Group Processes In Organizations Research Paper

1. Definition And Structural Dimensions Of Groups

Groups are defined as a number of people who are oriented toward the same or similar goals and who interact and communicate in order to achieve these goals. All groups share at least three structural principles: norms, cohesion, and role differentiation.

Norms. Norms can be defined as the shared expectations of the group members about how they should act or behave in certain situations. Norms make the behavior of group members more easily predictable and thus help to clarify social relationships.

Cohesion. When group membership is highly attractive—because goal achievement and need satisfaction are perceived to be achieved better in the group— group members are motivated to sustain the contact with the group. The sum of all the forces that increase group attractiveness is called ‘cohesion.’

Role and status. Role differentiation in groups is the social–psychological basis for work differentiation and organization. Role is defined as the expectation of the group members about the appropriate behavior in a certain position. Role-conformant behavior is regularly positively sanctioned, and deviations are sanctioned negatively. Status means that people differ in the hierarchy of prestige, power, influence, and privileges. High-status group members are allowed to deviate from group norms more strongly without being sanctioned than low status members (idiosyncrasy credit).

2. Conformity And Dissent

Conformity and dissent within groups are central aspects of group functioning. Behavior according to the group norm is necessary for relatively conflict-free interaction. Normally, group pressure brings the groups’ behavior and attitudes into line with the norms. This is important for group functioning and in order to achieve the relevant goals. However, normative behavior can also be dysfunctional, as has been shown by Asch’s studies (1951) in which group members expressed clearly wrong and irrational perceptions just because of the groups’ pressure towards conformity.

2.1 Groupthink: The Conformity Of Groups

Groupthink describes the phenomenon by which existing information that is relevant to a certain decision is not processed by the group members in a rational and systematic way, but instead information processing is biased in the direction of a preferred decision alternative within the group. This reduces the quality of information processing within the group and increases the risk of faulty decisions. Analyzing historical political disasters following group decisions, such as, for example, Pearl Harbour, the American invasion of Cuba, or the Vietnam War, Janis (1982) has specified the symptoms of groupthink. These symptoms can be observed in the economical field too, such as, for example, in project teams, or on boards or committees. The risk of groupthink is amplified when groups are homogeneous (absence of minorities and contradicting views), when the group structure is markedly hierarchical, and when there is a strong commitment to particular decision alternatives before group discussion begins.

The symptoms of groupthink include the following (cf. Janis 1982). (a) Illusion of in ulnerability; that is, high conformity concerning the views of the group members and concerning their thinking styles makes them optimistic and overconfident. (b) Willingness to take high risks resulting in warnings, potential hazards, and other forms of negative feedback being ignored or not taken seriously. This behavioral tendency in groups serves the purpose of avoiding questioning one’s own basic beliefs and value systems when facing a challenging decision. (c) Stereotyping of members with a different opinion by labeling them as incompetent. (d) Pressure towards conformity exerted by the formal leader or the majority of the group in order to stabilize the group’s homogeneity. Conformity pressure helps members to neglect counter arguments more easily and supports self-censorship processes which makes group members (falsely) assume that silence means approval.

There is considerable empirical evidence regarding prevention and intervention strategies for counteracting groupthink. Some examples are (for a summary of these interventions, see Frey et al. 1996):

(a) the group leader acts as an impartial coordinator,

(b) systematically strengthening self-confident minority members,

(c) bringing external experts into the group,

(d) implementing artificial conflict in the group decision process (e.g., by devil’s advocacy or dialectical inquiry techniques),

(e) holding each group member individually responsible for the decision process and the outcome,

(f ) creating different subgroups separately engaging in decision making.

2.2 Minority Influence

The problem of conformity and homogeneity in groups is that it may come at the expense of divergent thinking, which can be helpful when scrutinizing premature conclusions, and innovative thinking. Due to conformity pressure, the default information processing style in groups is consent oriented. Minority influence, however, often generates productive dissent.

According to Moscovici (1976), minority members are able to oppose the pressure towards conformity in groups under certain conditions—and are thereby able to influence the attitudes and behavior of the majority. To achieve this, minority members should present their point of view in a consistent behavioral style, though not rigidly (flexibility of negotiation and argumentation), while signalizing a willingness to compromise.

Why can minorities exert an influence on majority members? According to Moscovici’s Conversion Theory (cf. Moscovici 1980), minority members induce an internal cognitive conflict within members of the majority; majority members then ask themselves What is in fact the right course? This leads to an intensification of information processing, and is accompanied by divergent and more creative thinking styles, resulting in a less biased information search and greater openness for the minority position. In contrast to this, majorities exert a pressure to conform, producing social conflict between people or subgroups of people within the group rather than a cognitive conflict. Group members ask themselves Which person is right now? This leads to a more superficial processing of information, and is accompanied by conventional and conformist styles of thinking.

