Team Exercise Designing a Dream Team least, address the following issues. You are free to discuss The Situation other issues you feel may be important in the development of You have just met with the CEO of X-lent, a medium-sized cloth- the new X-lent team. ing manufacturing company with factories in China and Mexico. Justify each of your answers. Do not just give one sentence X-lent sells to several large stores that carry moderately priced responses. Explain why you believe your recommendations are clothing in the United States. The CEO is concerned that her cus- appropriate and critical. tomers have expressed increasing dissatisfaction with X-lent's responsiveness to their complaints about product quality, the 1. What type of group should this be? (Formal or informal? returned-order process, and the overall treatment by the company's Command? Project? Committee?) employees when there is any kind of customer service problem. 2. Discuss the best fit characteristics for this team (for The CEO has asked your consulting group to make recommenda- example, size, composition, and roles). tions for a permanent customer service "dream team," which will 3. How should norms be established? This may relate to the develop and oversee plans and policies to address these issues. type of team you recommend. Your team must now develop the recommendations that you 4. How much conformity and cohesion will be needed will then present to the CEO and the top management of for this team to perform effectively? What could X-lent X-lent. (Remember, you are not designing or discussing your do to help the team develop an appropriate level of own team. You are making recommendations to the CEO as to cohesion? the composition of the new X-lent team to be assigned this task.) 5. What team competencies will be most critical? 6. How can the organization assist the team in developing its Assignment effectiveness? Your group's assignment is to develop recommendations to Source: Grace B. McLaughlin, Ph.D. Reprinted with the permission of present to the CEO. Your recommendations should, at the the author