Assessment Task 3 – Reflective Essay

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This reflective essay aims to analyse and critique the performance of members in the group assessment by applying theoretical concepts to help illustrate the effectiveness of the team’s overall performance. By being reflective of myself and my group members with respect to past events, will allow for new perspectives and insights that will act as a driver for improved performance in the future.

Although the group assessment was a universally positive experience, the group encountered numerous difficulties. In response, this reflective piece will explore and assess group performance using several theories centred around defining and measuring performance, managing teamwork, and motivating work performance.
Summary of Experiences

Upon being allocated into our group of five, we swiftly communicated over Facebook, where we planned the majority of our meetings to discuss the assessment. Everyone successfully contributed to forming group expectations, setting deadlines, and volunteering for the allocation of roles for the presentation. This was an essential part of managing our group assessment as we were able to gain consensus over team goals which led to our establishment of the Belbin team roles.

Furthermore, we created a Google Doc where members could collaborate, share ideas and provide feedback on other people’s work. This platform enabled us to have a positive group experience as it allowed us to manage our tasks by ticking them off or highlighting important tasks. Additionally, we discussed our group presentation by using Zoom meetings to identify issues and clarify our roles in the coming weeks. Zoom was an important facilitator for our meetings which allowed us to interact in a sociable way and ensure that everyone has a clear understanding of our presentation topic. The meetings also helped us pitch ideas to each other, discuss relevant PMS theories, and enabled us to practice our presentation smoothly. All members needed to attend the meetings to keep in touch with one another and update the team on their progress to ensure that individual tasks were still being completed.

During our collaboration, we experienced difficulties due to online teaching, which led to us feeling sceptical and nervous at first to communicate, resulting in time management problems. Nevertheless, we had a positive group experience, as we had a cohesive group that was open to new ideas and perspectives.
Analysing & Managing Group Performance

Group formation and teamwork was an important part of managing the performance of the presentation. Participating in a formal team allowed us to combine goals and problem- solving skills to achieve a common purpose, all qualities of a high performing team (Fulk et al., 2011). During our time as a team, we had clearly defined roles for each member and tracked the progress of performance through weekly goals. Being in a team was vital as we accepted both individual and collective responsibility. This meant we were mutually accountable for certain group tasks which allowed us to be intrinsically motivated to perform our best. Shin and Grant (2019) define intrinsic motivation as someone who is driven by internal factors, such as wanting to engage in a task because it delivers satisfaction or because it offers an opportunity to learn and for the sense of accomplishment that the task evokes (Shibly & Chatterjee, 2020).

Our team encompassed several Belbin Team Roles that positively impacted our performance. Belbin (1981) suggested that an ideal team should have all nine roles permitting any team member to encompass more than one. Belbin (1981) also expressed that the strengths of these roles are represented in high functioning teams and can compensate for another member’s weakness. These roles originally changed from what we previously thought and was evident in our group assessment, as in the start, we were not a high performing team. Nevertheless, many team members took the initiative to portray several Belbin roles in order to complete the presentation.

Another aspect used for delivering effective performance was to utilise the AMO model, which includes ability, motivation, and opportunity. The AMO model states that motivation is a contributor to positive discretionary effort, meaning if an individual is motivated, they will want to go above and beyond to complete their role (Marin-Garcia & Tomas, 2016). Intrinsic motivation was crucial for the group assessment as at university a student is mostly motivated by recognition and the psychological ‘reward’ of getting a high mark. According to Kumar and Raghavendran (2013), it is essentially the internal motivations at work that genuinely influence behaviour and performance. With the help of recognition and support from our team members, we were able to perceive group work as meaningful, leading us to improve our overall performance. Scholars such as Jones (1995) argue that rather than managing the performance of workers, managing the context in which performance occurs is more effective. However, due to our current situation, we were unable to control the context and deeply relied on intrinsic motivation to drive our performance.

In analysing our group performance, we adopted a developmental approach that focused on a team member’s behaviour and commitment, rather than outcomes or tangible rewards that that is traditionally valued (Stiles et al., 1997). Adopting a developmental approach was beneficial for its future-oriented view and use of goal-setting.

