GROUP VS.

TEAM: DEFINITIONAL CONSIDERATIONS The terms "group" and "team" are widely used interchangeably by researchers and practitioners. In contrast to the more prosaic understanding of a group as a mere collection of individuals, we define a group as "two or more [individuals] who interact with each other in such a manner that the behavior and/or performance of a member is influenced by the behavior and/or performance of other members" (in Gibson et al., 1994, p. 30). More specifically, Bowditch and Buono (1994) identify two conditions that must be satisfied to consider two or more people as a group: (1) awareness of each other, and (2) interaction to achieve a common goal. A team "is an officially sanctioned collection of individuals who have been charged with completing a mission by an organization and who must depend upon one another for successful completion of that work" (Alderfer, 1987, p. 211). A group becomes and can be described as a team as soon as it meets certain criteria, such as: (1) interdependency between members of the team to accomplish organizational goals; (2) collaboration between the members expressed in help and support between one another; (3) the members of a teamare identifiable as such, and (4) clear goals and objectives. In this regard, Katzenbach and Smith note that "when a group of people has no separate and distinct purpose as a group, when it generates no joint work product, and when its leadership is determined by external hierarchy instead of internal need, such a group is not a real team" (1994, p. 71). Differences between Groups and Teams

A group is informal and meets to solve short-term problems. A team solves long- term problems and includes more coordination and structure. A team can evolve from a pre-existing group. However, a group by itself cannot be considered a team. A team tends to be closer knit and works together over a longer period of time than a group. A team also holds a stronger sense of collective identity than a group. Definition of a Group A common definition of a group is three or more individuals that interact about a common goal and have influence over one another. Three components of a group are size, goal orientation, and influence. Employee Groups Groups can become a team if a group identifies a problem that requires a more structure, long-term approach to solving. Definition of a Team A common definition of a team is that it comprises a group of people. A group can develop into a team if it has a coordinated effort to reach a common goal. Teams are typically more close-knit groups of people who work together over a long period of time to accomplish a goal. Differences between Groups and Teams A group doesn't necessarily constitute a team because a team requires a coordinated effort. A team is a more specialized in that it includes common resources and collective effort. Characteristics of a group are interdependence, interaction, synergy, common goals, shared norms, and cohesiveness. A group can be informal, such as 3-12 people that are in a meeting to discuss a business problem. Teams are structured more formally and are sometimes assigned. Teams have a purpose, specific goals, and assigned duties. Teams need to have different members with special roles in order to help achieve a common goal. On the other hand, groups are often comprised of people with similar abilities and goals and may not have participating members with different skill sets. Groups come together more casually and will typically have less structured meetings than teams. A successful business needs both groups and teams in order to function effectively. Groups may come together to solve less complex issues in meetings, while teams will be structured and formed in order to solve more difficult issues that take a longer time to solve.

http://www.freeonlineresearchpapers.com/starbucks-case-study 4. Teamwork Teamwork can not only construct a small social structure in organization for employees to socialize, but also composite of various kind of members who equip with different background of skill and knowledge on account of the mission. Each member plays an important role in the teamwork; therefore everyone in that team can meet their need for getting acquainted with different colleagues and learn new skill from each other. Hoegl & Gemuenden (2001) observed that the definition of teamwork is a social system including more than three people in an organization or context. These members identity others as one member of the team and they have the same goal. Robbins (2001) stated that the factors influencing teamwork are relation of leadership, roles, principles, status, size, composition and the power of agglomerate. 4.1 The strategies to keep well relationship Starbucks establishes a well-developed system to keep good relationship between managers and employees. At first, the leaders of a retail shops use the same title partner as a basic level worker to narrow the gap of bureaucracy. Furthermore, they co-work in the first line to eliminate the distance between different statuses. Secondly, the numbers of employees are usually from three to six. Such a small size of a retail shop makes staffs acquaint with each other easily and deeply. In the co-working period, this helps a team to match different personalities and majors quickly to achieve well performance. Next, the suggestions and complaints provided by employees are treated of equal importance. In the same way, they have a right to participate in the process of revising company policies as well as a manager. In that case, each staff thinks that they also play an important role in company operating, and they can join to work out a direction of Starbucks. These give employees not only a respect, but a sense of participation. 5. Conclusion Starbucks changes the behaviours and viewpoints of global consumers to coffee, and this successful example has caught global attention. Nevertheless, it was also a small retail coffee shop in North American initially. Nowadays, it is not only one of the fastest growing corporation, but also an outstanding business model with lower employee turnover rate and higher profit performance. A good relationship between managers and employees could maintain a high quality of performance. Just like Starbucks, to use the correct strategy would lead to a successful path.

