The world of today, a workforce that is diverse, is seeming to be a custom and a normal practice. Currently, globalization is trending each day, and the leaders are obliged to working in a diversified environment with teams of different cultures. The leaders and employees in the diversified environment are always made to adapt to other skills, approaches, and ideas compared to those they are familiar with. According to Aga et al. (2016), bringing the multicultural team together is a huge challenge to the managers. Gender, professionalism, race, nationality, and diversity by organization characterize diversity in cultures. Multicultural diversities will influence the working flow, interactions, and closeness of people in an organization due to differences in backgrounds, cultures, values, and levels of education (Ammeter & Dukerich, 2002). Based on the behavior of individuals in the workplace, their impact will contribute to the success of the business. The communication styles, perceptions of employees, individual’s backgrounds, and the use of language will profoundly influence the management in an organization. In that case, the leaders have to make sure they find ways to collaborate with these diverse teams in order to achieve the set goals. The following essay will discuss ways in which managers can handle multicultural atmosphere through leadership and teambuilding. It will also discuss Goggle’s Inc case study and reflect on theories of multicultural leadership and teambuilding,

Multicultural teams and management skills

Multiple ways can be applied in dealing with a diverse team in the workplace to improve and ensure production is efficient and effective. According to Aga et al., (2016), the achievement of intercultural training and recruitment may pose a challenge if the organizational structure is poor. Innovation, successful production, and cohesiveness may be difficult is the leaders fail to deal with issues affecting multicultural teams. Below are some of the different ways that will help leaders effectively achieve the goal in an organization.

Selection of a cross-cultural team leader

It is very crucial for management to select a team lead who is more competent in addressing diversity issues rather than just leaders with leadership and technical skills. This will be an added advantage since a flexible leader who is familiar with multiple cultures will be able to tolerate without biasness and know how to deal with each teammate. Training the leaders in dealing with diverse teams will help them improve competences in addition to personal career experiences (Ochieng & Price, 2009). Personal work experiences should include, to mention a few, engaging in workplaces that are unfamiliar, having membership in a diverse team, and involving a mentor who is also diverse culturally.

Selection of team members

Having selected a professional, diverse leader for the diverse team, the selection of team members will be easy to identify members fit depending on the population of the project and goals to be achieved (Ochieng & Price, 2009). Specific criteria have to be met, defined clearly, and also clearly communicated to all team members. Factors like the hierarchy of authority, organizational structure, and working space have to e considered while selecting the team members.

The kick-off phase has to be personalized.

The leaders should always ensure they set up a kickoff event that the members of the team will get to know one another. Sharing of meals while having brief talks will allow the team members to know each other and how they are diversified in terms of ethnicity, race, to mention a few (Hope et al., 2005). Other modern ways of communication, such as video conferencing, can be a better strategy to mingle the employees, especially in situations that team members are diversified geographically.

Take time to build trust and relationships.

Among the multicultural atmosphere in an organization across the world, building relationships and trusts among the team members may become challenging (Hope et al., 2005). In the case of Germans, rather than having time to build relationships and trusts, they get down to work without any negotiations. The German leaders should be aware of the importance of employees socializing after or even before business so as to enhance relationships amongst teammates.

Learn about differences

Team members in an organization, however, may have the same educational backgrounds, same professions, and work in the same environment. It is, therefore crucial for leaders to learn these differences amongst the employees (Hope et al., 2005). Their diversities may include a difference in hobbies, career paths, education, professional experiences, social and cultural backgrounds. When these differences collaborate, team members will bring innovative ideas that will lead to the success of an organization.

Clarification of expectations

While dealing with team members who are diversified, the management should always ensure that the processes of discussing, explaining, and clarifying information are well outlined. The team members have contrasting expectations concerning their leaders due to reasons of age, cultures, and professional experiences. Patterns of communication should be considered and clearly explained to employees. Communications such as what is expected from them, to who, and why? Who should make decisions and how the decisions will reach the employees? The employees should also be given a chance to say their expectations from an organization, possible sources of conflicts, and recommend remedies.

