Groups are dynamic systems in constant change. Groups grow together and eventually come apart. People join groups, and others leave. This dynamic changes and transforms the very nature of the group. Group socialization involves how the group members interact with one another and form relationships. Just as you were once born and changed your family, they changed you. You came to know a language and culture, a value system, and a set of beliefs that influence you to this day. You came to be socialized, to experience the process of learning to associate, communicate, or interact within a group. A group you belong to this year—perhaps a soccer team or the cast of a play—may not be part of your life next year. Those who are in leadership positions may ascend or descend the leadership hierarchy as the needs of the group and other circumstances change over time.

Group Life Cycle Patterns

Several steps characterize your life cycle, and while it doesn’t follow a prescribed path, there are universal stages we can all recognize. You were born. You didn’t choose your birth, your parents, your language, or your culture, but you came to know them through communication. You came to know yourself, learned skills, discovered talents, and met other people. You learned, worked, lived, and loved, and minor injuries took longer to heal as you aged. You competed in ever-increasing age groups in your favorite sport, and while your time for each performance may have increased as you aged, your experience allowed you to excel in other ways. Where you were once a novice, you have now learned something to share. You lived to see some of your friends pass before you, and the moment will arrive when you, too, must confront death.

In the same way, groups experience similar steps and stages and take on many of the characteristics we associate with life (Moreland, R. and Levine, J., 1982). They grow, overcome illness and dysfunction, and transform over time. No group, just as no individual, lives forever.

Your first day on the job may be comparable to the first day you went to school. You may have learned some of the basics at home, like how to write with a pencil, but knowledge of that skill and its application are two different things. In school, people spoke and acted in different ways than at home. Gradually, you understood the meaning of recess, the importance of raising your hand to get the teacher’s attention, and how to follow other school rules. At work, you may have had academic training for your profession, but the knowledge you learned in school only serves as your foundation—much as your socialization at home served to guide you at school. On the job, they use jargon terms, have schedules that may include coffee breaks (recess), have a supervisor (teacher), and have explicit and understood rules. On the first day, it was all new, even if many of the elements were familiar.

Many researchers have described the universal stages of group development to better understand its life cycle. While there are modern interpretations of these stages, most draw from the model proposed by Bruce Tuckman. This model, shown in Table 19.2.1, specifies the usual order of the phases of group development and allows us to predict several stages we can anticipate as we join a new group.

Tuckman begins with the forming stage, which is the initiation of group formation. This stage is also called the orientation stage because individual group members come to know each other. Group members who are new to each other and can’t predict each other’s behavior can be expected to experience the stress of uncertainty. Uncertainty theory states that we learn more about others we interact with to reduce or resolve the anxiety associated with the unknown (Berger, C. and Calabrese, R., 1975; Berger, C., 1986; Gudykunst, W., 1995). The more we know about others and become accustomed to how they communicate, the better we can predict how they will interact with us in future contexts. If you learn that Monday mornings are never a good time for your supervisor, you quickly learn to schedule meetings later in the week. Individuals are initially tentative and display caution as they begin to learn about the group and its members.

It is easy to offend if you don’t know someone very well. Each group member brings to the group a set of experiences combined with education and a self-concept. You won’t be able to read this information on a nametag; instead, you will only learn about it through time and interaction. Since the possibility of overlapping and competing viewpoints and perspectives exists, the group will experience a storming stage, a time of struggles, as the members themselves sort out their differences. There may be multiple ways to solve the problem or task, and some group members may prefer one strategy over another. Some group members may be more senior to the organization than others, and members may treat them differently. Some group members may be as new as you are and just as uncertain about everyone’s talents, skills, roles, and self-perceptions. The wise business communicator will anticipate the storming stage and help facilitate opportunities for the members to resolve uncertainty before the work commences. There may be challenges for leadership and conflicting viewpoints. The sociology professor sees the world differently from the physics professor. The sales agent sees things differently from someone in accounting. A manager who understands and anticipates this normal challenge in the group’s life cycle can help the group become more productive.

A clear definition of the group’s purpose and mission can help the members focus their energies. Interaction before the first meeting can help reduce uncertainty. Coffee and calories can help bring a group together. Giving the group what they need and opportunities to know each other before their task can increase efficiency.

Next, groups that successfully transition from the storming stage will experience the norming stage, where the group establishes norms, or informal rules, for behavior and interaction. Who speaks first? Who takes notes? Who is creative, who is visual, and who is detail-oriented? Sometimes, our job titles and functions speak for themselves, but human beings are complex. We are not simply a list of job functions, and in the dynamic marketplace of today’s business environment, you will often find that people have talents and skills well beyond their “official” role or task. Drawing on these strengths can make the group more effective.

