Interpersonal & Group Communication:

Teamwork interactions among employees represent one of the essential elements of inter-personal communication.

A team is a unit of two or more people who share the responsibility for working towards common goals. Problem-solving teams and task forces, which are often cross functional, are set up to resolve specific issues. Committees are mostly formal teams which deal with regularly recurring tasks.

Team members have a shared mission and are often at the core of ‘participative management’. Since team members are collectively responsible for their work, effective communication is essential on every aspect of team performance.

Successful teams, forming into groups, provide some advantages, like:

* Increased information and knowledge * Increased diversity of views * Increased acceptance of a solution * Higher performance levels

There could be some disadvantages as well, such as:

* Groupthink * Hidden Agenda * Free riders * Costs

Effective teams have a sense of purpose, open and honest communication, consensus-based decision making, creativity and effective conflict resolution. When teams collaborate on reports, documents, presentations and other communications, the collective energy and expertise of the various members in a team or a group will lead to results which would be better than what most individuals could bring.

We would gain much better results if we follow some guidelines towards effective collaboration, including ‘collaborative writing’, such as * Pick team members carefully * Determine project goals clearly * Assign individual responsibilities * Establish the processes and procedures * Monitor how things are moving

When we work in a team or in a group, we must also be aware of the play of Group Dynamics – i.e. the interactions and