he HR department at Bailey Services is considering offering telecommuting as an option to some experienced employees. At a meeti
ng to formalize the move, the heads of the different departments met with Laura Watson, the HR manager. Laura, who thought this meeting would be a short one, was proven wrong when all the members, who had previously agreed that telecommuting would work in their company, began coming up with divergent views. By the end, two divisions claimed they had major concerns about allowing employees to telecommute, and those in favor of it were equally vocal. This scenario depicts the operation of ________.
Groupshift is a change between a group's decision and an individual decision that a member within the group would make; the shift can be toward either conservatism or greater risk, but it generally is toward a more extreme version of the group's original position.
This scenario describes the operation of groupshift.
This can be defined as a phenomenon that occurs to explain that when people are part of a group, their risk decisions are made differently than they would be made if they were alone. Shared group risk decreases individual risk, so decisions that are made in a group are often more risky.
One of the reasons for groupshift is that the emotional bonds created in the group help to reduce anxiety and tension within the group and therefore the risk seems less.
