Change Management and Teamwork

Change management success solely depends on the leadership development and team collaboration. Focusing on leadership can yield to productivity on the output. A practical approach rather than the classical approach to enhancing leadership ought to be employed by social organizations and institutions. Workforce development through initiatives offers employees an opportunity to acquire knowledge, skills, and become abreast of the developing proactive approach to deal with prevailing occurrences. It is considered an effort that targets to evoke motivation and inspire innovation towards the success of an organization.

The case study of the Castle Spring Police Department is calling for a change to impact the society and achieve social justice. Administering social justice will help create an integrative society. The application of classical approach in dealing with judicial cases will hamper the attainability of justice to the victims. Noting the concerns of a detective in the Castle Springs Police Department, much has not been achieved to help in solving the prevalence of crimes and offenses.

Considerably, the application of the classical management theory in the case study is a revelation of the tendency by an organization not to appreciate organization communication as critical to developing and maintaining an organizational culture.

Organization communication follows the supposition that the management has a compulsion to prompt the contemplation of humanity’s long-run essentials and needs. The efforts by Jack Whitson following frustrations of minimal impact of the police department to help address issues of domestic violence are notable. However, much of the decisions are based on the classical management which fails to motivate innovation and productivity. Jack was however determined to bring change and this prompted to the engagement of the workforce to issue on the way forward. Through the engagement with the staff, it is noted that there is a poor team relation that derails collaboration. If the establishment of the DVERT (Domestic Violence Enhanced Response Team) fails to initiate a team change no results will be achieved. Once a workforce team feels shortchanged and demoralized, positive stimulation is lost creating a way to attrition and low productivity.

Low productivity is usually triggered by unconducive work environment and lack of collaboration leading to motivations that cause negative attitudes and eventually poor productivity, dissatisfaction at a workplace, job insecurity and lack of growth prospects in the current job. It concurs that managing employees can be a complicated responsibility than it is to manage capital or intensive technologies (pp. 99-120).

In regards to the development of teamwork, classical approach puts focus on leadership control rather than a followership model. The approach often ignores the employees with leadership qualities forgetting that investing in them is the pathway to business success. Following the case studies of companies such as General Electric, Ford Motors, Monsanto, training and employee development are essential as they help in imparting knowledge and skills. It is their responsibility to ensure that the team-players acquire the needed skills to steer an organization ahead to prompt innovation through employee development programs.

Since the virtual teams comprise of multi-cultural individuals, there is the need for organizations to invest hugely in an online platform where the team members can interact to get acquainted quickly to close the gap of physical separation.

Conflict and Teamwork

The team group in conflict at Castle Springs Police Department case takes the form of a task-force. This is because; the establishment of the DVERT (Domestic Violence Enhanced Response Team) is for the course to eliminate the crime prevalence.

On the other hand, General Electric, Ford Motors, Monsanto team group takes the form of a functional-work team. In their case is to enhance teamwork and democracy to increase their performance and productivity.

Borrowing from the above cases, it is clear that conflict plays part prompting low delivery of objectives. It details the benefits earned through teamwork. The prevalence of conflict in an organization set up, poor performance is usually the outcome. Interpersonal relationships that are the foundation of a strong team are disrupted due to conflicts.  In consideration of the organizational setting with numerous interactions, it is humanly impossible to elude conflict.

At the center of team success and conflict management is the organizational leadership. It is important that a leader to understand and acquire conflict management skills to avoid unwarranted confrontations that could jeopardize operatives in the organization. In reference to the case study, they are conspicuous signals of conflict since there is lack of teamwork to prompt change. To appositely deal with the prevalent conflict, it is necessary to have a leadership that is somber and quite accommodative.

Following the supposition of Pamela Shockley-Zalabak (2002) the integration of virtual teams can be enhanced through organization communication. However, there are issues that ought to be appreciated so as to build trust and change from the classical management approach. Building trust in the virtual teams can be promptly enhanced through the rapid response from top management which often is not the case in classical approach. This is effectively facilitated by use of the electronic communication platforms available (Google Drive, Gmail, Dropbox).

Teamwork creates a sense of unity, brought together for a common purpose and offers encouragement multi-disciplinary work where teams cut across organizational divides.

Thought-provoking Question

1. In what ways would the detective John Whitson manage to establish a collaborative team and ensure that all the officers are on the same page? The establishment of DVERT seems to be a good strategy, however a change of attitude and communication must be coursed, how effective will the response team be in the current situation going forward?
2. How can an organization maximize the groups’ gains potential while minimizing loss to deal with the challenge of making virtual teams effective?
3. What challenges and obstacles virtual teams may encounter in a cross-cultural setting?
4. How to make virtual teams more effective and efficient in the cross-cultural setting?
5. What are the common sources of conflict that havoc teamwork and preventing them from achieving the organizational goals and expectations
6. Teamwork and leadership are directly proportional. However, the leadership fails to understand how to establish a collaborative team to achieve the objectives. What are the different type of techniques that can be employed to eliminate conflicts among teams?

References

Keyton, J., & Shockley-Zalabak, P. (2009). Case studies for organizational communication: Understanding communication processes. Oxford University Press.