Reflection on own teamwork and communication throughout the semester

At the commencement of the second semester, I was hoping to learn a lot of new things due to all the interesting modules that were allocated to us. The collaboration of CG1102 and CG1413 particularly interested me as this was the first time it was being implemented. We started with learning how to interact effectively in inter-cultural groups in CG1413 while the building of programming concepts went parallel in CG1102. We were eventually teamed up differently for the two big projects that were to be taken up this semester and it was made sure that each team had people of diverse cultures.

                                                             They said they can do it!

For our CG1413 project, we took lack of awareness of diet having an impact on global temperature as the problem to be solved. Kai Ren proposed this topic and was chosen as our team leader as he had all the knowledge on this topic. The submission of proposal fell amidst the Lunar New Year festival when three of my group mates were unavailable. We needed to conduct meetings to discuss the structure of our project. It was a tough call for me and Kai Ren. We could not contact the others. Teamwork requires empathy so without complaining, Kai Ren and I met to let the work go on. Later when everyone returned, they resumed their respective jobs and showed high level of commitment till the end. Most of our communication was via e-mail and Skype. We decided on designing posters, constructing displays, conducting questionnaires and interview, sending blast emails, asking permission from the concerned authorities and conducting a food exhibit. I was in charge of designing posters and food stall in particular and contributed to the displays and questionnaires with other team members. However, the food stall could not be conducted due to limited time and budget. We uploaded our plan in the wiki and the Gantt chart helped to keep us on track. Due to the effective task allocation among the members, everything went smoothly and our target was accomplished without any major conflict.

                           A team works like this, they need to communicate to not let it fall!

My CG1102 project required us to grab concepts taught in the lectures and implement them in our weekly labs. The main aim was to design an Inventory control and Monitoring System. Our team leader, Jei Sern was considerate and focussed. He was smart enough to have known the strengths and weaknesses of the three of us and divided the tasks accordingly. Throughout this project, there were certain conflicting instances. Jei Sern did not like the idea of Long changing the functionality design but they resolved it through effective communication. Jei Sern would always set an internal deadline. Due to my workload from Hall activities and the CG1413 project going parallel, I missed the deadline twice and felt that he was agitated at my irresponsibility towards work. I realized this and talked to him about it. I assured him that though I missed the internal deadline, I would never let the whole team suffer by missing the actual deadline. I think this conflict was a consequence of different working styles. We used to meet up to discuss the labs every week and also video tapped two of our meetings. Later Jei Sern came up with the idea of communicating over emails and hand phones to discuss any problem regarding solving our parts.

I gave two presentations in this semester. Oral Presentation 1 was to introduce our CICMS design to the tutor. My team received praises for our visual effects and Ms Brenda liked my presentation style. The second one was with 'Friends of Green', our group name for CG1413 project. I think I could have done a better job if I had not blanked out while presenting.

Working in teams was a whole new experience for me this semester. Three of my core modules namely, CG1102, CG1413 and CG1108 involved teamwork. I learnt how to conduct a formal meeting, how to work in teams and how to communicate effectively to resolve conflicts. I am grateful to Ms Brenda and all my teammates for their contribution and support. I hope to implement the skills and values acquired from this module in my life ahead.

Reflection on the oral presentation 2

The second oral presentation came as an end to our one-month-old campaign on spreading awareness about the link between ones diet and global warming. Our team was the last to present our ideas and solutions to the problem we had come up with. We presented last Thursday. This gave us a lot of time to prepare for the presentation.While compiling the presentation slides, we realized how much work we had done in this one month time, as there was so much to present on. There was a large number of slides, compiled together only after the assent of all the group members. This made our slides interesting enough to attract the audience's attention and the flow came out pretty well while presenting.

