Week 11: Communication & Pitch Perfect
The Barden Bellas follow a very hierarchical leadership structure and the leaders make all the decisions. While they have two leaders in their organization, Aubrey typically ends up making the decisions based upon what she thinks is best.
The Bellas play various communication roles throughout the movie. Aubrey is very self-centered and focused on winning this year to redeem her reputation after her embarrassing performance the year prior. She does not care about the other Bella’s opinions, not even Chloe’s, who had stuck with her from the year before. Beca creates a significant amount of conflict with Aubrey, but mostly works to resolve conflicts among the other Bellas as was seen after the Riff Off. She encourages the other Bellas to stand up for themselves and to do what makes them happy, but is not afraid to stand up against Aubrey when she disagrees.
Aubrey is very focused on the norms of the Barden Bellas. She tries to continue their image through using the same uniforms and same music even though the members have all changed but two. She tries to continue previous norms of not allowing dating within the different a cappella groups and continuing how the Bellas choose their songs. Beca tries hard to change these norms as they do not well fit the new group of Barden Bellas. This creates significant conflict.
The Barden Bellas balance consensus and conflict by a few extroverts leading the decisions. When Chloe sides with Aubrey on a conflict, the Bellas, excluding Beca, agree without a second thought. When Chloe sides with Beca on a conflict, most of the Bellas again side with Chloe. It seems that the Bellas try to avoid conflict by agreeing with their leaders, but let their opinions be know when their leaders disagree. This absence of conflict by members of the Bellas other than Beca is likely due to fear of Aubrey and not wanting to be removed from the organization because she had not hesitated to kick people out before. The Bellas did not reach true consensus until the end of the movie. The book states that, “consensus does not mean that all team members agree with a decision, but instead that they feel their views are adequately considered by the team.” Beca did not feel her views were considered by the team until the end of the movie and they changed their set list because Aubrey shut down the idea of changing it without considering their options. If Aubrey had given a better reason for not changing the Bellas’ set list, consensus may have been reached earlier.
In the end of Pitch Perfect, the Barden Bellas work as a team; however, in the beginning of the movie they operate as a network. In a team, the value and skills of all members are valued. However, the leaders of the Bellas do not trust the opinions of the new members and they do not allow the new members to do anything but sing the old set list. They do not function well as a whole organization. Thus, I view the Bellas as a network rather than a team. They communicate regularly and are working toward the same goals, but do not value the members as necessary to work together and be a team. In the end of the movie, Aubrey works with Beca to restructure the organization and to emphasize the strengths of all members. This leads them to win Nationals by utilizing the strengths of their current members rather than trying to make them act like the previous members.
