We explain what the differences are between a group and a team, what their performance is like, how their elements and examples are related.
What is the difference between a group and a team?
A group It is a set of things, beings or referents that share certain features or characteristics, their own or contextual, permanent or transitory, and that for some reason we consider as a whole, globally.
A group of professionals, for example, can include geographers, historians, doctors, engineers and / or architects, to name a few examples, since the common feature that allows us to group them is, precisely, that they have a professional title.
On the other hand, a team implies that this group of objects, beings or referents are interrelated in a productive way, that is, they have an internal organization that allows them to carry out some job, solve an enigma or fulfill a task. We can say, seen like this, that a team is a group with a purpose and a proposed organization to fulfill it.
This distinction between a disorganized group and a structured team can even be traced to the very origin of both words. The first comes from Old German kruppa, translatable as "mass" in the sense of "kneading" or "compressing", that is, something that has volume but no given shape.
From there he went to Italian group ("Bundle") and eventually into French group, used to refer to a set of statues in the same garden or objects painted in the same painting. Eventually the term was used to refer to people as well.
Instead, team comes from the Germanic skip, "Boat", from where it passed into French equip Y equiper, used in the maritime jargon of the Middle Ages to refer to the preparation of the ship before leaving the port.
Thus, from the beginning, it was linked to organized work and specialized accessories, in such a way that those who make up a team act as if they were the crew of a ship, that is, distributing functions, taking on tasks and not all doing the same. same.
A group and a team differ in their composition, structure, and operation. Thus, the groups are agglomerations of persons or objects without a structure or a specific purpose, while teams are groups endowed with a purpose and an order. For that reason, group work (each one doing their thing together with the others) is not the same as group work. teamwork (all doing one thing in a coordinated way).
All of this can be summarized as follows:
| Group | Team |
|---|---|
| They are made up of several elements that share a common feature. | They are made up of several different elements, integrated in an order and with a purpose. |
| Its elements act autonomously. | Its elements act in an organized manner. |
| The performance of the group is understood as the sum of the individual performances of its members. | Team performance is measured collectively: if one item fails, the entire team fails. |
| It lacks a stated purpose. | It is oriented towards the accomplishment of a goal. |
| Group examples are:
● The crowd at a rock concert. ● Those who attend a political rally. ● Passers-by in a square at any given time. ● All the people of a country. | Examples of equipment are:
● A national soccer team. ● Doctors and nurses in an operating room. ● The sailors of a ship. ● The pilots of an airplane. |