Background and Context
Nowadays, team-working skills are becoming more and more important in schools as well as the workplace Most people believe that "teamwork makes a dream work" because in reality, successful teamwork can lead to amazing outcomes, much better than the overall results of any person who works independently In addition, the ability to work in teams is one of the most essential soft skills that is commonly taught in universities to be practiced in the workplace as well as required in everyday life.
However, according to Thanh (2016), employers are not confident about the soft skills of graduates, particularly team-working skills In addition, Yamashita (2012, as cited in Tuoitrenews, 2012) also said that many international companies have expressed dissatisfaction at the communication skills and teamwork spirit of recent Vietnamese college graduates Skills such as teamwork, problem-solving, time management, communication and interpersonal skills are targeted by most employers as a key need for recruiting, especially in a team setting It is also very critical for undergraduates to have the technical skills of working in teams so that they can produce better academic results.
The purposes that I aimed in this research were to show out IDB students’ opinions about their team-working skills and how they are doing to improve it From that, we have collected needed information to understand why there is still lack of graduates with fully equipped soft skills and what we need to solve this problem.
Rationales/ purposes
My research is willing to investigate the practical issues that people have whenever they do team-working and how they deal with it in order to lead the teams and achieve the success Generally, the study focused on IBD students to collect data and then analyze how they are doing to improve their ability of working in teams Besides, this essay could show some effective ways to help them build team-working skills as well as being excellent group members.
Research Questions
- What do IBD students think about their team-working skills?
- Which problems do IBD students have when working in groups?
- Why do IBD students think that they need these skills?
- What can IBD students do to improve their teamwork skills?
Research methods
The advantages of working in teams
Some research suggests that the feeling that we work with others can significantly increase our motivation to perform complex and demanding tasks, even though we are basically working on our own According to Gaskell (2017), Stanford's research a few years ago showed that survey respondents who were primed to work collaboratively stuck to their tasks were 64% longer than their independent colleagues, while also displaying higher levels of engagement, lower feelings of depression and increased rates of achievement A similar finding has also pointed out that companies encouraging collaborative work are 5 times more likely to have great performance (Gaskell, 2017) In addition, Carr and Walton (2015) have concluded that even subtle recommendations to be part of a team greatly improved the motivation and enjoyment in relation to difficult tasks, leading to greater perseverance, dedication and even higher levels of output.
The importance of team-working skills
Teamwork can allow students to gain a wide variety of skills that are increasingly relevant to the business world Moreover, supportive community interactions have been shown to contribute to learning outcomes, retention and overall college performance (Astin, 1997; Tinto, 1998; National Survey of Student Engagement, 2006, as cited in
“What are the benefits of group work?”, 2020) Group work may also strengthen the relevant skills to both group and individual work, such as the ability to split complicated tasks into parts and phases, schedule and manage time, refine understanding through discussion and clarification, provide and receive feedback on results, question assumptions and develop stronger communication skills (“What are the benefits of group work?”, 2020) When working as a group, students learn how to listen to their leaders and peers in order to accomplish their responsibilities Teamwork skills allow students to express their ideas and thoughts with respect and trust in a group environment (Marlborough, 2019) According to Wehbe (2017), in today's information economy, most of our jobs include engaging with people who are not in the same field As a result, the need for successful teamwork skills is essential for any company The ability to succeed as an individual and together with your colleagues or employees in collaboration is the secret key to success In every department of the organisation, team work skills are required to achieve success, and to make use of every opportunity you have to participate in teamwork so that you can develop excellent communication skills (Wehbe, 2017).
How students improve their teamwork skills
There are various skills that people need in order to have an efficient teamwork and from that, they can produce incredibly results According to Shneiderman (2016), as a team member, people should write a shared vision of the overall goals and explain responsibilities, particularly when working in broad scattered teams In addition, teams are best when they have regular and open conversations Teams in which a number of people interact during meetings generally do better than the teams in which one or two people dominated the conversation Modest controversy is always a healthy one in choosing between alternative directions and in cultivating trust among team members. (Shneiderman, 2016) Weir (2018) also showed that, what researchers call teamwork ABCs are shaped by these deep-level factors: attitudes, activities and cognitive statements that collectively influence whether a team achieves its objectives These elements rely to some extent on the context and goals of the team Another research has found that individuals who appreciate working in groups appear to be both more optimistic and more cooperative in team environments When team members have a high degree of conscientiousness, they are better at self-regulation of their teamwork (Bell,
With the existing research studies, we will summarise the information about the important of team working skills Based on our study, we will analyse these information and research on students in IBD to collect more primary sources.
