Could team make or break you?

Till what point do you agree with me? Do you believe in team work or do you believe that one person can do it all?

I am one of those who believe in team work. Team work is dynamic, uniqueness in its structure and it integrates different ideas and perspectives which gives better result than work of individual.

Through the years I have worked in different teams, (co)work teams, council teams, and study teams. I could claim it, that result of team depends on individuals that are combined in the team together, but unfortunately most of the times is not so.

For me, the success of project or team work depends on main factor and that is (internal) communication. I have seen whole projects been destroyed and not realized because of bad communication or let’s put it in other words, lack of communication.

Lately I am engaged in student job (in restaurant) which enabled me (and I am grateful) to survive during this study year. One may think, that is just one meaningless student job, but it is not. There is much to learn (of course if you are willing to learn it) especially about team work among other. There is one thing clear though; you cannot work in restaurant if you are not team player. 

In my current working place I am daily facing several obstacles in communication.

First is multicultural environment, co-workers from different countries and cultural background gives different view or opinion on same thing. Within communication, one needs to be careful not to insult, disrespect team member, because this would lead to tension between individuals and in which most of cases would end with quarrel and the result would be bad spirit and performance in the whole team. For that reason the conversation or raising questions about taboo topic is not advisable.

The second obstacle in communication is different way of communication and ability to communicate.  Way of communication depends on personality type, cultural background and ability to understand and express yourself in foreign language. Most of the times for miscommunication in the team are limits of expressing yourself. That could be because of lack of knowledge of the working language, type of your personality (if you are introvert, you will not confront your team members or your supervisor) and also cultural background. For examples Belgians will not confront you directly with problem, while Spanish and Slavic people would.

While I was living in Spain and since I am living in Belgium I came across variety of nations and for that reasons also different way of communication. I notice that with Spanish (and that could be true for Italians, Portuguese) are really easy to make first contact, they have smaller personal space, for that reason they are constant in human contact. They are generous with compliments and they show fast what they do not agree with. Unfortunately they are people of large promises and sometimes their promise do not realize (in other words, they promise too much). What I adore with Spanish is they put and pour their heart in things they like to do. The work becomes their passion.

On the other hand I faced quite a shock when I came to Belgium. The people were totally different with those in Spain. While I had difficulties to adapt to their habits in beginning, they grew under my skin now. To tell you honestly I really love the way the “Belgians”, well actually Flemish are. When I am speaking in terms of Belgians, I mean actually Flemish. For all those you who do not know the detail of Belgium history, I need to say that is really complex. In short the Belgium is divided in three communities, Flanders (where they speak Dutch), Wallonia (where they speak French) and German part. I will write about Flemish, because I know that part of the Belgium the most.

First and most important to know is that the Flemish are extreamly diplomatic. They are so diplomatic, that word in dictionary could be changed from diplomatic to Flemish. They do not have habit to express their opinion out loud or give fake compliments. If they do not like or not agree with something they will pull out their diplomat card. The other important characteristic is their politeness. They always play fair game, but if you cheat the game, you are out. Belgians are also patient and they give you enough chances to learn. Last and not least Flemsish are (really) hard working. 

I am coming from Slavic origin. We have also “special” characteristic. First is that we are direct, if we need to say something we say it at spot. We could say in this aspect we are totally opposite than Belgians. We do not wrap things in diplomatic cellophane. Good thing is that we resolve things easily and problems are solved fast. Second thing is that we are hard working and we take work as mission, focus only on work.

 The third obstacle in communication is the noise in the working place that prevent receiving information. I observe that “newbie” have especially hard time. First they are not aware about jargon on working place, so they do not know to what words need to be alert; second they do not know how to communicate with other team mates; third they yet develop how to behave in crucial moments (which is normally rush hour) (that they only gain with more experiences).

Noise and lack of concentration can prevent us to receive crucial information, which could lead to miscommunication and problems in the team.

Beside the communication problems, they are some other disadvantages of team work. One is that distance to everything that comes from outside of the team (newbie, management), until is accepted by senior/leader of the team.

Second disadvantage are so called freeloaders. They are people who profit from the team. They put less hard energy and hard work in to project or mission, than other team members. Tracking freeloaders is especially hard in large teams. Freeloaders are fast recognizable in small teams. If they are many freeloaders in one small team the project or team work is condemn to failure. In case they are one or two individual freeloader in team of eight or six, the situation can be fixed. The freeloader can be either confronted with leader of the team. Confrontation must be started with leader and not individual member, because otherwise the fractions between team members will erupt. In case that the confrontation with the leader doesn’t work, next step is the confrontation with the whole team. Once freeloader is exposed s/he could change the game and put more effort (but in reality of the cases s/he doesn’t).

The freeloaders, lack of communication and crash of personality are the reasons the team could break. To prevent breaking of the team the communication and fact reactions are crucial. The leader of the team must be alert enough to detect issues that could be rise to problems.

Not only on leader of the team is responsible for team success, every team member matter.  For that reason each team member needs to be alert to rising issues, communication in the team and encourage mutual work.

So if I summarize in short the beginning question: Yes, the team could break or make you, but you too could break or make the team.

Each individual is also responsible for their action. Is crucial that every team member ask themselves “how do I affect the team and how can I improve the team”? Only than the true slogan from the musketeers can be realized:  "One for all, all for one" (in original un pour tous, tous pour un).