Page 22 - Effective group discussion theory and practice by Adams, Katherine H. Brilhart, John K. Galanes, Gloria J

The Small Groups in Everyone’s Life 5

We spend a tremendous amount of time in groups. In the business world alone,
executives spend on average half of their time in meetings, adding up to an estimated
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20 million business meetings a day in the United States, and this time spent in meet-
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ings only increases over time! When you add to this the amount of time we spend
informally in groups outside of work, you begin to appreciate how pervasive groups
are in our lives. However, poorly managed meetings hurt the very businesses they are
supposed to support, wasting valuable time and resources and losing as much as $37
billion in the United States alone each year. Moreover, the ability to function effec-
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tively as part of a group requires skills that must be understood and practiced. Over
70 percent of respondents from 750 leading U.S. companies, in a national survey,
ranked the “ability to work in teams” as a more essential skill for MBA graduates than
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knowledge of statistical techniques. Learning to be a good team member is essential
to our personal, professional, and social lives.
To start off, we want you to consider three important ideas about groups. First,
the formation of groups is natural to humans. Why? Groups are a fundamental way
humans meet important needs. Schutz explained that we use groups to belong and
identify with others (inclusion), find openness (formerly called affection), and exer-
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cise power over others and our environment (control). Notice that each of these
three needs mandates the participation of others and is so significant to us that often
we will relinquish our own resources, such as time and energy, to participate in groups
and satisfy our basic human needs. For example, citizens of Springfield, Missouri,
worked to transform a decaying downtown space into Founders Park, a public green
space in the city’s center. By assembling in the various groups needed to accomplish
their goal, these citizens worked hard because the issue was important to each of
them, and they understood it could not happen without their collective efforts.
David Brooks, a national political and cultural commentator, speculated that
humans are wired to cooperate and collaborate, just as much as they are to compete.
Groups provide a vehicle by which we can do this. Stop for a moment and think
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about all the groups you have participated in this past week, including family and peer
groups. College students average about 8 to 10, and sometimes list as many as 24
groups. For example, one student listed the following: family, Bible study, sorority,
executive committee of sorority, study group in small group class, project group in
marketing class, intramural volleyball team, carpool, and work group of clerks in
clothing department.
Does this seem like a lot of groups? Consider this: Reliance on groups in our
society is increasing and expected to increase further, perhaps dramatically. American
managers recognize the value of participative decision making, with the small group
as one important vehicle for encouraging employee participation and improving cor-
porate decision making. Top management teams are acknowledged as the most
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influential groups in organizations today. Monster.com, a popular employment
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website for college students, lists teamwork as one of the “hot skills” in demand from
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managers, no matter the size or type of their industry. Even further, Monster.com
counselors recommend that all college first-year students join a club to practice their
group skills. 13

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