Organizational

Behavior, 8e
Schermerhorn, Hunt, and
Osborn
Prepared by
Michael K. McCuddy
Valparaiso University

John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 2

 Chapter 9
The Nature of Groups
 Study questions.
1. What is the nature of groups in
organizations?
2. What are the stages of group development?
3. What are the foundations of group
effectiveness?
4. What are group and intergroup dynamics?
5. How do groups make decisions?
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 3
 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 A group is a collection of two or more
people who work with one another
regularly to achieve common goals.
 Groups:
– Help organizations accomplish important
tasks.
– Help to maintain a high-quality workforce by
satisfying members’ needs.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 4
 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Effective groups achieve high levels of:
– Task performance.
• Members attain performance goals regarding quantity,
quality, and timeliness of work results.
– Members satisfaction.
• Members believe that their participation an experiences are
positive and meet important personal needs.
– Team viability.
• Members are sufficiently satisfied to continue working
together on an ongoing basis.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 5

 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Synergy.
– Effective groups offer synergy.
– With synergy, groups accomplish more than
the total of the members’ individual
capabilities.
– Synergy is necessary for organizations to
compete effectively and achieve long-term
high performance.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 6

 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Situations in which groups are superior to
individuals.
– When there is no clear expert in a particular
problem or task.
– When problem solving can be handled by a
division of labor and the sharing of
information.
– When creativity and innovation are needed.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 7

 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Social loafing as a performance problem.
– Social loafing is the tendency of people to
work less hard in a group than they would
individually.
– Reasons for social loafing.
• Individual contributions are less noticeable in the
group context.
• Some individuals prefer to see others carry the
workload.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 8
 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Social loafing as a performance problem — cont.
– Ways of preventing social loafing.
• Define member roles and tasks to maximize individual
interests.
• Link individual rewards to performance contributions to the
group.
• Raise accountability by identifying individuals’ performance
contributions to the group.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 9

 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Social facilitation as a performance
problem.
– Social facilitation.
• The tendency for a person’s behavior to be
influenced by the presence of others.
• Positively affects performance when a person is
proficient on the task.
• Negatively affects task performance when the task
is not well-learned.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 10
 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?
 Formal groups.
– Officially designated to serve a specific
organizational purpose.
– May be permanent or temporary.
• Permanent work groups are command groups in
the vertical organization structure.
• Temporary work groups are task groups
specifically created to solve a problem or perform
a a defined task.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 11
 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?

 Formal groups — cont.

– Virtual groups.
• Groups whose members convene and work
together electronically via networked computers.
• Activities are facilitated by groupware.

• Can accomplish the same things as members of

face-to-face groups.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 12

 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?

 Informal groups.
– Emerge without being officially designated by
the organization.
– Types of informal groups.
• Friendship groups.

• Interest groups.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 13

 What is the nature of groups
in organizations?

 Benefits of informal groups.

– Can speed up work flow by supplementing
formal lines of authority.
– Can satisfy needs that are thwarted or unmet
by the formal group.
– Can provide members with social satisfaction,
security, and a sense of belonging.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 14
 What are the stages of
group development?
 A group or team passes through five
lifecycle stages.
– Forming.
– Storming.
– Norming.
– Performing.
– Adjourning.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 15

 What are the stages of
group development?
 Forming stage.
– Initial entry of members to a group.
– Members concern’s include:
• Getting to know each other.
• Discovering what is considered acceptable
behavior.
• Determining the group’s real task.
• Defining group rules.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 16

 What are the stages of
group development?
 Storming stage.
– A period of high emotionality and tension
among group members.
– Members concern’s include:
• Formation of coalitions and cliques.
• Dealing with outside demands.
• Clarifying membership expectations.
• Dealing with obstacles to group goals.
• Understanding members’ interpersonal styles.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 17

 What are the stages of
group development?
 Norming stage.
– The point at which the group really begins to
come together as a coordinated unit.
– Members concern’s include:
• Holding the group together.
• Dealing with divergent views and criticisms.
• Dealing with a premature sense of
accomplishment.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 18

 What are the stages of
group development?
 Performing stage.
– Marks the emergence of a mature, organized,
and well-functioning group.
– Members deal with complex tasks and handle
internal disagreements in creative ways.
– Primary challenge is to continue to improve
relationships and performance.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 19

 What are the stages of
group development?

 Adjourning stage.
– Particularly important for temporary groups.
– A well-integrated group is:
• Able to disband when its work is finished.

• Willing to work together in the future.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 20

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?
 From a systems perspective, group inputs are the
foundation for all subsequent group action.
 Key group inputs are:
– Nature of the task.
– Goals.
– Rewards.
– Resources.
– Technology.
– Membership diversity.
– Group size.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 21
 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?

 Tasks.
– Technical demands of a task.
• Routineness, difficulty, and information
requirements.
– Tasks that are complex in technical demands
require unique solutions and more information
processing.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 22

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?

 Tasks — cont.
– Social demands of a task.
• Relations, ego involvement, and controversies over
ends and means.
– Tasks that are complex in social demands
involve difficulties in reaching agreement on
goals or methods for accomplishing them.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 23

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?

 Goals, rewards, and resources.

– Long-term performance accomplishments rely
on:
• Appropriate goals.

• Well-designed reward systems.

• Adequate resources.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 24

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?

