Team work is the most essential component of an effective and functioning group to produce a desired product. The goal for the group course work assignment, was to produce a written proposal for a new electronic publishing product. The team comprised of four members having different and diverse backgrounds in education, career and culture and from different countries. Despite of the diversity, the team required a coordinated effort in order to work on the common strategy to achieve the goal.
The main objective of this reflective essay is to evaluate the effectiveness of the team to deliver the product and to discuss experiences, achievements and challenges during the execution of the team project and provide possible ways of overcoming them. In order to achieve this objective, it is important to define and explore the meaning of the term ‘team’. In general, a team is a group of people with different skills and different tasks, who work together with a meshing of functions and mutual support to achieve a common goal (Barnes, 2001). However, the team goes through various stages of development to function efficiently. Tuckman’s theory explains the 5 stages of team development and dynamics (Tuckman, 1965). The stages are; Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing and Adjourning. During the assignment, the team went through all the above stages.
For the group coursework assignment, the team members did not participate in the grouping process as it was entirely done by the course lecturer. However it is an effort of the group to work together and develop into a team. A team is distinct from a group when it has several attributes such as a common purpose, team identity, interdependent functions and agreed norms or values which regulate behavior (Moxon 1997). Peter Levin 1 explains the meaning of ‘team’ by comparing it with ‘group’ where it’s emphasis that ”you don’t become a team until when you have developed methods of working together and collaborative relationships have been formed amongst the members”.
In order to form a team, the first group meeting was arranged with the main purpose of getting to know each other better and also to brainstorm on ideas needed to develop the product. It is important for group members to share information about each other including their backgrounds, specialty, skills, interests and experience among others. (https://www.projectsmart.co.uk/the-five-stages-of-team-development-a-case-study.php). This forms a basis for role distribution during assignment execution. In the forming stage, each member tries to fit into the team in accordance to their preferences and culture aaccording to Social Identity Theory (Kelly, 2009). At this time, the team needs to set standards of behaviour and ethics and also to also agree on strategies to use throughout the course of the assignment. Various strategies were agreed upon by the group members such as a
Communication is vital for the success of any group of team. This is important because its keeps every member of the team updated on the fellow group members and also it improves relations with in the team members. For easy, reliable and cost effective communication with in the group, we opted for a mobile social platform “WhatsApp messenger”. WhatsApp Messenger is a cross-platform mobile messaging app which uses internet data and allows users to exchange messages without having to pay for SMS. 5 (https://www.whatsapp.com/ ). The platform was easy for members to communicate since replies to exchanges were immediate and thus efficient. Google document and emails were preferred mainly for report writing, report exchange and reviewing.
For the team project, each member was asked to come up with possible topics to brainstorm for product development. There are 4 techniques used for group decision making process which include brain storming, Nominal Group technique (NGT), Delphi technique and Didactic interaction. (http://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/management/4-techniques-for-group-decision-making-process-more-effective/3506/). We opted for brainstorming because it produces many quality ideas as individuals not only produce more Ideas when working alone but they do this without sacrificing quality because they fear to look foolish or unserious so they censor themselves. (M D. Dunnette, J. D, Campbell, and K Jaastad, "The Effect of Group Participation no Brainstoming Effectiveness for Two Industrial Samples, Journal of Applied Psychology, XLVII (February, 1963), 30-37.)
Among the various topics which were proposed, the team was looking for a unique and interesting product which will have a positive impact to the users but also fits into the current technological changes and developments. Although we had started smoothly, there was a kind of friction caused when it came to determine which topic is the best as each member was rooting for their idea to be considered. This created some form of competition amongst the members especially since we had opted not to have a team leader but to treat ourselves with utmost respect and professionalism. It is almost impossible not to avoid conflict in teamwork as each member has different viewpoints, ideas and analysis. This is important because it creates the ability of members to have informed debates and also to give constructive feedbacks. If the team is getting along peacefully, without arguments and debates, it may be an indicator that they are not thinking critically as a team. Due the small size of the team, it wasn’t difficult to agree on the topic and the product. It was important for the team to agree on the topic and product as this was the only way members could start on their individual roles.
The product of the team was to write a funding proposal for developing an App which would enable users to read short articles during their spare time such as while travelling, lining up in the queue or in the waiting rooms. The stories are tailored to fit exactly the spare time you have to read.
In order to write the product proposal each individual was assigned various roles depending in their background, interests and skills. My main roles were to work on the technical and development aspects of the App development to include cost implications, challenges and future opportunities. Although each member had their core roles, members were encouraged to look at other aspects and support members of their individual roles. However, I felt that there wasn’t much criticism on individual sections or ideas about their roles because each member was focusing on how to write their section better and less little focus on other sections.
As we continued to meet and work together, we grew fond of each other not only in the academic aspects but we also shared some aspects of our private lives. We learnt to enjoy each other’s company during the project work and also during free time joked about various social aspects, shared lunches among others. We learnt to trust and support each other during the process which had a positive impact in team working. The team was working effectively, each member working on their tasks, and meeting our deadlines. Each member was supposed to write exclusively on their section without any word limits and then upload their section in the google document to form working drafts. Google documents allows team members to open, share, review and edit one document at the same time and allows users to view past edits. (https://www.google.co.uk/docs/about/ ). The face to face meetings were important to discuss issues which needed thorough clarifications, to talk to each other, listen to other member’s opinions and also for debates and analysis to agree on certain issues which needed collective decision making.
The teamwork was a success with deliverables as a power point presentation and a proposal report. There were many achievements both as a team and on individual aspects. As a team, there was significant improvement in skills and experience for the time we worked together. We learnt that the success of every project is based on the ability to work effectively with other people irrespective of their backgrounds. Team work also promotes combination of opinion, knowledge, and ability of each member to achieve quality work. We also learn that criticism from any member doesn’t necessarily need to create friction or conflict but rather it’s a way to bring out the best from the members. As we team we need to support each other because each member has a strengths and weaknesses and its up of the team members to work collectively to improve each other.
Personally, I learnt that working in the teamwork doesn’t necessarily mean to work with people in your close circles or the people you agree with. It’s about the common goal and supporting each other to achieve it. I also learnt that conflict management is very important aspect for successful teams, if a conflict is mishandled to can break the team or cause misunderstandings with bring about poor outcomes and products. The idea of small teams with 4 members was good because smaller teams are more cohesive, there is great interaction among members, each member of the team is constructive because it is difficult to hide thus bringing out the best from every team member. After the team assignment, I was grateful that we indeed worked together, supported and encouraged each other throughout the process.