“Teamwork means working well with others. Don’t try to do everything yourself. Don’t try to just take command either. Teamwork is about cooperation and coordinating with others, not competition against them.”
This interview is reaching out to a broad audience to help me (and you!) get a better understanding of just what people actually think about teamwork and how it impact their lives. I hope you enjoy it and maybe gain an insight or two.
Interviewee Profile
1) What is your official job / position title?
Fantasy Content Manager
2) What is your direct supervisor’s official job / position title?
Operations Manager
3) What industry do you work in?
Sports Entertainment
4) How many years have you been in your current industry and job?
4
5) What are 3 to 5 of your most important skills, specialties, or areas of expertise?
Written communication skills, Microsoft Excel, WordPress, Can work without supervision
Interviewee Responses
01) Describe (in your own words) what you think ‘teamwork’ means.
Teamwork means working well with others. Don’t try to do everything yourself. Don’t try to just take command either. Teamwork is about cooperation and coordinating with others, not competition against them.
02) Think about a person you feel needs team-building training. How do you think this training would help him/her?
My coworker John could use some team-building training. He tends to just work on everything himself when he is supposed to send everybody else in the league information for projects and then we all do pieces of it. He never does this and always does projects himself. The training would help him because he is unnecessarily doing all the work when he shouldn’t be and it would be easier on him if he just worked with us.
03) How do you think teamwork could help a company or business?
Teamwork helps a company or business by increasing its efficiency. Everything is easier when you work with others because each person has to do a fraction of the work they normally would have if they did it alone. Teamwork also inspires new ideas and more creativity.
04) Describe a teamwork / team-building exercise or event you’ve been through at your work, school, or during training.
When I was in college I was in ROTC. This was really good for team-building because you had to do everything with other ROTC members, like physical training. The group was judged as a whole rather than individually so your group’s time was only as good as your slowest guy. That inspired people to want to help everybody else out because helping them indirectly helped yourself.
05) Explain at least 1 thing you’ve learned from a team-building exercise and how it has helped you.
One thing I learned from team-building exercises is that you can get a lot more done by working together instead of competing against others. Even if your team itself doesn’t have very many strong individuals, working together with them can still lead to great success. You don’t need to be a team of all-stars to do amazing things as a team. You can just be a team of regular, average people.
06) Think back to a team-building exercise you did NOT enjoy. What do you feel could have been improved and why?
One team-building exercise one of my old places of work did was invite us all to go to play laser tag. Although playing was kind of fun, it didn’t teach anybody anything. In fact, there was more competition than there was cooperation. It wasn’t very well thought out. It could have been improved by having our company play against another company’s team rather than competing against other members from our own company.
07) Describe what you like most about team-building efforts and training.
What I like most about team-building efforts and training is that afterwards you feel more at home at work. You get to know people more so going to work is like being among friends rather than just co-workers. You might not know or talk to everybody but after being in a team-building exercise with them they are more open with you which is nice.
08) What are a few things you like least about team-building efforts and why?
Some team-building efforts can be boring and yet they are still mandatory. Sometimes I would rather just go to work and do my work than do team training. Team training should be voluntary and the people involved should have some say of what you are doing, and not just be told by upper management.
09) When learning about team-building, would you rather read about it, listen to a trainer, watch training videos, or physically participate in an event? Describe why you feel that way.
I would rather participate in a physical event. This is the easiest way to remember what you’ve learned because it is an actual experience that you are remembering and not just something you read or heard. It also is the most clear cut in your mind because you did it and didn’t just read about it which could lead to vague perceptions.
10) Pretend you are asked to give a quick team-building presentation at work. What are your first couple of steps to get prepared?
In order to give a team-building presentation at work I would first research proven team-building exercises. I would list these exercises in my presentation and give examples of when they were used in the past to success. I would also list ways that team-building exercises increases efficiency and trust in the workplace.
11) In your opinion, what type or personality of person do you think could benefit most from team-building efforts?
Extroverted people benefit more from team-building efforts because they WANT to work with others. Introverts don’t so they would not enjoy team-building exercises. Since they would hate it while they are doing it, they would learn less and just want it to be over. Extroverts would also be more likely to applies its lessons later on in the real world.
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