Reflecting on Group Dynamics: A Project on Parental Stress

This reflection paper discusses the experience of working in a group to develop a poster related to parental stress in families with autistic children. The author reflects on the benefits and challenges of collaborative work, highlighting the importance of effective communication and conflict resolution. The author identifies the initial conflict related to work division and how their communication skills helped resolve it. The benefits of group work included the ability to listen to multiple opinions and analyze them, leading to a unanimous decision on the poster's structure. Barriers such as dominancy, floundering, and digressions were also encountered, but these ultimately increased the group's affinity to complete the project effectively. The author concludes that the group assignment helped them explore different aspects of their personality, address conflict situations, and utilize effective communication to achieve a successful outcome. Desklib provides similar assignments and study tools for students.

Running head: REFLECTION PAPER
REFLECTIVE PAPER
Name of the student
Name of the university
Author note

1REFLECTION PAPER
The 21st century has observed several changes in the education and learning process as
with dynamic changes in educational processes the work culture demand s the students to work
in groups or teams so that they can experience such aspects in their educational career (Jackson,
2015). As mentioned by Lovett, Clarke and Kilmurray (2018), it helps the students to face
critical conditions and helps them to develop positive attributes so that they can overcome any
conflict or adverse condition. In this paper, I would also be discussing about our group work and
my experience of working in the group while developing a poster related to parental stress.
Further, the primary purpose of this paper would be discussing the benefit and challenges of
working in the group while developing this assignment.
In the initial stage, we formed our own group as we were familiar to each other and were
aware of each-others capabilities as class mates. Everything was smooth and swift until the time
of organisation of work came. We did not decide any leader until then due to which minimal
conflict was observed in this situation. As mentioned by Ginnett (2019), while working in group
works, it is important to select a group leader so that under his/her leadership each aspect of the
assignment could be decided. We all were independent to share our knowledge, our ideas to
conduct the process and develop the poster. However, initial conflict related to the work division
was a critical condition which I was able to identify and hence, used my communication abilities
to resolve the situation. I was able to understand that the group assignment would be a longer
process as starting from the analysis of the background situation, to the final submission of the
poster, few weeks we were supposed to work together and in case of any conflict, it could affect
the quality and accuracy of our group project, as mentioned in the paper of (Jiang et al., 2016).
Hence, I used my effective communication skills to understand the ideas of each of the four
members and then provide them with their sections depending upon their ability to conduct the

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process. I took the ethical consideration of the conducted process as I was aware of the ethical
perspective that should be addressed while conducting the process. Hence, I was able to
distribute the task depending upon the ability of each member to contribute strongly to the group
project which is mentioned as the primary need of group project task allotment as mentioned by
Filho, Pinheiro and Albuquerque (2017) in their paper.
Use of effective communication was the first and most important benefit of group
assignment as the researchers Delerue and Sicotte (2017) mentioned that effective
communication among each group members helps to increase the affinity of the group task
towards success and each of the members becomes aware of each section thereby increases their
knowledge about the subject. We conducted 2 meets and several video callings so that we can
brainstorm about the topic as a unit and then noted all the information in word document to
forward it to each group embers. This helps to make each group member to understand the flow
of the assignment and the way it would be discussed in out poster. Therefore, with effective
communication, we were able to overcome our conflicts and increased our abilities to complete
the assignment with accuracy, which should be the primary aim of any group work as mentioned
by Ziek and Anderson (2015).
The second benefit of group work for my personality is my ability to listen to multi
opinions and then analyse them to my own perspective so that I also could evolve as a
professional and learner (Butt, Naaranoja & Savolainen, 2016). As we gathered more than 20
ideas for structuring and arranging the poster, we all were able to settle to one structure and
format unanimously and hence it clearly shows our connection and accuracy as a team.

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Despite this, there were also some barriers that increased the complication of the group
project. As mentioned by Rezvani et al. (2016), while conducting group project several
complications and conflicts arises which has both positive and negative consequences. The
barriers that this group assignment faced was dominancy, floundering, and digressions that
affected the group project by delaying the final outcome and enhancement of conflicts among the
group members. However, as mentioned by Patton et al. (2017), conflict in a group project is a
sign of multiple perspectives and ideas which is beneficial for the group and lack of conflict
determines no one in the group is able to provide ideas due to which the project lacks multiple
application. Hence, these barriers also increased out affinity to complete the project effectively.
Hence, in conclusion, I could mention that this group assignment helped me to explore
different aspects of my personality, my ability to address a conflict situation and utilise my
effective communication in a group of five people to make them come to a decision and work
together to develop an effective and successful poster.

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References
Butt, A., Naaranoja, M., & Savolainen, J. (2016). Project change stakeholder
communication. International Journal of Project Management, 34(8), 1579-1595.
Delerue, H., & Sicotte, H. (2017). Effective communication within project teams: the role of
social media. IAMDC-Wairco, February.
Filho, M. S., Pinheiro, P. R., & Albuquerque, A. B. (2017). Task assignment to distributed teams
aided by a hybrid methodology of verbal decision analysis.
Ginnett, R.C., 2019. Crews as groups: Their formation and their leadership. In Crew resource
management (pp. 73-102). Academic Press.
Jackson, D. (2015). Employability skill development in work-integrated learning: Barriers and
best practice. Studies in Higher Education, 40(2), 350-367.
Jiang, X., Flores, H. R., Leelawong, R., & Manz, C. C. (2016). The effect of team empowerment
on team performance: A cross-cultural perspective on the mediating roles of knowledge
sharing and intra-group conflict. International Journal of Conflict Management, 27(1),
62-87.
Lovett, T., Clarke, C., & Kilmurray, A. (2018). Adult education and community action: Adult
education and popular social movements. Routledge.
Patton, L. J., Tidwell, J. D., Falder-Saeed, K. L., Young, V. B., Lewis, B. D., & Binder, J. F.
(2017). Ensuring safe transfer of pediatric patients: a quality improvement project to
standardize handoff communication. Journal of pediatric nursing, 34, 44-52.

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Rezvani, A., Chang, A., Wiewiora, A., Ashkanasy, N. M., Jordan, P. J., & Zolin, R. (2016).
Manager emotional intelligence and project success: The mediating role of job
satisfaction and trust. International Journal of Project Management, 34(7), 1112-1122.
Ziek, P., & Anderson, J. D. (2015). Communication, dialogue and project
management. International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, 8(4), 788-803.