BMGT 110 Study Guide - Midterm Guide: Process Variable, Group Cohesiveness, Organizational Culture
23 May 2018
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1. After reading the case, do you think that the teams in the case reflect an
optimally successful team/working group? Why or why not? What two
recommendations would you make to either maintain their success or improve
the team?
After reading the case, I have concluded that teams working for Snapchat do not reflect
optimal success within a working group. This is due to multiple factors regarding the
team’s overall characteristics, their behaviors, and the external/internal work
environment. More importantly, there is a disparity between the current team structure
present in Snapchat and team effectiveness, this results in less than optimal working
group. The disparity mainly exists within a comparison of Snapchat and the ‘Team
Effectiveness Model’, which organizes key components of effective teams into three
categories of influences. The first is resources and contextual influences contributing to
team effectiveness. The second relates to the compositional aspect of a team. Finally,
the third explores process variables as events within the team impacting effectiveness.
For the purpose of this analysis, I will highlight key factors that are most applicable to
Snapchat. The first category of context includes adequate resources, leadership and
structure, climate of trust, and performance evolution and reward systems. In the case
of Snapchat, an issue that directly jumps out to me is regarding trust and leadership and
structure. These two go hand in hand when discussing the problems that are present.
Trust is the foundation of most employee relationships with their coworkers, superiors,
and top executives. When entering a new company, recruits are excited to put their best
foot forward. On the other hand, managers are typically excited to have fresh talent and
innovation on their teams. As a result, everyone is expected to work toward common
goals in order to help the company succeed. However, Spiegel’s obsession for secrecy
has controlled the company and has defined many employees experiences with them
negatively. For example, an employee stated that, I definitely didn't feel as if I was a
valued part of the team. When you don't know what's going on and just read about it in
the headlines, it makes you feel like an outsider. You feel like a fool.” This establishes
context of the problem Snapchat faces and showcases how there is a lack of effective
and successful teamwork. When employees are unable to hear communication from
leadership about core actions that are undertaken, they are not only left in the dark, but
are only working with half of the information available. According to the case, most
employees do not know when a new product is coming, even if it has the potential to
affect their team's long-term metrics or goals. This errods the climate of trust within the
organization because Snapchat's excessive behavior of withholding information has
changed norms. This also showcases problems with leadership, because while the
problem of quelling leaks is addressed, the CEO shows that he can not trust his own
Document Summary
After reading the case, i have concluded that teams working for snapchat do not reflect optimal success within a working group. This is due to multiple factors regarding the team"s overall characteristics, their behaviors, and the external/internal work environment. More importantly, there is a disparity between the current team structure present in snapchat and team effectiveness, this results in less than optimal working group. The disparity mainly exists within a comparison of snapchat and the team. Effectiveness model", which organizes key components of effective teams into three categories of influences. The first is resources and contextual influences contributing to team effectiveness. The second relates to the compositional aspect of a team. Finally, the third explores process variables as events within the team impacting effectiveness. For the purpose of this analysis, i will highlight key factors that are most applicable to. The first category of context includes adequate resources, leadership and structure, climate of trust, and performance evolution and reward systems.
