Work with Others

 

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Didactic Unit 7	Theme	Time
Work with others	understand work within a group;	2 hours

 

Modern production process become more complex and require the diversity of skills and abilities that can provide only team of different workers. Therefore the  majority of people work in groups or teams.

Although working together with other people is common it is a task that require special types skills both - occupational and social. Teamwork is a necessary skill in almost any job, and especially in life.

Apart from specific occupational skills (like plumber, metalworker...) team working requires good social skills.
The most important teamwork skill is the ability to communicate effectively. This includes speaking knowledgeably and tactfully as well as listening actively with an open mind.

Other teamwork skills important to achievement of common final result/goal is commitment to the team: making decisions with objectivity;  discipline;  ability to support other team member's opinions, and, most importantly, being ready to get involved.

Being an effective team member starts and ends with communicating. It is crucial to be able to communicate openly and honestly with ideas, recommendations, and concerns in front of other team members. It is just as important to be able to listen attentively and respond objectively with helpful feedback.

 

There is a time to talk and a time to listen and the time to listen comes twice as often as the time to talk. We can often find ourselves so concerned about what we have to say that we never really hear what the person is saying. Instead of focusing on what they are trying to convey we are thinking about what we are going to say next, in which time we have missed their entire point.

 

It is so important that you have an established habit of speaking in an uplifting way. If you are at all demeaning or domineering or insulting it will grind the team to a halt. People will still be willing to sacrifice, share and discuss just not with every member of the team
From didactic unit 2 of this module you can learn about basics of communication skills.

• Another essential teamwork skill is the ability and desire to commit to a shared team goal. It seems simple at first glance. However, people tend more to achieving narrow personal goals. 

 

For example, a team of electricians have a task to install electricity in the house. One of them well qualified electrician have finished installation works at the second floor (the task he was personally responsible for). At the same time unexpected problem occurred on the ground floor, so electricity in the whole house does not work. In this case, well done personal work (installation on the second floor) is useless because the final result (working electricity in the whole house) is not achieved and team of workers will not be paid unless final goal is achieved. Committed and skilled team worker should immediately get involved in solving installation problems that occurred on the ground floor and help other team members to fix the problem as soon as possible.

 

Remember!

Other teamwork skills are useless without commitment to common goal. Commitment to the team means that members should be willing to take on any role necessary to accomplish the required tasks, whether it is a leadership role or a subordinate role.

 

• The teamwork skill of effective, responsible decision-making is crucial because most group conflict arises during the decision-making process. Effective teams have members who can make decisions objectively after discussion within the group. If a group makes a poor decision that most, if not all, of the members would not have made on their own then team members will try to get involved and avoid responsibility as much as possible.

 

In our example with the team of electricians working in a house team leader, an authoritative personality, made a decision to start installation simultaneously in the whole house instead of checking possible problems in the seller first. Meanwhile problems that might occur in the seller may jeopardize the whole work and may require a lot of unplanned work. He did not discuss his decision with other team members and they “accepted” this decision under the ”leadership pressure”. In this case, electrician who has accomplished his work on the second floor may be reluctant to get involved in other works despite the fact that result is not achieved and he will not get money. Such a team becomes a team of rivals.

Each team member has to evaluate what they are truly willing to sacrifice and then continue to be willing when the time comes that they are asked to sacrifice it. It could be everything from time, to resources, to positions of power.

Remember!

Teamwork takes individual work for a collective good that ultimately increases the good everyone receives.

 

 

 

 

Answers to the questions and exercises of Didactic Unit 7

 

Exercise 1

3.

Exercise 2

2.

Exercise 3

This is a very simple test it can not reveal all skills that you need to improve but only gives general answer to a question - do you have features of team worker?

Score 1.- 3 points; 2- 2. points; 3. – 1 point.

If your score is 15  you have basic skills for team working. If your score is 10 you need to revise areas in which your skills are weak and strengthen them. If your score is close to 5 you need to pay attention to your team working skills otherwise you will not be able to work effectively in teams.