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  • 1.  need an exercise on giving each other feedback on team performance

    Posted 10-02-2012 14:17

    Hello All, (apologies for cross postings)

     

    I am trying to do team building exercises for masters students accountants who are getting ready to do a case competition. So far we have done three exercises (marshmallow, PB tech and carter racing).

     

    I noticed that when they were reflecting on their performance in these exercises within their group (using questionnaires), they were very hesitant to be 'open'. I noticed that most of the students who have just moved from China in the past 2 weeks (we have 51 out of 81 students in this group) are quite reluctant to do this aspect of the exercise. I am guessing that they are not used to team-reflection or giving each other feedback. The students who were born in N. America seem quite frank and open and seems like they are used to articulating their own strengths and weaknesses and therefore that of the team...

     

    Is there any research on how to overcome it? I really need them to start building trust in their teams so that they can be more effective in their team competitions that will come up in only 18 days. Any exercise you can recommend to build 'trust'? The ones I know are in negotiation –the prisoner's dilemma paradigm with two groups and I have used it before but am not convinced it builds trust in the entire team because it breaks up the team into two groups to do the exercise.  I also know of a role playing exercise on giving feedback in a one-one managerial situation but again that is not useful in a team situation...

     

    Thanks!

    Phani

     

    Apologies for cross-postings

     

    Phani Radhakrishnan PhD

    Senior Lecturer, Organizational Behavior & Human Resources

    Management Department

    University of Toronto

    phanira@utsc.utoronto.ca

    www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~phanira (cv & publications here)

    1265 Military Trail

    Scarborough, ON M1C1A4 Canada

    P please consider the environment before printing this email

     



  • 2.  need an exercise on giving each other feedback on team performance

    Posted 10-02-2012 15:57
    Phani, I think you have a more complicated issue than just trust. It likely involves collectivism/individualism, comfort with open conflict and other cultural differences that are common between Chinese born students and North American born students. For example, things that predict performance well in the US like personality and motivation are not nearly as effective in China. An unmotivated American will often perform poorly, where a similarly unmotivated Chinese will still perform well, because the Chinese worker feels a responsibility to the group to do his or her best that the American worker typically doesn't feel. Similarly, they may not want to experience the open conflict of feedback, because they may assume that people are doing their best and criticism might undermine the cohesiveness of the group.

    Having said that, this is what I do with my MBA students. I first have them read "Methods of Peer Assessment" by Kane & Lawler (I tried to attach it but it was too big, email me if you want the pdf.). It's a little old but it does a good job of explaining the difference between peer nomination, peer rating and peer ranking and showing what each method is effective for. I then give them the attached assignment which has them do a peer ranking. After they turn this in we discuss what was difficult and what they liked about it. Most students don't really like raking each other (managers tend to like it because it helps to discriminate when making administrative decisions). I then give them the opportunity to come up with a different method for giving each other feedback. I ask them to come up with their own criteria, choose if they want to give the feedback as a narrative, or use ratings or rankings. What I get is high buy-in because they had to discuss what success looks like for their particular team, what should each person be doing and how they want to give feedback to each other, which usually results in a discussion of "how do we help each other be the best without it hurting anyone's feelings." 

    This may be way more than you wanted to use to solve this situation, but it works well for us, since our teams remain throughout the program and they are able to use the system they developed for each class as they progress. Perhaps immersing the Chinese students in the process of developing a feedback mechanism would overcome their cultural reticence to provide feedback. Hope this helps and you are free to use and modify my assignment.