http://voices.yahoo.com/starbucks-organizational-mission-strategies-5707838.html Work Team ArrangementsStarbucks was founded on teamwork. Their work team arrangements allow diverse members of the Starbucks staff to work together in order to construe ideas and strategies. Each member plays a vital role in the survival and maintenance of Starbucks success. This work team environment allows each employee to learn new ideas and ways of thinking from colleagues. Starbucks instructs each employee on their leadership role, principles, status, and structure and how to act as a Starbucks team player. (Starbucks Corporation: Case Study in Motivation and Teamwork, 2009), http://www.ukessays.co.uk/essays/management/beginning-of-starbucks.php Starbucks requires that team-work be a part of each employees daily routine. Team-work provides all employees the option to interact, and socialize in an environment that they feel comfortable. All kinds of members with different skills, knowledge, and backgrounds are a part of Starbucks mission. Each member of the team plays a key role. There for everyone can become acquainted with different members and their skills. By permitting teamwork to play such an important role in their business, Starbucks has continued to be successful. As a result of teamwork all employees receive equal treatment. Staff members of Starbucks are referred to as "partners," including the managers, and supervisors. By narrowing the gap between employees, and managers Starbucks co-works each employee. Because of this, the company maintains a familiar and closer atmosphere, and this maintains a well management system.

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/small-business/openforum/articles/tips-on-teamwork-from-the-man-whoreinvented-starbucks/ Forming a Team Great teams start with great leaders. He describes Schultz as "very aspirational, and very optimistic. He was really introspective and open to new ideas. Very open to sitting down with customers and hearing how a company can do better." But that's just the first piece of the puzzle. A leader must know how to create cohesive teams. "First, you must have a sense of purpose," he says. "That's what Steve Jobs taught me. The belief that what we are doing will make a difference in the world. Great teams understand the forces with and against them what stands in the way." Building Trust The second part is trust. "Teams that perform really well have trust between people," he says. This begins with any combination of two people working together. It can take up to 18 months to figure out how to effectively work with a colleague, he says, but he works with companies to speed up that process. "What is the other person's unique strength? What are their misconceptions about you?"

http://www.workforce.com/articles/how-starbucks-is-offering-not-just-jobs-but-careers So how has Starbucks become such a runaway success? Certainly, the high quality of Starbucks products, the ambiance of the stores, and the current trendiness of slurping steaming cappuccinos or mocha grandes out of bright white paper cups stamped with the famous green and black company logo have played a large part. However, of at least equal importance are Starbucks employees. And critical to this element is the way that Starbucks Coffee involves its employees in the business of making and selling coffee. In an effort to increase employee involvement, Starbucks has recently instituted self-managed work teams at its coffee bean roasting plants. Although plant managers and supervisors are responsible for the initial organization of the teams, partners are encouraged to take over the day-to-day workings of the teams including decision making. Cross-functional teams of partners and supervisors are used to make hiring decisions. Everyone on the team has a voice in the selection process and partners are encouraged to offer their views on the candidates potential compatibility with the company. The companys "Mission Review Team"comprised of partners from throughout the companyvisits Starbucks outlets to review the consistency of the stores operations and the companys guiding principle of providing quality service and products. Employee benefits are company strengthone that helps to keep employee turnover at approximately 65 percentfar less than the industry average of 150 to 400 percent. Starbucks led the pack when it decided in 1987 to give all employees, including part-time partners, full healthcare benefits. If a partner works at least 20 hours a week, then he or she is eligible to begin receiving these benefits after only 90 days on the job. The health planwhich pays 90 to 100 percent of medical costs with a $10 co-paycosts employees less than $400 a year. Dental insurance and vision care is provided for free. Disability and life insurance is also included in the employee benefits package.

