Question

3. What is meant by the term “employee empowerment?” What is the relationship between employee empowerment and teamwork?

9. Briefly describe the five stages of the life cycle of a team. Is it important for a team to pass through each of these stages? Why or why not?

11. What is meant by a self-directed work team? In your judgment, are self-directed work teams a good idea? Explain your answer.

15. What are the primary sources of conflict in work teams? What are some of the methods for resolving team conflict?

Answer 1

Employee empowerment - It means giving employees autonomy in the workplace to a certain extent and decision-making power for certain tasks associated with heir work. Employees are provided necessary tools and resources to aid their decision making without any approval. The employees are made accountable for their actions.

For example - Travel policy of one company allows the salesperson to book air tickets for sales related travel up to $1000. On the other hand, in another company salesperson needs to go thru lengthy approvals for ticket booking. In the first case, the salesperson would be happy that he has the power (empowered) to make decisions on his own and in the second case the salesperson would feel frustrated if approvals are not on time.

Teamwork is one of the objectives of employee empowerment, At the offset, it may look two different things as one supports an individual (employee empowerment) and other talks about the team. However, both are mingled with each other.Organizations encourage employees to take initiatives to contribute positively to the team. Empowered employees generally help in creating an environment for team-work and take efforts to finish their tasks and help others in their work. Further, empowered employees believe in shared decision making with peers at their levels. Instead of going higher-up to sort things, they take it up with their team and find solutions to issues. All this increases the team bonding and team goals being met.