PERFORMANCE Chapter 9

Group Performance Increasing importance in today’s workplace  Teams/Groups are more common now  Global competition will require more effort from employees  Downsizing requires adaptability & extra effort  Resources may be scarce

Adaptive Group Performance Beneficial due to changing nature of work  Changing technologies alter work tasks  Mergers, downsizing, & corporate restructuring – dealing with uncertain conditions  Globalization & Diversity - working in different cultures

Social Facilitation  Social facilitation: improvement in performance in the presence of others (both audience and coaction)  Triplett’s (1898) early studies on cyclists – performed better when racing against others than being timed alone against others than being timed alone  Coaction – performing a task in the presence of one or more other individuals who are performing a similar activity

 Zajonc’s motivational analysis of social facilitation (1965) – Dominant Responses vs. Nondominant Responses Social Facilitation (cont) Presence of others Dominant responses increase and nondominant responses decrease If task requires dominant response If task requires nondominant response Social interference Social facilitation

 Zajonc’s motivational analysis of social facilitation (1965) – Social Facilitation occurs on simple tasks that require dominant responses – Social Impairment occurs for complex tasks that require nondominant responses Examples: – Making speeches – Getting dressed in familiar & unfamiliar clothes – Playing games Social Facilitation (cont)

Theories of Social Facilitation  Zajonc’s Drive Process: Zajonc suggests compresence (responding to the presence of others) leads to increased readiness and arousal (psychologically & physiologically)  Motivational Processes: Cotrell’s evaluation apprehension theory (also, self-presentation theory): when working in the presence of others a general concern of how others are evaluation them, and this apprehension facilitates their performance on simple, well learned tasks

Theories of Social Facilitation  Cognitive Processes: distraction-conflict theory when people are in the presence of others their attention is divided by the other people and the task  This attentional conflict increases motivation and so it facilitates performance on simple, well learned tasks  Recall is poorer when original stimulus was presented in the presence of others

Alone or with Others ?  Prejudice as a dominant response  Electronic performance monitoring  Study groups

Group Productivity  Social Loafing – the reduction of individual effort when people work in groups compared to when they work alone  Productivity losses in groups  Steiner’s law of group productivity  Actual productivity = Potential productivity – losses owing to faulty process  The Ringelmann Effect  People become less productive when they work with others  Loss increases as group become larger

Group Productivity  The Ringelmann Effect  People become less productive when they work with others  Loss increases as group become larger  Causes of Loss  Coordination problems  Reduction of effort

Potential Productivity Pseudo groups Actual groups Alone Dyads 6-person groups

Social Loafing  Social loafing depends on a number of group-level factors, including:  Identifiability  Free-riding  Goals

Cures for Social Loafing  Involvement – exciting, challenging, involving tasks limit loafing – Karau and William's (1993) collective effort model, or CEM – social compensation: involved members work harder to compensate for others  Identification with the group: Social identity

Building an Effective Team  Steiner’s social combination theory predicts productivity depends on  Group composition: Who is in the group, how do they fit together?  The group’s task: What must the group do to reach its goals?

Building an Effective Team  Group composition  Members’ knowledge, skills, abilities, or KSAs outperform less skilled groups “the best individuals make the best teams”  Group Diversity may outperform less diverse groups b/c their wide range of talents & traits enhances their cognitive flexibility – i.e., creativity, alternatives, solutions  Men and women in performance groups (solo status)

Building an Effective Team  Steiner’s taxonomy of tasks and task demands  Distinguishes between the types of tasks groups perform based on how members’ inputs are combined  Task Demands – the effect that a problem or task’s features, including its divisibility and difficulty, have on the procedures the group can use to complete the task Asks three basic questions…. Divisibility, Quantity vs. Quality, Interdependence

Task Demands QuestionTask Type QualitiesExamples Can the task be broken down into subtasks ? DivisibleSubcomponents can be identified and assigned to specific members  Playing a football game  Building a house  Preparing a six- course meal UnitaryThe task does not have subcomponents  Pulling on a rope  Reading a book  Solving a math problem

Quantity vs. Quality Is quantity produced more important than quality of performance ? Maximizing Quantity: The more produced the better the performance  Generating many ideas  Lifting a great weight  Scoring the most goals Optimizing Quality: A correct or optimal solution is needed  Developing the best answer  Solving a math problem

Interdependence How are individual inputs combined to yield a group product ? Additive Individual inputs are added together  Pulling a rope  Shoveling snow Compensatory Decision is made by averaging together individual decisions  Estimating a pig’s weight by asking 3 people to guess & averaging their guesses  Averaging ratings of job applicants Disjunctive Group selects one solution or product from a pool of members’ solutions or products  Picking one person’s answer to a math problem to be the group’s answer  Letting one art project represent the entire school Conjunctive All group members must contribute to the product for it to be completed  Climbing a mountain  Eating a meal as a group Discretionary Group decides how individual inputs relate to group product  Deciding to shovel snow together  Choosing to vote on the best answer to a problem

Types of Tasks  Additive Task – a task or project that a group can complete by cumulative combining of members’ input  Compensatory Task – a task or project that a group can complete by averaging together individual members’ solutions or recommendations  Groups outperform individuals on additive tasks and compensatory tasks.

Types of Tasks  Disjunctive Task – a task or project that is completed when a single solution, decision, or recommendation is adopted by the group  Groups perform well on disjunctive tasks if the group includes at least one individual who knows the correct solution (truth-wins rule on Eureka problems)  Groups rarely perform better than the best member (synergy, or an assembly bonus effect)

Types of Tasks  Conjunctive Task – a task that can be completed successfully only if all group members contribute  Groups perform poorly on conjunctive tasks unless less skilled members increase their efforts (the Köhler Effect) or the task can be subdivided.  Köhler Effect – an increase in performance by groups working on conjunctive tasks that require persistence but little coordination of effort and is likely due to the increase effort expended by the less capable members.  The effectiveness of groups working on discretionary tasks covaries with the method chosen to combine individuals’ inputs (see Table 9-3).

Brainstorming  Brainstorming rules  Be expressive  Postpone evaluation  Seek quantity  Piggyback ideas

Brainstorming…  Brainstorming groups are not as creative as nominal groups due to  Social loafing  Production blocking  Social matching  Illusion of productivity.  Other methods: brainwriting, synectics, the nominal ‑ group technique (NGT), and electronic brainstorming (EBS), offer advantages over traditional brainstorming.