Multicultural Group-Work Individual Reflection Report

We worked in a group of four members. Since we were not conversant with one another in the group at the start of the work, one of the challenges we faced was gauging the attitude of each of the members towards their contribution in a team, and estimating the effort each member was required to put in the project (Kelly, 2008). My work was to discuss the leadership problem as per the case study, analyze the leadership problem regarding national culture, and provide my recommendations to HG Company and its Human Resources Managers. The group leader gave the suggested topic of discussion then clarified on what was supposed to be done. This work was done on the first meeting of the group. The clarification phase consumed much time because most of the members of the group had not read about the topic of discussion, and as a result, the allocation of the topics to be handled by each member of the group took us a substantial amount of time. Punctuality was a major issue because some group members were not present at the time we had agreed to start our group meeting, and therefore we had to wait for all members to arrive to start our group work.

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The topic we were handling dealt with the issues that emerged from the case study we were given by the lecturer. Therefore, we split the issues such that each member of the group handled a single problem evident in the case study. The identification of the problem, division of the tasks all went well since each group member agreed to work on the subtopic he/she was given. What was not clear to the group members was clarified through group discussion and each member began working on their tasks. The decision to allocate the subtopics to each member was done so that every member could work individually on some parts of the whole project (Adams et al., 2014). We were able to identify four problems from the case study "Martin in Uganda." Since our group had four members, each member had one task to do. The time taken for preparing and designing the work was short, and therefore the subdivision was a good idea to make the work be done faster (Davis,2009).

There was moderate communication within the group. At the starting of the group work, we created a group on "WhatsApp," consisting of the four group members, that was used for easy and fast communication with each other, as all of the members were reachable on "WhatsApp" almost instantly. For Instance, if it is about agreeing on a meeting time and date for our group.

We had set a deadline for each member of the group to complete their task and give the final work on that date. The date was set such that it was several days to the final day of the presentation so that we could get time to compile all the work into a single document before handing in for marking. We had agreed to do the compilation of the tasks as a group after all the members had forwarded their work to the group leader (Van den Bossche et al., 2006). We did the merging of the subtopics in the final group meeting, which was late according to the timelines we had set. This was because two group members had not completed their part and hence we had to add some more time for them to finish. All the group members agreed to extend the deadline, although the reasons these members gave for failing to complete the work were viable. During our final meeting, we had planned this meeting to collect all the single parts, cross check them and compile them into a single document. We held this meeting with all the members present, the two members who had unfinished work brought it with them too at this meeting. However, it did not occur as it was planned because one group member who had finished her work early could not locate it on her laptop because somehow she failed to save the work. We had to assist her to do her part of the topic as good as possible because we could not hand in incomplete work. We finally did the work and compiled it into one document in readiness for presenting the work for marking. However, this member had other imaginations as far as her topic of work was concerned, and therefore she decided to re-do the work on her own and changed several sentences and ideas. This was a bit of frustration, and the team members felt offended because of the effort and time they had put on that work. This was a sign of a lack of proper communication in our group (Belbin, 1993).

In the beginning, I had recommended to the group members to adopt a given style of discussing the topics each member had been assigned so that we could find it easy to compile the final work. However, my recommendation was rejected by two members and accepted by one member; hence, we had to agree on the style of writing at the very last meeting (Ingram, 1997). In this case, I see that I was weak in my role as a member of the team. Instead, I should have taken the role of the group leader and also embark on working on my topic of discussing the leadership problem as evidenced in the case study, analyzing the national culture of Uganda and recommendations to the HG Company and the Human Resource Management of the company. However, I concentrated on my topic.

The main creditable part of the functioning of our group was the fact that each member offered support to each other from time to time (Staniforth, 1996). On one instance, one member of the group experienced challenges while doing his or her part of the assignment, and communicated that to the group. Since we were working as a team, we helped him or her out to the best of our abilities and offered our suggestions on what needed to be added or improved to tackle the topic more easily (Moon, 2004). Again, concerning the issue of understanding a topic, none of the team members failed to give her contribution on a specific topic if he or she realized a group member did not fully understand a certain part of the topic.

Given a chance to work in the team in the future, many things in the group would need to be improved. For instance, teamwork, punctuality, personal preparedness, and time management are some of those aspects that each team member would need to work on so that he or she could become a better member of the group (Ellen Sarkisian, Derek Bok Center., 2007).

Conclusion

Generally, I love working in a team that is functioning, as it should, that each group member is well prepared, is aware of the task to work on beforehand, and does his part of the work to satisfactory levels. As a result, group members can trust each other and have confidence that each member can handle the task he or she has been assigned, and the members are collaborating well within the group. According to me, I would prefer sharing ideas as a group; such that opinions are presented and shared during group meetings- the ideas concern the work we are supposed to fulfill and other related ideas about the working of the group. Considering that we are know well conversant with one another, and we have gotten a clue about how each member of the group is performing in the team and on an individual basis, I would work with the same group again. In the future, I would prefer to have more discussions and to take risks to disagree on some matters instead of leaving others decided on some issues without discussing them out (Coveney, 2011).

References

Adams, E. A., Antaya, C. L., Seager, T. P., & Landis, A. E. (2014, January). Improving learning productivity and teamwork skills in freshman engineering students through conative understanding. In American Society for Engineering Education.

Belbin, L. (1993). PATN technical reference. CSIRO Division of Wildlife and Ecology.

Coveney, C. M. (2011). Cognitive enhancement? Exploring modafinil use in social context. In Sociological reflections on the neurosciences (pp. 203-228). Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

Davis, B. G. (2009). Tools for teaching. John Wiley & Sons.

Ellen Sarkisian, Derek Bok Center., 2007. "Working in Groups" Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning, Harvard University

Ingram, H. (1997). Performance management: processes, quality, and teamworking. International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, 9(7), 295-303.

Kelly, P. (2008). MULTICULTURAL GROUP-WORK: THE GROUP ALLOCATION PROCESS. In Higher Education Association Conference.

Moon J.(2004), A Handbook of Reflective and Experiential Learning, London, Routledge Falmer

Staniforth, D. (1996). Teamworking, or individual working in a team?. Team Performance Management: An International Journal, 2(3), 37-41.

Van den Bossche, P., Gijselaers, W. H., Segers, M., & Kirschner, P. A. (2006). Social and cognitive factors driving teamwork in collaborative learning environments: Team learning beliefs and behaviors. Small group research, 37(5), 490-521.