Exam 8: Self-Managed Teams and Team Leadership

In your organization, you know of one department that has no departmental goals; everyone is simply told to do their best to accomplish the organization's mission. In your opinion, this department is functioning as which of the following?

Think of a work situation in which you were required to do a lot of creative thinking, or in which your job required doing a lot of very creative things. In what ways did the organization and your immediate supervisor or leader facilitate or hinder your effectiveness? Use the discussion of top management and the team leader's roles in facilitating creativity as your guide.

Recall a team decision that you were a part of, and describe the team leader's role during the process leading up to the final decision. Would you characterize the leader's role as belonging to the leader-centered or team-centered approach to decision making?

Your team has been charged with developing a new product within three months. The head of your department has informed you that it is up to the team to come up with ways of achieving this objective as long as it operates within stipulated parameters. Which of the following describes your team?

A team environment characterized by lots of rules and regulations to work by may not make for the most creative working environment. What strategy for managing creative teams is missing according to this example?

What is team-centered leadership, and how does it differ from the leader-centered approach?

Instructions for the following question(s) For the Variables line, write the numbers 1 to 4. To the right of the four numbers, write the four variables. To the left of the four numbers, write the answers to each variable from the Leadership Decision Making model that represents the style to use based on the variable. Fill in the Leadership Style and Action Taken lines with the appropriate answers. Variables: Leadership Style: Action Taken: -Leadership: Decision Making. You are being promoted from a supervisory job to a middle-management position in two weeks. You have been given the authority to hire your replacement from your department before moving on. You have two fairly equal candidates who want to be promoted to management.

List the advantages and disadvantages of working in teams.

Team norms develop in the early stages of a team's formation.

The ____ during meetings may be preoccupied with other issues, not pay attention or participate in the group meeting, or feel superior and wonder why the group is spending so much time on the obvious.

Shirking of individual responsibility is also known as:

Think of a past or present job. Based on your knowledge of the distinction between a group and a team, would you say you were part of a team or a group? Explain.

The part of a meeting that covers agenda items:

According to the team-centered decision-making model, the role of the leader should be to serve as a consultant, advisor, teacher, and facilitator.

Individual satisfaction is the degree to which the team's output (product or service) meets the needs and expectations of those who use it.

Describe how team member characteristics impact self-managed team effectiveness.

Which of the following statements regarding team diversity is NOT true?

When using the team-centered decision-making approach, the role of the leader should be to serve as a(n) ____.

Top management can positively influence team creativity by providing adequate resources and a supportive organizational culture.

Creativity is usually thought of as a characteristic of individuals, but are some teams more creative than others?