What is the relevance of the minority research for group processes in organizations? Very often minority groups or minority persons have the feeling that they cannot change a big organization. Taking minority research into account, the opposite is in fact true. Minority influence in organizations is a precondition for scrutinizing common patterns of thought and practice, and thus is an important ingredient for organizational learning, change, and innovation. The interesting thing is that a minority can be influential independently of the hierarchical structure.

3. Bringing Together Individual Contributions

How can individual contributions be brought together in an optimum way so that production losses (e.g., loss of motivation and coordination loss) can be minimized, and procedural gains or synergies (e.g., motivating each other, learning from each other, and sharing innovations) are maximized?

3.1 Activating Or Impeding Individual Performance

Whether social inhibition or social facilitation occurs via the mere presence of other persons is a question of the complexity and newness of the task to be performed. If other persons are present, difficult or new tasks are carried out less satisfactorily, since these tasks will lead to uncertainty and fear of negative feedback (‘social inhibition’). Simple or well-trained tasks, on the other hand, are usually carried out better in the presence of other people, as the active subject can expect success and a positive judgment from his/her colleagues (‘social facilitation’).

In the case of social inhibition, no matter whether the task performed is difficult or not, loss of motivation is involved. For example, if the individual contributions are not perceptible in the groups’ overall output, or their importance for group productivity is not clearly seen, social loafing occurs. When group members expect other people in their group to be ‘freeriders,’ they may be inclined to conclude that their own individual contribution might be too high compared with the contributions of other group members. Consequently, individual performance will be decreased since no one wants to be left to carry the can; this is called the ‘sucker effect.’ Additionally, if group members fear negative comments from others, or if they are not sure about the norms and standards of evaluation as a whole, they will also withhold optimal performance (for fear of a negative evaluation). These motivational impediments on optimum individual performance can be met by transparency of performance feedback, by conveying concrete individual as well as collective performance norms, by fostering intrinsic motivation (e.g., interesting and challenging tasks), by strengthening group cohesion in combination with a high achievement norm, and by pointing out how important each and every individual contribution is for the group’s productivity (for an overview see Sheppard 1993).

On the other hand, when group cohesion is high and the group’s task is highly important, one can observe that groups will increase individual performance via motivation gain. If the group members’ capabilities do not differ very much, and if the success of the group as a whole is very important for all the members, very strong and competent persons often try to compensate for the weaknesses of their colleagues by trying even harder to do their best. The weaker group members then likewise try to increase their output, as they do not want to be the ‘losers’ bringing the whole team down. These gains in motivation are especially likely if group cohesion is high—that is in case of a very attractive group (cf. Brown 1992), in case of a high mutual sympathy (cf. Latane 1986), and if the group’s task is highly important (cf. Williams and Karau 1991).

3.2 Task Structure And Social Combination Of Individual Resources

According to a very well-known model of group performance in social psychology (i.e., Steiner 1972), the de facto group performance is a function of the potential group performance, minus procedural losses, plus procedural gains. In order to find out whether groups are working to their full potential, one needs to determine the potential level of group performance. For this, one needs to know the individual capabilities of the group members and the type of task at hand.

In general, the structure of work tasks may be additive, in which case the potential group performance is the sum of all the individual performances, for example in the case of brainstorming. If the task is structured in a compensatory way, then the potential group performance is the result of the mean of all individual performances, for example in the case of guessing tasks or majority decisions). If work tasks are disjunctive, the group potential is the result of the best individual performance (for example in the case of problem-solving tasks or decision problems). Thus, determining a group’s potential level of performance requires consideration of the group task. In order to further determine whether and to what extent a group is working below (or sometimes even above) its potential, the actual group performance is obtained and compared with the potential level of performance. The differences tell us to what extent group-induced procedural losses and procedural gains have occurred.

3.3 Synergy In Groups

Practitioners very often speak about ‘group synergy.’ This means that a group is more than the sum of all its parts, or more precisely: that a group generally does better than its aptest single member. However, synergy effects have only rarely been demonstrated in social–psychological group research (for an overview, see Hill 1982, Brown 1993). Stroebe et al. (1992) have argued that the common belief in group synergy may rest on an overestimation of one’s own output in group contexts. For example, where brainstorming is concerned, single individuals usually believe they are better and more productive when they work in groups—probably because they feel ‘enriched’ by the ideas of the others and because many new perspectives emerge. However, Stroebe et al. (1992) have shown that individual group members are inclined to claim other group members’ ideas as their own body of thought (and, hence, believe in ‘having produced a lot’). Consequently, one feels being ‘more productive’ as a participant of a brainstorming group compared with working alone. Each group member extrapolates this impression onto the other persons, and in the end believes that the group is much more efficient than the sum of its components (i.e., members) working alone. This overestimation feeds the idea of ‘group synergy.’

