Human Resources Paper and Memo Essay

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Official Memo on Team Development

Ms. Sally Gates, the Customer Operations Division chief, to head PrimeCell's

FROM: Mr. Bill Welch, Head, Customer Service Branch, North East Region

What has been gathered from the observations about the functioning of the team has shown that there is a need for the major development of a sense of team spirit among the members and measures to bind the five members as a cohesive team that works together to solve problems through constant communication and innovation.

The Need for Team Development

Teamwork entails the coming together of individuals as a collective force with the aim of and ultimately resulting in working together as a collection of individuals where each of the individuals has a separate and specific role or a combined role (Dyer, Dyer & Dyer, 2013). While each of the five individuals of the team have a specific role of their own, building a team would also result in a collective output from the five employees apart from results in terms of output from every individual. The aim of making a very cohesive team is to ensure that while each member of the team is essentially independent and are identifiable separately as individuals in the team, they would also be recognised as a part of the whole, i.e. the team.

The formation of a cohesive closely knit and functional team is to collect inputs from individual members of the team and create a sense of involvement with the organization as well as among the members which would drive them towards the achievement of the goals of the organizations -- better customer service and speedy and efficient redress of customer calls with reduction in repeat calls. The teams would also need to be flexible so that certain cross-functional exercises can be undertaken by the team for better output (Cherry & Cherry, 2015).

It needs to be recognised that in the customer service cell of the North East division, teamwork is very important and the success of the functions of the cell depends on the formation of a team and successful teamwork so that the company is able to achieve its goals and objectives. Teamwork is important to allow for greater exchange of ideas which can foster a culture of innovation within the five members of the division here in the North East region which can ultimately be fruitful to the company. It is important to remove the constraints and personality clashes between the team members which would create a work environment where knowledge and expertise would be shared and each individual would be ready to help out the other (Clayton Becton, 2016).

Hence, it is very critical that an effective team is set up in the customer service division in the North East branch. It is critical because, across the business world, there is the even more growing realization that the development of teams is often the key to successfully completing and accomplishing company objectives and often critical for the success and survival of a company.

The Problems

1) Communication -- it has been noted that one of the major problems of functioning of the five members of the customer service. Effective communication is virtually nonexistent with the team members. One of the characteristics of the team member is the diversity of the background from which they come. Such differences originate due to differences in age, education and past work experience. For example, Ted has more experience in customer service than all of the other four but is not as qualified as Mamie. One the other hand Larry is the oldest of the five employees and has the most job experience due to his long stint as a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. army. These differences have resulted in a variety that seems to have hampered in effective communication between the members. This is, however, one of the major challenges that impact team development. It is, therefore, necessary to solve the problem of lack of communication between the team members. One of the key components of a well-functioning team is individuals working as a part of a team and, therefore, communication with each other during all the phases of a project or an assignment or on a daily basis. Communication suffers when an individual team member regards his role as an independent one. The role of communication between the team members as well as with the team leader is critical to convey the company messages efficiently to the team members.

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The level of communication can be gauged by the output of the team as whole ("Resolving Conflicts Within Multicultural Teams in Industrial Enterprises," 2013).

2) Conflict within the team -- another very critical factor that often impinges upon creation and functioning of an effective team is internal conflicts between the individual team While it is admitted that there would be minor conflicts between various team members due to the variety of backgrounds that the individuals come from, the manner in which the team members manage to deal with such conflicts is critical for the development of a team. It is critical for an effective team to find out ways and mechanisms for reduction and resolution of conflicts (Johnson, Beyerlein & Beyerlein, 2009). This is true for the five-member team of the company at the Northeast region. For example, personal conflicts prevent Jane from helping of the younger call-center representatives while Ted feels that that his ideas for customer problem resolutions are not respected which has created an inner conflict within Ted with the company and the management. The most important conflict lies in the relation between Larry and me where Larry, being of the same age as I am, believes that I am less competent in the management of the team and situations than he is. This primarily flows from his being in a position in the U.S. army where he managed hundreds of people.

3) Poor Work Environment -- for effective team functioning, it is important that a healthy and favorable working environment be provided to the team The work environment needs to be conducive and quite to effective teamwork. The conducive working environment is necessary to allow free flow of ideas and messages within the team as well as from the management and the company. The conducive working environment also encourages greater motivation and team work which in turn creates better output and for the team to accomplish goals (Johnson, Beyerlein & Beyerlein, 2009).

4) Lack of Skills, Interests, and Motivation -- team good teamwork or an efficient team requires that the individual members function as a cog in a wheel so that the wheel rotates properly. This means that the individual team members should have skills and interests to fit the team. The team members also require to be motivated to work as a team and work for the company. This is one of the problems for the five-member team. For example, Jane, a member of Bill's team is not motivated enough to help others especially the juniors and the younger members of the staff despite the fact that she is very responsive to customers. On the other hand, Ted who has more experience amongst everyone else in the five-member team in terms of customer service has new ideas but feel de-motivated as he feels that his ideas related to customer problem resolutions are rarely respected in the team of management.

Mary, however, has another problem as she does not seem to have developed the requisite skills as she often struggles with her. One of the reasons for this is that there is no one in the office or the team to talk to her about the development of skills. The problem for Mamie, a 24-year-old team member who has recently graduated from college, is of motivation. Though she follows Ted and does what Ted does, this job for her is only of a temporary nature as she awaits to find a good job in the area of her college major, which is music appreciation. Thus, it is clear that the subject of her choice is very different from the work she is doing now and since she only considers this job as an interim measure, she is quite de-motivated and does not have the urge as any other employee attributing more value for the job (Dyer, Dyer & Dyer, 2013).

Larry is a problem for the team as he feels that he has greater management skills compared to the team leader -- myself. Therefore, there is enough potential for conflict as well as the lack of motivation on the part of Larry to give his best at the job.

Thus, it is evident that the there is a general lack of motivation among the tea members with respect to functioning as a team and team development.

5) Lack of Leadership -- it is also evident that till now the team has been suffering from a lack of good leadership. This is reflected.....

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