Beyond the Team ($68 + GST)
Book by R Meredith Belbin
2000
Butterworth Heinemann

'The answer is that Belbin's analysis sheds brilliant light on the source of so much confusion and disappointment at work. There is little he doesn't understand about the way we work now. He is both captain and our number one team player.' Management Today

Beyond the Team draws on Meredith Belbin’s extensive work with organisations worldwide to give further insights into the workings of teams and groups. The modern job needs to be actively interpreted and constantly revised in terms of the balance between a team role, a work role and a professional role. The increasingly complex demands of modern jobs can be aided by a colour system as tested in international trials. A colour based top down, bottom up form of communication creates sensitive feedback with a special value where members of a workforce do not share common language.

The language systems of these roles are developed and discussed as they recur in both theory and practice. The socially complex nature of communication in the workplace offers parallels with the intricacies of the social insect world. Information technology is extending human networking with the potential of creating a form of organisation closer to what can be achieved in superorganisms

Beyond the Team shows how eventually, the mature team can learn to distribute work between its own members by giving a comprehensive understanding of how to manage both team roles and work roles.

Contents

• The impact of team roles
• Rise and fall of the team
• Distinguishing teams from groups
• Understanding work roles
• What pink work reveals
• A framework for meetings
• What ever happened to empowerment?
• Rewards and renumeration
• Adding value to the job
• Feedback and networking
• Decision-making and the mature organisation
• From groups to supergroups
• Some steps in the right direction
• Snakes and Ladder

• The Apollo Syndrome
• Creativity
• Team Leadership
• Improving Unsuccessful Teams
• Winning Teams
• Team Size
• Designing a Team
• Teams in Public Affairs

‘It should be read by all who have responsibility for guiding organisations in their selection of management teams’
Personnel Management