Developing an Effective Team

Developing and improving the team work in my organization is one of my key responsibilities. I work in a military department with about thirty different personnel. Each individual has certain skills, age, rank, and motivation. These attributes can make my department effective or ineffective.

My department has a high level of professional expectation. The range of experience in my department varies from twenty years of experience and two years of experience. Ages range from 19 to 45 years of age. Some individuals have graduated from prestigious universities and grew up in positive family atmosphere. Some of my personnel barely graduated High School and lived in single parent homes. I’ve learned in the last year is not to judge a book by its cover, education and experience doesn’t always equate to motivation. I have an individual that graduated from West Point and has been accepted to attend graduate school at Vanderbilt University. He lacks teamwork and motivation unless it’s self-serving. Based on his education level and need to be successful I assumed that he would be a key component and valuable member to our team. I used two perception shortcuts when judging their effectiveness to our team; selective perception and halo effect. According to (Robbins & Judge, 2009, p. 143), halo-effect is the tendency to draw a general impression about an individual on the basis of a single characteristic. I assumed that a highly educated person would be an effective team member. Based on my own personal selective perception I assumed that if I wanted to obtain my Master’s degree, he would have the same work ethics as myself. I learned that he didn’t have a high level of organizational commitment.

On the other hand I have a ni...

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.... Don't do it because you want to get more and more money. Do it because you really want to serve." (1 Peter 5:2). I must build cohesiveness in my team working towards one goal, if we all work together with one goal we will increase effectiveness and efficiency, God wants us to serve our leaders not because we have to because we want to. Instilling selfless service and teamwork in my Soldiers is key. It becomes difficult in today’s society with individualistic attitudes. If these problems are resolved my department can reach high levels of success.

Works Cited

Robbins, S., & Judge, T. (2009). Organizational behavior. New Jersey: Pearson Custom

Publishing.

Inceoglu, I., Segers, J., & Bartram, D. (2011). Age-related differences in work motivation.

Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 85, 300-329.

doi:10.1111/j.2044-8325.2011.02035.x