2. Developing The Team Through Time
The composition of our base team was arranged to maximise diversity with respect to, amongst other things, the nationality, learning style and professional background of each member. Within the team we have members with professional knowledge on: engineering, healthcare, political science, communication, and law. Importantly, to transform this diverse individual knowledge into a collective resource requires team development. Miles & Watkins (2007) suggest that it is also important that leadership maximises the input of multiple perspectives to ensure that value of a diverse team is realised. As a first step we have agreed to aim for equal airtime in team meetings where the current leader is in charge of ensuring this. …show more content…
Team development can be understood as a chronological process. A chronological model of team development was created by Tuckman (1965) and revised by Tuckman & Jensen (1977) which postulated that teams go through five stages of development: forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning. Yet, this model alone does not provide guidance on the leadership and management required to move through the stages. To do this the chronological model must be combined with a functional one. Fulk, Bell and Bodie (2011) merged Tuckman and Jensen’s model with Drucker’s (1954) functional model of management. Using this combination they described types of leadership interventions that can support team development in each stage. This understanding of the leadership required to move through each stage is an invaluable starting point for us in assessing our current strengths and weaknesses and the actions required to reach our team
The composition of our base team was arranged to maximise diversity with respect to, amongst other things, the nationality, learning style and professional background of each member. Within the team we have members with professional knowledge on: engineering, healthcare, political science, communication, and law. Importantly, to transform this diverse individual knowledge into a collective resource requires team development. Miles & Watkins (2007) suggest that it is also important that leadership maximises the input of multiple perspectives to ensure that value of a diverse team is realised. As a first step we have agreed to aim for equal airtime in team meetings where the current leader is in charge of ensuring this. …show more content…
Team development can be understood as a chronological process. A chronological model of team development was created by Tuckman (1965) and revised by Tuckman & Jensen (1977) which postulated that teams go through five stages of development: forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning. Yet, this model alone does not provide guidance on the leadership and management required to move through the stages. To do this the chronological model must be combined with a functional one. Fulk, Bell and Bodie (2011) merged Tuckman and Jensen’s model with Drucker’s (1954) functional model of management. Using this combination they described types of leadership interventions that can support team development in each stage. This understanding of the leadership required to move through each stage is an invaluable starting point for us in assessing our current strengths and weaknesses and the actions required to reach our team