The Nine Belbin’s Team Roles

Source: www.belbin.com

Introduction

A researcher from Cambridge, Dr Meredith Belbin, discovered the nine clusters of behaviour - these were called ' Belbin Team Roles'. He concluded that the team’s composition with similar kind of people will not last longer as together and no innovations will be created (Palmer, 2007).

For successful teams, Belbin (1993) argues that the following roles must be played by members of the team.

Table : 1.0 Belbin's Nine Team Roles

 (Belbin,1993) 

When working and observing groups, the team roles plays a vital part in how the team members coercively work together (Bates and McGrath, 2013).

 How to apply the Belbin’s Theory

To apply the Belbin’s theory it is compulsory to identify the strength and weaknesses of each individual in the team (Jones, Jowitt and Holton, 2016). Also, it needs to identify the team’s goals and objectives, the resource capacity and deadlines of your projects (Jones, Jowitt and Holton, 2016).

When recruiting, the combination of interviews and Belbin’s questionnaire can be used to identify each person’s role /s (Mowll and O'Neil, 2010). Also, assure that the team able to cover all the role functions and sometimes a single person can cover multiple roles (Hoover and Gorrell, 2009). Once the expectations are set, observe the progress, identify the failures and mitigate them (Hoover and Gorrell, 2009).

As mentioned by Bates and McGrath (2013), some example of problems it may rise and how roles impact them to resolve;

·         When an uncertainty of the team's objectives, how Shaper is acting.

·         When the low performance of the team, how better the Completer handling

·         When the team is not capable to resolve problems, how Plant is supporting

·         When the team is poor in analyzing a situation, how the Monitor get triggers

·         When the team can’t convert new ideas to the action, what Implementer is doing

·         When the team is lack of resources, how Resource Investigator tackle the resource balancing

·       When the team is lack of harmony and commitment, how team worker building the team spirit.

·      When the team is not collaborative, how Coordinator involves connecting moving parts.

·   When the team needs subject matter expert knowledge, how your Specialist contributes his knowledge to the project.

 

Figure:2.0 Belbin’s Role groups, (Jones and Jowitt, 2016)

Each of the Belbin’s roles has unique strengths and using them can compensate for any missing roles which would be a great challenge (Bourne and Bourne, 2009). Also discussing the strength of the team among the team would be the right way to complete the profiles. And it supports to identify and mitigate the potentially problematic areas which could arise inside the team (Mowll and O'Neil, 2010).

As discussed by Jones and Jowitt (2016) for example;

·         If the team consists of many Sharpers then they bring energy to the team, but they can create conflicts while they are competing.

·         If Completers finishers are lacking whilst the task is completed by the team, the quality of the end product will be poor.

·         If the Monitor evaluators are too many even, they support to new ideas and questions, it can lead to analysis paralysis.

When you select a leader to the team, his strength should be on people and the attributes of the Coordinator role more suitable for that (Palmer, 2007). So, Coordinators can be leaders on someday (Palmer, 2007).

 

Conclusion

By using Belbin’s theory, individuals can have self-assessment of their strengths, which will nourish the effective communications and precise understanding between teammates and the supervisors. To become a high performing team, the team should have access to nine roles of Belbin’s, and it doesn’t mean that every team must contain 9 individuals minimum, however, most of the team can have people who play two or three roles that are comfortable to them.

As Yemm (2013) discussed in his case study when a new project kick-off and a new team formed. The initial startup would be the focus of the team roles and teamwork rather than the project details. Once members are comfortable with their preferred roles, it is a lot easier to assign responsibilities and actions which fitted best for them. So, team members can get their work done a lot faster because they are happier with their roles and willing to go an extra mile because of that. That saves a lot of project hours and no debates or arguments raised because the team is focusing on their outputs and achievements. It transitions the team from forming towards storming in lot easier.

In modern work environments, managers are applying Belbin’s theory when forming new teams. Also, when recruiting it takes Belbin’s questionnaire to understand the right team member to the right role to combine with psychometric testing.

 

Reference

Bates, B. and McGrath, J., 2013. The Little Book of Big Management Theories. 1st ed. London, United Kingdom: Pearson.

Belbin, M., 1993. Team Roles at Work. 1st ed. Boston, United States: Butterworth-Heinemann.

Bourne, M. and Bourne, P., 2009. DK Essential Managers: Motivating People. 1st ed. London, United Kingdom: DK Publishing.

Hoover, J. and Gorrell, P., 2009. The Coaching Connection: A Manager’s Guide to Developing Individual Potential in the Context of the Organization. 1st ed. New York, United States: AMACOM.

Jones, P., Jowitt, A. and Holton, V., 2016. How to Coach Your Team. 1st ed. New Jersey, United States: FT Publishing International.

Mowll, J. and O'Neill, C., 2010. Fast Track to Success: Managing. 1st ed. London, United Kingdom: Pearson Business.

Palmer, S., 2007. People and Self Management. 1st ed. London, United Kingdom: Routledge.

Yemm, R., 2013. FT Essential Guide to Leading Your Team. 1st ed. New Jersey, United States: FT Publishing International.