Team Dynamics
Team Dynamics
Teams are groups of people who come together to achieve a collective goal. In order to accomplish that goal, teams must work together effectively, create synergy by combining individual talents, and work in harmony to minimize conflicts. Teams form for any number of reasons in social and business settings. For instance, many work teams form to help facilitate the completion of an important project. Church groups combine individual efforts to raise money for a worthy cause, and groups of students band together to forge study groups in the hopes of improving grades. Although the reasons for forming teams vary, successful teams have some common characteristics and personality types. The purpose of this paper is to define the characteristics of the four diverse personality types found in successful teams. In addition, the paper will offer insights on how these diverse personality types work together using compiled strengths to contribute toward team objectives, compensate for individual weaknesses, and overcome potential obstacles to success.
Four Roles of a Successful Team
Successful teams consist of four diverse personality types (Kratz, 2005). The Thinker, Giver, Organizer, and Adventurer personality types each contribute unique strengths and skill sets to the team (Bishop, Carter & Kravits, 2007). As each name implies, individual team roles define certain character strengths and personality types of the individual team members. A team functioning without each of these four roles will likely be unbalanced and may perform poorly or fragment before achieving the desired goal (Building Balanced Teams, 1996). For instance, a team full of Thinkers may have difficulty reaching a goal because Thinkers prefer the problem solving process in favor of reaching a solution to the problem (T. Snook, personal communication, September 5, 2007). The same notion is true for any of the other individual personalities that form an unbalanced team....
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