3.4 Top Performance Of Work Teams

There is growing evidence that top performances in groups occur despite dominant forces such as conformity, groupthink, loss of motivation, and coordination loss (Levine and Moreland 1990, West 1996). A high decision quality and top performance of teams is likely under the following conditions.

(a) Homogeneity of values and rules exists, meaning that team members agree on rules for dealing with each other; they are able to communicate honestly and to respect each other, and show loyalty.

(b) A heterogeneity of talents, experiences, education, and backgrounds exists within the team.

(c) The team has a vivid commitment to excellent output and an ethos of achievement. All members take responsibility for team success.

(d) Team members fit together technically and personally.

(e) Team members are able to profit from their individual strengths.

(f ) Orientation towards the best practice idea (benchmarking). This technique means comparing oneself with best practice in one’s own branch or with the best in the world, but also with the best within the organization.

The team is able to use the tool of team reflection, meaning regular joint reflection on social and task issues. What is good and should be sustained, what is bad and should be improved (West 1996).

4. Group Dynamics

Group interaction may be viewed from three different theoretical perspectives. First, one can look at socioemotional relations where cohesion, role-forming, open communication, the building of trust, and linear models concerning the development of groups are relevant (forming, storming, norming, performing; Tuckman and Jensen 1977). Second, one can look at the development of goal-directed and output-oriented groups, mainly to be found in work groups in organizations where goal finding, role differentiation, leadership, quality of decisions, coping with problems, and action-oriented models of group dynamics (cf. Pinto and Prescott 1988) are relevant. Third, one can look at the development of interpersonal and task related structures within and between groups, in organizations where high-quality work, customer orientation, and innovation are sought to be improved. Scientific progress has been made in all these fields (cf. Brodbeck 1996, Hinsz et al. 1997). In the following we will discuss two subjects that are particularly related to the development of goal and task-oriented group dynamics: group learning and approaches to team development in practice.

4.1 Group Learning

Group learning in general has not been explored very well to date (Argote and Epple 1990). However, transactive knowledge systems have been researched quite thoroughly; in other words the way in which a group chooses to encode, store, and retrieve information systematically. Transactive knowledge systems make information accessible for team members, even if this information has been (physically) stored by other members of the group (Wegner 1987). According to Liang et al. (1995), teams that have been trained to do complex tasks together (i.e., who have been trained as a team) do better afterwards than groups where the members have been trained individually to solve the task. The authors hold that this lead in the output is due to the fact that teams who have been trained as a group have established transactive knowledge systems. These structures improve the group’s performance, for example by means of group processes such as feedback about weaknesses, helping each other out, sharing information that others need right now. A model of group learning as a multilevel phenomenon; that is, on the individual level, the group level, and respective interactions between these two levels; has been presented by Brodbeck and Greitemeyer (2000a, 2000b).

4.2 Team Development

Typical techniques of team development usually deal with the analysis and layout of group processes in order to increase work performance, personality development, team climate, and cooperation between departments. Four team development approaches can be distinguished. (a) The interpersonal approach tries to increase competence as well as cooperation by promoting self-reflection within groups. (b) The goaloriented approach tries to increase motivation, performance, and subjective well-being by optimizing goal finding and goal negotiation, for example by way of participation, mutual feedback, and intelligent reward systems. (c) The role approach tries to reduce misunderstandings and conflicts (due to poor coordination or bad communication): underlying conflicts are to be made visible and a better role understanding achieved using techniques of role building and role reconstruction. (d) The process-oriented approach aims to obtain an increase in performance as well as achievement by restructuring collective work processes (such as problem solving and decision making) by way of well-established methods (e.g., Delphi Technique), to some extent assisted by computer technology (for example, group decision support systems (GDSS)).

Practitioners often combine these approaches. For example, it is common to combine the negotiation of new goals with role negotiation so that a corresponding new understanding of expectations and norms can be established. (For concrete techniques and measures of team development that can be utilized in this process, see West 1997.)

5. Social Identity: In-Group–Out-Group Processes

Until now we have discussed group processes and their consequences within groups. Of course, in organizations there are also group processes between groups. Here the most important theory which is relevant for these processes is Tajfel’s social identity theory (SIT). Interestingly, it is a psychological theory about the social cognition of individuals (not a sociological one that directly addresses entire collectives such as organizations). The predictions made by SIT are among the best proven in social psychology.

Individuals identify with the groups they belong to and derogate others who do not belong to their group (the in-group). Consequently, there is a high degree of identification with the in-group and the respective organization, but at the cost of respect for and cooperation with individuals perceived to belong to other groups (out-groups). Tajfels’s theory is very important for understanding the in out-group processes underlying conflict and conflict resolution.

