Psychology: Leadership and Team Essay

Submitted By hackervow
Words: 1307
Pages: 6

Psychology assignment 3
A team’s success can be determined by a number of factors. In this report will be looking in to the main factors that can have the biggest effect on team success. The first of these factors that I will talk about is the stages of group development (forming, norming, storming and performing.
The team that I have chosen to observe for this assignment was Bristol Rovers. The match that I watched was against Exeter City on Wednesday 6th March. The game was a league fixture in Npower league 2.
The forming stage of group development is exactly what it suggests. It is the coming together of a team at the start of the season. It is at this stage that first impressions are made of each other, if a bad impression is created then it cause friction within the squad. During this stage you automatically start assessing the strengths and weaknesses of your team mates. At this stage doubts are also in every players head about whether or not they are in the right place. At lower level this doubt could be about whether football was the right sport for them. However at a professional level a player might be having doubts about the club they are at.
My observations would suggest that Bristol rovers are past this stage because the game I watched was a long time after the start of the season and everyone looked to be settled and knew their roles.

Storming is the second stage of the development process. It is at this time that if conflict is going to happen it will. The reason for this is because as a team develops people will start to question authority around the team.
As conflict arises amount of cliques with in the group will start to increase. Cliques form because a group of people have the same interests. If these groups do not get on then the success of the team will be very limited. Towards the end of this phase members of the team begin to behave more professionally. This improvement in behaviour will increase team success it is the team that matters not the individual.
Again I feel that Bristol rovers are past this stage as there are no signs of conflict within the club. Each player knows there role within the team and are therefore in turn not arguing against authority.
The third stage of group development is known as norming. This stage is important to a team as it means that all conflict within the team has disappeared and in turn has been replaced by the team coming together to form solidarity. As the team have been together for a longer period of time players start to gain more respect for each other as professionals. This respect for each other creates a better atmosphere within the team and therefore means the success of the team is good.
I think that aspects of Bristol rovers are within this category. The advantage of being in this section is that the team have a feel of togetherness. This is an advantage because it means that the team will do everything together and wont point the finger when something goes wrong.
Stage four is called the performing stage. This stage is where the team is fully committed to work for each other and together as a team. The reason the team work together all the time is because they are all working towards the same goal, to win trophies. The group is also knowledgeable about each other and the tactics that are needed to create success. This means that the team are able to make decisions together rather than told what to do. At this stage the team has no conflict within it at all. Conflict creates a weakness and impacts team success so it is positive that at this stage it is gone.
At the start of the 2012/2013 season Bristol rovers were in the forming stage. This was because new players were joining the club. After moving through this they moved in to the storming stage. However it took them a long time to get through this phase meaning that there was constant conflict between players. This conflict meant that a lot of games were lost which meant