A good team
A student wrote to me: “As college students, five of us have worked together since we were in high school. We study together, play together, help each other, and support each other. Are we a good team? Does it means we have teamwork?
Answer: To work together and support each other will make five of you into a group but not a team. A good team is often made up of people with different but complimentary skills. Each team member adds something to the group such as study skills, personality types, knowledge and areas of interest. A good team has learned to value the differences among team members. A good team also shares the same vision and goals and these things really define a team. Without a shared vision and goals it is not a team but only a group. When the team members get together, they focus on getting something done to achieve the shared goals.
I have seen many students get together with the idea of doing something but never become a team. They had conflicts of opinion, arguments and uncoordinated efforts. This is because the team has not developed a set rules or guidelines to govern how they work together. If you want your team to achieve its shared goals, the team must establish at the beginning a set of rules where everyone must agree to follow. For example the team sets a time to study together when all members must come. Anyone who missed two or three meetings without good reason should be eliminated from the team. If a member is not serious then he or she should not be on the team.
A team is different from a work group. A work group is a number of people who get together to share ideas, compare notes or make suggestions to help each other. They do not have rules or commitment and usually last for a short period of time. Sometime words such as “teams,” “teamwork,” are used carelessly. If you want to form a team, make sure you have shared vision, shared goals, and shared rules.
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