The norming stage is marked by less division and more collaboration. The level of anxiety associated with interaction is generally reduced, making for a more positive work climate that promotes listening. When people feel less threatened and their needs are met, they are more likely to focus their complete attention on the group’s purpose. If they are still concerned with who does what and whether they will speak in error, the interaction framework will stay in the storming stage. Tensions are reduced when the normative expectations are known, and the degree to which a manager can describe these at the outset can reduce the amount of time the group remains uncertain. Group members generally express more satisfaction with clear expectations and are more inclined to participate.

Ultimately, the purpose of a workgroup is performance, and the preceding stages lead us to the performing stage, in which the group accomplishes its mandate, fulfills its purpose, and reaches its goals. To facilitate performance, group members can’t skip the initiation of getting to know each other or sorting out roles and norms, but they can try to focus on performance with clear expectations from the moment the group is formed. Productivity is often how we measure success in business and industry, and the group has to produce. Outcome assessments may have been built into the system from the beginning to serve as a benchmark for success. Wise managers know how to celebrate success, as it brings more success, social cohesion, group participation, and a sense of job satisfaction. Incremental gains toward a benchmark may also be a cause for celebration and support, and failure to reach a goal should be regarded as an opportunity for clarification.

Focusing on the group’s performance rather than individual contributions is generally wiser. Managers and group members will want to assist underperformers and congratulate achieving members for their contributions. If the goal is to create a community where competition pushes each member to perform, individual highlights may serve your needs, but if you want a group to solve a problem or address a challenge as a group, you have to promote group cohesion. Members need to feel a sense of belonging, and praise (or the lack thereof) can be a sword with two edges: one stimulates and motivates while the other demoralizes and divides.

Groups should be designed to produce and perform in ways and at levels that individuals cannot, or else you should consider compartmentalizing the tasks. The performing stage is where productivity occurs, and ensuring the group has what it needs to perform is necessary. Missing pieces, parts, or information can stall the group and reset the cycle to storming all over again.

Loss of performance is inefficiency, which has a cost. Managers will be measured by the group’s productivity and performance. Ensure that the performing stage is productive and healthy for its members.

Imagine you are a group manager who has produced an award-winning design for an ecologically innovative four-seat car. Their success is your success. Their celebrations are yours even if the success is not focused on you. A manager manages the process while group members perform. If you were a member of the group that helped design the belt line, you made a fundamental contribution to the style of the car. Individual consumers may never consider the line from the front fender, across the doors, to the rear taillight as they make a purchase decision, but they will recognize beauty. You will know that you could not have achieved that fundamental part of car design without help from the engineers in the group, and if the number-crunching accountants had not seen the efficiency of the production process that produced it, it might never have survived the transition from prototype to production. The group came together and accomplished its goals with amazing results.

As typically happens, all groups will eventually have to move on to new assignments. In the adjourning stage, members leave the group. The group may cease to exist or be transformed with new members and a new set of goals. Your past contributions may have caught the management’s attention, and you may be assigned to redesign your marque or brand’s flagship vehicle, the Halo car. It’s quite a professional honor, and it’s yours because of your successful work in a group. Others will be reassigned to tasks that require their talents and skills, and you may or may not collaborate with them in the future.

You may miss the interactions with the members, even the more cantankerous ones, and will experience relief and a sense of loss. Like life, the group process is normal, and mixed emotions are to be expected. A wise manager anticipates this stage and facilitates the separation skillfully and easily. We often close this process with a ritual marking its passing, though the ritual may be as formal as an award, as informal as a “thank you” or a verbal acknowledgment of a job well done over coffee and calories.

On a more sober note, it is important not to forget that groups can reach the adjourning stage without achieving success. Some businesses go bankrupt, some departments are closed, and some individuals lose their positions after a group fails to perform. Adjournment can come suddenly and unexpectedly or gradually and piece by piece. Either way, a skilled business communicator will be prepared and recognize it as part of the classic group life cycle.

Life Cycle of Member Roles

Just as groups go through a life cycle when they form and eventually adjourn, so the group members fulfill different roles during this life cycle. These roles, proposed by Richard Moreland and John Levine, are summarized in Table 19.2.2.

Suppose you are about to graduate from school and are in the midst of an employment search. You’ve gathered extensive information on some local businesses and know they will participate in the university job fair. You’ve explored their Web sites, talked to people currently employed at each company, and learned what you can from the public information available. At this stage, you are considered a potential member. You may soon have an electrical, chemical, or mechanical engineering degree, but you are not a member of an engineering team.

You show up at the job fair in professional attire and completely prepared. The representatives of each company are respectful and cordial and give you contact information. One of them even calls a member of the organization on the spot and arranges an interview for you next week. You are excited at the prospect and want to learn more. You are still a potential member.

The interview went well the following week. The day after the meeting, you receive a call for a follow-up interview that leads to a committee interview. A few weeks later, the company calls you with a job offer. However, in the meantime, you have also been interviewing with other potential employers and are waiting to hear back from two of them. You are still a potential member.

