The concept of teamwork and its definition

“Is the ability of individuals to work in a team important and how is collaboration encouraged. Or is privacy an issue that precludes collaboration?”

Teamwork is the ability of an individual to work in teams towards a common vision for the objectives of the organization. Effective teamwork can affect the successful delivery with the implementation of various learning processes (Aarons et al., 2014). In order to promote deep learning teams and teamwork has contributed beneficially through interactions, cooperation and collaboration. Teamwork is an essential part of success in modern workplace (Cardon and Marshall 2015). In this regard since time immemorial scholars have emphasized on providing distinction between various teams. For instance they have divided teams which are composed of- two or more individuals, share common goals, manage boundaries and exhibits task interdependencies. However modern scholars view teamwork from organizational perspectives. Teams are often regarded as collaboration of two or more individuals and therefore scholars have provided deep understanding of the concept of collaboration (Cheruvelil 2014). Scholars have defined collaboration as the merging or construction of different shared perspectives of two or more people (Couchman 2015). In the later part the research seeks to draw an attention regarding the ability of individuals to work in a team in collaboration with each other where privacy becomes a key issue that obstructs collaboration.

The research intends to provide a deep understanding on various factors which promotes effective teamwork in an organization. In regard to this the research seeks to draw attention on the fact that while performing in teams individuals are often faces certain issues. With the establishment of various organizations in modern era, teamwork has become essential and the development of high performing teams is essential in achieving organizational goals. Sharing of knowledge has been regarded as an important part of inter-enterprise collaboration (Duner 2013). Modern scholars are of the view that the higher is the level of sharing the greater is the benefit to the organizational development however this may lead to privacy issues in the long run (Gillam and Siriwardena 2013). According to modern scholars majority of collaborative decisions in an organization are carried out without proper and complete information (Humphrey and Aime 2014). In other words collaborative decisions mainly comprises of sharing and protecting sensitive and common information such as cost data, financial data and other confidential matters. These are the few factors that creates hurdle in effective collaboration by creating obstacle in teamwork which will be addressed in the research paper.

Categorization of teams

The major aims and objectives of an organization is to encourage proper teamwork and collaboration in order to achieve organizational goal. The research paper has set some of its objectives in this regard:

• To emphasize effective teamwork.
• To examine the ability of the individuals to work in teams.
• To encourage collaboration in teams.
• To evaluate the matter that whether privacy acts as a key issue in preventing collaboration in teams.

Concept of teams and teamwork:

The concept of teamwork from the beginning has been defined by various scholars in different ways. Teamwork has been defined by Koontz and Weihrich as the interdependence of two or more persons while executing a set of activities (Jiang 2014). In this regard they have defined teamwork as the interaction of two or more individuals in making different contributions towards the achievement of a common goal. However Hackman argued that teamwork comprises of individuals who are seen as the formation of social entity and are interdependent on each other because of the quality of task they perform with each other and the performance of such tasks affects each other (Kamar, Gal and Grosz 2013). According to Smith and Katzenbach a group of individuals promote teamwork when there develops a sense of share commitment among the team members (Kearney Damron and Sohoni 2015). Hemingway has other perspectives in this regard.  Hemmingway suggested that in order to build effective teams by ensuring successful teamwork it is necessary that individuals should understand the assignment and the nature of the work  (Keerativutisest and Hanson 2017). Individuals must possess clear goals and values and must be able to communicate with each other openly. Individuals should develop basic environment of trust and possess basic team skills.

Scholars since time immemorial has categorized teams into-

• Self managed teams.
• Virtual teams.
• High performance teams.

Robbins, Odendaal and Roodt defined self-managed teams as a group of highly skilled organizational members who takes the joint responsibility of the whole process through the performance of wide variety of tasks within limited boundaries (Koschmann 2013). They have also emphasized on the fact that self-managed teams could contribute to effective teamwork only when teams are capable and willing to work independently with the evaluation of each other’s performance. In order to promote effective teamwork team workers should make their own decisions in order o thrive towards higher level of empowerment and involvement.

In modern era of globalization and growing competition with the rise of technologies have created an environment in which are drastically scattered and may not be able to perform in the same time zone accordingly (Klarare et al., 2013). This drastic change in environment has promoted virtual teamwork as nowadays all the team workers cannot be seen working in the same place. Katzenbach and Smith emphasized that in modern era with the development in technology the concept of virtual teamwork has been possible (Körner et al., 2016). According to their views with the emergence of recent concept of virtual teamwork the use of computers and technology has redefined that how the work has to be done. In modern era the virtual teamwork is no longer bound to the traditional practices of teamwork.

