University Assignment: Individual and Team Work in a Group Setting

This report examines the dynamics of individual and teamwork within a group assignment, providing a strategic reflection on the author's role and experiences. It delves into the key attributes of effective teamwork, including commitment to shared goals, interpersonal skills, interdependence, open interaction, suitable team composition, and commitment to leadership. The report highlights the benefits of teamwork, such as increased efficiency, shared ideas, accountability for weak areas, and improved work relationships. It also addresses the challenges encountered, including lack of trust, role uncertainty, unclear goals, differences in talents, and disengagement. The conclusion summarizes the lessons learned, emphasizing the importance of teamwork for career development. Recommendations are provided to improve team working, such as emphasizing the importance of teamwork, teaching teamwork skills, building cohesive groups, thoughtful group formation, considering roles for team members, and setting clear goals. The report references various academic sources to support its findings.

Running head: INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Individual and team work in a group assignment
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Authors note

1INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Discussion........................................................................................................................................1
Effective teamwork attributes......................................................................................................1
Benefits of teamwork...................................................................................................................3
Challenges of teamwork..............................................................................................................4
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................5
Recommendations............................................................................................................................5
References........................................................................................................................................7

2INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Introduction
The individual and teamwork in the preparation of the group assignment are an important
part in every project development. The teamwork is very important to achieve a successful end
result for any project or task (Morton and Weinstein 2015). The role of an individual in a team as
a team member in a group assignment is an experience that helps in future group assignments
and career prospects. The group assignments are helpful to make a team work collaborative and
cooperative so that they become a great team player in future group assignments. The report
presents the experiences of team work in a group assignment. The purpose of this report is to
present strategic reflection of my role and experience of team working in the preparation of the
group assignment.
The structure of this report is effective teamwork attributes, benefits of teamwork and
challenges of team work along with recommendations provided at the end of this report.
Discussion
Effective teamwork attributes
My role as an individual and experience of team working in the preparation of the group
assignment helped me to learn that there key attributes for effective teamwork to prepare a group
assignment and they are discussed below.
Commitment to Shared goals and team success- The understanding of assignment purpose to
share goals with each other which is combined to achieve the common mission or objective. The
team members should share common goal and provide prestige, respect and recognitions to each
other’s perception (Levi 2015). The members must be satisfied with their work in order to
achieve a common objective.

3INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Interpersonal skills- The caring attitude of team members towards each other is important and
they must support and protect each other. The feeling regarding group assignment must be freely
expressed (Meslec and Curşeu 2015). The respectfulness towards each other, mutual
expectations, trust and supportive nature is a key to develop interpersonal skills.
Interdependence- The team members cannot succeed until and unless their other team members
do not succeed equally. The group delivery is far more successful and desired than individual
delivery (Angelo and McCarthy 2018). The team members must depend on each other to succeed
where they must help each other to improve the group assignment as a whole rather than an
individual.
Open interaction and positive retaliation- The interaction is the major attribute as it helps to
develop a strong bond between team members (Belanger 2016). The interaction includes giving
and accepting queries and feedback in terms of non-defensive way, expressing ideas and
opinions while working in a team and engaging in open dialogue and interaction.
Suitable team composition- The team members are successful when they deliver a successful
group assignment which is the contribution of suitable team composition. The team members
should be clarified with the roles and responsibilities that each team member is playing (Betta
2016). The differences should be discussed in terms of what each member will deliver through
their part in the group assignment.
Commitment to leadership, team process and accountability- The structure of team members
must be in a way that they cannot act as a superior or inferior from each other (Cox and
Bobrowski 2016). The acceptance of each and every team member must be imparted in a team
work to avoid any conflicts.

4INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Benefits of teamwork
The team working is important in a group assignments as it helps to not only achieve a
successful completion of group assignments but it also helps in making an individual a good
team player in future group assignments. The team working benefits a lot and it has benefitted
me also in several ways that are discussed below.
Increased efficiency- The team working in preparation of group assignment helps to achieve
increased efficiency that helps in doing work more effectively. The group assignment become
more efficient if several people work on it and it is also delivered on time without and delay
(Macpherson 2015). The group assignments are thus important to improve the completion of
group assignments in an effective way.
Shared ideas- The benefit that team working in a group assignment provide that helps in future
development also is sharing ideas. The sharing of ideas is important as it helps to not only
express their ideas and opinions but also collaborate and cooperate with each other (Vance
Kulturel-Konak and Konak 2015). The sharing of ideas open several opportunities to interact and
improve group assignments.
Weak areas are accountable- The team working does not only helps in showcasing strengths of
team members but also helps team members to realize their weak areas (Betts and Healy 2015).
Thus team members can work upon the weak areas to improve in future and enhance their skills.
The weak areas helps to understand where an individual is lacking and how much they have to
improve by working in a team.
Improved work relationships- The work relationships are improved while working in team to
prepare for group assignments. The team members while working in team realize each other’s
strengths and weaknesses and help each other to improve their weak areas (Beecham et al.

5INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
2017). The improved work relationships helps to contribute in a successful completion of group
assignments to achieve professional and personal goals.
Challenges of teamwork
The team working benefits in several ways as discussed in the previous section however,
there were challenges that I found and observed while working in a team to prepare for group
assignments. The challenges are as follows.
Lack of Trust- The lack of trust is common in any team working in a group assignment and it
leads to major conflicts (Morton and Weinstein 2015). The trust plays an important role in a
team work as it helps to achieve a desired project in an effective way. Thus lack of trust is a
challenge that poses issues in a group assignment.
Role Uncertainty- The roles and responsibilities of team members must be divided and shared
equally so that there is no future conflicts that can occur (Weimer 2016). This helps to maintain
integrity and a continuous work flow that is useful to achieve desired goals and objectives of
group assignment.
Unclear goals and objectives- The goals and objectives when remain unclear for any team and
its team members then it contributes in confusion and conflicts (Cox and Bobrowski 2016). The
team members when see goals and objectives in an individual manner rather than as a team then
the goals and objectives become unclear and thus poses issues in a team.
Differences due to talents- The team members have different talents that they contribute in a
team to prepare for a group assignment. Sometimes it happens that some team member
contribute less in a team and some contribute large and thus this poses conflicts (Vance,
Kulturel-Konak and Konak 2015). The team members in this situations feel either superior or
inferior that contributes in conflicts.

6INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Disengagement- The disengagement in a team working to prepare a group assignment often
poses issues. This is because when team members have not any proper direction and they feel
inferior towards each other then it poses challenge for a team (Betta 2016). The disengagement
occurs due to lack of clarity among team members in terms of goals and objectives. The
motivation is also affected due to disengagement in a team.
Conclusion
Therefore, I can conclude that the experiences that I gained in a team working both as a
team member and individual in preparation of groups assignment, is helpful to improve my
career in future. The above paragraphs shows what I gained in team working. The report shows
what I learned from my experiences including key attributes of team work, benefits from team
working and challenges that are faced while working in a team. I also learnt that I can improve as
an individual and as a team member by working in group assignment. Hence, team working is
important for every individual as it open opportunities to work as team player, improve
interaction and professional relationships.
Recommendations
The team working is important and hence to improve team working the below
recommendations must be taken into account.
Importance of team work must be emphasized- The emphasizing should be on making clear
regarding why the particular assignment is chosen and being done before forming groups.
Teaching team work skills- The team members must be given teaching on what are the skills
that are effective in team work and contribute in completion of group assignments.
Building cohesive groups- The team members must know each other before starting group
assignment as it will help them to understand each other’s perspectives.

7INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
Group formation must be thoughtfully considered- The group must be formed with
thoughtful consideration to prevent any future challenges in a group assignments.
Considering of roles for team members- The roles of team members must be considered as an
important aspect and must be assigned as per the ability of team members.
Clear goals- The goals must be cleared before starting of group assignments as it helps to make
group assignments successful and desired goals and objectives are achieved.

8INDIVIDUAL AND TEAM WORK IN A GROUP ASSIGNMENT
References
Angelo, R.F. and McCarthy, R., 2018. Group Assignments as a Measure to Promote
Performance in Virtual Teams. Information Systems Education Journal, 16(4), p.4.
Beecham, S., Clear, T., Barr, J., Daniels, M., Oudshoorn, M. and Noll, J., 2017. Preparing
tomorrow's software engineers for work in a global environment. IEEE Software, 34(1), pp.9-12.
Belanger, J.R., 2016. Learning in the Laboratory: How Group Assignments Affect Motivation
and Performance. Journal of Education and Learning, 5(1), p.210.
Betta, M., 2016. Self and others in team-based learning: Acquiring teamwork skills for
business. Journal of Education for Business, 91(2), pp.69-74.
Betts, S. and Healy, W., 2015. Having a ball catching on to teamwork: an experiential learning
approach to teaching the phases of group development. Academy of Educational Leadership
Journal, 19(2), p.1.
Cox, P.L. and Bobrowski, P.E., 2016. The team charter assignment: Improving the effectiveness
of classroom teams. Journal of Behavioral and Applied Management, 1(2).
Levi, D., 2015. Group dynamics for teams. Sage Publications.
Macpherson, A., 2015. Cooperative Learning Group Activities for College Courses.
Meslec, N. and Curşeu, P.L., 2015. Are balanced groups better? Belbin roles in collaborative
learning groups. Learning and Individual Differences, 39, pp.81-88.
Morton, L.H. and Weinstein, J., 2015. Teamwork.
Vance, K., Kulturel-Konak, S. and Konak, A., 2015, March. Teamwork efficacy and attitude
differences between online and face-to-face students. In Integrated STEM Education Conference
(ISEC), 2015 IEEE (pp. 246-251). IEEE.
Weimer, M., 2016. 10 Recommendations for Improving Group Work.