Make known to the audience the difference between the organizational groups that exist within most companies, how they work, how they are formed and how to keep these teams in harmony so that they can carry out different activities in the best possible way.
Within organizations there are different tasks that have to be performed. Most of these activities are intended to be carried out by working groups. Among the groups that exist within organizations are departments, work teams, and committees. Nowadays most of the companies prefer to have an organization and performance of activities through groups, which is in order to have a better help in the implementation of more flexible production processes, to have quality controls. more optimized. This is why for a Master in Administrative Engineering it is extremely important to understand how these groups work and how they influence the results and goals for organizations.
But before we can understand what was mentioned above, we must know what a group is, many of us can have a personal definition of what a group is, because they are immersed in our day to day, from the teams sports or even the governing body of a city; but so that we can know exactly what it is, a definition with which we will work is mentioned below.
A group is "a social unit, made up of people who have a set of values or norms that regulate their behavior, have frequent interactions and share common interests and goals" (Middlemist & RL, 1983). But as we know every thing, person or place that exists on our planet has characteristics that make them unique, and groups are not the exception, among the characteristics that groups have we find the following:
- There is more than one person There is a certain permanence in the relationships of its members Some members are more influential than others There is a set of precepts (norms and values) that guide the behavior of their members There are certain important goals that are pursued by the group. Its members note that they belong to a different entity or unit. They have the media. (Marin Garcia, 2013)
Therefore, it can be said that a group can be denoted because it has an internal organization and all the members know each other and that is how among all the members they create a feeling of belonging towards the group and feel part of it.
Now, knowing what a group is and what its main characteristics are and the feeling of belonging that its members generate towards the same group, we can cover more interesting points, firstly, the types of groups that exist in organizations will be described and classified.
TYPES OF GROUPS
There are a large number of group classes within organizations, however they can be classified by four main types, which are mentioned below:
- Formal and informal Working and parallel Open and closed Reference
In this case the groups that interest us are the formal groups and the informal groups.
FORMAL GROUPS
Formal groups have been created by business organizations, which have specific functions. However, there is a classification within formal groups, and among the most widely used in this section we find functional groups also known as command groups. These functional groups are composed within their structure by a chief or command and a series of subordinates.
Some examples of command groups that can be located within a company are the following:
- Accounting Departments Human Resources Department Research and Development Finance Marketing
And as it can be denoted by the name of the departments mentioned above, they are of great importance within companies since they were structured to carry out a specific task within the organization, focusing on performing their tasks in the most effective as possible and taking advantage of the experience and behavior of each member of the team or group.
However apart from groups that already exist within organizations, companies may find themselves tasked with creating more formal groups parallel to those that already exist. A clear example of these parallel groups is the project teams, the committees and the groups that are in charge of proposing some type of suggestion of any kind within the organization. The following is a brief explanation of the tasks that these parallel groups perform within an organization.
Speaking of project teams, it can be said that they have the task of taking on specific tasks, which are usually carried out in short periods of time and are not repeated regularly. Once the task for which the group was formed is finished, it disappears and each one of the project members becomes part of the areas to which they were previously assigned.
The committees are groups that are formed with slightly more selected members since in order to integrate these members into the group, it is based on the experience, expertise and knowledge of each of the members, these committees have a period of duration a little larger, since the tasks to be performed will be somewhat repetitive. These groups have more advisers than decision makers and the members can be changed or not.
The groups that are created to propose suggestions are generated by the same workers of an organization, which can meet to provide some type of suggestion within the processes or tasks that they create can be improved within an organization.
THE INFORMAL GROUPS
Informal groups emerge spontaneously and are observed at all levels. As long as there are people working together there is a tendency to form groups whose activities are not those that correspond to the formal organization; These groups can seek social satisfactions or achievements of common interest. (Marin Garcia, 2013)
A clear example of informal groups is the following: “Given the proximity of workstations or interactions at work, there are employees who play golf together, drive to work, and drink coffee together on breaks of work". (Virtual Campus, 2011)
FUNCTIONS OF THE GROUPS
As previously mentioned, groups are formed to achieve some type of objective within organizations, which can lead to improvements in the efficiency and effectiveness of the entire organization, not just the area for which they are intended.
However, they also have the function of improving the psychological situation of the group members.
