DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A WORK GROUP AND A TEAM

What is a group

A group is an assemblage of persons who work, interact and cooperate with one another in achieving a common goal in a specified time. The identity of the group members is taken individually. The members share information and resources with other group members. A group is a collection of individuals who coordinate their individual efforts.

What is a team.

A group of people who are joined for achieving a common goal within a stipulated period, having collective accountability is known as the team. The agenda of the team is "one for all and all for one". Apart from sharing information, the team members also share the responsibility of the team task. The team is always responsible for the outcome (i.e. Result of the collective efforts of the team members). A team is a group of people who share a common team purpose and a number of challenging goals. Members of the team are mutually committed to the goals and to each other. This mutual commitment also creates joint accountability which creates a strong bond and a strong motivation to perform.

The team members have a mutual understanding with other members. They work jointly to maximize the strength and minimize the weakness by complementing each other. The most important feature of a team is "synergy" i.e. The team can achieve much more as the members can achieve individually.

The deference between a group can be discussed in various perspective;

v  Purpose And Relationship Of Members Of The Group.

The main difference is that a team's strength or focus depends on the commonality of their purpose and how the individuals are connected to one another. On the other hand, a group can come from having a large number of people or a cohesive willingness to carry out a focused action - political reform, for example.

While these differences might be subtle, we have to understand that a group is a number of individuals forming a unit for a reason or cause, and a team is a collection of accomplished people coming together for a common goal that needs completion. The subtleness of these differences are more pronounced when we take these words a step further and look at a work group and work team.

v  Work Group And Work Team.

In the business world, we have work groups and work teams. A work team has members who work interdependently on a specific, common goal to produce an end result for their business. A work group is two or more individuals who are interdependent in their accomplishments and may or may not work in the same department. Once again, the differences are subtle, but the main thread is a team works together and shares in the outcome, while a group is more independent of each other.

The deference between group and team in the workplace can be drown in the following ways;

v  There is only one head in a group. A team can have more than one head.

v  The group members do not share responsibility. But the team members share responsibility.

v  The group focuses on achieving the individual goals. Conversely the team members focus on achieving the team goals

v  The group produces individual work products. As opposed to, the team who produces collective work products.

v  The process of a group is to discuss the problem, then decide and finally delegate the tasks to individual members. On the other hand, a team discusses the problem, them decide the way of solving it and finally do it collectively.

v  The group members are independent. Unlike a group, the team members are interdependent.

The deference can also be discussed by comparison;

         Basis for Comparison                        Group                                    Team

Meaning	A collection of individuals who work together in completing a task.	A group of persons having collective identity joined together, to accomplish a goal.
Leadership	Only one leader, The leader dominates and controls the group.	More than one, The leader acts as a facilitator.
Members	Independent, The leader is apparent and will conduct the meeting, The leader usually assigns work to the members.	Interdependent, The members have active participation in the discussions and eventual outcome, The team members decide on the disbursements of work assignments.
Process	Discuss, Decide and Delegate.	Discuss, Decide and Do.
Work Products	Individual	Collective
Focus on	Accomplishing individual goals.	Accomplishing team goals.
Accountability	Individually	Either individually or mutually

Sources/ Reference

https://study.com/academy/lesson/the-difference-between-groups-and-teams-definition-contrasts.html

https://www.bizjournals.com/bizjournals/how-to/growth-strategies/2013/06/the-difference-between-a-group-and-a.html

https://keydifferences.com/difference-between-group-and-team.html