This week’s lectorial theme was ‘collaboration’. It simultaneously excites and scares me that much of the next three years of this program involves working in groups and collaborating with my peers; and that in the media industry in which I will hopefully work in the future, effective communication and teamwork is key in creating successful stories and pieces of art.
Coming into uni fresh from high school, I haven’t really had much real world experience in working on creative projects with others. The most useful skills I’ve learnt from teamwork so far, I think, has been playing club netball for four years in my early high school years. With the girls I played with, we formed a strong bond through our common goals. We got to know each other’s strengths and weaknesses, and learned not to play ‘the blame game’. We supported each other – when we lost we lost together, and when we won we won together. I think qualities from good sportsmanship can also apply to creative collaboration.
So – given my limited experience in collaborating in professional settings, learning effective collaboration techniques is something I’ll make note to explore particularly during this semester as well as in the next few years. From the points that the lecturers mentioned today, I’ve developed some notes that I think will be helpful.
Collaboration is good for:
- Developing leadership
- Gaining experience in negotiation
- Learning to resolve conflict
- Practicing professional communication
- Establishing peer relationships
- Sharing and deepening your knowledge
Characteristics of positive collaboration include:
- Clear objectives. Clarity of goals, motivating value, attainability, and future potential are all aspects to consider.
- Good communication. Keeping an open mind and listening critically to others is key. If a conflict situation arises, ensure to keep focus on the actual problem, not the personal dynamics. The Hat System may be a tool for feedback that allows constructive criticism as well as praise.
- Consistency, responsibility and equitability. Even out the work load and complete your share of work on time so that no one member has to pull more weight than the others.
- Respect. Obviously this is a value that applies to any type of relationship, but respecting someone’s idea even though you may not agree with them.
- Support. Collaboration focuses on people helping each other to create an even better product than what can be achieved individually. The sharing of ideas is crucial.
Good experiences in group work involve:
- Solving problems together
- Everyone is responsible in pulling their own weight
- Everyone contributing different ideas so there is more brain power
- Bouncing ideas each other which can cause inspiration
- You can share the work load and take on bigger projects or get projects done faster
Bad experiences in group work involve:
- Not contributing
- Not considering others’ opinions
- Not listening
- Placing trust in someone else and finding that they are not reliable
- Not feeling comfortable expressing your opinion, especially if it is negative
- Doing more work and that others being credited for
- Clashing opinions that aren’t willing to reach a compromise