The presentation went well. I could clearly see an improvement over the first presentation in all my group mates. Kai Ren was our leader throughout the campaign. He is a vegan himself and is extremely passionate about diet related issues that are responsible for the warming of the earth. He convinced each one of us that there is a link between ones diet and global warming before we started our work. This gave us a belief in the project which could be seen while we were presenting our ideas and solutions to the problem. We managed to answer all the questions that were put before us by the panel of judges confidently.
We practiced each person's part as a group only once and this might have been the reason why there was a problem in switching  presenters every time. I strongly believe that each one of us is capable of doing much better if we improve on areas like grammatical errors in speech.

Comparing with the others groups I felt that our presentation exceeded the time limit of 20 minutes by only a few minutes while others took over 45 minutes to finish. I hope we get some benefit for this!
I am very proud of all my group mates for their dedication and commitment that made this project possible. We bonded well during the construction of the displays and conducting interviews and came to know each other well. I think this helped in the division of the slides among us as we knew each other's strengths and weaknesses.

 Seeing my individual performance, I feel that I became more nervous when I faced the class than I was before. I managed to present but I know that it was not my best. I was carrying cards to remember the points during the presentation and in reading from the cards, I forgot to change the slides on time as I did not look at the screen at all.These small errors made me even more nervous while presenting but there was one thing I managed to remember which was to "keep talking", as Ms Brenda always tell us.
Sadly, there is no CG1413 for the cows shown in the left!

Reflection on the first group meeting

It was my second experience of a group meeting that was being video tapped. The first one being with my blogging group mates, a result of sheer miscommunication!

Our CG1102 assignment is based on the development of a software system. We are divided into groups of three. My team mates are Long and Jeisern. It is my first hand at such highly technical software development project. Both nervous and excited at the commencement of the journey after Lab 3 assignment was announced,  we decided to have a meeting as soon as possible. 10th February 6.00pm was chosen as the meeting date and time respectively and PGP meeting room was decided as the venue.

We chose Jeisern as the leader of our group and decided the Agenda before meeting up. The meeting went well. Before discussing our ideas regarding the assignment, Jeisern made sure that all of us have understood the question. Then he explained his idea and both long and I contributed our ideas to come up with the API and the UI design.

The assignment required us to divide the task as attempting the problem alone would make one fail other modules! This was clearly mentioned in the four pages long question! This idea strengthened our team spirit as we realized that one cannot do without the other. Long seemed confident in the designing of the User Interface while Jeisern was comfortable with the API. I was given the task of writing the report. The notion of team spirit and observing how enthusiastic all my team mates were made me more responsible towards the task I was given.

I was also asked to take the minutes of the meeting so I made sure I would write all the essential details to later e-mail them whatever was discussed.

Last but not the least was the discussion on the oral presentation. We talked about how to go about it. However, Long suggested that we should first complete our individual tasks and compile the final report. Jeisern was going home for Chinese new year so we decided to conduct a second meeting after all of us have attempted the given task and when he comes back. We decided on a deadline for the submission of our work to each other.

Long's friend Le Vi Thanh helped us video tape the entire meeting. The meeting was a good experience and I learned a lot about how a team works. The division of task and observing the commitment of my team mates reduced the pressure on me and made me more confident about the project.

Resolving interpersonal conflict

It is surprising to know that in my life so far I have not seen two individuals who think alike in every situation they face. No two persons have the same thinking process and so clashes are bound to happen. I can support the above by the numerous conflicts I have had with my best friend and how every time we resolve it without much hassle. This is because we understand each other, despite our different opinions.

If a compromise is not reached, conflict is inevitable. This reminds me of what my friend's parents went through last year. After 15 years of their marriage, they got divorced. There was no immediate reason for the decision. They always complained about each other's habits and landed up in heated arguments on a regular basis. The problem here was mistrust. They did not trust each other which lead to regular conflicts between them. They often talked about it but the problem could not be solved.

Often conflicts can arise while working in teams. I was a member of the student council in my school and was involved in organizing several activities. During the preparations for various school events there would always be clashes. I remember how once our school counselor told off the entire council for not reaching a decision before the deadline due to interpersonal conflicts among the team members. This made us realize that we were actually conflicting over petty issues and wasting our time. Furthermore, it taught us a lesson that while working in a team one should respect each person's perspective and that is how such conflicts can be resolved.