Communicating always

An efficient communication channel that fits all the employees should be chosen. Local and virtual employees in an organization must consistently stay connected in communication. Communicating with a crowd without controversies, even in mother tongues, can be quite challenging. In the case of international organizations, employees are from different races, and different vocabularies are used to communicate (Ochieng & Price, 2009). Hence, it is very important always to give examples of yourself, ensure clarity while addressing the employees, and avoid making judgments as much as possible. Leaders should always ensure to impact pleasure and inspire them again and again to increase communication among the culturally diverse teams.

Respecting the set deadlines.

In terms of personal and cultural affairs, the time has always remained to be precious to everyone. When the employees fail to meet the deadlines, the managers feel, and it becomes an issue and a multicultural team will respond differently. Some cultures are always strict when it comes to time management, whereas others, it’s never an issue (Hope et al., 2005). Hence, communicating rules concerning deadlines and time management is very important. The employees should be aware of the effects of failing to meet deadlines, and time zone differences for multicultural teams should be considered.

Staying alert to signs of trouble.

Signs such as delays in delivering work and inconsistencies may be a concern while studying diversified teams. Team members may reduce the level of interaction amongst themselves compared to the past (Hope et al., 2005). Leadership in an organization should avoid postponing such issues and address them immediately. They should intervene by incorporating activities such as team building, holidays, sharing meals before or after work, and frequent reminders of objectives yet to be achieved in order to address such issues. While addressing these issues, leaders should be cautious in considering cultural differences.

Assessing the team’s work.

It is a great step for leaders to request feedback from the members of the team. Some leaders use face to face, indirect and positive criticisms rather than public and direct criticisms (Ochieng & Price, 2009). Leaders should, therefore, understand the cultural backgrounds of their teams to avoid unnecessary conflicts. By this, they will be able to acquire feedback in the right way. The organization will, therefore, benefit from profits when feedback is analyzed.

Leadership and teambuilding in the case study of Goggle Inc.

In the past few years, Goggle corporation has been heavily investing in having a great team in their workplace. The organization has taken much time to assess each aspect of each employee in the last decade. The organization made sure that its employees share meals frequently and rotate their companions during the sharing of meals (Duhigg, 2016). When they meet, they get to interact and share personal information with the rest of the team members. However, in the beginning, the company only achieved this using its top executives and employees, and thus they realized production could be improved if they engaged all the employees within the organization.

The organization started an initiative known as ‘Project Aristotle, ‘ which involved the study of some employees and their reason for reluctancy to the achievement of goals, yet some were very focused. The team leaders of the project worked together with professionals such as engineers, statisticians, sociologists, and psychologists. People who would study the habits and routines of employees were also needed (Duhigg, 2016). These people began by studying past habits and their interests. They evaluated how the team members interacted, their equality in motivation and renumeration, how they socialized, and their educational backgrounds. The researchers also studied the amount of time the employees spent together, their hobbies, their personalities in terms of introverts versus extroverts, the gender balance. These research questions, to mention a few, were surveyed to determine the influence of a multicultural team in the maximization of profits in the company.

Graphs and charts were drawn to shown relationships between members of the team. Patterns were hard to be traced despite the arrangement of their data. More than one hundred and eighty teams were studied, and much was discovered. There was a similarity of data concerning cultural backgrounds, related skills, personal traits, or even educational backgrounds (Duhigg, 2016). Some of the teams were very active while others were dormant. It was found that the active teams highly socialized outside work. The inactive teams, some were strangers to each other and never performed well. However, the identical relationships amongst teams were never effective; hence it was considered to have poor patterns.

The researchers tried to find out why some of the groups were active, whereas others were dormant. With the help of sociologists and psychologists, they found ‘group norms’ in each team. Norms are the unwritten rules that control how individuals behave with others (Duhigg, 2016). Some teams preferred agreeing on a specific topic while others worked in disagreements. Some teams engaged in arguments to solve any issue affecting them, while others did work independently without consulting other members of the team. These inactive teams were recommended to work together in order to achieve better results.

