Transcription
For the reflective practitioner, there is an impact, uh, on reflection due to organizational dynamics. And so, what the reflective practitioner needs to think about, uh, is how to reflect within an organization and within a framework of the, the effects that dynamics can have.
So, the first question for us as reflective practitioners, when we're in a working environment, is to think about, uh, the team that we're a part of, the teams that exist in the organization. And what is a team? Well, a, a team is more than just a group of people. A team is, uh, people coming together, uh, with a common objective to achieve, um, uh, all of whom are mutually accountable for the work and see themselves, uh, as an entity, as a social entity within the organization. So, the reflective practitioner needs to understand the impact of groups and teams on their role within the school.
Um, it's true to say that all teams are groups, um, but, uh, all groups are not teams. Some groups are just people assembled together, uh, in the same place without any common goal or, or mutual accountability. Teams therefore have, uh, something known as task interdependence. Task interdependence is where each member of the group relies on other members of the group for the work that they're doing.
And within teams, uh, within organizations, we can consider different types of teams. There are, uh, teams which are permanent in an organization, for example, uh, departmental teams. And there, there are teams which are, uh, perhaps more transitory within the organization, teams coming together for particular tasks, um, or, or particular, um, uh, uh, activities within the school environment. And then, of course, there are, uh, other types of teams that can work together in a group, uh, for example, a total quality management group or a steering group. And there, of course, the, the temporary teams, um, tend to be very short-term and very focused on achieving a particular activity.
So, we can consider this impact of organizational dynamics on the reflective practitioner by looking at organizational dynamics from some categories. For example, the team operates within an environment, and the team creates its own environment, its own identity. And therefore, there are imposing factors on the reflective practitioner from this category, for example, how communication occurs between teams and the organizational space and structure for the team and its work.
There's also the team design, how big is the team and the people involved in the team. This is another category that the reflective practitioner needs to be aware of because of its potential impact. The team processes are very important to be aware of. The team processes can affect the functionality of the team, and ultimately, all of these lead to team effectiveness, or in other words, how the goals are being achieved, to what extent the objectives of the team are being met. So that we can see from this that the impact of teams and impact of, uh, the dynamics of teams for the reflective practitioner can be quite considerable from both a positive point of view and a negative point of view.
So, there are certain characteristics to be looked at in terms of the impact of teams. Um, the characteristics for the reflective practitioner are that the, the task should be accomplishable and it should be relevant, uh, to the team. And the reflective practitioner within the team can actually consider these imposing factors. If their team is quite small, um, um, but large enough to complete a task, this can have an effect on how the reflective practitioner is undertaking their role and undertaking the activity of reflection.
And the team composition, who are the people who comprise the team? Um, are they specialists, or are they, um, an accumulation of different specialized skills? And so, what this leads to is an understanding that teams are really homogeneous, or in other words, their people are supporting each other, working together, and developing as an entity in their own right. Then there's a higher degree of satisfaction in teams than there is in groups, and considerably less conflict. Whereas in a group of individuals who are not functioning as a team, we're potentially looking at more conflict and also a slower pace of development.
And so, the reflective practitioner can look at these two components and understand whether they are a team or a group. And so, this is important in terms of reflective practitioning to, to understand the impact that working within an organization and the dynamics of the organization can have on reflective practice.