Essential Theories Of Motivation And Leadership

Factors that improve the effectiveness of an organizational team

Discuss about the Essential Theories of Motivation and Leadership.

The mere presence of work teams or groups in an organization does not make a successful team or group, effectiveness of a group is essential to make it successful (Robbins and Judge 2013). There are certain factors that make an organizational team either successful or unsuccessful.

The following factors may be considered essential to improve the effectiveness of an organizational team:

• Clear performance goals- The group has set clear performance goals not only for itself but has also translated these performance goals into well-defined landmark against which it assesses itself;
• Informal and relaxed working environment- the organizational environment should be comfortable and relaxed. The environment must be such that employees must express their thoughts freely and without any reluctance and clarify such thoughts as well;
• Effective Communication- the members must participate in group activities and discussions, making necessary contributions to the team. They must be patient enough to listen and learn from the other team members;
• Respecting diversity- team diversity depicts uniqueness of each individual in the team and does not only include age, race, sex, religion but additional personality traits as well. The difference in the cultural diversity may affect team performance and interactions primarily due to miscommunication, which may arise relating to gender, cultural, race and disabilities.
• Criticism is received positively- any criticism is received positively with the assurance to rectify the mistakes or errors;
• Disagreement is perceived positively- Disagreements must be resolved instead of suppressing or overriding it by undertaking premature group action. The dissenters are not viewed as dominators of the group but that they have a different opinion. In case of disagreements that cannot be resolved should be dealt with differently without letting it hinder its efforts.

The following are some factors that hinder an effectiveness of work teams or groups in an organization:

• Disorganization- this is one of the most significant reason behind reduction in effectiveness of a team. The members often disagree with the leader or amongst themselves with respect to the tasks assigned or difference of opinion regarding carrying out the tasks (Pinder 2014). There may be certain confusion regarding the standards for quality or expectations, which may lead to indifference among the team members or between the members and the team leader, thus, exhibiting lack of responsibilities, leading to disorganization.
• Lack of knowledge- the team members often lack knowledge and skills that is required to perform their assigned tasks and responsibilities.
• No Self-Analysis- the organization often fail to monitor their processes and realize inefficiency of their process while effective teams assess their efficiency to identify their faults, which enables the organization to rectify their faults and make improvements.
• Lack of communication- there is an absence of effective communication amongst the members of the team owing to the difference in cultural diversity of the members or lack of relaxed working environment. The workers feel reluctant to communicate their issues to the team leaders or actively participate in any organizational activities.
• Lack of unity- the absence of cohesion and unity amongst the members of a team often leads to disagreement resulting in disorganization. The team may not be clearly informed about the team goals which may drift the individual member in performing their individual tasks and projects, without having regard to the effort put in by others to achieve company goals.
• Disrespect towards members- due to cultural difference or difference in opinions, the members often fail to respect the other team members which is essential to develop a feeling of united. It is important for a team to show interest and encourage their team members in exploring ideas and o-operate with each other to become a successful team.

The advancement in technologies brings with it challenges for managers in all professional fields. In the contemporary era, the relationship between people and technology has become increasingly visible (DuBrin 2013). In the modern day, the organizations are incorporates new technologies to gain frame over others in terms of services and productivity. The managers of an organization are obligated to provide adequate training to the employees to make them aware of the new skills and techniques required to deal with the advanced technologies integrated by the respective organizations. The employees must be competent to adapt to changes in their work-styles and such change should be made simple to make it easier for the employees and the management to adopt and implement the same (Langer 2017).

A virtual team may be defined as a group of people who interact with each other through interdependent tasks guided by a common objective. Virtual teamwork is beneficial for an organization as it enables an organization to achieve more than it is possible for individual to achieve (Northouse 2015). It enhances flexibility in striking balance between professional and personal life. It is cost-effective and facilitates quick information gathering. The significant role played by virtual team is to provide an opportunity to physically challenged people to work in a non-traditional environment and allow the team members to widen their career opportunities by working across cultures on various tasks and projects.

• Functional structure- it helps to deliver clear task assignments that is easy to explain to the employees, customers and suppliers while facilitating in resolving issues through effective communication.
• Divisional structure- it aims at combating issues that are associated with geographic or product diversity as each division responds to specific requirements of its product or market strategy.
• Matrix structure- It introduces multiple authorities and responsibilities to ensure flexibility by forming new project teams, optimum utilization of resources and encourages cross-functional cooperation.

