Team Building and Collaboration

As our groups progress through the stages of team building, we establish relationships that are important to us professionally and personally.  We come to trust and respect each other in multiple ways and there’s a sense of loss in knowing that the work is coming to a close.  I have one group that I work with that keeps coming back together after all the work seems to be completed.  I think this is because we work so well together and because we recognize (sometimes months later) that there is a new facet of our work.  I do think the adjourning phase is important…it is an opportunity to celebrate our successes and, sometimes, say goodbye to a group that is not working well together.  I think we can all think of times when it was not necessarily a bad thing when a group ceased to meet.  In general, all of the phases of team building are important in order to achieve positive outcomes.

I worked with a group to develop a series of trainings called “Pathways to Inclusion”.  This was a series aimed at teaching child care center staff about the importance of caring for children with differing abilities in mainstream child care.  We worked on this project for almost two years and had great success; it was definitely something to celebrate!  We worked so well together that we were ending each other’s sentences.  I think our success can be attributed to the fact that we brought our passion with us to every meeting and had very clear goals for what we wanted to accomplish.  Our group has adjourned and reconvened twice and we’re getting ready to do it all over again.  We enjoy working together and it’s always fun when we find ourselves as team members of other groups.

When our Master’s program comes to an end in the fall, I think I will feel somewhat lost.  I enjoy the interaction with others who are committed to their professional growth.  We have established a virtual community where we rely on each other.  It will seem strange not to be interacting in some way every week.  I think I will also miss the educational setting!  I have so enjoyed the work of each class and it will seem strange not to be reading and writing.