This week I had the opportunity to learn the concept of self-managed work teams and how to lead these teams. My first thought was that these teams did not warrant any leadership. The name self-managed work team states that they do not need leadership. But, I was wrong. All teams need some leadership, but the style of leadership must be adjusted for a self-managed work team. According to Brown (2011), a self-managed work team is “An autonomous group whose members decide how to handle their task” (p. 349).
In the 2008 video from INSEAD entitled Self-managing teams: Debunking the paradox, self-management teams are described as a contradiction to traditional organizational structures. Paul Tesluk described that self-managing teams work well for a highly skilled group such as technicians (INSEAD, 2008). The technicians know how to do their jobs and do not need help organizing performance data or developing a method to handle customer calls. The individuals are highly skilled and highly professional, so the typical method of dictating management would be counter-productive. The external leader could be utilized in “helping the team understand its strengths, roles, and responsibilities” (INSEAD, 2008, n.p.).The leadership is still used in a self-managed team; just in a different format.
As I learned more about self-managed teams, I began to ponder the major benefits and drawbacks from this type of team. One benefit, in my opinion, is the makeup of the team itself. The team is comprised of highly skilled members that all have knowledge in the field. These individuals have years of working with the subject matter and more than likely have all worked together and have formed an open level of communication. I feel that the possibilities are endless with a team that knows the field very well.
According to Brown (2011), increased responsibility is placed with the team members in this type of team structure. I believe this is an excellent concept- allowing the team members to feel a sense of empowerment. According to Whetten and Cameron (2016), empowerment creates trust, purpose, and autonomy in an individual’s work and could lead to increased production. Self-managed teams remind me of a leadership concept I read that Zappos implemented called Polyarchy. Polyarchy consists of creating a flattened organizational structure in which middle managers are eliminated. This form of leadership allows employees to be responsible for their work without answering to middle management. Employees become more responsible for their work and receive additional value or purpose from the tasks they complete.
There are also a couple of downfalls that can come from self-managing teams. My first thought is to beware groupthink. Groupthink can occur when all members of a team have similar backgrounds and perform similar jobs. Members could avoid making harsh judgments or disagreements with members of the group to evade creating group discord. A group that contains the one antagonist that helps the group see their decisions in a different light could be more successful. Telsuk mentioned another downfall in that during the group processes mistakes are bound to happen, but the external leader must fight the urge to jump in and correct the problem (INSEAD, 2008). Though the external manager has the skill and ability to correct the issue, for the betterment of the group, they must let the situation play itself out. Also, the external manager must stay away from micromanaging the group. With a team of highly skilled professionals, micromanaging could become counterproductive and slow the production and process of the group.
I also thought about if I would like to work on this type of team, and I am torn. I have noticed that having a sense of empowerment does increase my productivity. I am also an achiever, so I work extremely hard to reach a goal. I also tend to get along with everyone in a team setting very well. I believe those three factors would allow me to enjoy working on a self-managed team. But, I have never had the opportunity to work for a self-managed team. My only two professional jobs have followed a traditional hierarchy structure where I report to a manager, who reports to a manager, and so on.
I would require access to more information about the company or organization to strive in a self-managed team. In my two previous roles, the structure of the organization made the middle manager an asset that allowed me to be successful at my job. Certain skills and information are housed with the middle and upper management, and I would fail without using them as a source. The company must be open to letting that information flow freely before I could say that I would like to work in this type of team setting. It is understood that a self-managed team would provide for more autonomy and decision making, but never having the opportunity to be self-supporting, I cannot imagine myself being productive in this type of team setting at this point in my career.
To become an effective external manager of s self-managed team, I would have to overcome some competencies. The two competencies that come to mind are my sense of self-confidence/fear of failure and my need to achieve/ perfectionist personality. First, I would have to lose my self-confidence. I have a feeling that I would be timid to speak up on a team that contained other experts in the field. My tendencies to be timid would not be helpful to a team. I would have to learn to speak up for the betterment of the team. The second competency seems to be a complete opposite of the first; the need to achieve. I have a feeling that though I would be scared to speak up the achiever and perfectionist inside of me would want to jump in and handle all aspects of the team. I have the tendency to want to make everything just right and in a team setting with other highly skilled members, this action would be counter-productive and could stifle production. If I was able to let go of certain tendencies and allowed the team to work as it is supposed to, self-managed teams could be a great organizational structure.
References
Brown, D. R. (2011). An experiential approach to organization development (8th ed.). Boston: Prentice Hall.
INSEAD. (2008, September 22). Self-managing teams: Debunking the leadership paradox. [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBnR00qgGgM
Whetten, D. & Cameron, K. (2016). Developing management skills (9th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall/Pearson
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