The Forgotten Group Member

The Forgotten Group Member Case Analysis
The Forgotten Group Member is a case study analysis why the group leader, Christine’s leadership abilities were ineffective. As defined by Schermerhorn (2010), “a team is a group of people brought together to use their complementary skills to achieve a common purpose for which they are collectively accountable”.   For a team to be effective, it must go through a development process. According to Tuchman (1965) the stages of group development are:
  1. Forming: Members are acquainted with each other.
  2. Storming: Group members frequently experience conflict with one another.
  3. Norming: A real sense of cohesion and teamwork.
  4. Performing: Issues have been resolved and the group is ready to work
  5. Adjourning: Group may cease to exist because they have met their goals.
Part 1: Group Development
The focal point of this case analysis revolves around a recently fashioned team of five diverse individuals with a mixture of talents and skills. The objective of the team is to generate a presentation for the class. Whereas the team got off to a great start initially in the forming stage, they lost focus and are now trapped in the storming stage of team development. The storming stage of team development is a period of high emotions and tension. During this stage, hostility and infighting may occur and the team typically experiences many changes among the group members (Schermerhorn, 2010).
We find this to be a true and accurate assessment because Mike seems to be at odds with the rest of the group. From the text, we see Mike is having difficulties feeling as if he is part of the team, he is feeling left out. The team does not seem to have clear and concise goals, no expectations for reaching the goals has been presented. The overall assessment of the team is unstable and non-communicative. Christine, as the group leader does not recognize this as a problem because she does not understand the stages of group...