http://sites.psu.edu/leadership/2013/03/15/team-leadership-at-starbucks/ While employed as a barista for Starbucks* coffee, it is the companys policy to promote teamwork within the work setting in order to provide a positive environment for patrons and employees in addition to delivering superior quality drinks, products, and services. Being that the store where I worked was the only Starbucks in town, we kept consistently busy and were typically staffed by at least two people in the evenings when business slowed and anywhere from three to six people during the morning rush and early afternoon. In fact, our unit functioned as a team as opposed to a group as we were a formal work group consisting of people who work intensely together to achieve a common group goal, which was offering quality drinks in a timely manner (George & Jones, 2005, p. 313). Of course, when operations were not running smoothly this was not only evident to our customers, but to our team as well as we would start running out of products, dishes would be piled up, and service was slower for patrons resulting in longer wait times. Due to our teams small group size, this allowed us to interact with one another continually whereby we were able to share information, recognize individual contributions to the group and identify areas that needed to be addressed immediately in order to restore the daily operations to meet or exceed customers expectations (George & Jones, 2005, p. 315). Moreover, since our manager (i.e. the formal leader) only worked Monday thru Friday in the mornings this presented our teams the ability to perform the critical leadership functions to assess the current effectiveness of the team and then take appropriate action[as] these duties and responsibilities often are distributed across the team (Northouse, 2013, p. 305). Therefore, in my experience Starbucks is a company that strives to use team leadership in order to achieve its business objectives.

Since the composition of each team did not remain consistent for some time as we had an influx of new employees, each group experienced the different stages of Bruce W. Tuckmans stages of

development. Initially, the team would enter the forming stage in which individual members would learn basic information about each other, such as who enjoyed working the hot bar (i.e. espresso drinks), the cold bar (i.e. smoothies, Frappuccinos), the cash register (i.e. socializing with the customers), or whether they enjoyed rotating positions. We also learned about each others personality characteristics and who was better equipped in different positions based on ones experience, knowledge, and customer feedback. Secondly, the team would endure the storming stage whereby disagreements occurred as some individuals did not wish to be flexible and rotate or move into other positions. Another area of contention was that older workers did not feel that they should have to listen to younger workers and that the more experienced members should automatically be given the leadership role. Nevertheless, the teams did eventually work themselves past this stage as members saw how their rigidity was a hindrance rather than supportive. What may have been most helpful in resolving these issues were the internal relational leadership actions of collaboration, conflict management, and power issues, whereby each persons opinions were heard and a compromise of using rotation was enacted. Fortunately, the third stage of norming took hold and each team began to work together in an efficient manner that was enjoyable for all. Interestingly, the group composition actually determined which team member was perceive by

the rest of the group as the leader for that shift, as no one held an official title except the manager. In the fourth stage of performing, the teams were playing functional, interdependent roles focused on the performance of groups tasks (PSU, 2013, p. 4). Naturally, this was evidenced by the higher ratings we began receiving by the mystery shoppers that would come into our store and rate our level of customer care and service. Thus, our teams had progressed through the first 4 stages of Tuckmans group development (George & Jones, 2005).

For instance, each task role had very specific duties associated with it and throughout an eight-hour shift team members would rotate in order that no one experience fatigue from the monotony of certain duties. However, while one occupied a certain position they were expected to maintain a particular standard of work, as this allowed for smooth transitions from the different positions with little to no disruption to the work. In fact, the eight characteristics that Larson and LaFasto (1989) found to be consistent with team excellence were all evidenced within the Starbucks work environment. For example, we were provided with clear goals (i.e. mission), which was to provide excellent tasting beverages in a timely manner while making personal connections with our customers. Secondly, our work structure provided a clear indication as to what each role entailed and how and when to perform those duties (i.e. cashier takes order and engages customer, while the hot bar barista prepares the drinks). Thirdly, we worked with competent team members as we were each trained with the skills needed to get the work done as well as having enough members to distribute the work between. Fourth, we shared a unified commitment toward our mission as we each understand all the positions and how they contributed to the overall product. Fifth, after experiencing the storming stage teams were able to build collaborative climates as we learned to trust each other in working together. Sixth, our teams maintained a standard of excellence, as that is what kept our customers returning time and time again. Seventh, our teams were provided with all the materials and equipment necessary to make drinks, while receiving recognition for high performance rating on our customer service satisfaction surveys. Lastly, the team members that served as leaders provided principled leadership, as they served as coaches and positive role models. Hence, these eight qualities are persistently being assessed within the Starbucks environment to accurately monitor and change if need be the health and dynamics of the teams.

Understandably, places of employment do not remain permanent and as team members began leaving and new people were hired to replace them the affects of Tuckmans adjourning stage were felt, in which the groups as we had known them disbanded. Nevertheless, each new team underwent Tuckmans stages of development and every time we were able to achieve a highly efficient work group that functioned optimally. In sum, the team leadership model helps to point the way for constant team analysis and improvement (Northouse, 2013, p. 304).