Learning Team A Debriefing

Learning Team A Debriefing

Anonymous

University of Phoenix

Learning Team A Debriefing

Teams are supposed to have synergy, a process of interaction where 2 + 2 = 10. (Scarnati, 2001) Teams are assembled to complete work in a more efficient manner. By assembling teams, every member's knowledge and skills are supposed to enhance the project or solution more than an individual's knowledge or skills alone. With that being said, Learning Team A's process of interaction has been 2 + 2 = 5.

Basing a majority of the content for this debriefing from the experience of Week 3's Ethics paper, it can be said that Team A is a two man show. This assumption can be made from the lack of teamwork and leadership observed during Week 3.

Learning Team Peer Evaluation

From my Learning Team Peer Evaluation the overall score for the team members was 20 for Jack, 19 for me, 11 for Joseph, and 10 for Nicole. I rated Joseph and Nicole with disagreeable scores in the following traits: preparation, contribution, timeliness, and interpersonal relations.

Their preparation for the Ethics paper was not seen. Even though they helped come up with the team charter there was no constant communication that would allow for us to plan any follow up meetings to make corrections if necessary.

The contribution from Nicole was minimal at best. She only contributed a small conclusion with content and editing issues. Joseph contributed a little more with evaluations of case studies. Other than their own portion of the project, I don't think that they contributed to their best academic ability. I thought they should have been more involved with the whole feeling of the paper, as well as the editing.

As far as timeliness, Joseph did not make his deadline and was two days late with his evaluations of the case studies. Also, there were a couple of meetings scheduled for the newsgroup and both members showed up late or didn't show at all.

I rated Joseph and Nicole disagreeable scores for interpersonal relations for all of the above traits and because Jack and I spent all of Monday night by ourselves finishing the paper.

Lack of teamwork

The reason for the lack of teamwork was because there wasn't an effective plan or developmental process for Team A. Even though there was a team charter established, it was non-specific with little conversation to provide further guidance. We didn't discuss in detail a few of the key issues needed for facilitating team development: how to communicate, setting meeting dates ahead, analyzing the task, and arranging the "organization." (Picard, Jolly, Stratton, 1998)

Agreeing on how to communicate was an issue that was covered, very briefly. On the team charter, it lists each member's email address and phone number, but there were still communication problems. In order to correct this issue, each member should post a weekly schedule of when and by what method someone could reach them if needed.

Setting meeting dates ahead was also an issue that was discussed in Team A's newsgroup. Even though this issue was discussed, there seemed to be a problem in getting all team members to the newsgroup at the right time. I think this was caused by a lack of synergy. This should be resolved from having a plan in the beginning that makes everyone seem to be part of the team.

Analyzing the task was another issue that was covered in the team charter, but again, very briefly. There were due dates on the team charter, however, nothing was covered in depth or at least discussed. This issue needs to be discussed in detail between all of the team members. Everyone needs to know what they need to do and when their portion is due, in order for the team to complete the overall project.

Arranging the "organization" was an issue that wasn't discussed during the preparation of the team charter. Since the assignment was only a week long, we didn't assign a team leader. Also, there should have been a discussion about how the paper was going to go from four individual parts into one finalized product. This is an issue