In the past, I worked as a member of a team aimed at organizing several discussions on business studies. On the whole, our team leader was rather effective; he was always clear and consistent in his statements and actions, showed integrity, and was able to organize an effective flow of information in the team. However, it should be noted that he did not encourage or motivate us; luckily, we were rather motivated on our own.
The type of team we worked in was probably a self-managing team, for often, the members of the team could use their judgment to decide what to do to meet the established general goals (Exploring business, 2014). It was also a virtual team to a certain degree, for we mainly interacted via e-mail.
Our team worked on an educational project (as has been stressed, we organized several discussions on business studies). The team was project-based, for we gathered and created our team to implement our project, that is, to organize the discussions.
The people in the team worked together in a rather efficacious manner. In particular, the responsibilities were rather adequately distributed between the team members, so that everyone would be able to do their part and not be overloaded. We usually met the deadlines and did not engage in conflict. However, in some cases, several people missed meetings, and we were forced to explain everything to them later via e-mail. In addition, it is difficult to say that there was synergy; although the team members worked in a coordinated manner, in most cases, everyone simply did their job remotely and then reported the results via e-mail.
Nevertheless, despite these problems, our team was rather successful; we were able to organize the discussions as intended, and they were rather interesting and informative.
The type of communication which is utilized in Zappos is lateral (horizontal) communication (Exploring business, 2014). This is because the employees of the Zappos company appear to communicate freely with one another; it seems that they do so not only because they have to due to being colleagues, but in many cases, because they wish to; in addition, one’s position inside the company does not appear to matter very much while engaging in communication with colleagues (Rice Sport Management, 2011). This communication is informal; employees probably perceive one another not just as colleagues but also as friends.
Inside the company, the channels of communication that are probably used are face-to-face conversations, e-mails, messages, phone calls; similar channels could be used to engage in informal communication outside the enterprise (Exploring business, 2014). As for formal external communication, it is still present – in the form of advertising, websites, letters and speeches, and so on (Exploring business, 2014).
It might be assumed that to handle cultural barriers to communication, Tony Hsieh would attempt to create common grounds between the individuals facing the barrier, and help them build communication on these grounds. As for divisional barriers, he probably would attempt to weaken the formalities existing between divisions, making the communication more informal and friendly.
These types of communication would likely be effective in some industries aimed at producing creative content, for a friendly atmosphere is probably essential for doing so. However, such communication might be ineffective in the government or the army, or in industries where workers have to engage in manual, repetitive labor.
References
Exploring business. (2014). Washington, D.C.: The Saylor Foundation.
Rice Sport Management. (2011). Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos, featured on 20/20. Web.