Goal-setting was a critical element of managing the group’s performance as meeting the weekly goals indicated how well the team was performing. Goal-setting theory focuses on creating SMART goals that are designed to motivate and guide team members towards reaching tasks. Throughout our assessment, team goals were discussed during weekly

meetings and through the group expectations document. However, a limitation of this theory that our group experienced is that goal-setting creates ‘tunnel vision’ where an exclusive focus allows members to ignore other priorities. Another limitation includes some goals being too difficult to write down for example, there may be no certain indicator to measure creativity (Latham & Locke, 2006). This limitation ultimately impeded our performance as we were less interactive due to our ideas not fulfilling the creativity criteria.

employees perform optimally under pressure and when they motivated externally by deadlines and rivalry with co-workers.

Nevertheless, the key take-away from the group assessment for real-world situations is to continue using psychological rewards such as recognition and words of encouragement. This is because it enabled us to form a stronger relationship with each other that helped motivate us and complete our team goals.
Conclusion

In summary, this essay focused on critiquing and reflecting upon group performance by exploring theoretical concepts including the Belbin team roles, the AMO model, Goal-setting theory, Equity theory, and Inner Work Life theory. Furthermore, this group assessment was a profound learning experience in which I was able to reflect on the preconceived ideas I had about managing teamwork and motivating work performance. This allowed me to obtain a newfound understanding and appreciation of how these lenses intertwine and are to be used in the future to manage performance.
References

Adams, J. S. (1963). Toward an understanding of inequity. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 67 (1), 422-436.

Albright, M. D., & Levy, P. E. (1995). The effects of source credibility and performance rating discrepancy on reactions to multiple raters. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 25 (7), 577-600.

Amabile, T., & Kramer, S. (2015). Inner work life: understanding the subtext of business performance. Management Review, 43 (1), 43–51.

Belbin, R. M. (1981). Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail. Heinemann. London.

Farndale, E., Kelliher, C., Brewster, C., Gollan, P., & Wright, P. (2013). Implementing Performance Appraisal: Exploring the Employee Experience. Human Resource Management, 52 (6), 879–897. doi/10.1002/hrm.

Fulk, H., Bell, R., & Bodie, N. (2011). Team Management by Objectives: Enhancing Developing Teams’ Performance. Journal of Management Policy and Practice, 12 (3), 17–26.

Huseman, R., Hatfield, J., & Miles, E. (1987). A New Perspective on Equity Theory: The Equity Sensitivity Construct. The Academy of Management Review, 12 (2), 222–234. https:// doi.org/10/

Jones, T. (1995). Performance management in a changing context: Monsanto pioneers a competency-based, developmental approach. Human Resource Management, 34 (3), 425–442.

Kumar, H., & Raghavendran, S. (2013). Not by money alone: the emotional wallet and talent management. Journal of Business Strategy, 34 (3), 16–23. doi/10.1108/JBS-11-2012-

Latham, G., & Locke, E. (2006). Enhancing the benefits and overcoming the pitfalls of goal setting. Organizational Dynamics, 35 (4), 332–340. doi/10.1016/j.orgdyn.2006.08.

Marin-Garcia, J., & Tomas, J. (2016). Deconstructing AMO framework: a systematic review. Intangible Capital, 12 (4), 1040–1087. doi/10.3926/ic.

Olawale, A., & Ishola, G. (2018). Inner Life, Meaningful Work, Conditions for Community, and Organisational Citizenship Behaviour. Economics and Business, 32 (1), 136–148. doi/10.1515/eb-2018-