On the facts here, the failure of the team attributes to the following factors. Firstly, the members of the team failed to communicate with each other, which became the biggest impediment to make it successful. Secondly, the members further did not exhibit any respect towards the other members of the team and since the team consisted members who belonged to different cultural background, it was essential for them to respect the cultural diversity of the team members (Miner 2015).

Factors that hinder the effectiveness of an organizational team

Thirdly, the team members revealed information that was confidential to the team. This exhibits lack of unity amongst the members of the team, which is fundamental for a team to achieve its objectives. Lastly, the conduct of the receptionist shows lack of adequate knowledge and skill to perform his/her assigned responsibilities. It is the responsibility of a receptionist, to deal with the customers politely and patient.

It takes into consideration the impact of a leader’s conduct on job satisfaction, effectiveness and motivation of workers. It identifies the following four leadership behaviors:

• Achievement-oriented behavior- it focuses on encouraging to performing well by setting goals that acts as challenge for the employees. Supervisors motivate the employees in meeting their performance objectives.
• Directive path-goal clarifying Behavior- it aims at reducing ambiguity in the job functions by specifying the employees the expectations with respect to task performance. The employees are specifically informed about the policies, rules of the organization.
• Supportive leader behavior- the primary responsibility of a supportive leader behavior is to support psychological well being of the subordinate.
• Participative Leader Behavior- it involves consultation with the employees with respect to performance of job requirements and encourages participation of sub-ordinates in the decision-making process.

The organizations frequently undergoes change due to change in customer, technology and markets as well due to changes in social, political pressure and in the demographic traits (Morton and Weinstein 2015). An organizational change involves shift in the movement from present stage to some future and preferred stage.  Resistance to change takes place when the change incorporated within the organization is incomprehensible or misinterpreted. Under such circumstances, manager plays the role to clarify the changes to the employees.

• When the employees dislike the change;
• The change is perceived as unnecessary;
• the change is not comprehensible to the employees;
• the employees perceive the change to have adverse effect on their interests;
• the employees are not certain about the impact of the organizational changes;

According to the given scenario, the receptionist indulged into a fight with the customer over the payment mode chosen by the customer. It lacks the application of the path legal theories which requires the management to clearly specify to the employees about the rules, policies and procedures of the company and to ensure that the employee is abiding by such rules and procedures (Nimmo and Clapham 2016).

The team failed to motivate the members to perform their assigned tasks because of which it failed to carry out its activities and failed as a team. The members should have been informed about the significance of maintaining information related to the team as confidential. It is essential to motivate employees so that they perform well and live up to the expectations of the employers. Although there were no exhibitions of resistance, but the conduct of the group members does exhibit lack of motivation and unity amongst themselves.

Reference List

Bateh, J., Castaneda, M.E. and Farah, J.E., 2013. Employee resistance to organizational change. International Journal of Management & Information Systems (Online), 17(2), p.113.

DuBrin, A.J., 2013. Fundamentals of organizational behavior: An applied perspective. Elsevier.

Gilson, L.L., Maynard, M.T., Jones Young, N.C., Vartiainen, M. and Hakonen, M., 2015. Virtual teams research: 10 years, 10 themes, and 10 opportunities. Journal of Management, 41(5), pp.1313-1337.

Langer, A.M., 2017. Information Technology and Organizational Learning: Managing Behavioral Change in the Digital Age. CRC Press.

Luthans, F., Luthans, B.C. and Luthans, K.W., 2015. Organizational behavior: An evidence-based approach. IAP.

Miner, J.B., 2015. Organizational behavior 1: Essential theories of motivation and leadership. Routledge.

Morton, L.H. and Weinstein, J., 2015. Teamwork.

Nimmo, G.R. and Clapham, M.C., 2016. Staff Training and Development. In Handbook of Intensive care: Organization and Management (pp. 87-105).

Northouse, P.G., 2015. Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage publications.

Pinder, C.C., 2014. Work motivation in organizational behavior. Psychology Press.

Robbins, S.P. and Judge, T., 2013. Organizational behavior.

Ybema, S.B., Thomas, R. and Hardy, C., 2016. Organizational change and resistance: An identity perspective. The SAGE Handbook of Resistance, p.386.