Groups in Process

1
Groups in Process

• Decision Making Pitfalls, Foibles, and Techniques

2
Types of Group Decisions

• Consensus
• Compromise
• Voting
• Railroading
• Coalitions/Handclasping

3
Stages of Group Development

• Forming
• Storming
• Norming
• Performing
• Adjourning

4
Groupthink--Irving Janis

• Backdrop to Janis work--the Bay of Pigs and the
  Cuban Missile Crisis
• Characteristics of Groupthink--illusions of
  invulnerability, unanimity, and group morality
  self-censorship, shared stereotypes, screening of
  adverse information

5
Solving Groupthink

• Appoint a devils advocate
• Leaders stay impartial
• Allow second chance meetings
• Invite comments from outside experts, trusted
  associates
• Subdivide tasks, then meet together
• Divide planning and evaluation tasks

6
Brainstorming--Rules and Uses

• Appropriate for inquiry, not all tasks
• Rules
• avoid negative feedback or evaluation
• strive for quantity of ideas
• strive for creativity
• encourage piggybacking

7
Nominal Group Technique

• Ideas are silently generated by individuals
• Ideas are recorded publicly, round-robin
• Each idea is discussed for clarification--criticis
  m not allowed
• Each member selects five, votes publicly
  recorded, list is narrowed, decision is reached

8
Traditional Problem Solving

• Based on John Deweys Reflective Thinking Model
• Define the problem
• Research and analyze the problem
• Establish criteria for solutions
• List possible alternative/solutions
• Evaluate each alternative
• Select the best alternative

9
Delphi Technique

• No face-to-face meetings, useful for conferences
• Participants ideas are collected and
  redistributed
• Each member synthesizes ideas
• Leader creates master list from participants
  syntheses
• Participants vote on issues in master
  list--return to leader