Week 6 (Sept 29): Workshop: Playing by Strengths

Oct2
  1. List 10 ways your teaming approach has changed, teamwork skills you have developed, and lessons you have learned.
    1.  Originally I’m typically the person that likes to try and take on everything, which is just not sustainable in the long term.  So, now instead of always being the one to try and take charge I’ve really tried to step back a little and let other people speak up about taking on more responsibility.
    2. I’ve also gotten better at being able to assign tasks to people when I feel like the work I’m doing is too much for me to handle.  I’ve gotten better at asking for help and understanding when it’s okay to not be on top of everything all the time.
    3. I’ve learned that I need to trust my teammates to do the work that needs to get done.  Sometimes I get caught up when people don’t have the same time management approaches I do so I need to tell myself that they’ll still do the work, just at different times and paces than I do.
    4. Having people on my team with very different opinions I’ve realized is super important because it makes me consider all the issues that I wouldn’t have necessarily though of
    5. I think another thing that I’ve learned is to make sure my team members know how much I appreciate them.  It’s hard working over zoom without human interaction, so letting people know I appreciate their hard work is important for motivation.
    6. A teamwork skill that I’ve developed is being able to find people’s strengths and weaknesses so we can better utilize them to make the most progress on our team.
    7. Another skill that I’ve developed is being clear with communication.  It’s really important to have everyone on the same page otherwise things get messy super fast and no one knows what’s going.
    8. A lesson that I’ve learned is that sometimes you can get frustrated with your team members and it needs to be known to them that you are frustrated.  Obviously needing to say it in a constructive way, but it’s important to be honest and open about things that are and aren’t working.
    9. A teaming approach that I’ve changed is also switching from expecting someone else to just do the work to actually taking charge more and either assigning work or doing the work myself.  Typically in teams I used to let someone take on the responsibility of being the leader, but now I’ve gotten more comfortable and confident taking on a more important role in my team.
    10. I think one last thing I’ve learned that it is important to bond with my team outside a work setting.  I’ve learned the importance of getting to know each person as an individual and understanding people’s different circumstances.  It feels good to be connected on more than a working level so it’s easier to communicate and get things done together.

 

  1. Goals
    • What are the personal goals (small g) of each member on this team? (Team Member #1,#2, #3, etc) Make sure they connect to the DREAM on the Individual Profile. 
    • What is the Project GOAL (big G) we’re all committed to achieve together?
    • Is our Project Goal scaled to our resources (dreams, materials, skills, differences, etc.) and constraints (assignment, time, skills, etc.) 
    • What are the metrics for success for what we’re producing?

    My personal goals: My goal is to be able to understand all the different concepts and ideas that need to be considered when trying to create sustainable change.  I want to be able to write a research paper that outlines the issues we’re tackling in an interesting way.  I also want to get more research and modeling experience because I am applying to graduate school and feel it is important to start early. 

    • Big Goal G: Decreasing the people’s exposure to air pollution and the amount of health diseases and deaths associated with cardiovascular and lung diseases in Almaty and improving overall quality of life 
    • Small Goals:
    • Strengthen our relationship with AlmaU to better understand the students and people there.  
    • Creating our survey to identify our prime customer segments. 
    • Recruitment passionate students to continue working on our project
    • Better understanding of the financial side of our project
    • Scaled to our resources and constraints? 
    • Our Project goal is scaled to our resources and constraints. Our venture is still in the early stages of development. We have an ultimate goal and know how we want to approach it, which is through a mobile app that will provide individualized advice. Our advice will guide people through better behaviors that can be taken to decrease the chances of getting a chronic illness associated with cardiovascular and lung health. 
      • What are the metrics for success for what we’re producing?
    • Decrease in the morbidity and mortality rates from conditions related to cardiovascular and lung diseases 
    • Decreasing the medical cost related to poor health 
    Roles
      • Who is responsible for which deliverables?
    • Alondra, Josue, Hugo – responsible for developing the survey and sending it out. 
    • Rebecca, Nathaly, Ulan – responsible for figuring out the financial portion of the project, identifying the funding sources. 
    • Everyone – responsible for writing a research paper, finding ways to make our project sustainable in the long term, and connecting with the partners from AlmaU. 
      • Which deliverables that require collaboration, subgroups & individual work? 
    • All of our deliverables require collaboration because they are fundamental parts of our project. 
      • Who does each person depend upon to succeed?
    • Everyone depends on one another for various things. We know what our strengths and weaknesses are and use them to our advantage. 
      • Do we need a project manager to coordinate? 
    • No, we do not need a project manager because we all keep each other accountable. 
    Procedures
      • Decision Making – 
        • Consensus/majority rules
        • If there is a tie in votes, our advisor’s vote will break the tie
      • Effective Meetings
    • Everyone comes with updates on their progress with their deliverables
    • We review goals and methods to progress towards them 
      • Meeting roles:  
    • Facilitator- advisor
    • Notetaker- Rebecca
      • Communication- Zoom
    • Weekly meetings with Advisor and team on Fridays @ 11:30 AM
    • Weekly meetings with only team members to work on deliverables together and update one another 
    • We send messages to update one another on our progress and where we may need help
    • Email advisor with updates on progress
  2. Relationships
      • Team Diversity – What is the diversity on our team? 
        • Our team consist of a range of disciplines from computer science/ engineering to environmental studies/ economics/business
        • Disciplines to tap for solutions;  individual learning styles for the stages of invention;  overall team learning style strengths and places to supplement;  cultural backgrounds , work experience,  dreams to leverage for scope & impact of goals, new roles, better procedures;  languages for more diverse customer set, bigger market;
    • Alondra→ Invested in learning about the environmental issues being faced globally. Learns mainly from social interactions
    • Hugo- Learns mainly from reading. Enjoys to learn about other cultures and 
    • Ulan – Comes from the same cultural background as the region our project is based on, fluent in their naitve language 
    • Nathaly- Passionate about environmental issues and helping disadvantaged groups. Learns by doing and seeing.
    • Rebecca-Trying to understand environmental issues from a more quantitative standpoint to fully interpret the implications of air pollution on individuals.
    • Josue 
      • Listening – Notice my binary thinking, auto-rankism, and go beyond it. 
      • Team Name
    • Air Quality, Almaty  

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