Team Composition and Task Allocation

A. Team environment – Critical issues

A team is a group of people who have come together to discuss something to achieve a certain goal. For a team environment to be effective, the members have to show cooperation. In this case, our team was composed of seven members but unfortunately one of us left due to issues concerning COVID 19. The member is Zach who had to deter the unit to deal with the COVID 19 issue. Another team member, Jackson, joined the group late because he had issues with online composition. Each member was allocated to a different task to perform including market analysis, executive analysis, competitor, and external analysis among others (Levesque, 2011) The members came from different backgrounds. Some came from China, Japan, and Australia. Each member was aware of the business and they had different opinions on how to approach the situation. The members worked online and completed the task. However, there were lots of challenges that were faced such as lack of cooperation. This is because the members were not having the same goals. Three members were comfortable with lower marks such as pass while I and another member wanted to get higher grades  (Tambe, 2017) Therefore, we had to redo the work editing some parts to increase relevancy in the work so that we would at least get a higher mark. This resulted in stress and tension among the group members as we were hurrying to beat the due date.

1. Your specific task in the team.

Every member had a specific task to perform in the group. The task allocated to me was writing on the competitor analysis, PESTEL analysis, energizing, managing time in which the assignment would be carried out, and external analysis which involves proofreading the work done.

1. Reflection
2. Interaction between team members.

Even though there was a critical incident concerning COVID 19, the team members did not have positive interactions during the online team meetings. There were low energy and a lack of cooperation in the group. The members did not have a common goal to attend. Some were comfortable with getting low marks while other members wanted to score standard high standard grades (Salas, 2018) This led to people performing their tasks independently instead of working together as a group. This led to frustrations among the members since the work was not done as planned.

My characteristic as an individual can be identified using the Five-Factor Model. According to this model, my personality can be best defined as being open to new experiences (Terracciano, 2013)This refers to my ability to be so curious about learning new things. Extroversion refers to my outgoing energy and by extroverts. I am also an agreeable person who is very friendly and compassionate. Also, I am so sensitive and insecure about failing to achieve my goals (McKena, 2010)The character that I strongly identify with is that of conscientiousness. This means that I am effective in organizing my work to achieve high grades. This character is linked to my ability to aiming at soaring higher in my academic work.

1. How your characteristic impacted team interactions.

Challenges and Issues Faced

Since I strongly identify with conscientiousness trait according to the five-factor model, I was so keen on organizing the group and pushing the members towards producing quality work. I pressured the members to tighten their belts and work on their areas to ensure that I compile the work so that we can be able to deliver it before the deadline( Chiaburu, 2011)

According to this trait that I identify with, I am self-disciplined and aim for achievement is key. I am also diligent and careful since I do not intend to mess up with my goals. This trait which I identify with most also brings pit the perfectionist side of me. According to this, I might have put the other team members through pressure since I demand quality work (Alik, 2012) This desire for perfectionism must have put tension and negativity among the members.  Conscientiousness is mostly linked to high academic performance. Therefore, I could not have accepted to score low grades in the work.

1. What kind of decision-maker are you?

According to the five model trait, I am a person who is open to new experiences. This means that I can listen to the opinions of other group members before concluding. I have agreeable and intuitive characters which greatly affect my decision-making skills. I allowed every member to voice their opinions and chose on which ideas should be accepted (Finn, 2012)This enabled me to give the members a chance to express themselves and choose the tasks they would handle and made me emphasize them to produce high-quality work. This trait of being open helped to reduce pressure and tension within the members thus making the process of decision making more efficient.

1. How will this impact the decisions you make in your future professional life?

According to the conscientiousness trait that I portray, it is evident that I  a procrastinator of events. I can handle tasks as they at a slow pace. In the team organization, I managed to bring the members together and ensure that we complete the work before the due deadline. This helped to reduce tension within the members and led to the production of quite good work. In the future, I will be able to provide support to the members without necessarily having to put them through much pressure to accomplish a goal.

I am also a maximizer of events. According to the organization, we had to gather more information before we started writing the report. This led to the production of a work that would score low marks and I had to do research again to fill the missing gaps. Being a maximizer is a positive impact because it gives the members a chance to chose what is best for them when they have a large variety of ideas to choose from(Slack, 2015)

I am also not a risk-taker. This would have some negative effects which would even result in a downfall. According to entrepreneurs, risks in businesses are not a desirable trait to have.

1. What would I like to change in the future?

This experience enabled me to identify m decision-making skills and styles of working. I have been able to identify my strengths and weaknesses when it comes to team decision making. I can better myself and make better approaches in team organizations (Herman, 2011) Upon reflecting on m decision-making skills, I am in a position to understand what I need to improve to better my skills and become an efficient leader in the future. I can understand the traits my personality relates to and how they affect the process of decision making in team organizations.

References:

Cohen, P. R., & Levesque, H. J. (2011). Teamwork. Nous, 25(4), 487-512.

Tambe, M. (2017). Towards flexible teamwork. Journal of artificial intelligence research, 7, 83-124.

Salas, E., Cooke, N. J., & Rosen, M. A. (2018). On teams, teamwork, and team performance: Discoveries and developments. Human factors, 50(3), 540-547.

 Hirsch, P. L., & McKenna, A. F. (2010). Using reflection to promote teamwork understanding in engineering design education. International Journal of Engineering Education, 24(2), 377.

Knipfer, K., Prilla, M., Herrmann, T., & Cress, U. (2011). Computer support for collaborative reflection on captured teamwork data.

Beer, M., Slack, F., & Armitt, G. (2015). Collaboration and teamwork: Immersion and presence in an online learning environment. Information Systems Frontiers, 7(1), 27-37.

Finn, R. (2012). The language of teamwork: reproducing professional divisions in the operating theatre. Human Relations, 61(1), 103-130.

Allik, I., & Allik, I. U. (2012). The five-factor model of personality across cultures. Springer Science & Business Media.

Chiaburu, D. S., Oh, I. S., Berry, C. M., Li, N., & Gardner, R. G. (2011). The five-factor model of personality traits and organizational citizenship behaviors: A meta-analysis. Journal of applied psychology, 96(6), 1140.

Löckenhoff, C. E., Terracciano, A., & Costa Jr, P. T. (2013). Five-factor model personality traits and the retirement transition: Longitudinal and cross-sectional associations. Psychology and Aging, 24(3), 722.