Business Case Studies & Business Publications

Learning Teams: Shrinking to Fit (A)

Clawson, James G.,...

Case

Learning Teams: Shrinking to Fit (A)

Clawson, James G.; Yemen, Gerry; Russell, Sondra

OB-0839 | Published February 26, 2005 | 5 pages Case

Collection: Darden School of Business

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Teams often collapse over personality issues. This case explores such a collapse, in the context of an MBA student learning team. Students can explore personality differences, analytical strategy, gender, ethnicity, and race issues. Joann Moyer, an MBA student facing her first year exams, is anxious and conflicted at what she perceives as personality conflicts among her team members. In the (A) case, she prepares to confront the other people in her group. The (B) case reveals that the team actually has process issues around their learning frameworks and that many of the team's problems revolve around that and not personalities. The business world requires people to work together successfully, and good learning teams learn to cultivate the skills necessary to do so.