Week 4 - Blog 4: Types of Teams (Ch. 8)

The authors state, regarding team-based organization, that "teams...generally fall into three categories or types: project teams, work teams, and quality-improvement teams" (p. 236). Fortunately, I have experienced these three types in my workplace. In one of my workplaces at a community college, an ESL lab, we have one coordinator (boss) and six teaching assistants. As a small organization, we coordinate some projects to develop better service (teaching and learning) for the students, as a "project team." Also, we, as a "work team," have responsibility for the whole work process. Not only teaching, but we also promot our services (what kind of activities and classes we offer, etc.). We are also a quality-improvement team because we "improve customer satisfaction, evaluate and improve team performance, and reduce costs" (p. 241). Since we have been threatened by the huge economic crisis, now our attention has turned to how we reduce costs.