Chapter 3

Group Behavior in an Organization

 Group dynamics

❑ The social process by which people interact and behave in a group

environment
❑ involves the influence of personality, power, and behavior on the group
process
❑ Group is a collection of two or more interacting individuals:
✓ with a stable pattern of relationships between them
✓ share common goals,
✓ perceive themselves as being a group
❑ This definition encompasses various elements:
1. members must have some influence on each other
2. groups must possess a stable structure
3. members share common interests or goals
4. the individuals involved must perceive themselves as a group
❑ these four characteristics suggest, groups are very special collections of
individuals
 Types of groups

❑ Two types of groups: formal and informal

❑ Formal Groups:
✓ intentionally created by the organization to accomplish stated goals
✓ two types of formal groups: command and task
a. Command Group: comprises the subordinates who report directly to a given
supervisor.

b. Task Group: comprises the employees who work together to complete a specific task
or project.
▪ may compose expertise in a specific area regardless of their positions in the
organizational hierarchy
 Informal Groups

❑ natural groupings of people in the work situation who come together in

response to social needs.
❑ Two types:
1. Interest group: encouraged by an expression of common interests
2. Friendship group: members have something in common, such as age, gender,
political beliefs, desire to play the same sport, or ethnic background.
 Reasons for group formation

❑ The most popular reasons for joining a group are related to:

1. Security: reduce the insecurity of "standing alone" _ we feel stronger, have fewer self-
doubts and are more resistant to threats.

2. Status: fulfill extrinsic needs by giving an individual status and recognition

3. Self-esteem: fulfill intrinsic needs

4. Interaction and Affiliation: fulfill needs for affiliation

5. Power: to protect themselves from unreasonable demands by management

✓ Informal groups provide opportunities to exercise power over others

6. Goal Achievement: to achieve a goal that would be considerably more difficult if

pursued by a single person
 Group development stages

❑ Each stage presents the members with different challenges that must be
overcome before they can move on to the next stage
1. Forming:

✓ members are preoccupied with familiarizing themselves with the task and to other members
of the group.

✓ the dependent stage - members tend to depend on outside expertise for guidance, job
definition, and task analysis

2. Storming:

✓ the group encounters conflict as members confront and criticize each other and the
approach the group is taking to their task.

✓ counter dependent stage where members tend to “flex their muscles” in search of identity.
 Group development Stages Cont’d

3. Norming:
✓ members start to resolve the issues that are creating the conflict and begin to develop their
social agreements.
✓ members begin to recognize their interdependence, develop cohesion, and agree on the
group norms

4. Performing:
✓ the group has sorted out its social structure and understands its goals and individual roles
✓ Mutual assistance and creativity
✓ becomes independent, relying on its own resources.

5. Adjourning:
✓ the group will resort to some form of closure that includes rites and rituals suitable to the
event.
 Characteristics of Groups

1. Structure: the pattern of relationships among the positions

✓ members are differentiated on the basis of such factors as expertise, aggressiveness, power,
leadership skills, and status
✓ each member occupies a position in the group

2. Status Hierarchy:
✓ the status assigned to a particular position differentiate one position from other positions.

3. Roles: are expected behaviors for a given position

✓ two roles a group member’s play:

i. task role: task-oriented group behavior

▪ enable the work group to define, clarify, and pursue a common purpose
 Characteristics Cont’d

ii. maintenance role: relationship-building group behavior

✓ foster supportive and constructive interpersonal relationships

❑ In short, task roles keep the group on track while maintenance roles keep the group
together
4. Norms: Unspoken rules of group behavior
✓ agreed-upon set of rules that guides the behavior of group members
✓ formed only with respect to things that have significance for the group
✓ accepted in various degrees by group members
✓ may apply to every group member or to only some group members
 Characteristics Cont’d

5. Cohesiveness:

✓ a closeness or commonness of attitude, behavior, and performance of a group

✓ force acting on the members to remain in a group

6. Social Loafing: refers to the failure of a group member to contribute personal time, effort,
thoughts, or other resources to the group

✓ referred to as the free rider problem or slacking

7. Loss of individuality: a social process in which individual group members lose self-
awareness and its accompanying sense of accountability, inhibition, and responsibility for
individual behavior
 Team

❑ A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are:

✓ committed to a common purpose and performance goals, and

✓ approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable

❑ A group becomes a team when the following criteria are met:

1. Leadership becomes a shared activity

2. Accountability shifts from strictly individual to both individual and collective

3. The group develops its own purpose or mission

4. Problem solving becomes a way of life, not a part-time activity

5. Effectiveness is measured by the group’s collective outcomes and products

❑ teams are task groups that have matured to the performing stage
 Team Versus Group: What’s the Difference
❑ Work group: a group that interacts primarily to share information and to make
decisions to help each group member perform within his or her area of responsibility

