Individual Blog -Self Reflection by Sharon CHU (52953865)

Collaboration between colleagues or business partners with high performance is required both parties great afford in order to achieve it. I am sure many people should have rich experiences in collaboration.  As we would have so many chances to work on group projects in each year since we were in middle-school.  In the real business word, collaboration is an essential part in our daily operations during work time.  So, does it mean that we are an expert on collaboration? I doubt it, as I have encountered a lot of difficulties when collaborating with others. Thus, developing an effective way on collaborate with others with high performance is the main focus that I would acquire from this course.

Based on our group project on virtual team collaboration, I will illustrate in detail on our team practices and process by team structure and usage of technology. Following will be my learning journal upon the group assignment by adopting the class reading materials. 

Team Practices

Composition on our team are Julie and Christina, both of them are in the same class with me.  We usually communicate with each other regarding to the project during break-time on weekly classes, WhatsApp and e-mail. As such communication channels are the most effective and popular in nowadays. First, we have brainstormed on our topic by agreement on being more creative and unique.  We thought that we have done a lot of projects in other classes on commercial side but without creative. After several discussions between three of us, finally we have roughly figured out to start a project on disaster rescue instead of a regular commercial project.

Upon communicated with our virtual team partner (group of morning class), we have come out that to use WeChat for our main communication channel in the very beginning. However, after the first meeting on We Chat, we found that it is very difficult to express our own idea on WeChat with six members to chat in the same time.  Julie suggested using Skype for group chat in order to explain our idea on disaster rescue. As the matter of fact that we have also encountered network problem on Skype as most of time we need to wait for system stability.  Finally, Christina recommended to use visimeet as a channel of video conference.  This is a very useful technology as we could see each member from the web camera and could express our idea more easily.  In addition, in case of the network was not stable, we could type sentences on the chat room like WeChat or WhatsApp instead. We agreed to meet in visimeet by weekly basis in order to report on progress and issues encountered of the project.

 

For team structure, we have designated a team leader on each of the group to be spokesperson.  For example, when we have any idea or suggestions want to rise before each visimeet, two team leaders will have preliminary discussion in order to seek consensus.  On the other hand, two team leaders would have to speak for their own group to set up goals, objectives and deadline on each path of the project.  In view of the structure and practices, two of our teams were running very smoothly and I could say that there is no conflict found on collaboration.

Although there is no conflict found between two teams in terms of virtual collaboration, we have found conflict in our own team of Harmony.  First conflict was setting deadline on each of our contribution to the power point presentation.  As we have different view on setting deadline either right before the real deadline then allow to have sufficient time to better prepare the materials, nor a week before the real deadline which allow us to have time for revision.  All three of us tried to come up a solution on each time by adopting compromising strategy.

Second conflict was the content of power point presentation.  We all known that each team have 20 minutes for group presentation only, it is very hard to put every single point in details during presentation.  One of our teammate does not agree on that, she would prefer going to deep detail when preparing power point and even insist the rest of others to amend their own part in details. This time we could not solve the conflict by compromise after several discussions.  We finally agreed to seek Professor’s view before making amendment.

Third conflict was the flow on presentation, as two of team members preferred to keep the presentation as simple as possible; as such, power point may take couple minutes only and the rest of 18 minutes should go to video and role play instead. Although one of the member disagreed on the flow; however, the rest of two members preferred to stick to the proposed flow. Finally, all three of us were satisfied on our performance during presentation. 

 

It is very hard to have virtual meeting between two teams at the same time by WeChat or Skype. It is because the network might not be stable to support a group chat of six members. In light of that, visimeet is the most recommended channel for the virtual meeting.  As both written message and real time video conference conversation could be sent at the same time.  In addition, the network is relatively more stable by comparing to other communication channels.

Team Process

During the whole process of the assignment, both team members had paid a lot of afford in order to complete an assignment with high quality.  In the beginning, we set a goal together with creative and innovative idea.  We all agreed that to complete this assignment with unique materials and being more thoughtful.  Actually, we have not stating any promises or commitment regarding to the project.  By observing from the first brainstorming visimeet meeting, I could see that all of us would like to acquire high quality achievement on the project.  Thus, we do not need to set up commitment and promises to guide to our progress.  After half way through the project, everything is completed as scheduled, including content and innovative ideas. This is to confirm that there is no conflict between two teams all the way up to completion. I definitely say that this is quite a successful collaboration with the morning class teammate.  I could see their consideration, understanding, innovative, sincere etc.      

Reflective Learning Journal

 

During my past academic years in college, I have taken several classes of leaderships and management in order to learn how to become an effective leader or manager in the organization.  However, there are not many classes taught how to collaborate with others with high performance. Although this is a core course of the program, I still found interesting on this course as I would like to learn how to cooperate with other parties by virtual platform with high performance.  Below topics which I have learned most and had applied to the final group assignment.

