Being able to work in teams/collaboration is important for your future career because it gives you the opportunity to give and receive feedback and collaborate among the other team members. Listening to and acknowledging their feelings, concerns, opinions and ideas of others, while acknowledging the skills, their experiences, creativities, and contributions and learn from them.
Having a team member with more knowledge or previous experience about a given task can teach you new information. Being a team member will not only allow you to learn from others on the team but to also learn about yourself by analyzing your own skills, efficiency and reactions to requests.
Effective team work brings communication, collaboration and combined efforts meaning that, every member brings about their skills, talents and experiences together for a common goal. In the job industry, nobody works without having the need to communicate. Employers expect you to bring collaborative work especially in the creative industry. Whether you are an employee working in a large firm or small business, you will be working with a boss and colleagues. Even if you are your own boss of your business, you will still need to collaborate with clients, suppliers and even vendors.
Working in teams at school will save you lots of frustration and when you begin to work on your first work project at work. Learning to work with different personalities and abilities at school prior to work will prepare you to work in teams at work.
Team work is like a lesson that allows you to gather basic life skills that will make you a better candidate for the job. One can improve their skills if at school by joining clubs, organizations or even study groups. Interacting with others will help build team work skills.
There are positive experiences working with groups and does often produce better outcomes. Based on my experience, when the group was formed and we got to know our group members, we progressed lightly towards assigning tasks among ourselves. Our group was a small group of 5 members who were each assigned tasks to work towards meeting our goal. Each member of the group had different skills and abilities that helped in growth and productivity. We participated in solving complex problems, brainstorming for more ideas and we all attended meetings when scheduled and responded via emails on our work progress while exchanging data through emails. As a result, our decisions makings were up to date, which increased team efficiency. What I have learned from this experience working with a group is that group projects can help us develop a host of skills that are increasingly important in the workplace. As a member of a group, one could develop their own voice and perspective in relation to other members. Be able to develop new approaches to resolving differences. Have delegate roles and responsibilities. Be able to take on more complex problem than they could individually and observe how they are resolved differently.
Working in groups often has its ups and downs which results in negative experiences. When your team member is unwilling to work towards the goal by not doing their part that was assigned to them. Such attitude and slackness will not only degrade the quality of the goal but will also lower the rest of the team’s productivity, where the rest of the members are giving their all to get the work done. For instance, I have had a member of the team delayed contribution on her behalf, because she was low on her contribution to the team we gave her a second chance to update the PowerPoint for the presentation. Little did we know that she was 100% unreliable she did not submit the updated PowerPoint slides and furthermore, showed up 2 minutes before the presentation has ended. Fortunately, we had to move on and presented our project well without her. Unfortunately for that team member, she did not get to present with the team neither presented at all. Based on this experience, I have learned that people are not always dependable. When one member slacks off from the group it affects the rest of the team. I also learned that we should all have backups for situations like these because we are not guaranteed what the future will bring to us. Things happen and is our duty to be prepared for it. Paying attention to each given task of a group member is essential for if a member is not present we are able to fulfill the given task of that member to work on wards meeting our goal. However we as a group were concerned that she would be given full credit for the project that she failed to contribute as a result of missed deadlines, not completing task, and unable to provide communication, while the rest of the members strived hard to get the project done and on time.
My role in the group was as a leader/facilitator. I contacted each team member via email and we shared the progress of our work through the google doc. I would ensure that we met after class to spend time working and discussing our project. I was well relied upon to see that assigned tasks were properly organized. I recognized errors that other members failed to notice. I also supported good suggestions and ideas and help solved matters that arise. I was a planner. I looked for the best way to accomplish task and looked at things from different perspectives. I was also a critic. I pointed out potential risks along with ideas to avoid those risks. Finally I was a team worker. I encouraged, innovate and share observations to help the group function more efficiently. There is no guarantee that goals will be achieved because group work can often go wrongly when they are not assessed properly and this could lack serious team work and collaboration.
