Nominal group technique decreases social loafing and production blocking-problems with brainstorming-by
- making people pool their ideas in a face-to-face meeting.
- making people write down ideas on their own.
- discouraging bad ideas in the meeting.
- making people agree to one idea generated in a face-to-face meeting.
- making people speak in turns during all face-to-face meetings.
Nominal group technique addresses the problems with brainstorming by making people write down ideas on their own, which decreases social loafing and production blocking. Although team members might still be hesitant about expressing wild ideas to the group, doing so might be less threatening than having nothing to contribute to the group.
Nominal Group Technique: A team process used to generate creative ideas, whereby team members individually write down their ideas and then take turns sharing them with the group.
Silas, Jerome, and Sasha are members of the marketing team at Widget Innovations, Inc. (WII), and are responsible for generating ideas for new marketing strategies. Silas has done a phenomenal job in gathering information necessary to help the team understand the desires and needs of the client. All things being equal, Sasha has the best record of making good recommendations to Alvaro, the vice president of marketing. Jerome can make some good recommendations, but sometimes his recommendations are completely off base. Usually, Alvaro pays careful attention to what Sasha has to say, but he generally does not pay much attention to what Jerome proposes. In addition to Alvaro, Sasha has been meeting with the vice president of operations and other members of the executive team to gain support for their request to increase the marketing budget. According to research, the best way for Silas, Jerome, and Sasha to improve their team hierarchical sensitivity would be to implement
- groupthink.
- action learning.
- collaborative problem solving.
- nominal group technique.
- personal clarification.
Nominal group technique can be used to improve their team hierarchical sensitivity. Similar to a traditional brainstorming session, this process starts off by bringing the team together and outlining the purpose of the meeting. The next step takes place on an individual level, however, as members have a set period of time to write down their own ideas on a piece of paper. The subsequent step goes back into the team setting as members share their ideas with the team in a round-robin fashion. After the ideas are recorded, members have a discussion intended to clarify the ideas and build on the ideas of others. After this, it's back to an individual environment; members rank order ideas on a card that they submit to a facilitator. A facilitator then tabulates the scores to determine the highest rated idea.
Nominal Group Technique: A team process used to generate creative ideas, whereby team members individually write down their ideas and then take turns sharing them with the group.
Tran needs to increase his team's creativity. He calls them in to a meeting and tells them to shout out as many ideas as they can think of for a new project. No one is to analyze or criticize any ideas while this exercise is going on. Tran is using the brainstorming technique.
Tran is using the brainstorming technique. An alternative would be using the nominal group technique where the team members first think up ideas on their own, then meet to contribute them one by one in round-robin format to a list of ideas.
Brainstorming: A team process used to generate creative ideas.
Britney, a manager in an advertising firm, was assigned a team and asked to come up with ideas for an advertising campaign. Britney briefed her team and outlined the purpose of the meeting clearly, after which she asked the members to individually generate ideas and bring their list to the next meeting. In the second meeting, the ideas were compiled, doubts clarified, and ideas built-on, after which the members were then asked to individually rank the ideas and submit the list to Britney, who tabulated the scores and created a list of the five highest rated ideas. Britney used ________ to generate the ideas.
- cross-training
- conflict management
- positional rotation
- cognitive bias
- nominal group technique
Nominal group technique starts off by bringing the team together and outlining the purpose of the meeting. The next step takes place on an individual level, however, as members have a set period of time to write down their own ideas on a piece of paper. The subsequent step goes back into the team setting, as members share their ideas with the team in a round-robin fashion. After the ideas are recorded, members have a discussion intended to clarify the ideas and build on the ideas of others. After this, it's back to an individual environment; members rank order ideas on a card that they submit to a facilitator. A facilitator then tabulates the scores to determine the winning idea.
Nominal Group Technique: A team process used to generate creative ideas, whereby team members individually write down their ideas and then take turns sharing them with the group.
