My Reflective Journey: Experiences in Project Work and Team Dynamics

This reflective journal documents a student's eight-week journey through a project, highlighting experiences and lessons learned about team dynamics and personal growth. The reflection begins with initial team interactions and insights gained from readings on racism and teamwork. The student explores the importance of finding a role within a team and adopting a supportive approach. As the project progresses, the journal delves into the challenges of planning and the realization of leadership potential, emphasizing the significance of understanding team members' strengths and weaknesses. The student reflects on the value of feedback in fostering team cohesion and individual correction, ultimately concluding that collaborative efforts and open communication are essential for successful project outcomes. The journal underscores the importance of breaking down complex problems and leveraging team members' expertise to ease pressure and accelerate progress.

Running Head: MY REFLECTIVE JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROJECT
NAME
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Running Head: MY REFLECTIVE JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROJECT
Contents
When the team becomes a machinery and you become a tool................................................3
Introduction............................................................................................................................3
Week 1 & 2.............................................................................................................................3
Week 3, 4 & 5.........................................................................................................................3
Week 7 & 8.............................................................................................................................4
Bibliography...............................................................................................................................5
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Running Head: MY REFLECTIVE JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROJECT
When the team becomes a machinery and you become a tool
Introduction
Working as a part of the team is a learning experience that can be divided into two
fragments. In the first fragment of the module, we learn more about the topic or the
endeavor that we are dealing with. In the second fragment of the module, we learn about
the team dynamisms and related concepts. I became a part of one such journey in the
recent past; this journey lasted for eight weeks. In the current paper, I am sharing some of
my experiences and jotting down some of the characteristics that I picked up from this
journey.
Week 1 & 2
The first week of the endeavor was an ice-breaking session where I met with my
teammates. During the course of second-week author's Lucas Walsh's (2015) write up
“Racism Demands action from all of us” gave me an insight about finding a role for myself in
any given setup or a team. This write up says that we cannot stand by all the time and wait
for the tragedy to strike us. We need to support others during the tough time and create a
support system against certain issues. According to the author, we should take the initiative
and find a role for ourselves in a team. If we don't have the expertise to serve the setup
then we should play the role of a supportive hand for the team players that are sharing the
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Running Head: MY REFLECTIVE JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROJECT
responsibilities on their shoulders. This dictum helped me a lot in playing the role of a team
player.
During the same week, I also read this article written by Chuck Salter ( 2013) in which he
emphasized about the importance of adopting a low key approach sometimes and allow the
teammates to come up with practical viewpoints about any given issues. This article says
that the presence of the team allows us to look at the issues from an objective point of view
and this is where the things really matter (Tools, 2018).
Week 3, 4 & 5
During week three and four, our team was busy finding out various projections connected to
the future events that can happen during the course of the implementation of our
endeavor. When we undertake any project then we cannot afford to miss certain "What If"
scenarios. It is not necessary that the things will always move easily. Sometimes difficulties
can act as a roadblock for us. After jotting down various roadblocks and opportunity areas
our team finally decide to write down a plan for the execution of the main endeavor. It was
the time when I realized a blind spot of my personality as it is described in the "Johari
window". My teammates gave me this response to come up with a planning framework
which is apt for the endeavor (Haughey, 2013).
I first went for a research and read Duncan Haughey’s project management guide to select a
proper framework. What I learned about project management is secondary for me.
However, during the week 5 what I have learned about myself was more important. Here I
discovered that I have some leadership traits present in me and I can be trusted for bigger
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Running Head: MY REFLECTIVE JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROJECT
responsibilities. It also gave me another lesson about the team dynamism. I was not the
leader of the group. During the first few weeks, I was playing a secondary role. However, my
teammates realized my true potential and promoted me to a post of responsibility during a
particular phase of the project.
The division of the work is an important step that is essential for the smooth functioning of
a team. I learned that if a person wants to become a leader then he should start thinking
like a team player where he can understand the strengths and the weaknesses of other
people. The attainment of the leadership is a process, where first we walk on the ladders of
the experience and then finds that we are in a position to take the responsibility of a
project. This thought gave me an idea to participate more
Week 7 & 8
During the second week of my project, I came across with this interesting viewpoint shared
by author Chuck Salter (2012). In his write up he wrote that sometimes it becomes
important for us to understand the fact that what we are thinking maybe partially wrong.
When a person shares a seat of responsibility he is required to keep a check on himself. I
searched a lot about the methods to keep a check on myself and here I figured out the
importance of the culture of the feedback. I studied various models of the feedback
collections. This study of the feedback models also gave me an idea that feedback plays an
important role in setting up the dynamism of a team it has a before and after impact over
the results of the Johari window (Salter, 2012).
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Running Head: MY REFLECTIVE JOURNEY THROUGH THE PROJECT
I realized that feedback culture brought all our team members on the same page during the
course of week 8. We can also say that during the 8th week all the teammates working
together were in the known zone of the Johari window. As a person, I also learned a
valuable lesson from this exercise of the feedback collection. This lesson taught me that
every feedback is a correction and it can become a valuable addition caused by the joint
efforts of the teams. During the eight weeks, I also learned an important lesson connected
to the team dynamism. Here I learned that we can break down a problem into various
parts. Later on, we can depute team members to take care of the parts in accordance with
their expertise areas. This break down can ease out the pressures of the team member and
speed up the execution of various plans.
Bibliography
Haughey, D. (2013). Project Planning a Step by step Guide. Projectsmart.co.uk,
https://www.projectsmart.co.uk/.
Salter, C. (2012). The Deal, Feb Vol 5, PP( 15-16).
Tools, C. T. (2018). Team Charters Getting Your Team off to a Great Start. Mind Tools,
https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newTMM_95.htm.
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