Organizational Development: A Manual for Managers and ... - FPDL
Organizational Development: A Manual for Managers and ... - FPDL
Organizational Development: A Manual for Managers and ... - FPDL
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equired level, or not. It does not matter who did what, or why something took place or not. All<br />
members of the team win together or fail together.<br />
There is no such thing, as ‘everyone has to do his own job’. Members of a team together do the<br />
job. They may have different roles <strong>and</strong> functions, fixed or changing, <strong>and</strong> they must have clear<br />
responsibilities <strong>for</strong> everyone at any given moment – but the main personal responsibility is to do<br />
whatever is needed <strong>for</strong> the team as a whole to win. Helping others in a team is not doing someone<br />
else’s job. It is the job of everyone to help others. Doing something extra or something that was not<br />
initially planned is not considered doing an additional job – it is part of the main job, because it is<br />
necessary.<br />
All members of the team depend on each another. Trust <strong>and</strong> mutual support is not a matter of<br />
morale; it is a matter of survival – <strong>for</strong> everyone in the team <strong>and</strong> <strong>for</strong> the team as a whole. The one<br />
who is not trustworthy <strong>and</strong> not supportive to others cannot be a member of the team. If trust <strong>and</strong><br />
mutual support are not present in a group of people – they will never become a team <strong>and</strong> obtain<br />
corresponding emergent features. However, that can only happen in a situation where these<br />
people can af<strong>for</strong>d not to be a team. And it can happen only if the organization allows them to do<br />
so.<br />
A group becomes a team when the existence <strong>and</strong> wellbeing of participants is determined by the<br />
common final result, which depends not merely on the sum of individual ef<strong>for</strong>ts, but on the<br />
interaction of all members in a common process to accomplish certain objectives or implement a<br />
certain mission.<br />
A team becomes a self-organizing entity when the team itself defines its internal structure,<br />
procedures <strong>and</strong> rules, distribution of jobs <strong>and</strong> awards, <strong>and</strong> all current tasks. This self-determination<br />
is built upon mutual agreement, based on available knowledge <strong>and</strong> resources, <strong>and</strong> focused to the<br />
common final result of operating as a team.<br />
A self-organizing team becomes high per<strong>for</strong>ming - in a process of permanent learning <strong>and</strong><br />
optimization of its activities - when the balance is reached between the structure <strong>and</strong> functioning of<br />
the team on one side, <strong>and</strong> the conditions that encourage survival in the environment on the other<br />
side.<br />
The literature on the topic more or less follows this sequence: group – team – self-managed team -<br />
high-per<strong>for</strong>ming team (see, <strong>for</strong> example, a very comprehensive book of Dale E. Yeatts <strong>and</strong> Clod<br />
Hyten, ‘High-Per<strong>for</strong>ming Self-Managed Work Teams’). In the author’s opinion, however, any team<br />
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