Types of Teams and their Activities
Types of Teams
Formal teams have a clear membership and a defined structure, as well as the goals they have – in place are systems to ensure those goals are reached. Formal teams may have been created by senior management to solve a particular problem so are all picked for a specific purpose, E.g. a multi-agency safer city partnership team who work together across a variety of organisations to combat anti-social behaviour on government behalf.
Informal teams are much more flexible, individuals can move in and out of the team as and when they are needed. Goals may be less defined but the nature of informal – allows for innovative and new ideas.
Small types of team will consist of few members which will probably have smaller tasks to complete – much easier to communicate and get on in smaller groups, and less confusion when it comes to assigning tasks and roles.
Large groups are quite the opposite to small teams, as they may have a bigger task to complete and therefore have more team members, this is a benefit as more work will get done with more people on the job, however there may some confusion, and there may be more conflict with the more people there are in the team.
Temporary teams are only together for a short period of time to carry out a task and leave when the objective/goals are achieved. It can be difficult as they won’t know each other long they may not come to terms with each member’s strengths and weaknesses; however they can be good at troubleshooting as things can be seen differently with different views and opinions.
Project teams are much like temporary team; they are only together for a specific time to complete a specific task/project. These types of teams are usually made up of specialists in specific areas – and a project manager will be in place to ensure the project runs to plan. A project in the fire service could be that all the primary schools in a certain region have a visit from a fire safety team about the dangers of fire.
Formal teams have a clear membership and a defined structure, as well as the goals they have – in place are systems to ensure those goals are reached. Formal teams may have been created by senior management to solve a particular problem so are all picked for a specific purpose, E.g. a multi-agency safer city partnership team who work together across a variety of organisations to combat anti-social behaviour on government behalf.
Informal teams are much more flexible, individuals can move in and out of the team as and when they are needed. Goals may be less defined but the nature of informal – allows for innovative and new ideas.
Small types of team will consist of few members which will probably have smaller tasks to complete – much easier to communicate and get on in smaller groups, and less confusion when it comes to assigning tasks and roles.
Large groups are quite the opposite to small teams, as they may have a bigger task to complete and therefore have more team members, this is a benefit as more work will get done with more people on the job, however there may some confusion, and there may be more conflict with the more people there are in the team.
Temporary teams are only together for a short period of time to carry out a task and leave when the objective/goals are achieved. It can be difficult as they won’t know each other long they may not come to terms with each member’s strengths and weaknesses; however they can be good at troubleshooting as things can be seen differently with different views and opinions.
Project teams are much like temporary team; they are only together for a specific time to complete a specific task/project. These types of teams are usually made up of specialists in specific areas – and a project manager will be in place to ensure the project runs to plan. A project in the fire service could be that all the primary schools in a certain region have a visit from a fire safety team about the dangers of fire.