ABSTRACT
Teamworking is enthusiastically promoted by managers as a means of securing better performance. Being a ‘good team player’ is a required attribute for employability. Writers, notably Belbin, have expounded, though not always convincingly, on optimal team numbers and essential team roles. The chapter traces the history of teams, from the self-defending autonomous work groups identified by Tavistock researchers in the 1950s, through the contribution of teams to quality of working life movements, to contemporary management enthusiasm for teamworking to bolster productive efficiency.
A central question is how teamworking provides for worker voice and autonomy. One problem is that teams differ considerably in size, composition and function. A second problem is how to measure and maintain autonomy, when the team is bound by formal objectives and performance measures. Similar problems afflicted the innovative teamworking developed and subsequently discarded at Volvo. Teams also provide the main operational core of lean production, and can be subjected to tight managerial controls. Case studies of ‘real’ teamworking, involving mutual trust and supportive management, demonstrate that teams can satisfy both intrinsic employee needs and those of the organisation.
