around teams.

Management is looking to find that positive synergy that would allow the organization to increase performance. North American companies now came to the realization that teams create the potential for them to generate greater outputs with no increase in inputs.

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