Ryan, J. (2016). Old knowledge for new impacts: Equity theory and workforce nationalisation. Journal of Business Research, 69 (5), 1587–1592. doi/10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.10.
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Introduction
This reflective essay aims to analyse and critique the performance of members in the group
assessment by applying theoretical concepts to help illustrate the effectiveness of the team’s
overall performance. By being reflective of myself and my group members with respect to
past events, will allow for new perspectives and insights that will act as a driver for improved
performance in the future.
Although the group assessment was a universally positive experience, the group
encountered numerous difficulties. In response, this reflective piece will explore and assess
group performance using several theories centred around defining and measuring
performance, managing teamwork, and motivating work performance.
Summary of Experiences
Upon being allocated into our group of five, we swiftly communicated over Facebook, where
we planned the majority of our meetings to discuss the assessment. Everyone successfully
contributed to forming group expectations, setting deadlines, and volunteering for the
allocation of roles for the presentation. This was an essential part of managing our group
assessment as we were able to gain consensus over team goals which led to our
establishment of the Belbin team roles.
Furthermore, we created a Google Doc where members could collaborate, share ideas and
provide feedback on other people’s work. This platform enabled us to have a positive group
experience as it allowed us to manage our tasks by ticking them off or highlighting important
tasks. Additionally, we discussed our group presentation by using Zoom meetings to identify
issues and clarify our roles in the coming weeks. Zoom was an important facilitator for our
meetings which allowed us to interact in a sociable way and ensure that everyone has a
clear understanding of our presentation topic. The meetings also helped us pitch ideas to
each other, discuss relevant PMS theories, and enabled us to practice our presentation
smoothly. All members needed to attend the meetings to keep in touch with one another
and update the team on their progress to ensure that individual tasks were still being
completed.
During our collaboration, we experienced difficulties due to online teaching, which led to us
feeling sceptical and nervous at first to communicate, resulting in time management
problems. Nevertheless, we had a positive group experience, as we had a cohesive group
that was open to new ideas and perspectives.
Evaluating group performance
Upon reflecting on our group assessment, I became aware that three members of the group,
including myself, contributed significantly more than the remaining two team members. This
is strongly due to the unequal distribution of work and minimal responsibility the others
faced. A way the group decided to evaluate the performance of the members was to see
whether students completed their tasks on time and participated in meetings.
The three main members of the group performed comparatively well as opposed to the rest
by undertaking more initiative to ensure a successful presentation. An instance that
demonstrates our effort includes actively participating and asking questions. In this scenario,
only three group members were discussing relevant theories to be applied to the
presentation with minimal input and support from the other group members.
For evaluating individual performance, I also took an unappointed leadership role by
managing the group and facilitating discussions by arranging all the Zoom meetings. The
other two prominent group members met expectations by successfully planning
presentation rehearsals and ensuring the timeliness of the presentation. Another student
took a creative role (matching their Belbin ‘Plant’ role perfectly) by making sure the
presentation was interactive and appealing to the viewer. One of the key instances that
demonstrates effective performance behaviours was when both students wanted to get
every member’s opinion on their work to ensure cohesion and relevance. This was an
essential factor in maintaining group harmony and collegiality that improved our group
performance.
The remaining two students who took a less participative approach to our group assessment
contributed by participating in voting and completed their individual parts in a timely
