Armen Alchian Econ 490 Fall 2019: Teams

I have experienced many teams in my life, some good, some not so good. At the end of the day, I have never been on a team as intense as Team Six. The teams I've been on simply haven't had the efficiency and the structure to take out Osama Bin Laden anytime soon. For this example, I wish to discuss a recreational sports team I was a part of last year, more specifically my fraternities basketball league. This, I would agree, is certainly an example of a team, although there are definite flaws within the system. 

It works like this: we run a draft at the beginning of the semester with delegated captains. Usually, the captains are chosen based off their high skill level and knowledge for the game. After this happens, all the teammates are thrown into a group chat and discuss play times and sometimes, potential strategies. For reference, I usually go in round 5 or 6 of 10 rounds of drafting.

Since we are talking about a basketball team, I believe this would be considered an all channel network. Sure, the captain works to organize game times, however it is discussed heavily in the group chat before the game, so everyone has a say as to whether or not they can make it. On the court, everyone is free to communicate with one another to make the best approach for a victory. 

In terms of Katzenbach and Smith's distinguishing features of high functioning teams, there are definitely some pros to the system. The captain, who could potentially be seen as the manager in this case, offers his plan of attack but allows the rest of the team to give their two cents. It is with this that maximum creativity in our style of play is achieved.

We all have the same goal: to win by any means necessary. None of us are attempting to lose, but lose by less than the last game. This keeps all of our eyes on the prize. Also, the team size is certainly manageable, with five on the court at any given time, and a substitute or two on the side. 

The last few features are where things seem to fall apart. To be completely honest, I'm not the best basketball player, and that goes for all of the teams. As the draft goes on and on, the skill level lowers. Every team has members that aren't as well off as the others. This causes the mix of expertise to be less effective. Unlike a business, where team members are chosen for specific reason, every individual signed up to play basketball is allowed to play. Sure, people are chosen based on various height levels to fill certain positions better, but their skill may not be there. This also directly affects the next feature about working relationships. I didn't play the best, and was constantly being yelled at by other teammates during the game for 'not hustling enough' or missing shots. This, in turn, caused me to play worse. Then, at the end of the game, the group wasn't held collectively accountable. Instead of saying 'we all did!' when asked who took the final shot, it was more along the lines of, 'he took the shot, and he missed.' 

We weren't the best team. I believe that the flaws I pointed out are the reason why. It is with this that I propose an important characteristic of a good teammate: positive communication. Nobody wants to be treated poorly, and although management may think that pushing their employees in this way will be beneficial in the long run, I think the opposite. People skills are necessary. Encouragement is necessary. Enforce work ethic and goals, but do it kindly. 

Comments

  1. Professor ArvanSeptember 29, 2019 at 7:51 AM

    That's an interesting story. For my benefit, it would me to understand why your frat would have a formal IM team rather than just play pickup basketball, perhaps only with members of your fraternity or maybe with one other fraternity. Was there some preference for playing full court versus half court? Or was it that there were teams in past years so it was a tradition.

    I was also a little bit surprised that you didn't talk about practice at all, just performance in the games. It seems to me if your teammates were to help you perform better in a game, the help would be given in practice ahead of time.

    I also wonder if any of what happened on the basketball court carried over to other interactions in the Fraternity. Or was it - what is said on the basketball court stays on the basketball court?

    Now, taking this a couple of steps further, your fellow fraternity members pushing you is structurally different from me pushing you. If I think your blog post is weak (this one was okay, but could have explained things more) and I push you to improve the argument you make, maybe my tone won't be as kindly as you'd like, but the intent clearly will be to help you learn better. And the big thing is I have a lot of experience to back that up. On the experience of things, your fellow fraternity members are still novices at management. So it might be hard for them to sort out their own frustration from your learning benefit.

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    1. Armen AlchianNovember 25, 2019 at 4:58 PM

      This has been a tradition for quite some time now. I think we choose to do an IM league to add some real competition to the members of the house. This way, we can play all semester long and have a winner by the end. Also, with established teams, we can work on team chemistry, but if we simply played pickup basketball, we would be playing with a different team every time, most likely. Full court is always more preferred to half court, as we can run full court presses, as well as give the opportunity for breakaways. If a team is particularly tired, they will have a harder time getting up and down the court.

      We did practice, but usually shortly before a game. It was difficult enough to get enough members of a team to show up for the games each week, so scheduling a practice is not an easy task either.

      I love this question. The answer is yes and no. Nobody says anything about anybody's performance on the team after we return home. Well, at least not to their face. However, during the time when I was on the team, I did think a little bit differently about my teammates based on their reaction to how our team played, such as when I made a bad play. After some time has passed, I don't think about this anymore, and I don't believe they do either.

      I agree with this. When you comment and point out things that I could have done better, I take this as a learning opportunity because I am aware you know what you are talking about. When my teammates are frustrated with me, I understand that it is simply because they are better than me, even though their means of management are not professional.

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