❑ Work team: a group whose individual efforts result in a performance that is greater
than the sum of the individual inputs

Factors Work group Work team

Goal Share information Collective performance

Synergy Neutral (sometimes negative) Positive

Accountability Individual accountability Individual and mutual

Skills Random and varied Complementary

 Reasons for the increasing popularity of teams
❑ Great way to use employee talents
❑ Teams are more flexible and responsive to changes in the environment
❑ Can quickly assemble, deploy, refocus, and disband
❑ Facilitate employee involvement
❑ Increase employee participation in decision making
❑ Democratize an organization and increase motivation

Note: teams are not always effective

 Types of Teams

1. Cross-Functional Teams:
✓ Team members come from different functional units of an organization
✓ The team works on a specific problem or task with the needs of the whole
organization in mind
✓ Cross-functional team can be:
a. Committees: people outside their daily job assignments work together in a small
team for a specific purpose
• Task agenda is narrow, focused, and ongoing
b. Task forces or Projects teams: people from various parts of an organization
work together on common problems, but on a temporary basis
 Types of Teams

2. Problem-Solving Teams:
✓ Members are employees from the same department
✓ meet for a few hours each week to discuss ways of improving quality, efficiency,
and the work environment
3. Self-Managed Work Teams:
✓ autonomous work groups who have been given authority to make many decisions
about how to do the required work
4. Virtual Teams:
✓ teams of people who work together and solve problems through largely computer-
mediated rather than face-to-face interactions.
 Organizational conflict

❑ Conflict is any situation in which incompatible goals, attitudes, emotions, or

behaviors lead to disagreement between two or more parties.
❑ Some level of conflict is inevitable given the wide range of goals in an
organization.
❑ Conflict is good for organizational performance
❑ two categories of causes of conflict:
1. Individual
2. Structural
 Individual factors
❑ associated with individual differences:
✓ skills & abilities
✓ Personalities
✓ Perceptions
✓ values & ethics,
✓ Emotions
✓ communication barriers
✓ cultural differences
 Structural factors
❑ Goal segmentation: different groups have differing goals.
✓ E.g. Production focuses on efficiency; Marketing on sales.

❑ Overlapping authority: two or more managers claim authority for the same
activities
✓ Leads to conflict between the managers and workers.

❑ Task Interdependencies: one member of a group fails to finish a task that another
depends on.
✓ This makes the worker that is waiting fall behind.
❑ Incompatible Evaluation or reward system: workers are evaluated for one thing,
but are told to do something different
✓ Groups rewarded for low cost but firm needs higher service

❑ Scarce Resources: managers can conflict over allocation of resources

❑ Status inconsistencies: some groups have higher status than others
 Nature of Organizational Conflict

❑ Based on its nature, conflict is divided into functional and dysfunctional

conflict
1. Functional Conflict:
✓ healthy & constructive disagreement between two or more people
✓ Without this conflict there would be little commitment to change and most groups likely
would become stagnant
✓ enhances and benefits the organization’s performance

2. Dysfunctional Conflict:
✓ an unhealthy, destructive disagreement between two or more people
✓ Management must seek to eliminate dysfunctional conflict
 Levels of conflict
1. Intrapersonal conflict: It occurs within an individual.
✓ It can result from threat to a person’s values, feeling of unfair treatment, and multiple
and contradictory sources of socialization

2. Interpersonal conflict: occurs between two or more individuals who are in opposition
to one another
✓ results from actual or perceived pressures from incompatible goals or expectations

3. Intra-group Conflict: conflict among members of a group

✓ occurs at the early stages of group development

4. Intergroup conflict: occurs among members of different teams or groups

5. Intra-organization conflict: occurs within an organization at interfaces of
organization functions

6. Inter-organizational conflict: occurs across organizations

 Conflict Outcomes

1. Lose-Lose:
✓ neither party gets what was initially desired
2. Win-Lose or Lose-Win:
✓ only one party’s concerns are satisfied and the other party’s concerns are not
3. Compromise:
✓ both parties give up something in order to receive something else
4. Win-Win:
✓ both parties get what they want
 Consequences of Conflict

Positive Consequences Negative Consequences

Leads to new ideas Diverts energy from work

Threatens psychological well-being- stress,

Stimulates creativity
alienation, apathy, and indifference.
Motivates change Physical withdrawal—absence, tardiness,
and turnover.

