Enhancing Team Performance Through Effective Communication and Collaboration

Statements I Agree With

1. It is necessary to speak to everyone in the team.

The team exists for the benefit of all the individuals working/studying in the common space and its purpose is to make the job easier of the team members and deliver better results. For this reason, it is important that one interacts and communicates with all the members of the team. Communication is a key aspect of delivering good results in a team and it is imperative that one maintains a good rapport with the team members they have.

We learn from our mistakes..

Since no one is completely competent in every job from the very beginning, it is natural to assume that an individual is bound to make mistakes in whichever arena they start working in. Mistakes are a natural part of the learning process and they allow the individual to completely understand the areas where they can improve and where they went wrong the first time. Mistakes should not be seen as a sign of incompetence, rather they need to be seen as a sign of a learning process which will ensure that the individual doesn’t make similar kinds of mistakes again.

3. After a group decision, we should all accept what has been agreed.

An important aspect of belonging to a group is that there needs to be consensus within the group regarding important decisions. That is the whole purpose of the group; to embody most number of perspectives within itself, so that there is no ambiguity about the rightness of the decision which has been taken. Hence, the group members need to be completely on-board with all the decisions that has been taken by the other team members. If there is any disagreement with the decision that the group has taken, then that means that negotiations need to continue. An important quality that all the team members need to possess is the quality of sacrifice, whereby the individual should be open to compromise and willing to accept a decision that doesn’t completely align with their own desires.

4. I may need help from other people in my group.

While it is a good idea for individuals to be self-reliant and independent, it is a bad idea for an individual to not rely on anybody’s help. There are some things which a person may not know how to do or may need help in completing their work in a timely fashion. In that case, it is important that the individual takes help from people who are well-wishers and their team members as well. This is necessary to improve the quality of the work of the individual and also ensure that the individual has a well-rounded educational and professional experience. In business-oriented teas, every group members is responsible for a particular function and it is important that they are delegated tasks according to their expertise. However, it is important to borrow from the expertise of other people and their help if needed.

Statements I do not agree with

I prefer to speak only to friends in my team.

This is an approach which only leads to discord within a group and any individual who does that opens themselves up to criticism and severely slow down their learning process. Firstly, it is important that the individual maintain cordial relationships with all the members of the team. Secondly, interaction only with one’s own friends in the team may lead to antagonistic feelings among the other team members and may lead to uncooperative behaviour from the other team members. Additionally, working in a team means borrowing from the expertise and skills with all kinds of members. When an individual only interacts with the team members they are friendly with, they are closing themselves up to educational experiences that they could’ve gotten when they would’ve interacted with all the group members equally. Also, there is a possibility that if an individual chooses to only interact with their friends and not other team members, they may become liable to being biased towards their friends’ work and that might lead to compromised quality of work. What is ideal is if the individual team member maintains a cordial relationship with every other team member, but doesn’t indulge in favouritism which could possibly lead to lapses in judgement by the team member. Additionally, the lines of communication between team members need to remain open, only then will individuals be able to work smoothly in a group and deliver results by effectively delegating tasks.

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