I am currently taking a Leadership in Groups and Teams course,
and last week, our class was assigned to sell a product and make a profit in
our randomly assigned groups consisting of five members. Once we were finished
with making our sales, we were to write a reflection paper explaining how we
chose the product that we sold, where and how we sold our product, and what we
learned during the process.
From the beginning of the project, there was a low level of
commitment from most of the group members. Three out of the five members would
show up 30 minutes late to group meetings, didn’t contribute ideas for the
sale, and never responded to the group messages. As the project progressed, the
work slowly staring falling onto the shoulders of myself and one other member.
Ultimately, the assignment became largely the product of the two of us with
small inputs from the other members. The two of us came up with the idea to
sell donuts on the quad and decided to donate all the profits to the American
Cancer Society. Luckily, all the group members showed up to help with the sale,
but the reflection paper was once again mostly written by the other member and
myself.
In comparison to Haidt's marble idea in his article, the other
group member and I were willing to pull the weight of the other members and
partake in this gift exchange (increase in production) because we all receive a
single grade in the end. Even though most of the group members didn’t
contribute much, the additional work by the one group member and I resulted in
all of us receiving a higher grade. The situation would have been drastically different
If we were each graded individually and the professor could somehow determine
how much work we each contributed to this project. Because the result wouldn’t derive
from a collective production, there would be no incentive for anyone to help
each other out.
From previous experiences with group projects, social loafing seems to be inevitable and I am wondering if altruism would be applicable to this type situation. As I’m reflecting on the group process and the unfairness of the situation, I can’t help but think that maybe I could have done things differently. In the article about altruism, Brooks stated that, “if you expect people to be selfish, you can actually crush their tendency to be good.” After getting discouraged about our first unsuccessful group meeting, was I too quick to assume that no one was going to do the work from the beginning? Could I have done a better job of communicating with the fringe members? It is possible that other group members could’ve been going through personal problems or maybe had a heavy work load in other classes. Whatever the issue may have been, our group could’ve definitely done a better job of communicating with one another. Similar to what we discussed in the first week of class, I am reminded once again of the importance of collegiality and how it plays such a vital role in group productivity.
From previous experiences with group projects, social loafing seems to be inevitable and I am wondering if altruism would be applicable to this type situation. As I’m reflecting on the group process and the unfairness of the situation, I can’t help but think that maybe I could have done things differently. In the article about altruism, Brooks stated that, “if you expect people to be selfish, you can actually crush their tendency to be good.” After getting discouraged about our first unsuccessful group meeting, was I too quick to assume that no one was going to do the work from the beginning? Could I have done a better job of communicating with the fringe members? It is possible that other group members could’ve been going through personal problems or maybe had a heavy work load in other classes. Whatever the issue may have been, our group could’ve definitely done a better job of communicating with one another. Similar to what we discussed in the first week of class, I am reminded once again of the importance of collegiality and how it plays such a vital role in group productivity.
Isn't it odd that in a course on leadership you have such obvious shirking? Doesn't that undermine the purpose of the class?
ReplyDeleteI wonder how the group meetings went after the late members arrived. Was there any discussion of their being tardy? And did that happen more than once?
In our class I have had students underperform and then pointed out the issue. The situation is different than on your teams, but I have the power to assign grades. What I want to report, however, is that mainly the students do alter the behavior some after the communication. So the issue in your case is whether some communication might have also changed behavior, though you didn't have the power over the other students.
These situations can get negative with expressions of anger pretty quickly. Once that happens I believe people just dig into their original position, so you can't make any progress that way. The communication I have in mind has to be more at an even level, and asks about what is going on without trying to judge it. It also asks about how to make the group more functional and whether that is possible.
I don't want to claim that this will always make things work the way you want them to, but I wonder if it was tried.
Then, returning to my first point, I wonder why these students are in a course on leadership.
I agree that this entire situation is quite ironic. I think the underlying problem comes from their lack of motivation to get the most out of the course. This is a required course for a leadership minor and I see many students pursuing this minor for the purpose of including in their resume rather than being intrinsically motivated to learn more about leadership.
DeleteThe group members were tardy to multiple group meetings, but they would always come with an excuse. At the time, their excuses seemed legitimate and due to my easy-going nature, there was no further discussion about it. I also agree about your even level communication method. This was definitely a learning experience and I hope to implement this even level communication method the next time I am working in a group or team.
The first article we had to read was about the marbles sharing. The first situation was about the rope that was pulled by both kids. This required teamwork and the outcome was 75% of the times marbles sharing. The situation that you are describing is just the other way around. The grade would be shared and therefore the input of teamwork wasn't required anymore. Another way I looked at is was with the third situation. The kids pulled each a different rope (they felt a tiny bit of inequality) and they didn't share as much as the first situation. Maybe your teammates felt smarter, better, or something else and therefore they felt inequality between everyone in the team and maybe therefore they chose the best outcome for themselves and that was relying on the other teammates to get a high grade without doing something. Those thoughts are different from the article, but I found it an interesting way to look at your example.
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