Which of the following statements is true regarding self-managed work teams?

MGMT 3720 – Organizational Behavior EXAM 3

(CH. 9, 10, 11, & 12)

Question 1

1.

While discussing their marketing campaign for a new product, the members of the cross-functional team responsible for Carver Inc. realized that a couple of changes relating to their prior plan would be beneficial. The offer of a franchising that had earlier been brushed off by the company head was discussed thoroughly and it was decided that it would be implemented on a trial basis initially, and on full scale if found to work well. From the information provided, it can be concluded that this cross-functional team has a high degree of ________.

Answer

reflexivity

uncertainty

diversity

conformity

demography

Question 2

1.

Max Hiller was recently hired by Sync, a consumer goods company. During his first meeting with the sales team, Max impressed upon his team that work performance is the only criterion he would use to evaluate them. To help them perform well and meet their targets, he pushed his team to work extra hours. He also gave very clear instructions to each member regarding their job responsibilities and continually verified if they were meeting their targets. Which of the following, if true, would weaken Max's approach?

Answer

Sales figures for the region that Max's team is responsible for have improved in the last quarter.

Max is leading many new employees who have joined his team directly after training.

Max's sales team is comprised of independent and experienced employees who are committed to their jobs.

Max's team functions in a sluggish manner and picks up pace only a week or so before the monthly operations cycle meetings.

Max's team does not display high levels of cohesiveness and members fail to coordinate with each other.

Question 3

1.

Which of the following statements is true regarding the effect of group cohesiveness and performance norms on group productivity?

Answer

When both cohesiveness and performance norms are high, productivity will be high.

The productivity of the group is affected by the performance norms but not by the cohesiveness of the group.

If cohesiveness is high and performance norms are low, productivity will be high.

When cohesiveness is low and performance norms are also low, productivity will be high.

If cohesiveness is low and performance norms are high, productivity will be low.

Question 4

1.

Neutralizers make it impossible for leader behavior to make any difference to follower outcomes.

Answer

True

False

Question 5

1.

Communication includes both the transfer and the understanding of meaning.

Answer

True

False

Question 6

1.

According to the path-goal theory, directive leadership is likely to be welcomed and accepted by employees with high ability or considerable experience.

Answer

True

False

Question 7

1.

Before buying her new phone, Gina listed the various requirements her new phone must meet. As a wedding planner, much of her work revolved around using e-mail to forward pictures of locations, designs, and food arrangements that she could categorize by themes and prices. She required a phone with high storage capacity, speedy Internet, and easy-to-use methods to organize and save content. After listing these requirements, she fixed a budget and began surveying phones online. She also obtained information from friends. In a week's time, Gina had shortlisted three models that suited her needs and was ready to make the final choice. Gina used ________ to arrive at this decision.

Answer

controlled processing

heuristical processing

selective processing

superficial processing

automatic processing

Question 8

1.

Aaron Dias was working on the last shift for the day at All Needs, a retail store owned by an Asian man, when he opened the cash register and stole some money thinking that nobody would witness him stealing. However, one of the customer attendants watched him steal the money and reported it to the manager the next day, following which Aaron was terminated. Subsequently, the manager became extremely strict with all his Caucasian employees and was often heard abusing them saying "you guys are all the same." This scenario depicts ________.

Answer

social loafing

in-group favoritism

groupthink

contrast bias

contrast bias

Question 9

1.

Which of the following is true with regard to the impact of diversity on team effectiveness?

Answer

High levels of diversity among team members benefit the group from the stage of forming.

Race and gender diversity bear the highest positive impact on team performance.

Cultural diversity serves as an asset for tasks that call for a variety of viewpoints once the team has worked out its differences.

Leadership has a negligible role to play in diverse teams because the members manage themselves autonomously.

Elements of diversity are undesirable as they interfere with team processes in the long run.

Question 10

1.

The ability to influence a group toward the achievement of a vision or set of goals can arise outside the formal structure of the organization.

True

False

Question 11

1.

ABL is one of the largest consumer goods companies in the country and it recently held its annual conference where members of all regional divisions were invited. Since the company is vast and rarely finds all its employees together in such a manner, it used this opportunity to present to them certain new ideas they had regarding various aspects of their functioning. Large meetings with each regional team were held to provide them with information about the proposed changes and to obtain their anonymous votes through computers. This helped the company speed up the decision-making process and consolidate the results immediately. Which of the following group decision techniques did ABL use here?

Answer

nominal groups approach

heuristics and algorithm approach

electronic meeting approach

reference groups approach

brainstorming

Question 12

1.