        In the beginning of the class, I have learned what “Blog” is.  During the process on designing our team blog, I have known that blog could express our idea and also a platform on virtual business through the blog.   

Beside bargaining skills, we have spent a lot of time to discuss win-win negotiation in this topic during class.  Through the reading and theories (i.e. BATNA) in class, we have learned the focus point on win-win negotiation especially on salary negotiation at work.  We have practice by role play in different role such as employer, employer (HR Manager), employee etc. in adopting negotiation skills. In addition, resolving conflict is also a topic during salary negotiation blog assignment.  After completed the blog assignment, I have learned how to solve a conflict by compromise, collaborative, integrative etc. I have also adopted the theory of compromise to solve the conflict during the final group project.

Innovation and Creativity

In accordance with our class materials, there are six factors i.e. perspiration, agelessness, two types of consciousness, emotional capabilities, abstractive play and social factors in order to help being creativity. 

 

Besides the class materials, reading material, Pixar could also give me insight on how to be creative at work.  As such, our final group assignment could think out of the box to figure out a virtual platform for disaster rescue instead of normal business collaboration. On the other hand, I was deeply impressed on the role play on how to teach English to children as second language in creative way.  It inspired us that creativity could adopt in education, for example, teaching by activity.

High Performing Teams

Having a high performing team, here below are the essential factors are required.  i) Clear direction, purpose and goals.  In the beginning of the final project, we have come out a direction and goals between teams that would like to think of a non-commercial but also not charity organization in order to become more creative.  ii) Talented members. No question asked that both team members are talented as we all have our own expert, i.e., I.T., Accountant, HR Manager, Administrator etc. iii) Clear role and responsibilities.  We have our own role, position and responsibility when completing the assignment.  iv) Effective & Efficient Operating Procedures. Most of us have adopted some theories on purpose on virtual collaboration in order to complete the assignment in effective & efficient way.  In addition, effective communication and building trust with each other are also important and affecting the performance of the project.

Virtual Organization

A virtual organization means electronic to transact business as opposed to a traditional that relies on face-to-face transactions with physical documents and physical currency or credit.  I have learned that the best virtual organization is Amazon.com.  Referring to our final group assignment on virtual collaboration, we have learned what virtual organizational structure is, function on virtual team, why we need virtual organization and what we could benefit on virtual team.  The most important is what makes a successful virtual organization.

In conclusion, beside the above mentioned topics that I have learned in class, I have also found useful in extra class materials such as reflective writing, reflective practices on collaborative experiences, and readings in each topic and how to write thesis statement.  Upon finished of this class, I agreed that I am satisfied on what I had learned and it also fulfilled my expectation on this course.  The most valuable in the class was the experiences in creating a virtual collaboration in virtual teams.

References:

1) e-mail

From: Julie <julie7_b@yahoo.com>
To: WANG Zhe <zwang25-c@my.cityu.edu.hk>; "xwkong2@student.cityu.edu.hk" <xwkong2@student.cityu.edu.hk>; "qiaojchen2@student.cityu.edu.hk" <qiaojchen2@student.cityu.edu.hk>
Cc: Sharon Chu <sharon1102@yahoo.com>; christine <vis268@gmail.com>; Julie <julie7_b@yahoo.com>
Sent: Tuesday, March 12, 2013 4:36 PM
Subject: Sunday Meeting at two p.m

All,

Thanks for making our first meeting!

To better utilize our precious time, I would recommend all of us come and prepared. Pls read through the professor readings and come with your idea on our virtual project... Be creative.

Morning class pls find a room and evening class will also find a room. We will then connect through virtual meeting, using the software christine recommended.

Joshua, pls also share with us your team hk phone number for us to stay in touch.

Everyone pls read through and send me a confirmation email to ensure all of us on the same page

Agenda

First half an hour

1. Self introduction and get to know each other especially the virtual side, yes the morning class and the evening class.

2. Pls share your strength briefly. We will leverage each other' s strength to work on our project.

Two thirty To three p.m

3. Topic discussion. Brainstorming. 

Three to Five

4. Project flow, process and assigning jobs to each individual.

We will conclude the meeting by agreeing on future milestones.

As I read through the readings that virtual team works well if it is task oriented. We will do so and also build up our social emotional bondage in our first meeting. 

Ground rules: do not be late. The last one come will buy everyone drinks at the new deliverance coffee shop in the university .

Joshua, could you help set up the we chat group again. And ensure the recommended software was installed at least on one of your computers.

Rgds

Julie