The Nature of Group Membership and Team Processes ADLT 675 –Groups and Team Facilitation Fall 2013
The Nature of Group Membership and Team Processes
ADLT 675 –Groups and Team Facilitation
Fall 2013
Exploring the Nature of Groups and Teams through your Assignments • Reflective Practice: What and Why the Blogs?
Blog Triads and Quads
• What It Means to Become a Group Facilitator
• Two team facilitation assignments
• Final paper – Individual assessment of the group and team experience
• Peer Assessment – Dee Fink’s contribution of team members
How the Course is Organized• Three segments
• Learning to Observe Group and Team Dynamics (4 sessions)
• Learning to Facilitate Group Dynamics (3 sessions)
• Learning to Intervene in Group and Team Processes (5 sessions, in Learning Studios on the 5th floor)
• Readings
• Three texts: Levi, Schein, Schwarz
Early Struggles in the Life of a Group
Question: Does the individual exist for the group, or does the group exist to support the individual?
• This bi-polar position fades only when members accept themselves as an entity capable of acting on behalf of its members,
AND• When the group accepts the importance of its
individual members
Early Struggles in the Life of a Group
Identifying your Group Memberships
What groups are do you belong to, and how do these shape your identity?
Consider family groups, work groups, social or religious groups, etc.
Our Collective Group Memberships Identify Who We Are as Individuals
To become an effective group, members must integrate individual differences among members
Impact of Group Maturity on Group Member Participation
Research on Group Process
Wilfred Bion (1961) found struggle and conflict at both the conscious and unconscious levels of group life. He describe groups as having three basic emotional states:
Dependency (leader)
Fight-flightPairing
Aspects of Collective Life in a Group
One of the outcomes of the ambivalence that individuals experience
upon joining a new group is reflected in ”holding
back” until the lay of the land is clear
The group can be thought of as a social entity
capable of acting as a whole and expressing
feelings and thoughts over and beyond those of its
members
Psychological Aspects – What’s going on in the group
Smith & Berg,Paradoxes of Group Life, 1987
A Group Effectiveness Model