When the middle-level manager of the production department at Wilson Works was laid off, many employees who worked under him became apprehensive about their job security. They were aware of the current trend toward laying-off employees in the economy. The termination of their manager combined with the fact that their division had performed only moderately well in the last two quarters led the employees to believe that they were at a high risk of losing their jobs as well. Which of the following, if true, would weaken the argument that the production manager should hold face-to-face meetings to assure the employees in the production division?

Answer

Rumors had spread about impending lay-offs at Wilson Works.

Wilson Works had a strong formal communication network in place.

The middle level manager supervised over five hundred employees.

The employees had serious concerns over job security.

The company had no fixed policy with regard to rightsizing employees.

Question 13

1.

Bonnie Patterson is a manager for seven years at Wayne and Watson, a legal consultancy firm. A good part of her work day involves holding meetings and she likes to get work on a time-bound schedule. For this reason, members of her team receive the agenda at the beginning of the meeting, followed by some time to contemplate over the issue at hand individually. Subsequently, the team members present their ideas one after another, the group discusses them together, and lastly, a ranking is done to choose the most favored idea. This represents the ________ approach of group decision making.

Answer

brainstorming

interacting

nominal group

reference group

Groupthink

Question 14

1.

Jason Jones has been asked to assemble an eight-member self-managed work team of experienced employees to work on a project that combines the functional areas of research, production, marketing, and distribution. Jason is apprehensive about managing a team so large; he knows from prior experience that larger teams do not always result in greater productivity. Jason has also been informed by the management that this team is being established as the project must progress according to the predetermined timeline. The work lagging behind by one division will cause a cumulative delay in all the successive stages of the project's execution. Jason plans to implement a group-based incentive that he feels would motivate each of the team members to work efficiently. Which of the following is an assumption made by Jason in implementing this plan?

Answer

Since the team is comprised of employees who are highly skilled in their respective areas, the output of the group will be of high quality.

Increasing the number of experienced employees in the team will reduce the need for supervision.

Each employee in the team is motivated to work equally hard to ensure that the group's performance is satisfactory.

Each employee will work well within the boundaries of their divisional functions and conflicts will be relatively fewer.

Each employee will be committed to working within the resources allocated.

Question 15

1.

The advantages of oral communication are speed and feedback.

Answer

True

False

Question 16

1.

Treesa Mayering recently began her first job at a PR firm called Pro as a copywriter. Her job involves creating scripts for press releases, advertisements, and other media events. She has been working under the guidance of Will Preston, the senior copywriter. Treesa, who has no prior experience in this job, had worked on scripts for advertisements and online brochures alone, when she was asked to work on a press release for the first time. Will reviewed Treesa's script and sent her an e-mail full of detailed corrections which she promptly implemented. However, when Will looked at the script later, he felt that it did not represent a significant improvement of her first draft. Which of the following, if true, would best explain this outcome?

Answer

Will routinely e-mailed feedback on scripts for advertisements, online brochures, and press releases to his team members.

Treesa was hired because she demonstrated considerable analytical and creative thinking skills in her pre-employment tests.

Will believed that Treesa's understanding of his e-mailed feedback would be accurate.

Treesa took a lot of time to implement Will's corrections and revise her script.

The feedback provided by Will was not elaborate and comprehensive enough.

Question 17

1.

Joe Sullivan and Mark Holland, members of the top management at EuAir, an European airlines, were preparing for a meeting to discuss strategies to combat the recent rise in fuel prices. Before the meeting began, Joe and Mark were discussing how oil prices significantly impact the health of the world economy. Joe spoke of how higher oil prices since 1999, partly the result of OPEC supply management policies, contributed to the global economic downturn in 2000-2001. Mark agreed but added that the right kind of strategy can help them overcome and even profitably use this opportunity for hiking fares. Which of the following statements, if true, would weaken the argument that Joe experienced groupshift during the meeting?

Answer

Joe stated that precise methods of fuel filling and consumption must be implemented to efficiently use their current supply of fuel.

Joe proposed the usage of direct and higher altitude routes that would curtail fuel consumption.

Joe stated that the company should cut expenditures on other areas like marketing and advertising instead of hiking fares to retain their current profit margins.

Joe stated that hiking prices would lead to losing market share to the low-cost airlines which already controlled half the market.

Joe suggested adding a fuel surcharge to all tickets for commercial flights with immediate effect.

Question 18

1.

Shirley Shands is a hardworker but Debra, her manager, is irritated with her. While Debra concedes that Shirley's work gives her no cause for complaint, Debra is tired of the interruptions in her work because of Shirley asking for repeated clarifications over what exactly she has to say in e-mails or phone calls. She often requests Debra to proofread her e-mails before sending them, and Debra feels she sends too many e-mails instead of just speaking to the person concerned. From the scenario, we can conclude that ________.

