Teams in organizations - Prevalence, characteristics, and effectiveness

This article offers a typology of team types found in organizations and reports the results of two surveys sent to U.S. organizations asking about the prevalence, duties, composition, and structure of groups and teams in practice. One sample was randomly selected from the entire population of U.S. organizations; the second sample consisted of organizations known or believed to use reams. Nearly half (48%) of the respondents in the random sample indicated that their organization used some type of team, and ongoing project learns were reported most frequently. Teams were more prevalent in organizations with multiple departments, multiple divisions, higher safes, and more employees. Interpersonal conflict was the best predictor of perceived team effectiveness, but several structural and composition characteristics of the ream were related to conflict and/or effectiveness as well. Organizations that reported using reams generally did not support them in terms of team-level performance feedback or compensation practices.