Virtual teamwork in modern organizations

The concept of team is as old as human race as commented by modern scholars and researchers (Koschmann 2013). Von Ginow emphasized that a group of talented individuals can accomplish more than the number of people working alone (Ku, Tseng and Akarasriworn 2013). In this regard Dalton stated that organizations in order to achieve organizational goals should rely upon the high performance teams rather than individuals (McInnes et al., 2015). Kreitner and Kinicki emphasized that high performance teams are those which encourages participative leadership and high communication levels (Kumar, Deshmukh and Adhish 2014). Sharing responsibility and developing creative talents by ensuring rapid response are also few attributes of high performance teams’ according to modern scholars (Lee et al., 2016).

Collaboration in teams:

The concept of collaboration has been defined by various scholars since time immemorial. According to modern scholars collaboration has been defined as the situation in which two or more individuals engage in an attempt to learn together and solve problems (McInnes et al., 2015). Collaboration has been defined more specifically by Roschelle and Teasley as the mutual agreement between individuals in an effort to work and solve problem together (Raver and Childress 2015). It was noted by Dillenbourg that there has been difficulty among various scholars in accepting a proper definition on collaboration. Dillenbourg noted that ambiguity in the meaning of collaborative learning stems from several sources (Nissen, Evald. and Clarke 2014). Firstly the scale of such interactions may range from two or more individuals to thousands with different theoretical tools needed to analyze interactions occurring at different levels. Dillenbourg has emphasized that nothing is inherently instructive about working with more than one person on a task rather than interacting triggers learning processes (Ronfeldt et al., 2015). Collaborative learning situations require instructions as well as physical setting with other kinds of performance constraints. These elements do not guarantee collaboration however these they only make it more likely. Roschelle defined collaboration as an exercise in convergence or construction of shared meanings and noted that research on conversational analysis has been identified as features of interactions that enable participants to reach convergence through the process of construction, monitoring, and repairing of shared knowledge (Weinstein et al., 2013). Convergence in modern era tends to include four elements:

• Construction of an abstract understanding of the problem’s deep structure.
• The interplay of metaphors.
• Can iterative cycle of displaying, confirming, and repairing conceptions.
• Application of progressively higher standards of evidence for convergence.

Similarly in this regard Roschelle and Teasley defined collaboration as the coordinated, synchronous activity that has been resulted from a continued attempt to construct and maintain a shared conception of a problem (Cardon and Marshall 2015). They defined the joint problem space as the shared knowledge structure which has supported problem-solving with the integration of goals descriptions of the current problem state, and the awareness of potential strategies. According to Roschelle and Teasley, collaboration takes place within this joint problem space, which provides the structure in order to allow meaningful conversations about the problem (Duner 2013). To construct a joint problem space, partners must ensure ways to introduce and accept knowledge, monitor exchanges for evidence of divergent meanings, and repair any divergences identified in such process. It was explained by Van Boxtel that collaborative learning activities allow students to provide explanations of their understanding in order to help them elaborate and reorganize their knowledge (Humphrey and Aime 2014). Social interaction has been stimulating elaboration of conceptual knowledge as team workers attempt to make themselves understood, and research demonstrates that providing elaborated explanations improves student comprehension of concepts. Once the concept of understandings is made visible and clear through verbal communication students can negotiate meaning by arriving at a conclusion of shared understandings.

Importance of high-performance teams

According to modern authors, collaboration is sometimes distinguished from cooperative learning and cooperation can be accomplished through the division of labor where each person is responsible for some portion of the problem solving (Jiang 2014). Collaboration involves individuals working together on the same task, rather than working parallel on separate portions of the same task. However, Dillenbourg noted that some spontaneous division of labor may be observed during the process of collaboration. It has been stated by Dillenbourg that there are several qualities that helps to characterize the process of collaborative interactions (Koschmann 2013). Firstly, collaboration can be characterized by a relatively symmetrical structure; however such symmetrical structure should be truly accomplished. For instance in situations with symmetry of action, each team worker has to access the same range of actions. In this context with the typical division of labor in cooperative learning structures; team workers split up the task and solve tasks individually by applying their respective contributions altogether. In this regard symmetry of knowledge occurs when all participants have the same level of knowledge however they may have difference in their perspectives. The process of symmetry of status involves collaboration among peers rather than interactions which involves supervisor and subordinate relationships in teams (Gillam and Siriwardena 2013). Finally in order to achieve common goal symmetry of goals includes the involvement of common group goals rather than individual goals which can create conflict. Modern scholars commented that in order to make true collaboration it is essential to quality the interactions, especially the degree of interactivity and negotiability in teams (Raver. and Childress 2015). In this regard the process of interactivity refers to the extent to which interactions can influence the thinking of the team workers. Negotiability refers to the extent to which no single team worker can impose his view on the others however all group members must work towards the attainment of common goal and understanding. It has been pointed out by Dillenbourg that trivial, obvious and unambiguous tasks has been providing few opportunities in order to observe negotiation due to the reason that there is no point on which one could disagree (Weinstein et al., 2013). However misunderstandings may occur in teamwork which is an important factor from a learning standpoint and they force team workers in constructing explanations by giving reasons and thereby justifying their positions in teams.