Answer

Shirley processes her e-mails in an automatic and superficial manner

Shirley uses filtering when communicating with Debra

Debra is engaging in social loafing

Shirley and Debra come from a high-context culture

Shirley suffers from communication apprehension

Question 19

1.

Shane Dermott is a manager at a software design firm that develops software programs for clients using multiple teams of specialists. One of his most successful teams has been performing very well for years and so it came as a surprise to Shane when he noticed a sharp drop in the team's performance. He decided to speak with the team individually and find a solution. After interviewing all 7 team members, he determined that one of the team members performed routine administrative tasks that were hardly visible to any of the other team members and understood that this was a case of social loafing which demotivated the entire group. Which of the following would most likely improve the performance of the employee who was social loafing?

giving him additional assignments to complete

providing him with administrative training

making him individually responsible for definite and crucial tasks

encouraging him to work more independently

empowering him to make decisions autonomously

Question 20

1. Intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration are likely to be seen in the management by exception (active) style of leadership.

True

False

Question 21

1.

Which of the following statements is true regarding the effect of status on conformity pressure?

High-status individuals are often given less freedom to deviate from norms than are other group members.

People in high-status jobs have especially negative reactions to social pressure exerted by people in low-status jobs.

Lower-status people are better able to resist conformity pressures than their high-status peers.

Groups exert equal conformity pressure on all individuals regardless of their status.

As compared to high-status members, low-status members are given a wider range of discretion as long as their activities aren't severely detrimental to group goal achievement.

Question 22

1.

Hank Murphy was selected to develop an advanced personal communication device with his own self-managed work team. Hank was assured that resource allocation and timelines were flexible for this project provided the work was a cut above that provided by the rest of the employees. As a part of the project guidelines, Hank included the demand that the device being developed by the team should also be marketed exclusively by them without resorting to franchising or cobranding. This was to ensure that customers recognized the product as reflecting the values of their company. Work on this project began with a lot of vigor and once the device was developed, Hank's team implemented their marketing strategy. However, even three months after the product's release, visibility remained low in the market and many reviewers did not consider the device to be much of an innovation. Which of the following statements, if true, would indicate a lack of reflexivity in Hank's self-managed work team?

In Hank's team, the members took accountability for the group's performance as a whole and reported their individual progress to him as well.

The device was later marketed as a part of a national level tie-up with E-store outlets and did remarkably well in its second stint in the market.

Hank's team members developed multiple blueprints of the device which were thoroughly discussed, improvised, and synthesized into the final plan for the product.

In the first few weeks of the project, Hank had witnessed a moderate level of conflict between the team members as each one had his own idea about how best to go about this high-priority project.

Hank's team used e-mail and instant messaging to communicate unique information when some of the team members were not available for face-to-face interactions.

Question 23

1.

Groupthink is a phenomenon that relates to the consensus norms.

True

False

Question 24

1.

Transformational leadership has a greater impact on the bottom line in smaller, privately held firms than in more complex organizations.

True

False

Question 25

1.

Social loafing illustrates a process gain from using teams.

True

False

Question 26

1.

E-Way is an electronics company that is developing a new cellphone that will be released in the market soon. Which of the following, if true, would strengthen the argument that the company should use social media to promote the new cellphone?

Answer

E-Way's last two releases received a lot of criticism from consumers.

The target consumers for the cellphone are not restricted to any demographic category.

One of E-Way's rival companies had used social media successfully to advertise its new product.

The production team overshot the budget and the marketing team has low funds.

The company has a tightly integrated production and distribution mechanism.

Question 27

1.

Which of the following is true with regard to deviant workplace behavior?

Answer

It is involuntary in nature.

Widespread deviant workplace behavior depends on the accepted norms of the group.

It has a negligible adverse impact on organization as it is accepted by some employees.

Research on deviance at the workplace has shown that employees operating individually engage in more deviant behaviors than those who function as a part of groups.

Leaving work early is an example of a property-related deviant workplace behavior.

Question 28

1.

Hubert Gray needs an instruction manual developed for his new product. This is the last step of the project and he has severe budget constraints. He needs a small team of technical writers to work together closely to write the manual on fairly short notice. He needs them to communicate ideas quickly, creatively, and affordably. Which of the following group techniques should Hubert consider?

Answer

nominal and electronic

brainstorming

brainstorming and electronic

electronic and interacting

interacting and brainstorming

Question 29

1.

The behavioral theories view leadership as a set of actions that people can be trained in.

Answer

True

False

Question 30

1.

According to the Big Five personality model, emotional stability is the most important trait of effective leaders.

Answer

True

False