11.1 Overview of groups and teams
A broad definition of a group is: 'when two or more people define themselves as members of it and when it is recognised by at least one other (person)' (Brown 1988). A more specific definition that is more useful to organisations is a collection of people who interact for a common purpose and between whose members there is interdependency (Kreitner & Kinicki 1995; Lahiff & Penrose 1997). Interdependency is the degree to which individual members rely on each other to reach the group's goals (Bartol et al. 2001). For example, a group of people involved in a meeting rely on each other's input to complete the meeting agenda.
A team is a specific type of group becoming more and more popular in organisations. Katzenbach and Smith (1993, p.5) define a team as:
A small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable.
Katzenbach and Smith (1993) believe that no group becomes a team unless they can hold themselves accountable as a team. They illustrate this with two very different statements:
'The boss holds me accountable' as opposed to
'We hold ourselves accountable'.
Two critical aspects of mutual accountability are commitment and trust. These are not always present in groups, but they are crucial for a high performing team.
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