In many organizations, perhaps the best way to approach certain new projects is to assemble a group of people into a team. Having a team of people attack a project offers several advantages. First of all, a group of people has a wider range of knowledge, expertise, and skills than any single individual is likely to possess. Also, because of the number of people involved and the greater resources they possess, a group can work more quickly in response to the task assigned to it and can come up with highly creative solutions to problems and issues. Sometimes these creative solutions come about because a group is more likely to make risky decisions that an individual might not undertake. This is because the group spreads responsibility for a decision to all the members and thus no single individual can be held accountable if the decision turns out to be wrong.
Taking part in a group process can be very rewarding for members of the team. Team members who have a voice in making a decision will no doubt feel better about carrying out the work that is entailed by that decision than they might doing work that is imposed on them by others. Also, the individual team member has a much better chance to “shine,” to get his or her contributions and ideas not only recognized but recognized as highly significant, because a team’s overall results can be more far-reaching and have greater impact than what might have otherwise been possible for the person to accomplish or contribute working alone.
Professor
Now I want to tell you about what one company found when it decided that it would turn over some of its new projects to teams of people and make the team responsible for planning the projects and getting the work done. After about six months, the company took a look at how well the teams performed.
On virtually every team, some members got almost a “free ride” . . . they didn’t contribute much at all, but if their team did a good job, they nevertheless benefited from the recognition the team got. And what about group members who worked especially well and who provided a lot of insight on problems and issues? Well . . . the recognition for a job well done went to the group as a whole; no names were named. So it won’t surprise you to learn that when the real contributors were asked how they felt about the group process, their attitude was just the opposite of what the reading predicts.
Another finding was that some projects just didn’t move very quickly. Why? Because it took so long to reach consensus; it took many, many meetings to build the agreement among group members about how they would move the project along.
On the other hand, there were other instances where one or two people managed to become very influential over what their group did. Sometimes when those influencers said, “That will never work” about an idea the group was developing, the idea was quickly dropped instead of being further discussed. And then there was another occa-sion when a couple influencers convinced the group that a plan of theirs was “highly creative.” And even though some members tried to warn the rest of the group that the project was moving in directions that might not work, they were basically ignored by other group members. Can you guess the ending to this story? When the project failed, the blame was placed on all the members of the group.
The lecturer talks about some important findings in a firm which adopted the group system for performing certain important tasks. He says that adopting a group system for carrying out some activities showed results which were contradictory from those stated in the passage.
First, some members got free rides. That is, some of the members didn’t contribute anything to their group but got the recognition for success. Also, some members worked diligently and provided a lot of insights on the problems and issues but didn’t receive the credit for their work which they deserved. This directly contradicts with the fact stated in the passage that an individual member has a much better chance to shine and get his or her contributions recognized.
Second, the projects took a longer time to be completed than what was expected. The passage states that a group can work more quickly in response to a task assigned to it as more number of people are involved and greater resources they possess. However, the firm that found out that groups were slower in their decision-making than an individual. Groups needed more time for their meetings in order to build an agreement and reach a consensus. This was another finding where reality contradicted theory.
Third, some members of the group managed to become influential and the group followed the opinions and ideas of these influential members. If those turn out to be in the right direction there wouldn’t be any problem. But, sometimes, their ideas simply move in the wrong direction and no other member in the group has enough influence to oppose these ideas. In other words, there will be less flexibility in thinking process and the group may become one-sided. This directly contradicts with the fact stated in the passage that a group is likely to come out with highly creative solutions as a group spreads the responsibility for decision-making to all its members.
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 46, Rule ID: SOME_OF_THE[1]
Message: Simply use 'some'.
Suggestion: some
..., some members got free rides. That is, some of the members didn't contribute anything...
^^^^^^^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, may, second, so, third, in other words
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 11.0 10.4613686534 105% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 3.0 5.04856512141 59% => OK
Conjunction : 12.0 7.30242825607 164% => OK
Relative clauses : 11.0 12.0772626932 91% => OK
Pronoun: 26.0 22.412803532 116% => OK
Preposition: 38.0 30.3222958057 125% => OK
Nominalization: 5.0 5.01324503311 100% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 1626.0 1373.03311258 118% => OK
No of words: 319.0 270.72406181 118% => OK
Chars per words: 5.09717868339 5.08290768461 100% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.22617688928 4.04702891845 104% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.77364106854 2.5805825403 107% => OK
Unique words: 175.0 145.348785872 120% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.548589341693 0.540411800872 102% => OK
syllable_count: 490.5 419.366225166 117% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.55342163355 97% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 6.0 3.25607064018 184% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.23620309051 49% => OK
Subordination: 1.0 1.25165562914 80% => OK
Conjunction: 0.0 1.51434878587 0% => OK
Preposition: 1.0 2.5761589404 39% => More preposition wanted as sentence beginning.
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 16.0 13.0662251656 122% => OK
Sentence length: 19.0 21.2450331126 89% => OK
Sentence length SD: 43.2950902961 49.2860985944 88% => OK
Chars per sentence: 101.625 110.228320801 92% => OK
Words per sentence: 19.9375 21.698381199 92% => OK
Discourse Markers: 4.3125 7.06452816374 61% => OK
Paragraphs: 4.0 4.09492273731 98% => OK
Language errors: 1.0 4.19205298013 24% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 4.33554083885 231% => Less positive sentences wanted.
Sentences with negative sentiment : 4.0 4.45695364238 90% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 2.0 4.27373068433 47% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.123208649964 0.272083759551 45% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0415314907561 0.0996497079465 42% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0293658573271 0.0662205650399 44% => Sentences are similar to each other.
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0728828402453 0.162205337803 45% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0326405230538 0.0443174109184 74% => OK
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.6 13.3589403974 94% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 60.65 53.8541721854 113% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 5.55761589404 56% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 9.5 11.0289183223 86% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 12.3 12.2367328918 101% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 8.49 8.42419426049 101% => OK
difficult_words: 79.0 63.6247240618 124% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 10.7273730684 75% => OK
gunning_fog: 9.6 10.498013245 91% => OK
text_standard: 10.0 11.2008830022 89% => OK
What are above readability scores?
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Rates: 71.6666666667 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 21.5 Out of 30
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Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.