Role of Teamwork

Role of Teamwork

  • Submitted By: unia915
  • Date Submitted: 11/12/2009 12:57 AM
  • Category: Business
  • Words: 1550
  • Page: 7
  • Views: 6

ROLE OF TEAMWORK IN ORGANISATIONS:
CRITICAL EVALUATION
Introduction
Teamwork and the importance of its role in any type of organization has been the most influential factor in management‘s practice and academic writers in recent years. It has been strongly advocated by management gurus (including Ken Blanchard (2005), Peter Drucker (1998) and it seems almost impossible to contend the criticality of teamwork as a driving factor, a solution to many in developing and sustaining a successful organization and delivering business goals. Behind this façade, however, teamwork generates employee pressure from excessive individual accountability and responsibility, dysfunction that weakens the individual and team performance and intense competition and rivalry amongst team members.
This essay discusses and critically evaluates the role of teamwork in three perspectives; control, performance and competition. Firstly, the benefits of empowering self-managing teams will be discussed followed by a counter argument that self-management is, in fact, designed to strengthen senior management control. Secondly, ‘synergy’ created by teamwork is illustrated as the drive for enhanced performance and common dysfunctions of teamwork which could potentially severely weaken organizational performance. Thirdly, introduce how organizations can gain competitive advantage in the market and demonstrating the reasons why there is competition within the team.
Self-managing teams
Self-management as a mechanism of control
Synergy; driving force of great performance
Dysfunction; damaging organizational performance
On the contrary, teamwork does not always create a synergy effect but may become a detrimental factor that leads to organizational failure from dysfunctions. Lencioni revealed five common dysfunctions teams experience; absence of trust amongst team members, fear of conflict, lack of commitment, avoidance of accountability and in the attainment of results....

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