Theories of teamwork:

The first theoretical perspective on teamwork was developed by Bruce Tuckman in 1965. Tuckman has described that the process of working with a team as a social organization as he himself has worked with a group of social psychologists on behalf of the U.S. navy. The team studied the importance of group behavior and teamwork from different perspectives. In such process Tuckman reviewed about 50 articles on group development and team building and noticed that there were two features common to these studies the team or group structure and the task activity. In this regard he identified that since time immemorial groups evolved into teams through four common stages. Tuckman’s teamwork theory has been illustrated on a graph which shows the link between group relationships (the horizontal axis) and task focus (the vertical axis). The performing position has reached the position when relationships have been developed within the group and it has started delivering with a clear focus on the task. However the ideas of  Tuckman clearly indicates the fact that it takes time to reach the  performing stage and it’s normal that teams can go through ups and downs during the development of relationships which is evident in the early period and due to this reason it was called as the storming phrase by Tuckman.

Figure 1: Tuckman’s theory of Teamwork.

Source: Statistica. (2018). Resources — Statistica.

Forming:

The initial stage of team development according to Tuckman is forming. In order to ensure successful teamwork the first stage involves formation of teams. The formation of team is an important factor in facilitating efficient teamwork.

Storming:

In this stage individuals begin to see themselves as part of a team. However at this stage they may challenge each other’s vies and can create a conflict regarding various things like what should be done or not. In this stage conflict and confrontation arises as differences between the team workers surface. This may result in loss of performance among the team members as illustrated in the diagram.

Norming:

At this stage the individuals in team comes together with the process of developing processing while  establishing rules and regulations by clarifying that how things could be done.

Performing:

This is the final stage where focus in increased on both the task and the relationship on teams in order to provide synergy. In this regard performance is delivered through individuals working together effectively for the attainment of common goal.

In modern world the Tuckman’s model on teamwork is of great value as it provided deeper understanding to the concept that how teams evolve. It also helped to consider how team members could encounter different problems at different stages of development in an organization.

In modern world the topic of privacy is highly publicized and hotly debated by many scholars. Due to the involvement of such complexities there exists no common definition of the term privacy. There is no proper definition on the term privacy however different scholars since time immemorial has developed different perspectives on the topic of privacy. It was pointed out by Bellotti that there exist two common definitions of privacy and those are normative and operational (McInnes, Peters Bonney and Halcomb 2015).  Normatively privacy has been defined as the freedom to be left alone.  Lee et al., in this regard provided an operational definition of privacy by stating that privacy is the ability of an individual to personally control the information about oneself (Lee et al., 2016).  Samarajiva extended the definition of privacy by stating that in order to control the outflow of information that may be of strategic value to the individual and control of inflow of information including initiation of contact (Kumar, Deshmukh and Adhish 2014).  It has been observed that various consequences and risks are involved in determining the amount of effort and time devoted while managing privacy. In this regard when the consequences are potentially severe at this stage people devote considerable time in providing attention in preserving privacy. Despite such efforts if violation of privacy occurs negotiations are done between individuals until a common state of privacy is reached in the presence of everyone.

The data collection method is an important method to evaluate that accurate data has been collected from the relevant sources. Data analysis method can be performed with the help of qualitative and quantitative methods. In this research the qualitative method has been used which can be done within a short span of time. The quantitative method deals with statistical analysis and figures which is complex and time consuming (Keerativutisest and Hanson 2017). However for the purpose of this research paper the qualitative method has been used by constructing semi-structured interview methods in order to gather information from the members of various organizations. The use of scholarly articles and journals has been used in order to collect information.

It is necessary that while conducting any research the ethical standards should be maintained. It is necessary that while conducting the interviews the confidentiality of each person should be maintained. The research is based on learning and do not involve any personal relationship. The consent of each person was taken while conducting the research and at the same time the questions asked during the interviews were not meant to hurt the sentiments of the individuals.

While conducting the research there were limitations in the process as the time period was short and the research report had to be submitted within that period of time. The time which was allotted was not sufficient to carry on the research effectively. The monetary issue was another limitation in the way of the research and as the budget for conducting the research was less so it was not carried on effectively.

Conclusion:

In the conclusion it can be stated that in modern world with the advent of globalization and other complexities in the market it is important that teamwork should be encouraged. It is important that individuals must work in a team in collaboration with each other towards the achievement of common goal. However while working in teams sometimes privacy between the team members becomes a central issue which sometimes prevents collaboration. In this regard it is important to develop trust among the other team members so that the confidential information of the company remains private. Lastly, it can be stated that though privacy creates an issue in developing collaboration in teams, the concept of effective collaboration is encouraged along with the ability of an individual to work in teams

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