Group Cohesiveness

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Group Cohesiveness

• Effective Team Management

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Group Cohesiveness

• The degree to which members are attracted to or
  loyal to their group or team.
• High Group Cohesiveness
• Individuals strongly value their group
  membership, find the group appealing and have
  strong desires to remain part of the group.
• Low Group Cohesiveness
• Group members do not find their group
  particularly appealing and have little desire to
  retain their group membership.

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Sources and Consequences of Group Cohesiveness
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Factors Leading to Group Cohesiveness

• Four factors contribute to the level of group
  cohesiveness
• Group Size
• Effectively Managed Diversity
• Group Identity and Healthy Competition
• Success
• These factors are known as determinants of group
  cohesiveness.

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Group Size

• Members of small groups tend to be more motivated
  and committed than members of large groups.
• Managers should form groups that are small to
  medium in size to promote cohesiveness.
• 2 to 15 members per group.

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Effectively Managed Diversity

• People tend to like and get along with others who
  are similar to themselves.
• Maintaining diversity in groups can help an
  organization gain a competitive advantage.
• Managers need to make sure the diversity in
  knowledge, experience and expertise necessary for
  group goal accomplishment is represented in
  groups and that the groups are effectively
  managed so that groups will be cohesive.

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Group Identity and Healthy Competition

• Managers can encourage groups to develop their
  own identities or personalities and engage in
  healthy competition to increase group
  cohesiveness.
• Managers can decrease cohesiveness by promoting
  organizational identity and making the
  organization as a whole the focus of the groups
  efforts.

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Success

• As groups become more successful, they become
  increasingly attractive to their members and
  their cohesiveness tends to increase.
• Managers can increase cohesiveness by making sure
  a group can achieve some noticeable and visible
  successes.

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Consequences of Group Cohesiveness

• Three major consequences of group cohesiveness
• Level of participation within the group
• Level of conformity to group norms
• Emphasis on group goal accomplishment

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Level of Participation Within a Group

• As group cohesiveness increases, the extent of
  group members participation within the group
  increases.
• Participation contributes to group effectiveness
  because group member are actively involved in the
  group, ensure that the group tasks get
  accomplished, readily share information with each
  other and have frequent and open communication.

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Level of Conformity to Group Norms

• Low cohesiveness can result in too much deviance
  and undermine the ability of a group to control
  its members behaviors.
• Increasing levels of group cohesiveness result in
  increasing levels of conformity to group norms.

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Emphasis on Group Goal Accomplishment

• As group cohesiveness increases, the emphasis
  placed on group goal accomplishment also
  increases within a group.
• A moderate level of cohesiveness motivates group
  members to accomplish both group and
  organizational goals.
• High levels of cohesiveness can cause group
  members to be so focused on group goal
  accomplishment that they may strive to achieve
  group goals no matter what.