Teamwork at Work
Advantages of Working in a Team at Work
Teamwork can be a very important part of any work environment. There are many advantages to working in a team as opposed to working alone. Every person has their own perspective and life experiences which can be very valuable when shared with co-workers. As important as this information is, the willingness and ability to use and share information is just as important. Not everyone has this willingness to share information or ask for help when tackling tasks at work. These are two of the biggest reasons for dysfunctional teams. Without working together, a team will not perform well. Just as important as sharing information and asking for help, is treating teammates respectfully. If team members treat each other disrespectfully, there will be no trust in each other. Trust is a huge part of any successful team.
Asking for help
Many people have too much pride to ask for help when they encounter a problem. They feel as though they are failing by asking for help from someone else. By not asking for help from a co-worker, a person may be missing out on a huge opportunity to learn and grow. In the long run, the same person who is asking for help will most likely be helping someone else solve a problem sometime in the future. In a perfect world, they’ll be helping the same person who helped them. By working on problems together, the team will become much stronger as time goes by. Each member of the team will gain respect for each other just by spending time around each other, and learning each others’ strengths and weaknesses. Most likely each team member will have certain strengths which other team members may not have. Asking for help is the only way to tap into those strengths and use them to make your team perform to its potential.
Sharing of knowledge
Sharing knowledge is another aspect of teamwork which will help a team to perform to its highest ability. If a person is committed to having a successful team, they will have no problem sharing their own knowledge with their team members. Not all people are willing to share knowledge with co-workers because they feel it takes away from their ability to “stand out” at work. They feel that they need to keep their knowledge to themselves in order to be needed at certain times. Though this may make a person stand out at work, it will most likely make them very difficult to work with. It will also hinder their own ability to grow and learn because people will not be as willing to share knowledge with them.
Treating teammates respectfully
Over time, if earlier problems have been handled in a respectful way, team members will not have any problem asking each other for help or offering help when it’s needed. The worst thing a team member can do is to “make fun” or ridicule someone for not knowing something. This causes people to feel inferior or inadequate which will usually cause them to struggle through future problems without asking for help. This will cause a team to perform well below its potential. Sometimes it’s good to remind a person of something they’ve helped solve in the past when they are struggling with a current problem. Positive reinforcement is always a good way to help a team become stronger.
Teamwork can be a very useful tool in the workplace if it’s handled in the right manner. No two people are alike. Because of this, people handle different problems in different ways. Every person has something to offer which will help make their co-workers’ jobs easier. The key to good teamwork is figuring out how to gain access to each others’ strengths in a way which makes everyone perform to their highest ability. Being a part of a successful team can be a very rewarding experience. Celebrating successes as a team can make the workplace a much more enjoyable place to be. Not only that, but it helps the company’s bottom line as well.
