To prepare you for the teamwork in the Group project and IE award, you have been assigned a team for the year.
Rationale
According to concepts from Organizational Behavior, there are five stages of team development: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. During the forming stage, teams tend to communicate in indirect polite ways rather than more directly. The storming stage, characterized by conflict, can often be productive, but may consume excessive amounts of time and energy. In this stage it is important to listen well for differing expectations. Next, during the norming stage, teams formulate roles and standards, increasing trust and communication. This norming stage is characterized by agreement on procedures, reduction in role ambiguity, and increased “we-ness” or unity. These developments generally are precursors to the performing stage, during which teams achieve their goals, are highly task oriented, and focus on performance and production. When the task has been completed, the team adjourns.
To accelerate a team’s development, a team contract is generated to establish procedures and roles in order to move the team more quickly into the performing stage. This process of generating a team contract can actually help jump-start a group's collaborative efforts by immediately focusing the team members on a definite task. The group members must communicate and negotiate in order to identify the quality of work they all wish to achieve, and the level of group participation and individual accountability they all feel comfortable with.
Successful team performance depends on personal individual accountability. In a team environment, individuals are usually effectively motivated to maximize their own rewards and minimize their own costs. However, conflicts can arise when individualistic motives or behaviors disrupt team-oriented goals. For example, conflict can stem from an unequal division of resources. When team members believe they are receiving too little for what they are giving, they sometimes reduce their effort and turn in work of lower quality. Such "free riding" occurs most frequently when individual contributions are combined into a single product or performance, and individual effort is perceived as unequal. At this point, some individual team members may take on extra responsibilities while other team members may reduce their own efforts or withdraw from the team completely. These behaviors may engender anger, frustration, or isolation—resulting in a dysfunctional team and poor quality of work. However, with a well-formulated team contract, such obstacles can usually be avoided.
Team Contract Assignment
Your team contract template is divided into three major sections:
establishing team procedures
identifying expectations
specifying the consequences for failing to follow these procedures and fulfill these expectations
Since the basic purpose of this team contract is to accelerate your team's development, to increase individual accountability for team tasks, and to reduce the possibility for team conflict, make your contract as specific as possible: (a) specify each task as detailed as possible, (b) specify each step in a procedure or process as detailed as possible, (c) specify the exact person(s) responsible for each specific task, and (d) specify the exact time and exact place for completion or submission of each task. The more specifically you describe your team expectations, roles, and procedures, the greater chance you have for a successful team experience.
Use the Team Contract template to discuss and finalize your team roles, procedures, and standards.
Once your team contract has been developed, your team is ready to begin work on collaborative assignments. However, you may soon find that your team is not working as well as you had hoped. This is normal but needs to be attended to immediately. Perhaps your team is simply not following the established contract procedures or roles as strictly as you should be, or perhaps you need to change some of the procedures or roles as outlined in your contract. Call a team meeting immediately to discuss and resolve the challenges your team is facing; do. Seek guidance from your teacher, to resolve any conflicts so that you will have the most positive team experience possible.
TEAM CONTRACT
Section # _______
Team Members:
1) _______Sanjay Nair________________________ Tutor Group ___11R_______
2) _______Vivienne Lam_______________________ Tutor Group ___11R_______
3) _______Calvin Zai________________________ Tutor Group ___10R_______
4) _______Justin Lai________________________ Tutor Group ___10R_______
5) ________Nicole So_______________________ Tutor Group ____9R______
6) _______Krishna Ramchandani_________________ Tutor Group _____9R_____
Preferred method of communication outside of class (e.g., e-mail, cell phone, Blackboard Discussion Board, face-to-face, in a certain class) in order to inform each other of team meetings, announcement, updates, reminders, problems:
- Facebook Chat
-Phone Numbers
Decision-making policy – How will you make decisions? (by consensus? by majority vote?):
- By Vote
Method for setting and following meeting agendas outside of Explorations? (Who will set each agenda? When? How will team members be notified/reminded? Who will be responsible for the team following the agenda during a team meeting? What will be done to keep the team on track during a meeting?):
- Facebook Chat to remind everybody
-Time Manager- to keep everyone on track
Work Quality
Project standards (What is a realistic level of quality for team presentations, collaborative writing, individual research, preparation of drafts, peer reviews, etc.?):
Be prepared before we have any meetings, and do the best we could.
Strategies to fulfill these standards:
Plan everything to be organised, Work on time management, Brief each other beforehand
Team Participation
Strategies to ensure cooperation and equal distribution of tasks:
- Allocate roles before hand, so everyone knows what to do
Strategies for encouraging/including ideas from all team members (team maintenance):
- Listen to everyone's ideas and try to include everybody's opinions
Strategies for keeping on task (task maintenance):
- Make a table
- Assign jobs
Preferences for leadership (informal, formal, individual, shared):
-Individual
-Responsible
Personal Accountability
Expected individual attendance, punctuality, and participation at all team meetings:
- Everyone has to participate/contribute
Expected level of responsibility for fulfilling team assignments, timelines, and deadlines:
- Each person should be responsible for their own contributions to the group and the work should be split evenly
Expected level of communication with other team members:
- Everyone should communicate their ideas for everyone to discuss in order to be successful in the project and you should not be quiet if you want to say something important.
Expected level of commitment to team decisions and tasks.
- At least contribute or provide 1 constructed idea
Consequences for Failing to Follow Procedures and Fulfill Expectations
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Describe, as a group, how you would handle infractions of any of the obligations of this team contract:
- We would warn the person.
Describe what your team will do if the infractions continue:
- Maybe get ignored?
- Excluded from group meetings
- If the case worsens, we might inform a teacher
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I participated in formulating the standards, roles, and procedures as stated in this contract.
I understand that I am obligated to abide by these terms and conditions.
I understand that if I do not abide by these terms and conditions, I will suffer the consequences as stated in this contract.
1) ___________________________________________________date__________________
2) ___________________________________________________date__________________
3) ___________________________________________________date__________________
4) ___________________________________________________date__________________
5) ___________________________________________________date__________________
6) ___________________________________________________date__________________
