Teamwork in classes and on the job - Part 1

We know that teamwork is probably the most important thing on the job. The old cliche of "there is no I in team" is pretty much true. It's multiple people working together. In classes, it's even more important.

When doing a class project, it's how well the entire team does. If one person does badly, the entire team suffers. I had this one team project and I kept telling the other two teammates that I didn't want to wait til the last minute. I had given them my contact info and class schedule a few times, and even then only one of the two gave me her text number. The other girl I never heard from until 10 hours before due time.

Apparently these two waited til the absolute last minute while I had my part already in the report with instructor's specs and questions to answer for them. My "don't wait til the last minute" was a common theme for the next three weeks before the due date. I told them I could make the report a good one but not if it was at the last minute. Come the due date, we had our presentation, and I was thinking it looked OK, though could have used some improvements. But the actual report I never saw til later.

What got me was that they kept claiming that I didn't say anything. Really? Like my many times of saying "no last minute" wasn't saying anything? That plus "we were aggressively working on project in classroom." If that were true, we'd have finished this long ago. Hardly "aggressive." And I was right there in the classroom and in the Commuter Lounge if they needed me.

Next - Part 2