Should you avoid groupthink within projects? How to spot groupthink?

What is groupthink? There's a groupthink definition that describes how a team or a group of people can be motivated or directed to reaching one or another objective. Have you ever noticed that on a project meeting or some other type of group setting some participants didn't agree with major statements, but they didn't express their disagreement because they didn't want to appear unsupportive of the group's efforts? Or you've seen that most team members were reluctant to express their own opinions? If so, then you've probably faced the phenomenon of groupthink of the groupthink theory. Groupthink examples occur when the striving for group consensus dominates over people's common desire to find alternatives, criticize a stated position, or express an unpopular opinion. Here're some signs that take place in case of group think:

• There's a persuasive and confident team leader
• A high level of group cohesion
• There's an intense pressure from the outside on decision making

Groupthink has positive impact on projects as group members can join their efforts to the direction of the project goal. At the same time, projects can fail as group members won't be active in discussing problems and offering alternatives. So as project manager you should always keep track of project goals and arising problems and try to find solutions with help of group think. You shouldn't also forget about possible negative influences of groupthink like group inactivity and lack of new ideas and try to avoid them.

And VIP Task Manager will help you with this. The teamware is designed for project group management providing you with task management and group collaboration solutions. By using VIP Task Manager, you can put the groupthink theory into practice and personally examine its positive and negative aspects to finally find a balance between your team's efforts and established goals.

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