After data were analyzed by the researchers, they found out that each team had their own rules. The teams had “team cultures,” which they considered them as “unwritten rules.” Some teams had no order in their groups in their debates, while others had team leaders who gave orders to the rest of the members so as to have control in the debate (Duhigg, 2016). Some teams engaged in weekend parties such as anniversaries and birthday parties. Other groups were serious while doing business, while others encouraged gossips. The researchers gave a conclusion that for harmonization to be achieved amongst the multicultural teams to resolve the differences, they had to work hard in studying the different norms. They were also supposed to select a team leader in each group who is professionally and culturally diversified. The clarity in communication, as well as educating the team members of the group on the importance of teamwork, would be an added advantage. The leaders were also advised to engage the team members in team-building activities or other external events outside work that will bring all the teams together.

Theories of teambuilding and leadership

Effective leadership and teamwork are a crucial element that helps production in an organization to be achieved effectively. When employees are diversified culturally, it is quite challenging to harmonize them. Leadership and teambuilding theories are designed to comprehend certain procedures, diversified instances, and the characters of each person in a team (Burke & Barron, 2007). Several theories of leadership and teambuilding are discussed. In this essay, we shall discuss the Bruce Tuckman and Action centered leadership theory.

Theory of Bruce Tuckman

This theory is based on four stages of forming a group. These stages include forming, storming, norming, and performing. Bruce Tuckman developed the theory in 1965, after which it became the best theory for the development of teams (Tuckman & Jensen, 1977). The theory mainly examines how a team handles a project once the team is created up to its separation. Bruce’s approach is mainly effective while dealing with challenges affecting the group. The leaders are able to identify the stage at which a team is good at and which stage the team is poor. The leaders can, therefore, address the challenges involved in each stage. More so, the theory will help the team members solve disputes amongst themselves and have empathy towards each other.

Theory of Action centered leadership

This theory was developed by Adair Johns in the 1960s, which is very significant in teambuilding and leadership. The theory is a good illustration and example of how leadership and teambuilding a cross-cultural environment should look like in an organization. The theory suggests three important elements of leadership and management. These include the achievement of tasks, management of team members, and managing the team. According to Adair (1973), the three components overlap each other holistically. Management of a team will overlap the tasks involved in the group. The activities in the group will as well overlap the individuals in the group, and the individuals overlap the group itself. A competent team leader has to ensure that the three components are well managed to ensure the success of the team.

Conclusion

Regarding the discussions above, it can be seen that a crucial impact can be made if the issues regarding a cross-cultural team are addressed. The benefits include efficient and effective production in the organization. The team members will also feel motivated and thus put extra effort in their workplaces. When leaders get to understand their diversities, they will feel like they are treated with equality. If the leaders clearly define goals, objectives, and deadlines to the team members, the performance will be highly enhanced. If communication is made effective, the team members will have a sense of belongingness and will be responsible and committed to the achievement of the goals. Through the team building activities and external events, the teammates will get to interact with each other, get to know one another deeply, which will increase their level of confidence in their workplace. The team building and leadership theories are a good example of the achievement of goals if clearly adopted to the achievement of maximum profits from the diversified teams.

References List

Adair, J. E. (1973). Action-centred leadership (pp. 07-084428). New York: McGraw-Hill.

Aga, D.A., Noorderhaven, N., and Vallejo, B., 2016. Transformational leadership and project success: The mediating role of team-building. International Journal of Project Management, 34(5), pp.806-818

Ammeter, A.P., and Dukerich, J.M., 2002. Leadership, team building, and team member characteristics in high-performance project teams. Engineering management journal, 14(4), pp.3-10.

Burke, R., and Barron, S., 2007. Project management leadership. Burke Publishing.

Duhigg, C., 2016. What Google learned from its quest to build the perfect team. The New York Times Magazine, 26, p.2016.

Hope, J.M., Lugassy, D., Meyer, R., Jeanty, F., Myers, S., Jones, S., Bradley, J., Mitchell, R. and Cramer, E., 2005. Bringing interdisciplinary and multicultural team building to health care education: the downstate team-building initiative. Academic Medicine, 80(1), pp.74-83.

Ochieng, E.G., and Price, A.D., 2009. Framework for managing multicultural project teams. Engineering, Construction, and Architectural Management.

Tuckman, B. W., & Jensen, M. A. C. (1977). Stages of small-group development revisited. Group & Organization Studies, 2(4), 419-427.

LEADERSHIP AND TEAMBUILDING

Introduction