Team Leadership

In Discussion Forum 9, post your response to the following discussion topics. Reply to at least two classmates’ responses by the date indicated in the Course Calendar.

Introduction to the Activity
All of us have experienced working in a team environment. The team dynamic is often unproductive and does little to enhance the level of performance. In fact, the word team is often incorrectly used to describe a group of people within a unit or department that is not interdependent and has little in the way of shared common goals and coordination of activity to achieve the goals. When the word team is used, the organizational leader must work to incorporate the team model into the group structure to create interdependence, shared goals, and coordination of activity. After this step is taken, it is important that the leader take time to evaluate the team’s effectiveness. Before we can create a high performance team, we must determine the current state of the team.

Consider the Following:
Use the Team Excellence and Collaborative Team Leader Questionnaire on page 313 (Northouse) to complete this assignment.

Think about a group or team to which you belong as a member or as the leader.
Complete the questionnaire.
Evaluate the effectiveness of the team based on your answers.
Identify the areas of team or leadership weakness that exists.
Develop a plan using information from the Northouse and Hayes texts to overcome those weaknesses and create a high performance team.
How would these changes positively influence your ability to achieve your change objectives?

Further Instructions on DF 9

Let’s focus on teams instead of groups for this question. Remember a “team” requires a pattern of interaction and mutual goals. You can focus on any team of which you are a member or leader. Complete the questionnaire on page 313 of the Northouse text, but you do not need to reproduce the results for your answer. Instead use your answers as a jumping off point to answer the other questions. Begin by describing the team, its membership, its goals, and your role to give us context.
You may want to use the Northouse material on team effectiveness (pp. 300-303) to compare with your findings and recommend improvements. The whole answer will probably not take more than 250 words.