Team organization

When I saw this prompt for team organization and success, there was one specific team that I was a part of that came immediately to mind. In high school, I was part of a choir that achieved an immense amount of success due to the leadership and organization of our directors.

As described by Bolman and Deal in chapter 5 of the textbook, our choir ran under dual authority, although selection was not democratic and our choir director had been tenured at our high school for 25 years. Our main choir director, Mrs. Tobison, had the final word on all matters but we also had an assistant director that worked under Mrs Tobison and influenced the decisions the choir made. Mrs. Tobison handled the chamber choir, which was also our competition choir, and the select ensemble women’s choir, while Mrs Spurling handled the freshmen and sophomore choir and the all girl freshmen choir. In terms of logistics, Mrs. Tobison arranged all of our concerts, picked our music, ran rehearsals, and acted as the punitive force of our choir. While all the music directors in our high school had to answer to the overall music director of the high school, due to Mrs. Tobison success and track record, she was given more of a free reign when it came to how she ran the choir.

While both the directors held the authoritative power, several student leaders were involved in helping direct the choir as well. This group of students was called the choir board and they had their own positions of power within that committee. The members of the choir elected these positions democratically, with the president and vice president usually being selected from the competition choirs. Besides the previous positions stated, there was also representatives from each individual choir and also a treasurer and a secretary. This student committee was mainly involved in organizing choir fundraisers or parties, but the president and vice president were very involved in the behind the scenes at the concerts.

What made us successful as a competition choir was the selection process that went into assembling it. While the general choir was all-inclusive, the chamber choir and the select ensemble were selected on a try out basis and were exclusive to more advanced musicians. While many students aspired to reach the top choir, the end number of people was around 50-60, which was about a third of the total choir. While the main reasoning behind this was to pick the best of the best, I now realize it was also because she could not control a choir much larger than that at competition level. This touches on something also brought up by Bolman and Deal, which is manageability of a team and its direct correlation to success in a team setting. Mrs. Tobison could have easily given in to the groping and nagging force that was disgruntled parents and let more kids in the competition choir, but she knew the key to a championship pedigree was keeping the group smaller.

To say that Mrs. Tobison’s decisions came without groveling or complaining would be a massive understatement. She was about as polarizing of a leader as you could imagine and it left a lot of the group frustrated and angry at time, myself included. While the frustration was clearly there, the results were also there to rectify any strife that she caused. During my time in the choir, we won competitions in New York City and in Prague and Mrs. Tobison was nominated for a Grammy in musical education. For me, to have a successful team or organization, you must have a leader that always has the team’s goals as their main intentions. Someone who is not afraid to pull punches and to tell people to their face that they are not performing to the expectations of the group. It’s safe to say that my time spent under the direction of Mrs. Tobison was some of the hardest but most gratifying work I’ve ever done.