Groups and Teams

Running head: GROUPS AND TEAMS

Groups and Teams

Pablo Mejia

University of Phoenix

Traci Thurman-Bowen, MAM

January 4, 2012

Groups and Teams

Throughout time and ages, people have gathered to form groups or teams. People have thought that a group is the same as a team, but they are very wrong thinking like this. A group can be made of different things and team is a well-oiled machine. On this paper, the author will explain the differences between a group and a team.

GROUP

A group can be many things, for example: students in a classroom, numbers, people, chemistry, and even the military. This is just a few examples of groups. However, in business, groups are different; a group is a collection of two or more people who work with one another regularly to achieve common goals. In a true group, members (1) are mutually dependent on one another to achieve common goals and (2) interact regularly with one another to pursue those goals over a sustained period of time. Groups are important resources that are good for both organizations and their members (Shermerhorn, 2008, p.170-171). However, these groups can and will try to show who is the dominant character and will try to take control of the group.

TEAM

Now a team is different from a group and teams are doers not followers, like in a group and according to the definition of a team in the book Organizational Behavior by Shermerhorn, Hunt, and Osborn, coincidently the three authors worked as a team to write this book. A team is a small group of people with complementary skills who work actively together to achieve a common purpose for which they hold themselves collectively accountable. In other words, a team is a welled oiled machine. For example, a baseball team, this group of men are brought together to form a team that their sole purpose is to win the World Series of baseball. As in baseball many businesses run the same, there are teams analyze or recommend, teams that manage, and there are teams that do things; and in the words of Jay Conger when he cited an example of an American jet engine manufacture that switched to cross-functional teams. Conger says: "Cross-functional teams are speed machines." (Organizational Behavior by Shermerhorn, Hunt, and Osborn)

In conclusion, the difference between a group and a team is clear; groups can produce if they are lead by a leader and teams are different, they can come together and are able to function in a manner that their work is done if as they have always worked together. Many businesses have changed from having