JLBC Effective Team Leadership

JLBC Effective Team Leadership

It is essential to be fair and sensitive when dealing with members. Ensure that you don’t put individuals on the spot or react negatively to anyone. Also, help members feel included by addressing people by name and inviting members to participate. Initially, inviting participation is helpful. However, insisting on participation or singling out non participators is not beneficial.

Provide Positive Feedback

At the beginning of a group, positive feedback from the leader increases cohesion. Using your leadership position to reward rather than punish members will facilitate group development. There are many ways to accomplish this. Thanking people for their attendance, input, and ideas are just ways to provide positive feedback.

Facilitate Open Discussion of Goals, Values, and Tasks

In the first stage of group development, leaders play an essential role in facilitating group growth. This is so because leaders have the most clearly defined role during this period. Since the product is pro-aggressive, the task of a leader at Stage 1 is to facilitate movement to the next developmental phase. The leader’s job is to act in ways that will precipitate open discussion of values, goals, tasks, and leadership so that differences of opinion regarding these elements of group life can surface. This will move the group in the direction of Stage 2. Since people are hesitant to express different views at Stage 1, it is sometimes helpful to ask people to express their opinions anonymously. This can be accomplished by asking people to write down their opinions on a specific issue. Next, those views can be summarized and shared with all members. This makes open discussion of divergent views much more accessible because no individual has to claim responsibility for expressing a difference of opinion or for being the first to disagree with a particular statement.

Help Members Feel Competent by Providing Supervision, Training, and Education in Task- and Process-Related Activities

It is essential for members to feel competent about group goals.