manner. An excellent aspect about these two students was that they were open to new
ideas and constructive criticism to improve on their parts.
A key measure to evaluate the performance of all members and to rate them fairly was to
benchmark their performance to the group expectations document that was previously
created. This method remains appropriate because it removes bias due to the expectations
being created as a group. Regardless of some inequities, all the team members exerted
behaviours that matched with our weekly goals and initial values of teamwork, commitment
and creativity.
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Analysing & Managing Group Performance
Group formation and teamwork was an important part of managing the performance of the
presentation. Participating in a formal team allowed us to combine goals and problem-
solving skills to achieve a common purpose, all qualities of a high performing team (Fulk et
al., 2011). During our time as a team, we had clearly defined roles for each member and
tracked the progress of performance through weekly goals. Being in a team was vital as we
accepted both individual and collective responsibility. This meant we were mutually
accountable for certain group tasks which allowed us to be intrinsically motivated to perform
our best. Shin and Grant (2019) define intrinsic motivation as someone who is driven by
internal factors, such as wanting to engage in a task because it delivers satisfaction or
because it offers an opportunity to learn and for the sense of accomplishment that the task
evokes (Shibly & Chatterjee, 2020).
Our team encompassed several Belbin Team Roles that positively impacted our
performance. Belbin (1981) suggested that an ideal team should have all nine roles
permitting any team member to encompass more than one. Belbin (1981) also expressed
that the strengths of these roles are represented in high functioning teams and can
compensate for another member’s weakness. These roles originally changed from what we
previously thought and was evident in our group assessment, as in the start, we were not a
high performing team. Nevertheless, many team members took the initiative to portray
several Belbin roles in order to complete the presentation.
Another aspect used for delivering effective performance was to utilise the AMO model,
which includes ability, motivation, and opportunity. The AMO model states that motivation
is a contributor to positive discretionary effort, meaning if an individual is motivated, they
will want to go above and beyond to complete their role (Marin-Garcia & Tomas, 2016).
Intrinsic motivation was crucial for the group assessment as at university a student is mostly
motivated by recognition and the psychological ‘reward’ of getting a high mark. According to
Kumar and Raghavendran (2013), it is essentially the internal motivations at work that
genuinely influence behaviour and performance. With the help of recognition and support
from our team members, we were able to perceive group work as meaningful, leading us to
improve our overall performance. Scholars such as Jones (1995) argue that rather than
managing the performance of workers, managing the context in which performance occurs
is more effective. However, due to our current situation, we were unable to control the
context and deeply relied on intrinsic motivation to drive our performance.
In analysing our group performance, we adopted a developmental approach that focused on
a team member’s behaviour and commitment, rather than outcomes or tangible rewards
that that is traditionally valued (Stiles et al., 1997). Adopting a developmental approach was
beneficial for its future-oriented view and use of goal-setting.
Goal-setting was a critical element of managing the group’s performance as meeting the
weekly goals indicated how well the team was performing. Goal-setting theory focuses on
creating SMART goals that are designed to motivate and guide team members towards
reaching tasks. Throughout our assessment, team goals were discussed during weekly
meetings and through the group expectations document. However, a limitation of this
theory that our group experienced is that goal-setting creates ‘tunnel vision’ where an
exclusive focus allows members to ignore other priorities. Another limitation includes some
goals being too difficult to write down for example, there may be no certain indicator to
measure creativity (Latham & Locke, 2006). This limitation ultimately impeded our

