Group Development: A Review of the Literature and a Commentary on Future Research Directions

Abstract

INTRODUCTION Today's organizational landscape is laden with small groups and teams. Organizations in the public, private and not-for-profit sectors are utilizing work groups, task forces, blue ribbon commissions and panels, and various types of teams and support groups to accomplish their missions and objectives. In addition, groups are being implemented at all hierarchical levels and have assumed many roles and responsibilities central to the functioning of these organizations. Team and work has become so prevalent that Hackman (1990) has stated that Virtually everyone who has worked in an organization has been a member of a task-performing at one time or another (p. 2). Despite the presence of groups in today's organizations, there are still questions that need to be addressed and dealt with. Central to such an examination is an understanding and evaluation of the existing development literature. An understanding of this literature is important since one critical concern that has been raised by Bettenhausen (1991) and Nahavandi and Aranda (1994) is whether our current knowledge and understanding is sufficient to warrant the use of these organizational types and more specifically what are our limits in understanding and team Therefore, it is important that we understand what we purport to know about this phenomenon prior to any speculation about what should be done to improve the field. This paper attempts to address this issue and others by reviewing and categorizing many of the existing development models. In addition, the paper focuses on the commonalities across the models (especially within categories) and provides a discussion that raises issues for future research. If this paper serves no other purpose, its primary intention is to act as a stimulus to reopen investigation into development and to inject some additional doubt into the models, ideas and theories that are currently being implemented on the job, taught in the classroom and used in related research endeavors. GROUP DEVELOPMENT DEFINED As a point of entry into this work it is necessary to define the phrase development. Finding an acceptable definition of this phrase is difficult because it has been defined in many ways and with varying degrees of depth and complexity. Berkowitz (1974), for example, has stated that development refers to the fact that process undergoes modification which enables the to have more alternative ways to solve problems (p. 311), while Ridgeway's (1983) and Bennis and Shepard's (1956) definitions of development focus on the group's need for improved communication patterns. The definition that best fits the models discussed in this paper was provided by Sarri and Galinsky (1974). In this definition these two authors have defined development as through time in the internal structures, processes, and culture of the group (Sam and Galinsky, 1974, p. 72). As outlined in this definition development entails changes within three different dimensions. The first dimension, the social dimension, is concerned with the organization of the group's structure and the patterns of the participants' roles and structures. The second dimension focuses on the group's activities, tasks and the operative processes of the and is labeled the activity dimension. The final dimension, culture, includes properties such as norms, values and a shared purpose. The definition is important to the present discussion as it outlines the types of activities and events that groups may deal with during their More specifically, the definition is significant in that it serves as a representation of the types of changes that occur in the various developmental models. As previously noted, the primary reason for including this definition is to establish an understanding of what is meant by the phrase …

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