IOP 470 Week 2 Roles, Norms and Power Example

Who Speaks First and Who Gets Heard: Roles, Norms and Power on a Heat Task Force

[Student Name]

University of Phoenix

IOP/470: Group Dynamics

Week 2 Assignment

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

The task force, its members and its meetings are composites written for a model paper; research findings come from the sources listed.

Every group develops structure, though little of it is written down. Members take on roles, follow unwritten norms and influence one another through different kinds of power. This paper examines that structure in the Phoenix heat task force introduced in Week 1, using notes from eight meetings.

What the Meeting Notes Show

Across eight meetings, Captain Ray Delgado of the fire department spoke first on eleven of fifteen agenda items, and other members usually framed their comments as responses to his. Dr. Amara Okafor, the university climate researcher, presented data on heat deaths by neighborhood at three meetings; members asked questions but rarely changed positions. The utility representative and the neighborhood association president each spoke less than once per meeting. The chair, Dr. Rosa Villanueva, summarized discussions and moved the agenda but seldom asked quiet members for input. The mayor's liaison attended occasionally and, when present, steered discussion toward what the budget could support.

Roles in the Group

Benne and Sheats (1948) cataloged the functional roles members play in groups. Task roles help the group accomplish its work, such as initiator, information seeker, information giver, elaborator and summarizer. Group building and maintenance roles support relationships, such as encourager, harmonizer, compromiser and gatekeeper, who helps others participate. Individual roles serve personal needs at the group's expense, such as aggressor, blocker, dominator and recognition seeker.

Captain Delgado acts as initiator and information giver, valuable roles, but his frequency of speaking first edges toward dominator. Dr. Okafor is an information giver whose information is not integrated. Dr. Villanueva fills the summarizer role. The group lacks a gatekeeper: no one draws in the quiet members. The housing official occasionally blocks, rejecting proposals that would affect shelter capacity without offering alternatives.

Norms and Why They Stick

Feldman (1984) asked why groups police some unwritten rules and ignore others, and answered that a rule gets enforced when it protects the group, keeps members predictable, spares people awkward clashes or announces what the group stands for. Feldman also noted that norms often develop from early statements by leaders, critical events, the first behavior pattern in a group and expectations members bring from other settings.

Several norms are visible. "Each agency defends its own turf" emerged in the first meeting when the transit manager rejected a suggestion about bus schedules, and it persists because it spares members from uncomfortable confrontations with colleagues back at their agencies. "Don't challenge the fire captain on emergency response" protects the group from embarrassing conflict with its most respected member. "Data are interesting but not decisive" developed when Dr. Okafor's first presentation was received politely and then set aside. These norms make meetings smooth but keep the group from changing anything.

No one ever said, "Defend your agency first." Everyone learned it in the first hour, when the transit manager did it and nothing happened.

Bases of Power

French and Raven (1959) sorted social power into five sources. Legitimate power rests on an accepted right to ask, usually tied to a title. Reward power comes from the ability to provide benefits, and coercive power from the ability to impose costs. Knowledge gives expert power, and being admired and identified with gives referent power.

Captain Delgado holds referent power, as a respected first responder whose stories of heat emergencies carry emotional weight, and expert power on emergency response. Dr. Villanueva holds legitimate power as chair. The mayor's liaison holds reward power over funding, which subtly limits proposals to what seems affordable. Dr. Okafor holds expert power that the group does not fully recognize because her knowledge comes from data rather than field experience. The quiet members hold information power: the utility representative knows which households have had power shut off for nonpayment, a key risk factor in heat deaths, and the neighborhood president knows where older residents live alone.

Status From Home Organizations

Status differences in the task force mirror the status of members' home organizations. The fire department, visible and admired, carries more status than a neighborhood association. Members bring these differences with them, often without noticing, so that the same idea gains more attention from one member than another.

Role Conflict and Ambiguity

Several members also struggle with their roles in a different sense. The transit manager is both a task force member, expected to put the city's heat goals first, and an agency representative, expected by his director to protect the bus budget. This role conflict explains his caution better than any personal trait. Other members face role ambiguity: the neighborhood association president was never told whether she represents one neighborhood or all residents, so she hesitates to speak beyond her own blocks.

Recommendations

Assign a gatekeeper role. Dr. Villanueva will open each agenda item by asking the least-heard members first, a practice that weakens the norm of deferring to the most senior voice.

Make norms explicit. At the next meeting, the group will discuss and agree on norms, including "Proposals are judged on evidence and effect, not on which agency they affect."

Structure data use. Dr. Okafor will present maps of heat deaths before each discussion, and proposals will be checked against them.

Use untapped information. The utility and neighborhood representatives will each prepare a brief on what their data and networks reveal about who is most at risk.

Clarify the budget. The mayor's liaison will share a realistic funding range at the start, reducing unspoken constraints. Together, these steps aim to make the group's decisions depend on evidence and on every member's knowledge rather than on status.

Conclusion

The task force's hidden structure explains why discussions felt productive but changed little. Role analysis shows a dominant initiator and no gatekeeper, norm research explains why turf defense persists and the typology of social power shows that referent and reward power drive decisions while expert and information power go unused. Structural changes to who speaks, how norms are set and how data are used can shift that balance.

References

Benne, K. D., & Sheats, P. (1948). Functional roles of group members. Journal of Social Issues, 4(2), 41-49. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.1948.tb01783.x

Feldman, D. C. (1984). The development and enforcement of group norms. Academy of Management Review, 9(1), 47-53. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.1984.4277934

French, J. R. P., Jr., & Raven, B. (1959). The bases of social power. In D. Cartwright (Ed.), Studies in social power (pp. 150-167). University of Michigan.