CLC - Effective Communication. Essay Sample.

The type of communication group of choice is the Congressional Caucus, which was formally formed as the Congressional Member Organizations (CMOs) via the Senate of the United States and the U.S House of Representatives. This particular communication group is made up of various members of the United States Congress. Usually, the members of this group meet to pursue common legislative objectives (Bardes, Shelley & Schmidt, 2014). With regard to the type of communication used in this particular group, scholars contend that the Caucus group can represent the voting members of the two major political parties in the United States, the Republicans, and the Democrats. For instance, the speaker of the Senate would be referring to that group of Senators associated with the Republican Party.

Federal communication is the primary type of communication that takes place in this particular group. In this regard, many important decisions are made by the Caucus of the majority. In the American Senate, the majority is represented by the Caucus of the party with the most members representing the legislative body (Smith, Roberts, & Vander Wielen, 2011).

Stages of Group Development According to Tuckmans Theory

Like many other groups, the Congressional Caucus must have been formed through various developmental stages. According to Tuckmans Theory, there are five stages of group development which include; forming, storming, norming, and the performing stage. In his account, Bruce Tuckman contended that the five phases are all the inevitable stages of the growth of any team, tackle problems, face challenges, find solutions as well as deliver the required results (MindTools, 2016).

Forming

This is the initial stage of the group which is high dependence on the direction and guidance of the leader. Besides, at this phase, group members highly rely on a safe patterned behavior since all the personal relations in the group are characterized by dependence. Because of primary functions of the group concern orientation, in this phase, the members of the group tend to become oriented to one another and also to tasks.

Storming

Usually the second phase of development. According to Tuckman, this stage is characterized by both conflict and competition in the dimension of personal-relations. Besides, members of this group are expected to bend and mold their feelings, attitudes, ideas as well as their beliefs to suit the organization. In this regard, to advance to the next stage, group members have to make progress from a mentality centered on testing and proving to that which is more of problem-solving.

Norming

Unlike the first and the second phase, the interpersonal relations at this phase are characterized by cohesion. Based on the problem-solving mentalities developed at the storming phase, members of the team are willing to change their opinions basing their facts on what is presented by the other members. Therefore, this being the case, the primary task in this particular phase is data flow among various group members. However, the norming phase has one major drawback, which is the fact that members may begin to fear the inevitable future breakup of the group (Abudi, 2010).

Performing Stage

In many cases, the performing stage is considered as the final stage which is in fact not reached by all the communication groups. However, for a group with members who can evolve to the fourth phase, their depth, capacity, and range of personal relations among the members has the potential to expand to true interdependence. Besides, this phase is marked by the existing relationship in both personal relationships and problem-solving in the realm of tsk functions.

References

Abudi, G. (2010, May 9). The Five Stages of Team Development: A Case Study. Retrieved from https://www.projectsmart.co.uk/the-five-stages-of-team-development-a-case-study.php

Bardes, B. A., Shelley, M. C., & Schmidt, S. W. (2014). American government and politics today: The essentials. Boston, MA: Wadsworth/Cengage Learning.

Mind Tools. (2016). Forming, Storming, Norming, and Performing - From MindTools.com. Retrieved from https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_86.htm

Smith, S. S., Roberts, J. M., & Vander Wielen, R. J. (2011). The American Congress (3rd ed.). Cambridge University Press.