I’m not going to lie, I felt our group’s planning process was a few steps beyond pathetic. We all had different ideas and if I remember correctly, the idea we actually implemented was a last minute afterthought (redundant I know). We did not define our goals and objectives very clearly. We were given 25(?) minutes for planning our contraption. We spent about 99% of that time thinking about what kind of design we should use. Due to this lack of definition on the specifics as well as general characteristics of our egg protection device, we really did not know when we were done, stopping only when the time was up.
In terms of knowing where we stood in reaching our objectives from the start, it was like we were blindfolded with no tightrope walking experience, while walking on a rope suspended very high from the hard concrete floor. We knew what materials we were going to use to build our egg haven, but we did not realize the strengths and weaknesses within our group, and thus did not assign tasks based on these undiscovered strengths and weaknesses.
Our group had a bunch of great designs that we did not implement. I guess you could call those our alternative strategies. We did not really assess the strengths and weaknesses of these alternative designs, or any of our designs for that matter. The people in our group basically thought that most of our designs were too hard to build or that it simply would not work. This hurt the most when we saw designs that we had thought up, being successfully used by the other groups.
The tactical plan part of our planning process was not very defined. We spontaneously chose a design because we were very low on time. There was nothing tactical about the way we chose our egg shielding mechanism. Desperation played a large role in the process of choosing how we used our supplies. There was no job assignation aspect to this step, as tasks just sort of fell into place during the actual implementation process.
On a positive, note, once we did decide what to make (because we had no other choice, there was only a few minutes left), we subconsciously assigned jobs like an assembly line. Though what happened before the device building and the results of the device building was disastrous, the efficiency of the actual building process was a nice positive change. I do not think the limitations of this project allowed us to evaluate our results and take corrective actions to revise our design. However, even if we could, I doubt we would have had the time.
To summarize, we skipped most of, if not all of the first four steps. The fifth step we performed partially, as it was absolutely unequivocally necessary. I would rate our team’s overall ultimate performance as quite low. We could have been more effective as a group had we quickly and thoughtfully assessed the strengths and weaknesses of our various design ideas. To end on a high note, we have a lot of potential and room for improvement. Things can only go up.
Until next time,
Kwok
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3 comments:
I agree with you to the point that our group wasn't that organized but at the same time, we DID do all the steps of the planning process. We knew what we had to do and because we didn't assign roles, it was easy for us to speak our mind but I guess it hurt the group's performance when it came to criticism and afraid of hurting each other's feelings? I love how you described our building process as an assembly line because when I think back, you are right! Next time, let's assign roles and see how that works for our group!
I agree with you that our team wasn't very organize. Also, we are too easy to give up on the ideas that is complicate to build. We get rid of a lot of the potential ideas that can lead to the success for our planning process. Like the idea that you have, we see that other group actually have a similar idea and they end up sucess. Therefore, maybe next time, we should just gather everyone's idea and then vote on the best one to work on! I agree with you that we need to assign role for different people in our group. I think that our group definetly need a leader. We hope that our teamwork will improve as the semester goes on! Look forward to work with you again!
It’s unfortunate that your experiment did not work but it is clear that you are aware your group’s shortcomings. Discarding steps 1-4 were crucial. If your group had great ideas, why did you change your mind at the last minute? You should have continued with your initial idea and changed the structure according to your needs. It seems as if there was no real communication. You needed a leader to structure your steps. You will successful on your next project.
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