Some Common Problems That Lead School Teams Into Failure
In the past couple of years as I started leading student groups for various projects and competitions, I come to notice some very common success-killing traps that both professionals, such as mentors, and unprofessionals, such as team members, fall into. With the increase in the questions of my peers who ask for my experiences and ideas in pre-university projects and tournaments, I wanted to write some basic but very important points that is usually missed while founding or leading a team. As I am no-expert myself I want to mention that all of this is from a perspective of a millennial student. And also before starting I’d like to mention that I’m not going to be including problems about sponsorships, equipment or any other non-human related problem in this essay of mine. Because we will be talking about the humans and most specifically teenagers.
While creating a team for a small project like a group of four or more, the group commonly forms itself without any problems. However, if there are going to be more than six or seven people in the group the trouble begins. And if the team is a very crowded group such as more than 15 or 20 people, it may become a disaster with the wrong team members.
Two main things must be kept in the mind while creating a team; the marginal abilities that a member can serve to the team and their ability to teamwork or co-operate. Unfortunately, most of the students are not aware of what they are capable of. While the member selection interviews most of the students promises on things that they think they can do but they have never done. This leads to a ton of crises and it usually results in one or a few very specific members shouldering the entire heavy work or, even the worst, mentor shouldering the work. In these kinds of occasions, the only thing to do is to fire the members or to not include the members in the future projects or tournaments. However, this will destroy the creation of a family bond as the members change every year. This will also reduce the possibility of a consistent team which may leave its legacy and knowledge to the newer students as old members leave and we don’t want that. If we move pass to the other problem stated above, which was lack of teamworking, this will lead to constantly ongoing arguments which will not result in any improvement and it will reduce productivity and the willing to work for all members. So as we define two of the most common problems in team formation here is the way I recommend to solve this.
Most of the mentors and school staff doesn’t personally know any of the students while they are forming the team. So, they choose members according to some interviews and forms. And this is not a great way of constructing an efficient team. So, in addition to all of these procedures I recommend something strange but more efficient. That is to find possible leaders who are going to be the team captain or the heads of Robotics, PR, Communication etc. By this method while mentors can interview students in order to learn their abilities, the well-selected trusted students, who are the possible leaders of the team, can observe these people in the school life and see if they have any anger issues, are they hardworking etc. in order to tell if they are a good selection for the team.
The other main problem I’d like to talk about starts after the foundation of team. It doesn’t matter how qualified and well-organized team you created these people are teenagers and they are not professionals. So of course, they have feelings that are playing a very important role while they are making decisions or taking actions. Even in professional life most adults are under the control of their daily feelings even though they are not aware of it. So, in the case of teenagers with their highly sensitive feelings and emotions of course it will be very hard to maintain the discipline and the work ethic. Some teammates will argue and break each other’s heart, some teammates will won’t like each other and won’t get along with each other, some teammates will have some personal problems that affects his/her life significantly, some people will feel useless in the team questioning themselves, some will want to be the leader instead of the current leader, some will feel lonely, some will fall in love, some will date and some will regret joining the team for some personal reasons. This list can go on and on. The point is everyone will have different feelings and priorities. Most of the students won’t be thinking about the competition or the tournament in the work hours. There probably be some students who are trying their best for the team for sure but most likely it’s not going to be the majority of the team.
So, in this occasion the mentors play a big role. The mentors must be a remainder of the teams’ goals and try to make students focus on the team’s mission rather than their personal priorities. Mentors should be friends with students. Some students will tell their problem easily while some will not. The mentor must always keep an eye on what is going on in every individual’s life and try to give a hand to everyone even if they don’t want it, of course without pressuring it too much. The most important part is, I believe, the mentor must gain the trust of his/her team. If there is no trust bond between team members and the mentor, than students will have personal problems with not just their friends but also with the mentors. This is the worst possible scenario that may happen. Also, the mentor should sometimes relax people and create a balance with the fun and work times.
And the last point I’d like to mention is the lack of coordination and communication. This is a very common problem that a lot of team’s face. Most of the students will be unexperienced in the tournament or project that they are going to take part in. So, it is important to draw a clear picture of the working-process in every students’ mind. If there are no plans to follow and checkpoints to finish these plans there will be a mess. Usually what teams face is a very relax start and mid working schedule which will lead to some huge crises as the tournament day, if it is a project the deadline than, comes closer and closer. So, most of the teams, even the successful ones, leaves more than half of the work at the last days and this may result in some products which are below the team’s capacity as a result of the lack of time. In order to avoid this situation from happening, through the working process every individual must be disciplined and watched with the help of a healthy level of physiological pressure, which may differ to every individual.
