Team and Groups - Admission/Application Essay Example

? Team and Groups Insert Team and Groups The opportunity to work with a team of professional sportsmen was a chance of alifetime to me. This is the experience I had with Los Angeles Clippers, a basketball team playing in the western conference in pacific division as classified by the National Basketball Association. I had the privilege to being part of their team in a workshop that they had organized, as one of the volunteers. While a member, I used to represent them in local committee for basketball teams. This committee comprised of two representatives from each team in Los Angles, and a lead team elected from members. The team comprised of players coming from around the world but mostly Americans. The team had an opportunity of working with the youth from the region in creating awareness on abuse of drugs among students. This was like social service work for them. The Los Angeles Clippers was formed in 1970, and it started out as the buffalos, then it was later called San Diego then finally it was called the clippers. Their matches were scheduled to be played at Staple Centre a place that they were to share with the Lakers and the Sparks. Through analyzing this team and committee, I came to understand some aspects, which create a dynamic difference found between groups and teams. I noticed there were leadership differences found in groups and teams (West, 1994). This was evident during the workshop whereby I realized that, in a team everybody is a leader by himself and everybody in the team initiates responsibility of delivering. On the other hand, in groups, leaders set goals and expect members in the group to be in a position of meeting these goals. Moreover, I observed that in teams, leaders are seen as role models, and they set outstanding examples in their teams to be followed. They also follow rules, and they are part of the team while undertaking all tasks. However, in groups leaders blame other members if goals are not met as per the requirements (West, 1994). In groups, leaders are superior to other members. This makes the relationship, between members and leaders to be minimal, as they do not have equal mandate in the group. Deriving from my experience, I realized that everybody had a responsibility to carry out in order to ensure growth of the team. Compared to groups where everyone had his or her own personal contribution, in that team the case was different and anybody’s objectives were the achievement of the team. Therefore, there was no team member isolated in success or losses of the team. The workshop made me realize that everyone wanted to be counted in team success, and also ensured that their contribution was for the team benefits. In groups, individuals strive hard to ensure they are at the top, which creates rivalry between members of the group (West, 1994). A team ensures that each member carries out collective responsibilities, and there was room for improvement as the weak members are motivated to work hard within the context of the team. In reference to loses, nobody was punished individually, and everybody accepted outcomes that embraced penalties of the loss. Through this experience, I understood that there was a collective responsibility in the firm, and they needed each other to grow financially and mentally. Team members based their overall result of the team. I recognized that a team depends largely on its members to attain their goals. This collective responsibility ensures that individuals were in a capability of helping other members in the team. This was possible as our leader and all members of the team and group being involved in the decision-making. For instance in our team, leaders communicated freely with other members. It was difficult to identify leader unless somebody pointed him out. The role of a leader was made to be nominal, as the goals set should have received approval from team members. The team issue and working together also applied in lying off workers. This was when team members were suspended from work incase mistake from one member of the team. Concerning the idea of virtual teams, I realized that working in this type of setting; I would miss the experience and opportunity of understanding the whole aspect of teamwork. The rules would have just been set, and we as the members would have followed without realizing the whole expectations that the leaders had anticipated (Duarte & Snyder, 2006). This is because virtual team refers to a group of workers with knowledge but is dispersed, and coordinates their work in an electronic way where the information and communication technology is the only way of communicating (Duarte & Snyder, 2006). Due to the reason that there is no face-to-face communication with the other group or team members, it would be a challenge for the team member to collaborate effectively while meeting the set goals at the same time. The workshop also acted as a revelation in relation to behaviors in team participation. In the team, it was obvious that success or loses were shared by all team members which assisted in individual motivation whose performances were lower than expected target. However, members acted as mentors for low performing members that enabled them focus on attaining goals. Other members were also eligible of questioning poor performance. In comparison of the whole concept with grouping, case was different as everybody concentrated on his or her individual achievements. This was to be affected if he or she were an under performer since there were nobody from the group who would have realized that targets were not being met (West, 1994). However, in case of the group-committee, it was noticeable that leader’s behaviors from my team differed from that of group. It was also observable that there were more interactions between leaders of the teams and their members compared to groups. This is the main reason why individuals in groups missed targets and go unnoticed. Moreover, group leaders usually are not in a position of communicating properly to group members unless he was ordering them around. The one on one communication in teams enables leaders to know and address weak points of individual team members. This contributed to development and improvement of the team as a whole. Individual problems were shifted to be an issue of the team. I observed that leaders were able to adapt faster to team environment, because of the maximized interaction with team members who made them feel like one of their own. I appreciated the habit of collaborative disciplining, firing of individuals, development, training of members and promotions in teams unlike in the group scenario where a select individual undertook these decisions. Moreover, the experience I gained while in the group and team can be related to assertions established by Schutz and Maslow in relation to interpersonal needs, which requires a sense of belonging. These laws imply that individual needs are not the same because others expect less and others more (Maslow, 1970). With the use of this experience, assertions can be explained on a broader basis i.e. under-socials, which refer to individuals who always want to stay off the picture and unnoticed. The second one is over-social; this is where one will always want to be on the limelight while seeking attention. In addition, there is a social person who will maintain balance while living in moderation of everything trying not to over-indulge or under-indulge with the people. These three situations can be used to describe team and group members (Schutz, 1966). References Duarte, D, & Snyder, N. (2006). Mastering Virtual Teams (3rd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Maslow, A. (1970). Motivation and personality (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Harper & Row. Schutz, W. (1966). The interpersonal underworld. Palo Alto, CA: Science and Behavior Books. West, A. (1994). Effective team work; The British Psychological Society Read More