What? In “Group Dynamics for Teams” Daniel Levi talks about the importance of Planning and Developing a Project (Appendix), there he provides different steps in order to accomplish the task of finding a good project to work as a group. There are many ways to approach this as a team and it also depends on the team members and the way they feel more comfortable at working which is the proper technique to apply in every case. The steps provided are simple and should be enough for a team to guide themselves into finding a new project.
So what? This topic in particular is of massive importance because doing one of these steps in a wrong way or choosing a path or technique that does not fit your team can be a real hazard to your team and the developing project. The real issue to attend is if these steps are fit to any kind of problem or project. There are different project levels of complexity and choosing one, taking into consideration the members of a team and whether they get involve into a project that is not too complex to solve or not too easy to be consider a waste of time is where relays the key to success on finding a suitable project. Industrial Engineer’s skills have a strong attachment to this kind of knowledge and, since it is what I am Majoring in, I pay good attention to this topic to correctly know which project is suitable for a specific teams according their capacities and differences.
Now What? As I have already mention before it is fundamental for my career to do a profound research in this subject to be able to successfully work in leadership positions within companies and industries. Not only that, I will use this as an incentive to continuously improve in this kind of matter with the final goal of learning how to correctly define projects and help others know if the projects they have chosen are the correct ones for them as well. To conclude this I introduce this Japanese term KAIZEN which means continuous improvement that in Industrial Engineering it is really important and which I think it is a goal we should all aim during our life and specially in team working.
Sources:
Levi, D. (2015). Group dynamics for teams. Sage Publications.
Smith III, H., Smarkusky, D., & Corrigall, E. (2008). Defining Projects to Integrate Evolving Team Fundamentals and Project Management Skills. Journal of Information Systems Education, 19(1).
Salvendy, G. (Ed.). (2001). Handbook of industrial engineering: technology and operations management. John Wiley & Sons.
Harvey, S. (2020). Kaizen: The Japanese Secret to Lasting Change—Small Steps to Big Goals. The Experiment.
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