Social identity theory emphasizes that all individuals are motivated to shape a positive social identity. The underlying processes are: (a) categorization; that is, a basic cognitive mechanism for structuring the manifold stimuli from the environment in an orderly fashion—in particular, within their social environment, humans categorize on the basis of who belongs to the in-group and who does not (in-group/out-group distinction). (b) Social comparison; that is, a basic sociocognitive mechanism for gaining information about where one stands within the social context—in particular, humans compare their own in-group with other out-groups, preferably in such a way that the dimension on which the comparison is performed produces positive distinctiveness (i.e., a feeling of positive uniqueness). Having the choice of a dimension is important in that when the in-group compares badly (e.g., with a highly performing group), it can be argued that it is more important to have character than to have strong skills and success, thereby protecting the positive distinctiveness of the in-group. Thus, in summary, SIT describes the dynamics between groups on the basis of the individual’s motivation to achieve social identity and positive distinctiveness—at the cost of derogating others because they are perceived to belong to an out-group.

Tajfel (1978) shows that even a minimal group context (minimal group paradigm) which may come about through a more or less arbitrary distinction between two groups (e.g., admirers of Vasily Kandinsky vs. admirers of Paul Klee), suffices to produce the in-group favoritism and out-group discrimination processes. People from the out-group are discriminated against more—for example concerning the evaluation of positive attributes, concerning judgments about liking, and concerning the distribution of material rewards (compared to persons from the ‘in-group’).

These processes are highly relevant for groups within organizations because very often subgroups within organizations think in terms of in-groups and out-groups instead of seeing the overall organization as an in-group. An organization is always in a conflict, on the one hand to increase the in-group feeling because a strong feeling of togetherness is positive, on the other hand the in-group feeling must not be too strong because this could mean shutting down borders so that there are not that many contacts between groups and departments. Therefore the question is what can be done in order to increase both. According to Tajfel’s SIT, it is (a) good to have a common goal which can only be achieved by joint action and cooperation of all groups, (b) important that groups have background information about what the tasks of the other groups are, (c) good to have a rotation of positions between heterogeneous groups, and (d) good to have a lot of informal activities and personal relationships between members of different groups. The important point is that a group must be open and have open borders.

6. Group Processes In Mergers, Acquisitions, And Change Management

When organizations are merged or taken over, or when organizational changes take place, group processes as described in SIT play a central role. In mergers and acquisitions, it is important that the norms and values of the distinct groups can be combined and are not too different from the start. Very often, these groups behave towards each other like an in-group towards an out-group. Very often with mergers or acquisitions, two actual competitors which merge as an in-group or out-group come together and have to continue as one group. Very often, an earlier empty competitor has to be integrated. Many intergroup conflicts can be reduced by taking into account certain psychological findings about the acceptance of change management processes, which are listed below.

(a) There is a cultural fit between the two merging companies and therefore an identification with the new emerging culture is possible ( principle of identification and social identity).

(b) The change process is perceived to be definite, inevitable, and irreversible ( principle of inevitability). (c) The vision is clearly perceived and shared, and one understands the reasons why change is necessary ( principle of explainability and sense).

(d) Participants have the impression that they can foresee and predict the processes to come ( principle of predictability).

(e) There is a consensus about rules and responsibilities ( principle of clarity).

(f ) Participants feel they are an active part of the decision process ( principle of participation).

(g) They feel they are being treated fairly; for example, there is perceived fairness about resources and positions ( procedural fairness).

(h) Top managers are perceived as being trust- worthy and are positive role models (principle of truthfulness).

Very often, groups and people who are responsible for change processes in organizations, who have to make the relevant decisions and who are responsible for the implementation of those decisions, have a poor understanding of how human beings and groups function in psychological terms. This is one reason why so many mergers, acquisitions, and change processes fail. Very often, the culture and the mentality of groups do not fit with each other; when the abovementioned aspects are neglected in the change process, it will fail.

It is the inability to judge employees’ and groups’ anxieties, hopes, and expectations correctly, and to communicate why and how and what changes are necessary (Hogan and Overmyer-Day 1994). Taking the above-mentioned conditions into account will help to make change processes more successful in the future.

7. Future Directions

Group processes in organizations are a typical example of good interdisciplinary cooperation between social psychologists and organizational psychologists. This research shows that nothing is as practical as a good theory. Of course, there are no integrating theories of groups but as we have shown there are different small group theories which can be applied for different heterogeneous phenomena. In the future, it is important to have an integration of these small group theories and in the empirical field it is also necessary to do more longitudinal studies within organizations.

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