Addressing Challenges of Groups and Teams Paper

Teams faces many challenges and may vary from team to team, some of the challenges a team may face are time constraints, team members being geographically located, lack of communication and simply learning how to work together as a cohesive team. Once a team is able to overcome or embrace any challenges that may occur, recognizing the many benefits of working with others may have arisen. Each individual possesses his or her own strengths and has his or her own personal means of contributing to a team project. When a team collectively works on a project together, there tends to be not only a larger flow of ideas but also more creativity. Due to the distribution of roles in a team project, each team members overall responsibility can become significantly smaller, leaving more opportunity for team members to assist each other and provide constructive feedback when needed (University of Phoenix, 2004). Dynamics of conflict According to the article written by DeJanasz, Down, and Schneider, the authors define conflict as "any situation in which there are incompatible goals, cognitions, or emotions within or between individuals or groups that lead to opposition or antagonistic interaction" (University of Phoenix, 2004c,). When working closely with others towards a common goal, team conflict is inevitable. Many factors can contribute to the result of conflict between team members. Factors may include; geographic location of all members, breach of ground rules or team goals, lack of participation among team members, lack of support or group feedback, time constraints, and miscommunication ( University of Phoenix, 2004).Although team conflict is inevitable, that does not mean that all team conflict is detrimental for the team. Over time societies view on conflict has changed tremendously. In the early 20th century, society viewed conflict from a traditional view. This view suggested that all conflict was viewed as "bad" and if the source of the conflict was eliminated then the conflict would cease. During the 1940s through the 1970s society took on a human relations view of conflict. This view on conflict was that conflict could not be avoided and that it was a natural way of life. The present view on conflict is the interactions view. This view still holds true that conflict is inevitable yet conflict can aid the group in creativity as well as keep all members energized and focused on the task at hand (University of Phoenix, 2004). Even though the word "conflict" is typically viewed as a negative word, team conflict can be very important to team dynamics. Constructive team conflict allows for all members to express their own opinion and ideas on the group project as well as force the team to be more open minded and creative with their ideas. Team conflict gives each member a voice and allows for more in depth discussion on the issue at hand (University of Phoenix, 2004. As team members, understanding the cause of the conflict and identifying the three different types of conflict, task, relationship, and process conflict, becomes imperative in order for teams properly to assess the conflict and determine the best strategy to solve this conflict. Task conflict is a type of conflict that may result when team members differ in opinion or ideas pertaining to the team project. Relationship conflict may occur when tension among group members is evident while process conflict can occur during the process of distributing team roles and responsibilities (Behfar, Peterson, 2008). Why Manage Conflict generally, most teamwork can be managed before the team is forced to implement a conflict resolution strategy. Managing team conflict before the conflict becomes detrimental to the team is imperative to maintain team cohesiveness. All team members should be aware that team conflict can be either productive or destructive. Destructive conflict can harm team cohesiveness and hinder team progress while productive conflict