Brainstorming results in production blocking because members
- have to wait their turn to express their ideas.
- do not work as hard thinking up ideas as they would if they had to turn in individual ideas.
- are hesitant to express ideas that are not well thought-out.
- are reluctant to pool good ideas with other ideas that are bad.
- have the tendency to social loaf due to lack of accountability.
Brainstorming results in production blocking because members have to wait their turn to express their ideas. This waiting around consumes time that could otherwise be used by individuals to generate new ideas.
Production Blocking: A type of coordination loss resulting from team members having to wait on each other before completing their own part of the team task.
Organizations no longer use brainstorming because of the problems associated with it.
In spite of the problems associated with brainstorming, organizations continue to use it. One reason is that the general idea of brainstorming is well known, and common sense leads people to believe that it works as advertised. Another reason is that there are benefits of brainstorming beyond just generating ideas-for example, it builds morale and results in the sharing of knowledge that might otherwise be locked inside the minds of the individual team members. To achieve the benefits of brainstorming, some companies take extra steps to ensure team members are fully engaged in the process of generating ideas.
Brainstorming: A team process used to generate creative ideas.
Five students from the KLM School have been selected to form the team that will represent the school in the National Science contest. They must come up with a creative project. These students' first meeting was face-to-face and involved each of them suggesting as many ideas as they could think of without analyzing or critiquing them at that time. The activity that the students engaged in is referred to as
- boundary spanning.
- social loafing.
- ambassador activity.
- scouting activity.
- brainstorming.
Brainstorming involves a face-to-face meeting of team members in which each member offers as many ideas as possible about some focal problem or issue.
Brainstorming: A team process used to generate creative ideas.
________ involves a face-to-face meeting of team members in which each offers as many ideas as possible about some focal problem or issue.
- Social loafing
- Groupthink
- Brainstorming
- Scout activity
- Boundary spanning
Brainstorming involves a face-to-face meeting of team members in which each offers as many ideas as possible about some focal problem or issue.
The nominal group technique involves utilizing a combination of individual and team settings to generate ideas and solutions and arrive at a good idea.
The nominal group technique starts off by bringing the team together and outlining the purpose of the meeting. The next step takes place on an individual level, however, as members have a set period of time to write down their own ideas on a piece of paper. The subsequent step goes back into the team setting as members share their ideas with the team in a round-robin fashion. After the ideas are recorded, members have a discussion intended to clarify the ideas and build on the ideas of others. After this, it's back to an individual environment; members rank order ideas on a card that they submit to a facilitator. A facilitator then tabulates the scores to determine the winning idea.
According to researchers, a cohesive team is always a high performance team.
Is a cohesive team necessarily a good team? According to researchers, the answer to this question is no. In highly cohesive teams, members may try to maintain harmony by striving toward consensus on issues without ever offering, seeking, or seriously considering alternative viewpoints and perspectives.
Team: Two or more people who work interdependently over some time period to accomplish common goals related to some task-oriented purpose.
When members of a team develop strong emotional bonds to other members of the team and to the team itself, they have ________, which tends to foster high levels of motivation and commitment to the team.
- potency
- cohesion
- groupthink
- transparency
- shared competency
For a number of reasons, members of teams can develop strong emotional bonds to other members of their team and to the team itself. This emotional attachment, which is called cohesion, tends to foster high levels of motivation and commitment to the team, and as a consequence, cohesiveness tends to promote higher levels of team performance.
Cohesion: A team state that occurs when members of the team develop strong emotional bonds to other members of the team and to the team itself.
Navy Seals go through extremely difficult training. Those who succeed become members of one of the most elite fighting units in the world. They trust each other completely and form intense emotional bonds. These teams have high levels of
- cohesion.
- groupthink.
- centralization.
- interdependence.
- individual achievement.
Teams such as the Navy Seals develop extremely high levels of cohesion.
Cohesion: A team state that occurs when members of the team develop strong emotional bonds to other members of the team and to the team itself.