Tuesday, 26 August 2014

Team Processes

We have been asked to complete the quizzes and reflections on a website (about a week ago) and i just did mine. The page forced me into completing several quizzes and reflections and i honestly thought it would be a two minute task so i didnt put in as much effort as i should have. Regardless of my behaviour, i took some screenshots of the questions so i have reference to my answers in case we would be asked on them.

This was my result for the first quiz. Clearly, im not the leader type. 

This was the first quiz i did on Effective Listening. I got two wrong and was pretty proud and took a screenshot, then i realised that the answers could easily be changed to look like you got them all right and i felt stupid. So this photo is pretty useless. 

Some more questions. I didnt do these ones because we haven't done a lot of group work yet.

Alongside these quizzes, we're also supposed to answer the following questions so..

  1. What did you learn about your attitudes to working in a team? Which Belbin roles did you identify with?
    I'm usually the quiet member in the team but thus far, i have found myself to be one of the people that lead the team. I tend to be explaining to other members in the team what the instructions were a lot of the time (which i actually like). So far, I've learnt that even though i am a shy person, i can speak with eloquence and confidence and actually feel good. Within the roles in the Belbin Inventory, i think i identified with a mixture of the leader and someone who evaluates and improves processes most (maybe less of a leader), but usually i find myself to connect with the role which makes sure that final product is fit for purpose most. 
  2. Were you surprised by either your Leadership or Team Score following the first quiz? Why/why not? You don't need to specify the scores that you received - rather was it higher/lower than you expected.
    'You don't need to specify the scores that you received', weeell I happen to be reading these questions after i posted all the images above, so too late ive already posted my results and dont really feel ashamed or insecure or anything so yea why not. No, i was not surprised by any of my scores mainly because I've been told soo many times that I'm a quiet person and that i should speak up. In previous team projects (for the ones that i prefer not speaking in), sometimes other members would look at me and be like, 'What about you? You haven't said much, what do you think about our ideas/do you have any ideas?', and its really obvious from their faces that they see me as the quiet person in the team that prefers observing and listening over talking. So my scores werent higher/lower than i expected, it was what i expected. Apart from not being the team leader, my results also mention that i am apparently an effective team leader because i keep things on track. In a way, i expected this too. 
  3. Did you identify with any of the causes of conflict? Is it something you have a tendency to do or something you have experienced from previous team projects? How will you manage this if it occurs in this team project?
    I'm not too sure where this question is going since I've met up with my team literally twice, so im not sure if its expected that we should already have conflicts or if this question should be answered sometime later in the semester, or if it actually means the conflicts that include the little tiny encounters that i don't think is really worth talking about (like not understanding what one person meant for two seconds or having a member absent). Anyhow, some of the conflicts include:
     - people being actively critical
     - people taking control/dominating
     - poor work standards of a member
     - differing expectations/goals
     - poor communications
     - free riding/social loafing
     - other priorities
     - disagreements/interpersonal
     - getting off track
     - people withdrawing/losing interest
    I wouldn't say that we encountered any of these problems, but if I had to choose one that related to our situation most, it would be poor communication. Sometimes we don't get what another member is suggesting. This isn’t a conflict though since we understand after a repeat of the sentence/rewording of the sentence. Last week, a member was absent during the contact lesson (this is cool, he told us that he was sick and everything, its fine), but when we were trying to update him with what we did in class afterwards, things got a little confusing. I think the main cause was because it was online and therefore harder to express what we meant. No, this problem is not usually something that tends to happen. If this problem (of communication) got worse during the semester, i would manage it by actively including members in the conversation and constantly keeping them up to date with what we are talking about (if there was a quiet person), and try to include myself in the discussions if i was the quiet person. I dont think there is a lot you can do to manage this conflict. I just realised my answers are getting longer for each question so i'll stop now.
  4. What is important to you when working in a team?
    I have been made to answer this question soo many times in the last few months.. I think that communication is important when working in a team. I believe that all team members need to know what is happening at all times and need to be aware of their assigned tasks. Sometimes when there is a quiet member, they actually dont feel welcomed to talk even once they are invited to, so i think its important that all members are included in discussions. Sometimes, the group comes to a dead end and is out of ideas. They then all start to think of what to do or how to fix their current problem. They ask around for suggestions. The quiet person says they know nothing, but really, they have a mindful of ideas and is secretly judging the slowness/stupidity of the rest of the group (ok yes i am the quiet one sometimes and this is what i usually think). What im trying to say is that unless the quiet one feels welcomed/close enough with the group, they still wont share their opinions sometimes. So i think communication is a big factor in this. Imagine collating everyone's parts for the documentation the night before its due only to realise that one person did not do their part/did their part on a completely different idea because communication was not strong enough in the group. What a nightmare this would be. Know what im saying? good. 


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