GROUP ATTRIBUTES
According to Longenecker and Dwyer "a way to better understand the functioning of groups is the examination of three attributes that characterize them: activities, interactions and feelings".
Following is a brief description of the three attributes mentioned by the authors Longenecker and Dwyer.
The activities. They are all those operations that several people (the group) have to carry out. For these activities to be carried out in the best way, the employees who are part of the group must have excellent communication among all team members, including the superiors from whom they will receive instructions.
The feelings. They are all those perceptions and interactions that the members of the group have between their colleagues and managers, up to the company's policies and their own work.
Interactions. They are all those activities of relationship between the members of the team, which usually lead to the members having some kind of feeling of sympathy towards their peers. Within the interaction activities you have to chat more than usual or what is necessary for the work to be carried out, or to carry out some complementary activity between the members, whether it is having a meal, celebrating a birthday or even practicing some sports together.
Within organizations it is common to find two or more employees who are not tolerated in the least, which leads to those negative feelings that may be generated within a group of workers interfere with the objectives and goals of the company.
These three aforementioned precepts are perfectly related to each other, so much that as time passes, more activities, interactions and feelings can arise.
It is well known that all groups, whether formal or informal, pursue some objective or goal, but in order to achieve them they must have a perfectly established structure. This structure that we are talking about has several factors that play in it, which are:
- Size Roles Status Standards Goals Cohesion
Size. Talking about the size that the groups must have to maintain cohesion among the members is seven, however some authors agree that the ideal number to organize work groups is five people. However, there is an acceptance range in which the groups are said to achieve good yields, these ranges are between five to twelve members, this is thanks to the fact that having a limited number of members can better meet the needs of each team member.
However, having groups of more than 12 members, there is a risk of having greater differences between the members, and even decision-making looks a little more tedious and conflictive.
It is said that the larger the group, the more satisfactory they will be, and that is why when a group is greater than 20 people, the ideal would be to separate it into subgroups to maintain order and control, and even to achieve the goals. and objectives in an easier and more dynamic way.
Roles. Roles are a set of stereotyped responses that a person manifests in the face of related or similar situations, that is, a combination of behaviors in certain situations. (Marin Garcia, 2013)
In order for a group to be able to work efficiently and be as stable within an organization and that it equally satisfies the needs of its members, it must have different roles, which are:
- Brains Resource Investigators Evaluator monitors Coordinators Implementers Finalizers Coherencers Drivers Specialist (Belbin, 1981)
Status. Status is nothing more than the position of any member within the group. However, within the status there are two types, which are scalar and functional. The escalar makes mention of the level of command that the members of the group have and the functional is one that emphasizes the knowledge and experience acquired during the course of time.
Rules. The norms are the rules that must be followed within the group which will define the behavior of the members and will be a guide which they must follow to maintain the behavior in an adequate way since the conduct is a very essential part for things come out in the best possible way.
Goals. The goals are the most important elements of study of the groups because they will determine the motivation that the members must have, since if there are no goals the group has no reason to exist and the best thing is that it be disintegrated as soon as possible.
Cohesion. Degree to which group members are attracted to it and motivated to stay in it. (Shaw, 1979)
CONCLUSION
As it could be observed, the groups are a very important part within the organizations since they help in a very special way so that these organizations can achieve their goals and objectives in a more dynamic and simple way, just as companies have objectives, by forming a group, whether formal or informal, the members have both joint and personal goals which they must satisfy for the good of both parties, which could be said to be a type of shared value.
REFERENCES
- Belbin, M. (1981). Management teams: why they succeed or fail. Virtual campus. (2011). Virtual campus. Retrieved on February 13, 2016, from http://www.uovirtual.com.mx/moodle/lecturas/semi2/8.pdfLongenecker C., S., & Dwyer, D. (1997). The human aspect of improving production. Harvard DEUSTO Business Review.Marin Garcia, JA (2013). https://www.upv.es/. Retrieved on February 13, 2016, from http://www.upv.es/i.grup/repositorio/own/CL_2013-MarinGarcia%202001%20Los%20grupos%20en%20la%20empresa.pdfMiddlemist, HM, & RL, M. (1983). Concepts and effective practice. West Publishing.Shaw, ME (1979). Group dynamics. Barcelona: Herder.
