Deck 9: High Performance Teams

Question 1

Which of the following is not a people-related early warning sign of team failure?

A) Personality differences in team members.
B) Lack of top management support.
C) No stakeholder participation in the project.
D) Failure of subject matter experts.

Answer 1

Personality differences in team members.

Question 2

Which one of the following is not a benefit flowing directly from an organisation's choice of adopting a team-based approach?

A) Increased workplace productivity
B) Lower overall costs
C) Lower levels of absenteeism
D) Improvements to product and service quality

Answer 2

Lower overall costs

Question 3

Which one of the following is a benefit flowing directly from an organisation's choice of adopting a team-based approach?

A) Increased workplace productivity
B) Lower overall costs
C) Higher levels of absenteeism
D) Multi-skilling

Answer 3

Increased workplace productivity

Question 4

What is the most important factor for ensuring the success of team-based projects?

A) Project managers detecting people-related and process-related early warning signs, and determining to bring about changes before it is too late.
B) Subject matter experts providing adequate time to teams.
C) Having adequate documentation on success criteria.
D) Having adequate resource allocation.

Question 5

A top management team usually has high levels of:

A) independence between the functional areas.
B) reliance on the board of directors.
C) reliance on customer feedback.
D) interdependence between the functional areas.

Question 6

Self-managing teams (also called self-directing teams) are:

A) groups of independent individuals that can self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks.
B) groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks.
C) groups of interdependent individuals that focus only on the tasks they are given.
D) groups of independent individuals that focus only on the tasks they are given.

Question 7

The concept of self-directed work teams was first formally introduced into:

A) Frederick Taylor's production lines in the 1920s.
B) Henry Ford's production lines in the 1940s.
C) British coal mines in the late 1940s and 1950s.
D) US steel mills in the 1890s.

Question 8

Self-managed teams:

A) need leaders to oversee their contribution to the larger organisation.
B) do not need leaders to oversee their contribution to the larger organisation.
C) do not need autonomy of decision-making and feedback on the results of work activities.
D) need a low level of employee involvement.

Question 9

The most important attribute contributing to the success of virtual teams is:

A) shared work time.
B) shared financial resources.
C) shared stories.
D) shared understanding.

Question 10

Which one of the following is not an aspect to be guarded against on a virtual team?

A) Increased similarity
B) Less team spirit
C) Less open communication
D) Fewer shared experiences

Question 11

Facilitating shared understanding in virtual teams involves which of the following?

A) Protection of personal information.
B) Protection of essential knowledge that is needed across sites.
C) Guarding against development of a strong team identity.
D) Sharing of information about day-to-day activities throughout the project.

Question 12

Selection of the right electronic collaboration and communication technology to meet the needs of the project is a critical success factor for which type of team?

A) Self managed team
B) Self directed team
C) Top management team
D) Virtual team

Question 13

A group of people who apply different skills, with a high degree of interdependence, to ensure the effective delivery of a common organisational objective defines a:

A) virtual team.
B) cross-functional team.
C) self-managed team.
D) top management team.

Question 14

Which one of the following is not a critical success factor in managing cross-functional teams?

A) Senior management should constitute the team and define their role within the organisation.
B) The appointment of a strong project leader.
C) Divergence of team's agenda and inter-departmental agendas.
D) Top management must visibly support the team.

Question 15

Defining processes, action processes and interpersonal processes are:

A) moderators in a model of team effectiveness.
B) team work process variables in a model of team effectiveness.
C) types of team effectiveness.
D) parts of a mental model.

Question 16

The first and perhaps the most important step a team should undertake is to:

A) establish clear rewards and punishments for team behaviours.
B) elect a leader.
C) develop a dispute resolution procedure.
D) reach a clear understanding of its mission through the articulation of a mission statement.

Question 17

Two moderators of teamwork processes and team effectiveness are:

A) mission and team composition.
B) task interdependence and team size.
C) coordination and mission.
D) conflict management and communication.

Question 18

The most visible indicator of team effectiveness is:

A) team performance.
B) team culture.
C) team communication.
D) team leadership.

Question 19

The emotional bonds that develop among members as they work together as a team are called:

A) team culture.
B) team mission.
C) team cohesion.
D) team relationships.

Question 20

Team mental models:

A) are the plans that teams draw up to complete complex tasks.
B) are ways of thinking about forming a team.
C) allow members to anticipate one another's actions and to coordinate their behaviours.
D) allow reason to prevail over emotional team situations.

Question 21

The extent to which members of a group believe that they can be effective as a team across tasks or contexts is best defined as:

A) team cohesion.
B) team performance.
C) team potency.
D) team mission.

Question 22

Which one of these options is not one of the three sets of diversity impacting on team performance?

A) Objective differences
B) Task process diversity
C) Personality diversity
D) Deep level dispositional diversity

Question 23

Define self-managing teams (SMT) and discuss any two foundations of SMTs.

Question 24

What are some of the factors that can lead to the downfall of self-managing teams?

Question 25

What are the critical success factors in managing virtual teams?

Question 26

What are the critical success factors in managing cross-functional teams?

Question 27

Briefly discuss task interdependence and team size as moderators of team effectiveness.

Question 28

What is your understanding of the term 'psychologically healthy workplace'?

Question 29

Define team cohesion and briefly explain its three components.