Essay Example on Teamworking

Teamwork is a combined effort of a group or a team in order to achieve or complete a task as well as a common goal in the most efficient and effective way. Every industry ranging from food services to information technology as well as business services requires teamwork as a necessity and all employers usually expect that the employees be team players. Irrespective of the job that one does, everyone needs to have the ability to work and create a good relationship with others. Some of the teamwork skills include the ability to clearly communicate ideas with the rest of the group or team members using both the verbal and non-verbal communication skills, the ability to mediate problems among team members hence proper conflict management skills, the ability to listen to the concerns as well as ideas of other pears in the team, the ability to complete any assigned tasks and ensuring the deadlines are kept appropriately hence being reliable in the team to earn the trust of the team members, ability to respect the team members as well as respecting their ideas enables the team members to be more open in communicating with you. This paper tries to explain about effective communication in a team, how ineffective communication affects teamwork and how it can be resolved or addressed.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

Communication can be defined as the act of turning over meanings from one group or entity to another by the use of commonly understood semiotic rules, signs as well as symbols. Effective communication, as well as teamwork, help an organization or a business in maintaining a work environment that is positive. Effective communication also pervades through all business operation areas the reason being that positive workplace generally means that happier employees in the business or organization are interacting with customers as well as the public. Leadership that sets clear standards and methods enables or ensures the beginning of effective communication among the teams in the organization or business. Clear communication ensures that there is a reduced confusion among the members of a team and managers in any organization will find it difficult to enforce employee accountability when the employees are confused about what they are supposed to do.

Any moment in a team when one party misconstrues or misunderstands the actions or words of another may lead to conflict in the team. Poor or ineffective communication may lead to reduced profits, poor performance, low morale as well as lack of teamwork in an organization or a group. Without communication in a group, team or organization, there will be no collaboration among the team members since everyone will be on the move on a frolic of their own also there is a risk that no one knows what he/she opts to be doing. Conflicts arise due to a breakdown in communication among a group or team members in an organization.

To resolve such conflicts that leads to failure of collaborative efforts in an organization, a group or a team, the team leaders need to make some effort. An example is when a team is working on a project in which the team leader has not defined the roles, the results of this will be blamed, missed deadlines as well as finger-pointing. This should be resolved by training all the team members on how to use the same set of metrics used for following up in an aim to ensure deadlines are met, assigning elements of a project as well as establishing clear timelines.

During everyday life situations, communication plays an important role in being it at work, at home or even out in public. Miscommunication, on the other hand, has also played its role mostly in business endeavors either between coworkers or with the customers or clients hence working towards improving the communication skills of a staff member in a workplace may help the staff in becoming a team and as a result the whole business benefits from the effects or impacts of the team. Effective communication can help the team members to understand their role in the business or team and work together ensuring they have achieved it. Most individuals prefer texting and emailing as their personal method of communication but when it comes to businesses, building teams requires face-to-face meetings as the best option. The reason for this is because the intent and tone of a text or an email can be misconstrued easily.

Whenever a team or group sits together and converse on a certain matter allows the members to bounce ideas off each other, this allows the members of the group to get to know each other hence allowing for immediate feedback. These simple things are what makes a team stronger and therefore should be encouraged by all team members who wish to make their teams strong and effective. Despite the fact that emailing may be used to disseminate information to all the team members without having a face-to-face conversation, but it is always important to bring together the members of the team on a weekly or monthly basis so as to ensure that they feel as being part of the group who have a common goal or mission. On the other hand, overdoing it may lead to the breakdown of the relationship once there are excessive meetings without something new to communicate to one another can break the morale of the team members such that they get bored and are now not able to commit themselves to the team.

A team usually succeeds when they allow themselves to listen to each other with a purpose and not listening to reply. Listening plays a significant role in communication and it is not everyone who possesses the listening skill. Lack of listening can likely lead to conflict within a team. Whenever one wants to practice active listening, it is advisable that they ensure an eye contact with the person who is talking and later when the person is done try to briefly summarize what the person said as a way to confirm whether you understood. A team leader should encourage active listening during team meetings by giving people more time to clarify their statements so that every member of the team understands. A skilled chairperson or a meeting facilitator can help ensure effective communications inside a team and can even recommend group or team exercise to help in building active listening skills among all the members of the team.

Physical barriers, as well as environmental distractions, may be a cause of ineffective communication within a team. Some of the examples of these distractions may include noise, telephone, as well as an uncomfortable meeting place. Whenever a telephone rings, the usual tendency of humans is usually to answer the caller despite the fact that the caller interrupts a delicate or important conversation. An environment which is too cold or too hot, background noise, unhygienic room, poor lighting as well as uncomfortable sitting are distractions that may affect the concentration as well as the morale of team members which in one way or another interferes with effective communication within a team. These factors or distractions should be addressed accordingly by setting rules that will force team members to switch off or put their mobile phones of silent mode during team meetings to avoid telephone distractions.

The team leaders should ensure that they look for favorable environments where there is no or there is minimal noise, places with the proper lighting system, rooms that are clean and hygienic as well as rooms that have comfortable seats to hold their meetings. This will help team members remain active and devoted to contributing to the achievement of the set common goals by all team members. Poor communication within a team limits the performance of the team as a whole mainly because there will be no order of doing things and some members of the team will lack an environment in which to give their best as they will be reluctant in all the activities that the team deals with.

Conclusion

This should be addressed by ensuring that every member attend group meeting either in a weekly or monthly basis in an effect to build face-to-face communication skills of all members as well as creating a good relationship among the team members. The main factor that holds a team together is the effective communication within the team, every member of a team has a role to ensure that they play their roles effectively and ensuring that they are able to communicate effectively and respecting the ideas and opinions of other members of the team. They should ensure they have appropriate teamwork skills to enable the success of the team.