Sunday, September 21, 2008
Management Issue
Thankfully I don't have any management issues at my current job. However there is something that I have been dealing with in school this semester, and that is managing to work with people who have a hard time communicating and responding to emails. In one of my other classes we were all assigned to a random group for a group project. After initially exchanging emails, I took the initiative and emailed everyone the next day with a couple of ideas that I had for the project. In that email I asked everyone for their feedback, and I also specifically asked that they all at least respond and let me know if they received the email so that I know that I didn't misspell anyone's email address. Only one out of the other four members responded. During the next class I asked the other members if they received my email and they all said yes and that they just didn't get a chance or didn't have time to respond. At first I didn't think it was that much of a big deal, however the same problem has been persisting the past two weeks where some members of the group just keep ignoring our emails. We're still in the initial point of the project so for now its not too big of a deal, however it is very frustrating not be able to get everyone feedback on certain things because it is a group project that we're going to get a group grade for. And I think this could become a major issue if it keeps continuing when we get to the harder parts of the project.
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7 comments:
I very understand you feeling. Everyone wants to get a good grade in there class, but there is just some people that never participate in the projects and hoping that other members of the group do it for them. I have face this problem last semester too. What I did was giving them some time to response first, but it got to a point that I told that person that if he doesn't give me something by a certain time of the day, I will tell the professor and take him out of the group. Yes, this is like taddle telling, but some sometime you just have to do so, because it is very unfair to other member of the group.
yes, i understand. I have the similar experience too with the group project. I think you should glad that your group members are showing up in the class. For me, three of my group members were rarely showed up in class or replied back to my email. The only solution we made was to ask the members to have a group meeting in the study room of the library building, and distrubuted the jobs.
Also, told the professor who missed the class a lot that you couldn't contact him/her, so professor would have an idea who is not doing the job. Moreover, it is a group project, but if your group members are not doing anything, you should talk to your professor, and ask him what should you do about it.
I totally agree with you. I am also randomly assigned to a group, and is the one who responsible for communicates with the others. However, I don't usually received any e-mails, and has no idea what their thoughts are. So, it is pretty frustrated. But, I took a step forward by deciding what to do since no one actually reply. I let them know what I think, and what I will do, if anyone has any objection they can e-mail me back, if i don't get their e-mail, then that means they agree to my decision. So, I'll just keep going. I give them enough time to decide and reply. So, I guess if our group is going to meet, then, i will send an e-mail 3 days in advance to let them know we have a meeting.
I think everyone has went throught this kind of experience when they deal with a group of people. I had a similar experience when I had to do a group project for the communication class. We have a group mate who just never reply to the emails we send him and he never shows up on our meeting. And by the end, we just complain to our professor and we just get him out of the group. Since he never shows up in our meeting day and never reply to our emails, he is just slowing our progress for the projects. Therefore, we need to take him out of the group. If not, it is not fair to all other group mate who really gives up their time for the project. I think if you keep facing the problem of can't contact your group members, I think you need to let your professor know and let your professor talk to your group mates.
reading about your managemment issue reminded me of problems I had with my group and them not contributing to the projects. But I realized the best way is for the group to actually meet up and discuss the project and also set deadlines. I think that works the best and when they see that other people are doing the work and they aren't they might just start doing it as well. Also sometimes people don't like to work before hand and sometimes last minute works the best for them and working before hand isn't something they are comfortable with so then you should get to know your teammates better- that is why we were randomly assigned anyways, and if that seems to be the issue then create false deadlines or something. Hope this helped!
I've had this experience numerous times when getting into groups for school projects. I observed that 9 times out of 10, it occurred because a leader didn't emerge from the members of the group. This causes the group to become disorganized and waiting for someone to tell them what to do and when to do it. The only logical way I found to handle this, was by trying to always take the lead and let others know the seriousness of the project. I've had the same problem of email communication between groups, that's is partly why I opted to only set up meetings or discuss project ideas in person. I think when you do anything by email, you let people have more of an option to hold off responding or reading. So if I could give you my advise, it would be to take on the leadership role as soon as possible before your other group members keep holding off on their responsibilities and it leads to procrastination. "The more you plan, the less you have to react." Hope it works out.
Exactly, it’s so hard to make a change of career when you are so comfortable where you are, and then we face the problem that if we change jobs and the new one doesn’t work out or that internship ends, where do we go, find another one? I know personally that employers look not only for experience but longevity and job loyalty, which is ridiculous to look for in people our age but that’s life.
I read your comment about the team work; I think everyone has a few situations like that through college. I would rather do more work then rely on people not interested in their grade to help support mine. How did it work out?
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