performance as we were less interactive due to our ideas not fulfilling the creativity criteria.

Applying learnings to the future
Reflecting on past experiences, there were many inequities in the distribution of our group
work, resulting in more pressure being transferred to some team members. Adams (1963)
argues that the more inequity a worker experiences, the more distress they feel and try to
rebuild equity. Adams’ Equity Theory is built on the belief that employees become
demotivated in their roles if they feel their inputs are greater than the outputs. Huseman et
al. (1987) suggest that workers need to deliver certain inputs such as effort, commitment
and hard work to achieve outputs such as recognition and sense of achievement. In terms of
the group presentation, several members had to work harder to compensate for the team
members that had smaller roles. This is a real workplace issue that many employees face,
and in our assessment, it led to many members feeling demotivated as they compared
themselves to others. As a result, in the future, it would be better to manage performance
by having a detailed team charter that distributes work fairly and entails how the work will
be carried out. Equity theory reinforces the idea that workers should cooperate to find a fair
balance between the inputs and the outputs to achieve distributive justice, and thus
improve performance in the future. However, Ryan (2016) critiques that the practical
application of equity theory in the workplace, including unconscious biases and different
perceptions of fairness still, allow inequities to occur.
A key learning that the group assessment provided is to document the progress and
performance of the team in the future. This is because recency bias can affect the
interpretation we have of events, leading to performance appraisal issues. A way to combat
this weakness for the future is to utilise ‘absolute systems’ of measuring performance
(Farndale et al., 2013). This includes recording ‘critical incidents’ that identify and describe
specific good and bad events (incidents) of an employee’s performance. Critical incidents are
used to capture and measure the behaviour of employees that can be later used in
behavioural rating systems or in performance reviews to reflect and give appropriate
feedback to workers (Farndale et al., 2013). This approach can be applied to real-life where
you may need to reflect on your work in the future, hence it would be ideal to keep a record
of everyone’s behaviour and contribution. However, a limitation provided by Albright and
Levy (1995) of this approach is that it can be time-consuming for both employees and
managers to record these incidents as they happen, which can impede productivity in the
workplace.
Additionally, as a student, my perspective of performance management has changed over
the semester from valuing extrinsic motivators such as pay to intrinsic motivators such as
praise and meaningful relationships. The Inner Work Life Theory helps to explain this
transition as the theory is based upon analysing perceptions, emotions and motives to
enhance performance (Amabile & Kramer, 2015). Kumar and Raghavendran (2013) contest
that humans are naturally inclined to have emotions and perceptions that are often ignored
in the workplace. Therefore, to encourage their inner work life to flourish, team members
need to engage in constructive actions such as recognising the achievements of others and
providing emotional support. However, Olawale and Ishola (2018) disagree and argue that
Why is this page out of focus?
This is a Premium document. Become Premium to read the whole document.
employees perform optimally under pressure and when they motivated externally by
deadlines and rivalry with co-workers.
Nevertheless, the key take-away from the group assessment for real-world situations is to
continue using psychological rewards such as recognition and words of encouragement. This
is because it enabled us to form a stronger relationship with each other that helped
motivate us and complete our team goals.
Conclusion
In summary, this essay focused on critiquing and reflecting upon group performance by
exploring theoretical concepts including the Belbin team roles, the AMO model, Goal-setting
theory, Equity theory, and Inner Work Life theory. Furthermore, this group assessment was a
profound learning experience in which I was able to reflect on the preconceived ideas I had
about managing teamwork and motivating work performance. This allowed me to obtain a
newfound understanding and appreciation of how these lenses intertwine and are to be
used in the future to manage performance.
References
Adams, J. S. (1963). Toward an understanding of inequity. Journal of Abnormal and Social
Psychology, 67(1), 422-436.
Albright, M. D., & Levy, P. E. (1995). The effects of source credibility and performance rating
discrepancy on reactions to multiple raters. Journal of Applied Social Psychology,
25(7), 577-600.
Amabile, T., & Kramer, S. (2015). Inner work life: understanding the subtext of business
performance. Management Review, 43(1), 43–51.
Belbin, R. M. (1981). Management Teams: Why They Succeed or Fail. Heinemann. London.
Farndale, E., Kelliher, C., Brewster, C., Gollan, P., & Wright, P. (2013). Implementing
Performance Appraisal: Exploring the Employee Experience. Human Resource
Management, 52(6), 879–897. https://doi.org/10.1002/hrm.21575
Fulk, H., Bell, R., & Bodie, N. (2011). Team Management by Objectives: Enhancing
Developing Teams’ Performance. Journal of Management Policy and Practice, 12(3),
17–26.
Huseman, R., Hatfield, J., & Miles, E. (1987). A New Perspective on Equity Theory: The Equity
Sensitivity Construct. The Academy of Management Review, 12(2), 222–234.
https://doi.org/10.2307/258531
Jones, T. (1995). Performance management in a changing context: Monsanto pioneers a
competency-based, developmental approach. Human Resource Management, 34(3),
425–442.
Kumar, H., & Raghavendran, S. (2013). Not by money alone: the emotional wallet and talent
management. Journal of Business Strategy, 34(3), 16–23.
https://doi.org/10.1108/JBS-11-2012-0073
Latham, G., & Locke, E. (2006). Enhancing the benefits and overcoming the pitfalls of goal
setting. Organizational Dynamics, 35(4), 332–340.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.orgdyn.2006.08.008
Marin-Garcia, J.A., & Tomas, J.M. (2016). Deconstructing AMO framework: a systematic
review. Intangible Capital, 12(4), 1040–1087. https://doi.org/10.3926/ic.838
Olawale, A.R., & Ishola, G.K. (2018). Inner Life, Meaningful Work, Conditions for Community,
and Organisational Citizenship Behaviour. Economics and Business, 32(1), 136–148.
https://doi.org/10.1515/eb-2018-0011
Ryan, J. (2016). Old knowledge for new impacts: Equity theory and workforce
nationalisation. Journal of Business Research, 69(5), 1587–1592.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.10.022
Shibly, S., & Chatterjee, S. (2020). Surprise rewards and brand evaluations: The role of
intrinsic motivation and reward format. Journal of Business Research, 113, 39–48.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2020.03.009
Shin, J., & Grant, A. (2019). Bored by Interest: How Intrinsic Motivation in One Task Can
Reduce Performance on Other Tasks. Academy of Management Journal, 62(2), 415–

ASSESSMENT TASK 3 – Critical Reflective Essay