Promotes organizational vitality Wastes resources

Helps individuals & groups establish
Creates a negative climate
identities
Serves as a safety valve to indicate
Breaks down group cohesion
problems
Can increase hostility & aggressive
behaviors
 Conflict Management

❑ the use of strategies and tactics to move parties toward resolution or at least
containment of a dispute that avoids further escalation and relationship destruction
❑ two aspects of conflict management strategies:
1. conflict resolution
2. conflict stimulation techniques
 When to use the techniques

Approach or Technique Conditions where used

Conflict Resolution ✓ Conflict is disruptive to the organization
✓ Excessive time and effort is devoted in pursuit of conflicts rather
than devoted to productive activity
✓ Conflicts pursued to advance the goals of groups and sub-units
rather than those of the organization

Conflict Stimulation ✓ People are complacent or stagnant and there is a shortage of new
ideas
✓ Change is needed to revitalize the organization and there is
strong resistance to change
✓ There is too much consensus between groups and sub-units
coupled with a belief that cooperation is more important than
performance
 Conflict Resolution Techniques
❑ aimed at minimizing the destructive impact of conflict

❑ techniques of conflict resolution:

1. Super ordinate goals: creating a shared goal that cannot be attained without the
cooperation of each of the conflicting parties

2. Expansion of resources: used when a conflict is caused by scarcity of a resource

3. Smoothing: playing down differences while emphasizing common interest between

the conflicting parties
 Conflict Resolution Techniques
4. Authoritive command:
✓ management uses its formal authority to resolve conflict
5. Altering human variable:
✓ behavioral change techniques such as human relations training to alter attitudes and
behaviors that cause conflict

6. Altering structural variable:

✓ changing the formal organization structure and the interaction pattern of conflicting
parties
 Interpersonal Conflict-Handling Modes

1. Avoidance:
✓ ignoring or suppressing a conflict in the hope that it will either go away or not become too
disruptive

2. Accommodation:
✓ allowing the desires of the other party to prevail

3. Competition:
✓ attempting to win a conflict at the other party’s expense

4. Compromise:
✓ each party give up some desired outcomes in order to get other desired outcomes
5. Collaboration:
✓ devising solutions that allow both parties to achieve their desired outcomes
 Fitting Conflict handling Style to the Situation

Conflict handling Appropriate Situation

style
Competing ✓ Time is short and you're sure you're correct.
✓ The other party would take advantage of a collaborative
approach.

Avoiding ✓ The conflict is trivial

✓ We need a temporary, cooling-off tactic
Accommodating ✓ The other party has great power
✓ The issue isn't important to us
Compromising There is little chance of agreement, both parties have equal
power, and there are time constraints

Collaborating This is the "ideal" style to be sought unless the parties to

conflict have perfectly opposing interests
 Conflict Stimulation Techniques
❑ provide the organization a means to introduce radical change

❑ Techniques for conflict stimulation:

1. Communication:

✓ using ambiguous or threatening messages to increase conflict levels

2. Bringing in Outsides:

✓ adding employees to a group whose backgrounds, values, attitudes, or managerial

styles differ from those of present members

3. Restructuring the Organization:

✓ realigning work groups, altering rules and regulations, increasing interdependence,

and making similar structural changes to disrupt the status quo
 Views on Conflict

❑ Traditional view
❑ Human relations view
❑ Inter-actionist view
❑ Structural view
❑ Open system view
❑ Contingency Approach
 Traditional view

❑ The early approach to conflict

❑ assumed that all conflicts are bad
❑ Conflict was viewed negatively as being synonymous with violence,
destruction, and irrationality
❑ Conflict in organizations is often assumed to be unnatural and undesirable
to be avoided at all costs
 Human relations view

❑ Argues that conflict is a natural, inevitable outcome in any organization.

❑ See conflict as a failure to develop appropriate norms for groups
❑ Since conflict is inevitable, it should be accepted
❑ This view seeks to achieve harmony through happy, pleasant work groups
 Inter-actionist view

❑ Posits that conflict is:

✓ a positive force in a group
✓ absolutely necessary for a group to perform effectively
❑ Encourages conflict on grounds that a harmonious, peaceful and
cooperative group is prone to becoming static, apathetic, and non -
responsive to needs for change and innovation
❑ urge group leaders to maintain an ongoing minimal level of conflict--
enough to keep the group alive, self-critical, and creative
 Structural view

❑ This approach sees conflict in terms of conditions that influence behavior:

✓ Rules and procedures
✓ Personality predispositions
✓ Social norms of the organization
❑ Suggested that:
✓ bureaucratic organizations lack capacity to deal with conflict, and
✓ System approach works to manage conflict
 Open system view

❑ As open systems, interact with their environments outside mandates and

pressures can cause sudden change and subsequent conflict
❑ Coercion can lead to conflict-hostility-resistance syndrome within
organizations.
 Contingency Approach

❑ This approach requires a solution based on diagnosis of the situation

❑ If a conflict does exist, then select a method of dealing with it productively
from options available
❑ In general, a win-win in which both parties win something tends to be the
most productive