Conflicts can have both positive and negative implications. The result of the conflict depends on the conflicting individuals and the circumstances that follow. It is only through understanding, communication and compromise can one resolve interpersonal conflicts.

Observation of team behaviour: intercultural and interpersonal communication

I am a Hindu by religion. Speaking in terms of Edward T. Hall, ours is a High-context culture. We have several customs like saying “Namaste” to greet and show respect for a person, taking blessings of elders by touching their feet, avoiding meat on auspicious days, fasting to pray for ones goodwill and these come naturally to us. There aren't rigid rules to be followed but since it is our culture, we learn it. Similarly, those growing up in families with different religious and cultural beliefs have different values because they’ve learnt what they’ve seen. However, two individuals sharing the same race and ethnicity need not share cultures too. They can have different cultures in terms of generation gap, sexual orientation, religion or beliefs. It is not a cake walk to mingle with a person having different beliefs and values than yours. Thus in this world of globalization and global exchange, one must possess adequate interpersonal and inter-cultural skills to hit off an effective communication.

We have learnt that gestures play an important role in communication. Within a cultural group there are non-verbal cues used unconsciously and frequently during communication. It is possible that those cues are local to that group and are completely unknown to a person from some other cultural group. For example, the V sign can be used as a sign of victory for some or peace for others. It is used as a sign of bunny ears in informal photo-shoots. It means a bad sign in some European countries and is taken as an insult.This clearly shows that how cultural diversity can cause miscommunication of highest order!

To avoid such misconceptions while communicating, the listener must not only understand speaker’s words but also his gestures and tone of speaking. Surely, it takes two to tango. So, besides appropriate speech, active listening is also important for an effective communication. It involves both hearing and interpretation. Active listening and understanding a person is extremely essential to relate to him/her and so is an integral part of interpersonal communication.

In my two weeks of close inter-cultural interaction with my team mates, I observed how different we are in the way we speak. Some of my team mates talk slowly while some talk fast. I think I am the loudest of all in my group! Some of us use our hands to express ourselves while explaining something or while giving presentations. During our discussions we tend to inquire about each other’s culture and traditions or talk about our past incidents. All these discussions are inter-cultural and interpersonal interactions and improve our cultural quotient greatly.

Teamwork and Communication

Man is a social animal. He ought to mingle in society to survive. The only feasible way to interact and make connections is communication. People can communicate using familiar languages, sounds, gestures or expressions. When I first came to Singapore, I found it difficult to start a conversation with people of different nationalities as it took me time to understand the accents. I wondered how hard it could be to express oneself through words and gestures as we have been communicating since we were kids. Soon I realized that as we grow up, we become aware and more careful in choosing our words for an effective communication. This is essential to make oneself heard in today’s busy world.

Arguments occur as a result of miscommunication. A broken communication worsens the problem through misunderstandings and often leads to final termination of relationships. But as they say, where there is a problem there is a solution too, a polite communication can restore the previous harmony of the relationship. This is the beauty of communication.

POOR COMMUNICATION

Teamwork is important to pursue a carrier in today’s world. A well co-ordinated team has committed members who respect each other’s opinion. I believe that true team spirit comes from the belief that ‘none of us is as smart as all of us’. There may be weak links, backbiting and gossip mongering that hampers the working process. It is the job of the leader to ensure that none of the above comes in the way of task completion.

TEAMWORK AT ITS BEST!

My first public speaking experience was a thanksgiving speech in my school. I still remember how nervous I was and had prepared very hard for that 5 minutes talk. Apart from quizzes, I had no experience of teamwork until our previous two sessions with Brenda at CG1413 class. She divided us into teams. Our team was asked to present our ideas on ‘letters’. Brenda analysed our flaws and appreciated our good points in the feedback. It was highly encouraging. I hope this module will bring out the effective communicator and leader in me.