What Exactly do Group Workers Do and What do Their Groups Seek to Achieve - Coursework Example

 what exactly do groupworkers do and what do their groups seek to achieve? Team work is always a tough job compared to individual work as it involves the coordination among different persons with varying wavelengths of thinking process (Andrew Malekoff, 1999). Some people may analyse that group work is easier than individual work as it involves contributions from several individuals, however its advantage is nullified by the complexity of decision making. In the earlier days, all notable scientific achievements were made by the individual persons, may it be electricity or helicopter. During those days, the organizational set up was not well established, hence individual talent played significant role. However, with the advent of organizational set up in twentieth century, both private ad public companies encouraged team work for achieving the technical output as it demanded more scientific inquiry compared to yester years (Gerald Corey, 2007). This necessitated us to recruit more people for combined work or group work. Hence it is high time to analyse the desirable attributes of group workers for achieving success. The group workers are initially trained before taking up their main task in the areas of organizational skills, team work and coordination (Irvin D Yalom and Molyn Leszch, 2005). They will be made aware about the necessity of understanding the group requirements. The group worker would certainly understand the time frame and nature of his responsibility as part of the whole team (Gerald Corey, 2004). He would be assigned short term targets and evaluation would be made at certain time intervals to assess his performance rate. Evaluation would also be made to ascertain whether his individual contribution is in proportion with the group requirement or not? At times, the group size may be very large and enhance there is need to divide it in to sub groups. While making sub groups, some flexibility is to be given to select the sub group. Of course, the care should be taken to ensure that the sub group involves the homogenous mixture of persons from different specializations to look after the main technical work. To make it more specific, I would like to share my practical experience with working n some non government or voluntary organizations. Voluntary organizations in which I had association work mainly for rural development. They aim at organizing the farmers and other rural poor for achieving higher net income by higher agricultural productivity. This requires the combined effort from different persons from agriculture, horticulture, economics, extension and social work streams. Above all, it requires the team to be highly motivated in achieving their target of rural prosperity. Some times, it may happen that the contributions of the individual team members may get diluted due to casual attitude of other members which leads to de motivation among members and group will fail in achieving its main objective. Hence there should be special training that focuses on these aspects and members should get a feeling that they are taken care and their efforts would be appreciated which acts like a motivational factor. This was clearly observed when I participated in a mission which aimed at motivating rural people to achieve higher crop productivity. The main problem witnessed by us in the beginning is that the farmers are highly disorganized and they had high social egos which led to severely fragmented land holdings. When I tried to convince them for cooperative farming, they didn’t show any interest. One of my social colleague explained me about the hindrances in their society and then we worked together to solve these problems and we could succeed in organizing them in a big manner. This is an example of group work. Though I am technically sound to suggest some measures to improve crop productivity, I am unable to solve the problem as it involves the solution from social perspective. This necessitates the essence of team work. This also gives us a feeling that the role of each team worker is equally important in achieving the success. I would also like to work in future with United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) which requires all members to work in coherence as a team. UNDP certainly works for the benefit of weaker sections in all the countries and it involves several people from different specializations working for the common goal. This organization mainly relies on the principles of group work and it seeks the employees to adjust to the mode of team work. It requires people from different geographical locations to come together and share their experiences so that they can solve the problems of some poorly developed regions of the world. In this process, it expects lot of flexibility in working schedule from the people. Depending upon the circumstance, the individual employee has to mould him self for achieving the defined task for the organizations (Brian Cole Miller, 2003). The organization mainly relies on a principle that “ It is not the personal qualification that you possess but the mode of adjustment or tuning you display for facilitating the fulfilling the group objectives. Several organization recognize the importance of leadership in achieving the success of team. Group work method is widely used in developing countries like in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka (Siddiqui, 2008). It became a vital strategy for empowering women, and helping children, youth and the elderly in a variety of settings. The leadership ensures the right direction in which the team works on a long run. It provides enough momentum and motivation to the team members from time to time. It will identify the problems or challenges faced by the members at regular intervals and addresses the problems immediately. It also ensures the conduction of some short trainings to infuse good attributes of team work among all the members. Last but not the least, leader will become a role model to all the members by exhibiting higher performance and motivational skills. Overall, the group activity certainly builds better cooperation, communication and creativity than individual effort (Kris Bordessa, 2005). References: Andrew Malekoff. 1999. Group work with Adolescents: Principles and practice. The Guilford Press. P: 336. ISBN-10: 1572304650 . Brian Cole Miller. 2003. Quick team building activities for busy managers: 50 exercises that get result with in 15 minutes.Amacom publication. P: 176. ISBN-10: 081447201X. Gerald Corey. 2004. Theory and practice of counseling and psychotherapy. Wadsworth publication. P: 576. ISBN-10: 0534536050 Gerald Corey. 2007. Theory and practice of group counseling. Brooks Cole Publication. P: 560. ISBN-10: 0534641741 Irvin D Yalom and Molyn Leszch. Theory and practice of group psychotherapy. 2005. Basic Books Publications. P:688. ISBN-10: 0465092845. Kris Bordessa. 2005. Team challenges: 170 + group activities to build cooperation, communication and creativity. Zephyr press publication. P: 256. ISBN-10: 1569762015. Siddiqui, H.Y. 2008. Group work : Theories and Practices. Rawat Publications. P: 220. ISBN:   8131601714. Read More