Small Group Work Climates

Abstract

This study examines procedural messages and group work habits of 20 three-person groups, 10 who preferred a tightly-structured work climate and 10 who preferred a free-associative work routine. The groups interacted for 15 minutes on a partyplanning task and then prepared a written report. Group talk was coded into nine categories and analyzed with a lag-sequential procedure. Results of the study reveal that tightly structured groups followed procedural messages with abstract headings that organized group talk, while free-associative groups followed procedural statements with specific details on a content-related issue. Moreover, group members elaborated upon procedural issues, particularly at lag 1 occurrences, and embellished digressions for the entire 25 lags. These findings suggest that practitioners who aim to help groups improve their work habits should focus upon the sequences of talk in addition to the inputs or outcomes of a group.The small group is a popular and essential unit of most organizations. In an age of matrix structures and specialization of task functions, small groups serve as project teams, coordinating agents, clearinghouses, and decision-making bodies for a wide array of tasks and organizational functions. In order to work efficiently and satisfactorily on a project, group members must concur on the modus operandi for planning and organizing their tasks and endeavors (Bormann, 1975 : 161). To this end, participants frequently barter and negotiate their

Time for Change: Why Learning Analytics Needs Temporal Analysis

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Revitalizing Conflict Research with a Communication Perspective: Celebrating and Learning from Linda Putnam's Contributions to the Study of Conflict

“…As a fellow conflict researcher who has relied extensively on Linda's scholarship for my own research, I thought it would be useful in this section to review three specific studies by Linda and her colleagues that illustrate the value of using interaction analysis to open organizational windows. The three studies include Putnam and Jones (1982b), Putnam (1983), and . This section will proceed by reviewing the unique contributions of these studies and then integrating their findings relative to understanding organizations.…”

“…The second article builds on this idea that individuals both create and confront communication systems as they interact in substantive tasks. In a lag-sequential study of group climates, Putnam (1983) sought to learn whether high procedurally ordered (HPO) groups structured their communication systems differently than the low procedurally ordered groups (LPO). In other words, when groups seek to forge a particular group climate, how do their communication exchange patterns differ?…”

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