After careful consideration, you decide to take the job offer and start the next week. The projects look interesting, you’ll gain valuable experience, and the commute to work is reasonable. Your first day on the job is positive, and they’ve assigned you a mentor. The conversations are positive, but you sometimes feel lost, as if they speak a language you can’t grasp. As a new group member, your level of acceptance will increase as you begin learning the group’s rules, spoken and unspoken (Fisher, B. A., 1970). As you learn to fit into the group, you will gradually move from the potential member role to the role of a new group member.

Over time and projects, you gradually increase your responsibilities. You are no longer considered the new person and can follow almost every conversation. You can’t quite say, “I remember when,” because your tenure hasn’t been that long, but you are a known quantity and know your way around. You are a full member of the group. Full members enjoy knowing the rules and customs and can create new ones. New group members look to full members for leadership and guidance. Full group members can control the agenda and influence the agenda and activities considerably.

However, full members of a group can and do come into conflict. When you were a new member, you may have remained silent when you felt you had something to say, but now you state your case. There is more than one way to get the job done. You may suggest new ways that emphasize efficiency over existing methods. Coworkers who have been working in the department for several years may be unwilling to adapt and change, resulting in tension. Expressing different views can cause conflict and may even interfere with communication.

When this type of tension arises, divergent group members pull back, contribute less, and start to see themselves as separate from the group. Divergent group members have less eye contact, seek out each other’s opinions less frequently, and listen defensively. In the beginning of the process, you felt a sense of belonging, but now you don’t. Marginal group members start to look outside the group for their interpersonal needs.

After several months of trying to cope with these adjustments, you decide that you never really investigated the other two companies and that your job search process was incomplete. Perhaps you should take a second look at the options. You will report to work on Monday but will start the process of becoming an ex-member, one who no longer belongs. You may experience a sense of relief upon making this decision, given that you haven’t felt like you belonged to the group for a while. When you line up your next job and submit your resignation, you make it official.

This process has no set timetable. Some people overcome differences and stay in the group for years; others get promoted and leave only when transferred to regional headquarters. As a skilled business communicator, you will recognize the signs of divergence, just as you have anticipated the storming stage, and do your best to facilitate success.

Positive and Negative Member Roles

If someone in your group always makes everyone laugh, that can be a distinct asset when the news is less than positive. At times, when you have to get work done, however, the class clown may become a distraction. Notions of positive and negative will often depend on the context when discussing groups. Table 19.2.3 (Beene, K. and Sheats, P., 1948; McLean, S., 2005) and Table 19.2.4 (Beene, K. and Sheats, P., 1948; McLean, s., 2005) list both positive and negative roles people sometimes play in a group setting (Beene, K. and Sheats, P., 1948; McLean, S., 2005).

Now that we’ve examined a classical view of positive and negative group member roles let’s examine another perspective. While some personality traits and behaviors may negatively influence groups, some are positive or negative, depending on the context.

Just as the class clown can have a positive effect in lifting spirits or a negative effect in distracting members, a dominator may be exactly what is needed for quick action. An emergency physician doesn’t have time to ask all the group members in the emergency unit how they feel about a course of action; instead, a self-directed approach based on training and experience may be necessary. In contrast, the pastor of a church may have ample opportunity to ask members of the congregation their opinions about a change in the format of Sunday services; in this situation, the role of coordinator or elaborator is more appropriate than that of dominator.

The group is together because they have a purpose or goal, and normally, they are capable of more than any one individual member could be on their own, so it would be inefficient to hinder that progress. But a blocker who cuts off collaboration does just that. If a group member interrupts another and presents a viewpoint or information that suggests a different course of action, the point may be well taken and serve the collaborative process. However, if that same group member repeatedly blocks behavior, the behavior becomes a problem. A skilled business communicator will learn to recognize the difference, even when positive and negative aren’t completely clear.

Key Takeaway

Groups and their individual members come together and grow apart in predictable patterns.

 

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Beene, K., & Sheats, P. (1948). Functional roles of group members. Journal of Social Issues, 37, 41–49.

Berger, C. (1986). Response uncertain outcome values in predicted relationships: Uncertainty reduction theory then and now. Human Communication Research, 13, 34–38.

Berger, C., & Calabrese, R. (1975). Some explorations in initial interactions and beyond: Toward a developmental theory of interpersonal communication. Human Communication Research, 1, 99–112.

Fisher, B. A. (1970). Decision emergence: Phases in group decision making. Speech Monographs, 37, 56–66.

Gudykunst, W. (1995). Anxiety/uncertainty management theory. In R. W. Wiseman (Ed.), Intercultural communication theory (pp. 8–58). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

McLean, S. (2005). The basics of interpersonal communication. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.

Moreland, R., & Levine, J. (1982). Socialization in small groups: Temporal changes in individual group relations. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 15, 153.

Tuckman, B. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 63, 384–399.

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