Team work Basics Summary

Ground rules are essential in ensuring the success of a group, in the process of establishing the ground rules the group will have to establish norms on how work will be done in the group. Work norms dictate how work will be assigned in the group, this included the consequences of not meeting deadlines and how groupwork will be reviewed.  Facilitator norms dictate how the head of the group will be chosen at certain times and what will be the duties of the facilitator. Communication norms dictates the means that will be used to pass information among the teammates. Meeting norms are the rules that guide the time, place and when the group meets and the consequences of not attending scheduled meetings.  Consideration norms are the last norms when it comes to laying the ground rules of a group, these rules allow room for extra activities during group hours such as eating during group time.

Not all the members of a group are collaborative, in some instances the difficult behavior of an individual in a group can render the whole group unproductive; therefore, it is important to have strategies in place on how to handle difficult behavior.  For an overly talkative individual, it is advisable to incorporate the use of humor to discourage the individual from dominating the conversation. It is also important to have a private conversation with the individual to warn him/her of the behavior.  For a too quiet person it is recommended that special efforts be made to ensure that they give their contribution on certain topics. For an individual who argues the most in the group, it is important to evaluate the value and importance of their contribution towards the group since they might be providing positive feedback. If the arguments of the individual are pointless then they should be warned of their behavior. The last difficult behavior is complaining, the first step of handling such behavior is listening to the complaints and solving them and asking for the individual’s contribution in solving the complaints. The whole team can also experience a hard time as a whole. When it comes to dealing with such problems it is important to consider remedies such as; drawing up a list of tasks to be accomplished, ending arguments before they cause any further disagreements, avoid making decisions too quickly and never opt for not making a decision at all,  do not ridicule or ignore each other in the group and lastly ensure that every member of the group is making a positive contribution towards the group.