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Teams in the 21st Century Reflection Paper Carol Robin Green University of Phoenix Teams in the 21st Century Reflection Paper I personally agree and approve of the way that University of Phoenix is set up by breaking every classroom up into teams because it is very important for people to know how to interact with one another in every aspect of life, (e. g. school, work, home, and in society). My personal experience thus far working with teams as a student here at University of Phoenix have been both gratifying and frustrating.
I especially enjoy the brainstorming ideas and the team collaboration that derive from meeting and working together as a team; for example, when each team puts together a PowerPoint slide show and gets instant approval. On the other hand, if someone on the team is not pulling his or her weight it causes a huge concern for the rest of the team. What one team member might fail to communicate could be detrimental for the rest of the team, because while one person on the team is not doing their part, “others expend their energy trying to improve communication rather than on trying to learn the course material” (Border L. 1997). A perfect example of this based on my own personal experience occurred recently when a particular team member who was assigned to post our learning team assignment failed to post it in the designated area. Everyone on the team received a zero for the assignment and it dropped everyone’s grade down a level for the class; fortunately for the team, we were able to assess the problem within a reasonable amount of time that the instructor made an exception and gave us our grade.
This was a very valuable lesson because even though nothing was lost, I saw the tremendous value in the need for proper communication skills when working on a team. The lesson learned here was self correcting and taught the team always to maintain checks and balances. Some people have the need to belong to a certain group, club, or organization because it adds a further dimension to their personal identities.
Working well within a group doesn’t always depend on certain commonalities that people have outside of the group because successful groups can consist of people from different backgrounds with different personalities that all share the same common goal and find interconnectivity within their group. The common interest is the group itself and the sole purpose of the group’s existence. The advantage of working in a group as opposed to going solo is the synergy generated from the ideas of one person sparking thoughts from another and yet further creating even more ideas from others in the group to solidify the process of reaching the goal. Several individuals working together and building on each other’s strengths can potentially generate more and better solutions than if these people worked alone”(McShane & Von Glinow, 2000, p. 312). Possessing good team working skills is almost mandatory in the workforce today, in fact, when a person is searching for a job via the Classified Ads or on the Internet, one of the most common prerequisites is to have team playing skills in the workplace.
A hallmark of successful teams is a passion for the outcome or result that the team is there to produce (Goldberg, 2007). My job requires effective teamwork and the contributions from each individual to have a finished product. Everyone on my team at my place of employment is considered a ‘cog in the wheel’ or a ‘mechanism in the engine’ and without every part working or doing their part it would fail to function. References Border, L. (1997). From Rowdy Crowd to Effective Team.
Further notes on Group Behavior, Rapport, Trust, and Etiquette, 6(5), 1. Retrieved from http://www. ntlf. com/html/pi/9708/border. htm Goldberg, I. B. (2007). Self-directing teams. (On Leadership)(Column).. Arkansas Business, 1. Retrieved from http://find. galegroup. com/ips/infomark. do? action=interpret&docType =IAC&contentSet=IACDocuments&searchType=BasicSearchForm&type=retrieve&tabID=T003&prodId=IPS&docId=A167305700&source=gale&version=1. 0&userGroupName=apollo&finalAuth=true