The Handbook for Working with Difficult Groups

WE'VE ALL EXPERIENCED the challenges associated with working with groups, but The Handbook for Working with Difficult Groups turns the idea of "difficult groups" on its head. Rather than view groups as inherently difficult, it looks at the factors that make working with groups difficult. Individual chapters focus on challenges such as involving dissenters, building external perspectives, reducing complaining, adapting to cultural differences, incorporating diversity, facilitating inclusion, working virtually, resolving identity-based conflict, transforming unproductive behavior patterns, preventing workplace harassment, and strengthening accountability.

The book first provides a framework for thinking systemically about the many and varied ways in which working with a group can be difficult. Building on that framework, the contributors each address three basic issues:

• How the group is difficult—a description of a real group and the observable phenomena that reflect the group's difficulty.
• Why the group is difficult—an exploration of the underlying causes of the difficulty.
• What you can do about it—what you can do as a group facilitator, leader, or member to help the group.

Preface xi
Sandor Schuman

About the Contributors xv

Introduction

Working with Difficult Groups: A Conceptual Framework xxix

Make sense out of what makes working with groups difficult.
Sandor Schuman and John Rohrbaugh

One Keeping Difficult Situations from Becoming Difficult Groups 1

Dissenters need support, or the group risks going off track.
Marvin Weisbord and Sandra Janoff

Two Building an External Focus: Avoiding the Difficulties on an In-grown Team 17

The critical importance of an external perspective.
Deborah Ancona and David F. Caldwell

Three The Downside of Communication: Complaining Cycles in Group Discussions 33

Help teams get out of the ‘‘complaining loop’’ and turn to solution-oriented interaction instead.
Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock and Simone Kauffeld

Four Facilitating Multicultural Groups 55

Customize structures and processes to match groups’ cultural preferences.
Donna Rae Scheffert and Mary Laeger-Hagemeister

Five Interpersonally Hostile Work Groups: Precipitating Factors and Solutions 77

A group perspective on workplace harassment and bullying is essential to understanding and preventing it.
Jana L. Raver and Ingrid C. Chadwick

Six Diversity by Design: Creating Cognitive Conflict to Enhance Group Performance 95

Ill defined, diversity might undermine a group’s purpose.
Michael Cassidy

Seven Facilitating Inclusion: Study Circles on Diversity and Student Achievement 113

Bridging differences in culture and ethnicity can foster academic achievement
Mark A. Clark and John Landesman

Eight Overcoming Sources of Irrationality That Complicate Working in Decision-Making Groups 137

Six factors make working with this group difficult in many different ways.
Dennis S. Gouran

Nine Working Without Rules: A Team in Need of a Different Picture 153

Affirmative language encourages new views of a team’s past and future.
Ann Lukens

Ten Interaction Archetypes: Keys to Group Difficulty and Productivity 169

Identify the repetitive behavioral sequences that reduce a group’s ability to produce results.
Steven Ober

Eleven Virtual Teams: Difficult in All Dimensions 189

Group members working virtually and interdependently face enormous challenges.
Thomas A. O’Neill and Theresa J. B. Kline

Twelve Politics of the Arts: Challenges in Working with Nonprofit Boards 207

A ‘‘confessional tale’’—lessons learned while facilitating an arts board in transition.
Richard W. Sline and Anna C. Boulton

Thirteen Competitive Group Interactions: Why They Exist and How to Overcome Them 223

Groups are less cooperative than individuals—learn how you can reduce intergroup conflict.
Taya R. Cohen, Brian P. Meier, Verlin B. Hinsz, and Chester A. Insko

Fourteen Active Facilitation: How to Help Groups Break Through ‘‘Mutual Stalemate’’ 237

Groups may abdicate their responsibilities waiting until another group makes the first move.
Celia Kirwan and Wes Siegal

Fifteen Mediating History, Making Peace: Dealing with the ‘‘Messy’’ Stuff in the Conciliation Process 251

Identity-based conflicts will not achieve long-term solutions through resource-based settlements.
Dagmar Kusa, Adam Saltsman, and Philip Gamaghelyan

Sixteen Deep Democracy: Multidimensional Process-Oriented Leadership 275

Learn to track the shifting roles of group members.
Stanford Siver

Seventeen Authentic Relationships and Collective Psychological Capital 293

How leader behavior can undermine group success.
Füsun Bulutlar

Eighteen How Leaders Can Make Diverse Groups Less Difficult: The Role of Attitudes and Perceptions of Diversity 311

Perceptions that lead to subgrouping can override the positive effects of diversity.
Astrid C. Homan and Karen A. Jehn

Nineteen The Hero’s Journey: Helping Inflexible Groups—and Inflexible Facilitators—Get Unstuck 323

Use the Hero’s Journey as an analytical and facilitation tool to help groups and facilitators get out of difficulties.
Carol Sherriff and Simon Wilson

Twenty Difficult Groups or Difficult Facilitators? Three Steps Facilitators Can Take to Make Sure They Are Not the Problem 339

Facilitators can unknowingly contribute to the difficulties their group’s experience.
Glyn Thomas

Key Terms 353

References 367

Name Index 401

Subject Index 409

Sandy Schuman has been helping organizations work more effectively to solve complex problems and make critical decisions for more than thirty years. He is a group facilitator, collaborative process advocate, and storyteller. He helps groups create shared meaning, make critical choices, and build collaborative relationships. He facilitates problem-solving and decision-making processes for a wide variety of public management and policy issues and provides training in group facilitation, decision making, systems thinking, conflict management systems, and organizational communication. He is the editor of the International Association of Facilitators handbook series: The IAF Handbook of Group Facilitation, Creating a Culture of Collaboration, and Working with Difficult Groups.

WE'VE ALL EXPERIENCED the challenges associated with working with groups, but The Handbook for Working with Difficult Groups turns the idea of "difficult groups" on its head. Rather than view groups as inherently difficult, it looks at the factors that make working with groups difficult. Individual chapters focus on challenges such as involving dissenters, building external perspectives, reducing complaining, adapting to cultural differences, incorporating diversity, facilitating inclusion, working virtually, resolving identity-based conflict, transforming unproductive behavior patterns, preventing workplace harassment, and strengthening accountability.

The book first provides a framework for thinking systemically about the many and varied ways in which working with a group can be difficult. Building on that framework, the contributors each address three basic issues:

• How the group is difficult—a description of a real group and the observable phenomena that reflect the group's difficulty.
• Why the group is difficult—an exploration of the underlying causes of the difficulty.
• What you can do about it—what you can do as a group facilitator, leader, or member to help the group.