Figure 1: The frequency of IBD students working in teams
The pie chart illustrates how often IBD students have to work in teams According to the results, there are 51 out of 65 respondents who did team-working only when they have projects in school, which made up 78% of total The number of students having team- working on a daily basis is lower, at 18% (12 people) There are only a few students who never or rarely working in teams, both accounted for 2%.
In learning, groups can be formed when there are the assignments of teachers or by a number of friends who have the same interest in learning about a topic that combines into groups to exchange, share and support in order to achieve better academic results (Thanh,
2016) According to Thanh (2016), Vietnam was said to be "where there is almost no teamwork culture, or there is very little".
Figure 2: IBD students roles in working teams
This bar chart demonstrates IBD students roles when they do the teamwork In this survey, there are 6 main roles of members in a team, which are leader, shaper, coordinator, completer and team-worker It is noticeable that students usually chose to be the team-worker whenever they work in groups.
First and foremost, being the leader of a team was chosen by 25 people (39.4% of total), which is considered as a slight important role of IBD students when working in teams. Secondly, team-worker is said to be the most popular role of students in teams by 36/ 65 respondents (56%) Besides, there are 22 students (33.3%) being shapers when they are in a team, which is higher than the coordinators with 21 people (31,8%) The number of students choosing to be the completer or finisher in teams was the lowest, at 20 people (30,3% of total).
The positions and obligations of the leader or facilitator and the individual members working within the group or team are discussed, the team workers are typically the most common members of the team, willing to compromise and work efficiently for the benefit of the group (Group and Team Roles, 2013).
Figure 3: Students opinions about working in teams
The bar chart illustrates the different opinions of IBD students when they are working in groups It can be seen from the graph that most of students thought that when they have team-working, they can improve many skills and other team members can provide them with great ideas The number of people having two of these opinions was 35 and 36 (51.3% and 53%), respectively.
There are 19 respondents feeling enjoyable with the teamwork (30.3% of total), while only 14 people who was unsatisfied with the tasks they have to work (21.2%) The number of people who cannot get along with other team members was 11 (16.7%), which was three times lower than those who think they can have skills improved when working in teams There are some other opinions of students who think they more prefer to work independently in order to achieve more excellent results (7.5%).
According to Ogbonnaya (2019), although team-working can lead to innovative ideas and strong performance, it can also be stressful when conflicts arise, people become too reliant on each other, some do not receive their fair share of credit, there are various coordination costs that come with making teams work well.
Figure 4: Reasons why students unsatisfied when working in teams
The bar chart shows figure for the reasons why students unsatisfied when working in teams There are numerous reasons for being unsatisfied when working in teams of IBD students shown in the survey, namely, teammates behaviour, leaders, connection between members and assigned tasks
The most popular reason why students are unsatisfied with the team-working is the behaviour of other members in teams, which was chosen by 45 people (68% of total). Additionally, the second most important reason leading to the dissatisfaction was the connection between members during the process of team-working, with 38 people chose this section (59.1%) There are 18 students are displeased with their assigned tasks when working in teams ( at about 27.3%) Finally, only 4 students believed that the leaders of teams are the reason of their dissatisfaction with the team-working (6% of total).
Regarding to Premuzic (2017), psychologists recognize there is a universal where human need to belong to groups, but they also understand that people are not always predisposed to working well with other people Individual ambitions also sabotage team spirit and the competitive impulses of people end up finding goals for fellow team members rather than rival teams (Premuzic, 2017).
Figure 5: Skills that team members need in the process of team working
The bar chart illustrates some different skills which IBD students think each team member need in the process of team-working
It is clearly shown that the most necessary skill that students should have when they are working in teams was the ability to build rapport, with 72.7% of respondents chose this skill (49 people) Besides, communication skill was also important, ranked the second place with 44 answers (68.2%)
There are 31 students who chose conflict resolution as a skill that team members need in the process of working in teams, which accounted for 45.5% of total The feedback skill and persuasion and influencing skill shared the same number of respondents, which was the two lowest figures compared to other skills, with 28 respondents (42.4%).
Figure 6: Factors that create a good teamwork
The bar chart demonstrates some elements which IBD students think that would help to create a good teamwork