 Technology.
– Provides the means to get work accomplished.
– The right technology must be available for the
task at hand.
– Work-flow technology can affect the way
group members interact.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 25

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?
 Membership characteristics.
– A group must have the right skills and
competencies available for task performance
and problem solving.
• Homogeneous groups may not perform well if they
lack the requisite experiences, skills, and
competencies.
• Heterogeneous groups may perform well if they
effectively utilize a variety of experiences, skills,
and competencies.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 26

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?

 Membership characteristics — cont.

– Diversity-consensus dilemma.
• Increasing diversity among group members makes
it harder for group members to work together, even
though the diversity itself expands the skills and
perspectives available for problem solving.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 27

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?
 Membership characteristics — cont.
– FIRO-B theory.
• Identifies individual differences in how people
relate to one another in groups.
• Based on needs to express and receive feelings of
inclusion, control, and affection.
• Groups whose members have compatible
characteristics are likely to be more effective.
• Groups whose members have incompatible
characteristics are likely to be less effective.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 28

 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?
 Membership characteristics — cont.
– Status.
• A person’s relative rank, prestige, or standing in a
group.
– Status congruence.
• Occurs when a person’s position within the group
is equivalent in status to positions held outside the
group.
• When status incongruence is present, problems
will likely occur.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 29
 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?
 Group size.
– As group size increases, performance and
member satisfaction increase up to a point.
• Division of work promotes performance and
increased satisfaction.
• Communication and coordination problems occur,
in turn decreasing performance and satisfaction.
– Problem-solving groups should have 5 to 7
members.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 30
 What are the foundations
of group effectiveness?
 Group size — cont.
– Groups with an odd number of members may
be more effective for resolving disagreements
and reaching a speedy decision.
– Groups with an even number of members may
be more effective when careful deliberation,
consensus building, or complex problem
solving is required.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 31

 What are group and
intergroup dynamics?
 From a system perspective, the
throughputs for a group or team are group
dynamics.
 Group dynamics concern the forces
operating within groups that affect the way
members relate to and work with one
another.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 32
 What are group and
intergroup dynamics?
 What goes on within groups.
– Required behaviors.
• Those formally defined and expected by the
organization.
– Emergent behaviors.
• Those that group members display in addition to
what the organization asks of them.
– Emergent behaviors often supplement and
extend required behaviors.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 33

 What are group and
intergroup dynamics?
 What goes on within groups.
– Member relationships revolve around:
• Activities — the things people do or the actions
they take.
• Interactions — interpersonal communications and
contacts.
• Sentiments — the feelings, attitudes, beliefs, or
values held by group members.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 34

 What are group and
intergroup dynamics?

 What goes on between groups.

– Intergroup dynamics.
• The dynamics that take place between two or more
groups.
– Organizations and their members seek to avoid
the negative aspects and achieve the positive
aspects of intergroup dynamics.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 35

 What are group and
intergroup dynamics?
 What goes on between groups.
– On the negative side, intergroup dynamics may divert
energies as members focus on animosities rather than
performance.
– On the positive side, competing groups may:
• Work harder.
• Become more focused on key tasks.
• Develop more internal loyalty and satisfaction.
• Achieve creativity in problem solving.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 36

 How do groups make decisions?

 How groups make decisions.

– Decision by lack of response.
– Decision by authority rule.
– Decision by minority rule.
– Decision by majority rule.
– Decision by consensus.
– Decision by unanimity.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 37

 How do groups make decisions?

 Potential advantages of group decision making.

– More knowledge and expertise is applied to solve the
problem.
– A greater number of alternatives are examined.
– The final decision is better understood and accepted
by all group members.
– More commitment among all group members to make
the final decision work.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 38

 How do groups make decisions?

 Potential disadvantages of group decision

making.
– Individuals may feel compelled to conform to
the apparent wishes of the group.
– The group’s decision may be dominated by
one individual or a small coalition.
– Group decisions usually take longer to make.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 39

 How do groups make decisions?

 Groupthink.
– The tendency for members of highly cohesive groups
to lose their critical evaluation capabilities.
– Groupthink can lead the group to make poor
decisions.
– Group members and leaders should:
• Be sensitive to the occurrence of groupthink.

• Take actions to prevent the occurrence of groupthink.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 40
 How do groups make decisions?

 How to improve group decision making.

– Brainstorming.
– Nominal group technique.
– Delphi technique.
– Computer-mediated decision making.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 41

 How do groups make decisions?

 Brainstorming.
– Group members actively generate as many
ideas and alternatives as possible, and they do
so relatively quickly and without inhibitions.
– Brainstorming rules.
• All criticism is ruled out.
• Free-wheeling is welcomed.
• Quantity is wanted.
• Piggy-backing is good.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 42

 How do groups make decisions?

 Nominal group technique.

– A form of structured group decision making
that enables everyone to participate and have
his/her ideas heard without hostile criticism or
distortions.
– A structured voting procedure is used to
prioritize responses to the nominal question.
Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 43
 How do groups make decisions?

 Delphi technique.
– Used in situations where group members are unable to
meet face to face.
– The process.
• A series of questions is distributed to a panel.
• Panel members submit their responses to a decision
coordinator.
• The decision coordinator summarizes the responses, and
sends the summary along with a follow-up questionnaire to
the panel.
• Panel members send in their responses.
• The process is repeated until a consensus is reached.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 44

 How do groups make decisions?

 Computer-mediated decision making.

– Electronic brainstorming through the use of
special software and personal computers..
– The nominal group and Delphi techniques
lend themselves to computer mediation.

Organizational Behavior: Chapter 9 45