HND Health & Social Care: A Reflection on Group Project - City College

This assignment is a reflective journal detailing a student's experience in a group project focused on diabetes mellitus within a health and social care course at City College. Using Driscoll's model of reflection, the student describes the events, analyzes the implications on their learning and professionalism, and outlines a plan of action for future improvement. The reflection highlights both positive and negative aspects of the teamwork, including challenges in communication, leadership, and collective responsibility. The student acknowledges their role in the team's shortcomings and proposes strategies to enhance communication and leadership skills, emphasizing the importance of collaboration and cooperation in multidisciplinary patient care. The conclusion emphasizes the need for improved teamwork dynamics despite the successful outcome of the assignment.

REFLECTION
A REFLECTION ON THE PROCESS AND OUTCOME
OF GROUP WORK.

Introduction
This is a critical evaluation and reflection on team presentation on diabetes
mellitus. The evaluation, analysis and reflection will utilize the Driscoll’s model of
reflection (1994). One, there will be a description of the events (what happened,
the what). This is a description of what I saw, my reaction, that of the other group
members and the key aspects of the situation. Two, the events that happened will
be analyzed (the so what). This is the implications it had on learning and on
professionalism. Analyze the feelings I had at the moment, have the feelings
changed now, the good and the bad experiences, the effects and did I share the
feelings with other colleagues. Lastly, the plan of action (the what now) to be taken
so to improve one’s faults, avoid them in future and in case they occur one will be
more prepared.

GROUP WORK REFLECTION
The team was a group of ---------- members, I, -----------. -----
The team was originally supposed to have ------ members. A
discussion on type 1 and type 2 diabetes is what we settled on.
The project was divided into sections, each one with a task to
complete. The group discussion was lively and I noticed that
everyone participated in the discussion.

The work presented by
------was not satisfying
although it was done
pretty well.-----as
mentioned above she did
most of the work. She did
her part, my work too.
She compiled the work
into a PowerPoint and
inserted videos and
images. From all these
events, I left out although
none of us spoke up.
Phase one (what?)

The teamwork experienced both bad and good experiences. The bad experiences
include; the lack of collective responsibility, ineffective communication, lack of
collective accountability, lack of cooperation/collaboration. As a team player, I lacked
leadership skills and effective communication skills. According to Fogleman and Gen
Ronald (2016), a leader should be commited to the vision and mission of the group,
should have integrity, should have the desire to lead, should be sincere, should have
consistency. In addition, (Kouzes and Posner 2012; Johnson, Scholes, Whittington
2010) added that a leader should act assertively, should communicate, should know
oneself and the team and should manage the performance of a team.
Phase two (So what?)

The good experience is that our performance was good in the assignment. Despite
this, it is clear that the experience that I had in this team hindered my learning and
my nursing professionalism. Working as a team utilizes the active and experimental
learning style from the Kolbs learning styles (Benner, 2012; Kurtz, Draper &
Silverman, 2016; Irby, 2014; Forbes et al, 2016; Kolb 2005). Not being able to
participate in the team denied me this chance to learn. It denied me a chance to
grow, my professionalism as I was unable to practice effective communication,
collaboration and cooperation bearing in mind that this three are so important in
patient care as patient care is multi-disciplinary (Hiver and Cheever, 2013).

As explained above, the bad experiences were as a result of ineffective
communication and poor leadership skills. To improve communication, I have to be
an active listener. With this I will be able to earn trust. I should question more so as
to get more clarification on a subject. I should reflect and summarize occurrences.
With these, I will be an effective communicator. On leadership, I will acquire the
leadership skills through; extensive studies on leadership, having mentors on
leadership, emulating good leaders and doing a course on leadership (Dar Ong
2010; Kilmann and Thomas 2010). On collaboration and cooperation, it should be
clear to me that patient care is multidisciplinary. The good experience was on the
good performance. I should ensure that I maintain the good performance but
through participation, not others doing it for me.
Phase three (Now what)

In conclusion, the performance on the assignment was a success although the
teamwork was not. There was lack of collaboration, cooperation, effective
communication, and trust. ------ one of the team player did most of the assignment
which hindered our learning. -----should not be blamed entirely as I also played a
role by not speaking up to solve this problem and also to negotiate the teams. To
avoid this in future, I should ensure that I improve my communication and
leadership skills.
Conclusion

References
Burnard, P., (2014). Effective Communication Skills for Health Professionals (2nd edn). Cheltenham:
Stanley Thornes.
Dar Ong Lin (2010). Trust in co-workers and employee behaviors at work. International reviews of
the business research paper. 6:1 194-204
DeVito, J. (2013) Human Communication: The Basic Course. New York: Harper & Row.Ellis, R., Gates,
B., and Kenworthy, N. Interpersonal Communication in Nursing: Theory and Practice. Edinburgh:
Churchill Livingstone.
Irby, D. M. (2014). Excellence in clinical teaching: knowledge transformation and development
required. Medical education, 48(8), 776-784.
Johnson, G, Scholes, K, Whittington, R (2012). Exploring Corporate Strategy, 8th Edition, FT Prentice
Hall, Essex,
Kilmann R.H., Thomas K.W. (2010). Developing a forced-choice measure of conflict-handling
behavior: the “Mode” instrument. Educ Psychol Meas.37(2): 309–325.
Kolb, Alice Y.; Kolb, David A. (2005). “Learning Styles and Learning Spaces: Enhancing Experiential
Learning in Higher Education”. Academy of Management Learning & Education. 4(2): 193–
212
Kouzes, J.M. and Posner, B.Z. (2012). The leadership challenge. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
Timmins, F., McCabe, C., (2015). How assertive are nurses in the workplace? A preliminary pilot
study. Journal of Nursing management. 13, 61-67.