It was Wednesday. Five days before the submission deadline.
Jack was delaying the team. He was able to send in his part of the code for the team project only now. According to the team’s Gantt chart, it should have been sent a week ago. He had his reasons: he got sick. Valid, but he didn’t try to keep in touch during those times - no email replies, no return calls, and, this was not the first time he suddenly went missing in action.
Jack, John and you combined the team’s 2,000 lines of code and tested it.
It was not working properly.
For the next two days, debugging was the issue. No one could find the root cause of the problem.
Friday. Three days before the deadline.
By Monday, the program should have been working and running in perfect condition for demonstration. During class, a hardcopy of the thirty page final report shall be submitted and a group oral defence shall be done.
Due to the record of Jack’s lack of team involvement, John, an experienced programmer, suggested to redo Jack’s code with you since he suspected that Jack’s code was causing the problem.
Saturday. Two days away from the submission deadline.
Confirmed. Since the new code is now working perfectly fine with John’s and your original codes, Jack’s code has had the problem. He admitted that he rushed his code. This made you and John upset. Obviously, both of you observed that Jack is not putting as much effort into this project as everyone else does. John and you are both feeling resentment against Jack while the latter remains in his usual self. He seems to be free-riding all the while since everyone will be receiving the same grade, anyway.
Less than 48 crucial hours left before the submission deadline.
The final report is yet to be made and everyone has to be prepped for the oral defence.
As the leader of the team, how will you divide the composition of the final report? Will you still entrust a portion of the final project content to Jack? How will you deal with him?
As the leader of the team, how will you divide the composition of the final report? Will you still entrust a portion of the final project content to Jack? How will you deal with him?
REFERENCE
1. Tokka Week: 4. Two to Tango (Edited Image Source): http://empty-smile.deviantart.com/art/Tokka-Week-4-Two-to-Tango-93737149
2. Blue Pills (Edited Image Source): http://empty-smile.deviantart.com/art/Blue-Pills-98896709
2. Blue Pills (Edited Image Source): http://empty-smile.deviantart.com/art/Blue-Pills-98896709
4 comments:
Hello Paul,
I must say you used a very nice way to portray your your conflict; by means of counting down to the deadline. Our conflicts posted are also somewhat similar, so I might have some experience on this, be it right or wrong.
First off, Jack going off-radar definitely brought the group some amount of anxiousness and uncertainty in terms of work. This behaviour is highly intolerable in a group and should be brought up immediately.
in this case, thankfully, there was John, the experienced programmer to salvage the situation. Even so, there cannot be too much reliance on one person in a group as it will mount too much pressure on him. Work should be spread out evenly and each group member must complete his part with utmost effort.
As the leader of the team, I would have spoke to John separately and reminded him of his priorities since there were only 2 days left. After which, I would divide the report as usual. However, this time, I would try to make the group work together, face-to-face, so as to monitor the progress of our final report up close. Hopefully after the talk to John, he would have woken up his idea and did his best, or else the entire project will just go to waste just because of one person's negligence.
This is what I would have done in this context. I will like to see what you have done in this context. I'll be awaiting your next post!
Cheers,
Qinxian
Hi Paul,
Great post once again! The words in bold helped us in following the story more closely. Overall, the layout was new and interesting. Of course, that goes for the story as well, as it is directly relevant to all of us here. (Although I do hope that we do not need to have 2000 lines of codes for our project... haha.)
Although it may be tempting to lash it out with people like Jack face to face, it may end up in a situation worse than before. After an all out clash, Jack may feel even more unmotivated to contribute for the team.
Instead of reprimanding him, we have to make him feel that his contributions are important, and encourage him on every job well done. Even if he finishes everything late, or makes shoddy work out of it, praise him for his work. Tell him that it’s alright for him to screw it up, since he did his best. This way he will realize his own importance, and maybe feel guilt for not putting in any effort.
The key is to make the other party realize that his contributions are important to the team. When a person feels that his efforts are recognized, he will be more motivated to work, even under harsh conditions.
Cheers
Zhen Yong
Hi Paul,
The way you have presented your post is nice. I feel that the story you have used in your post is completely relevant to us. It is true that if a member delays his/her code, it affects the whole team, as to develop a complete program,contribution from each member is necessary. Whenever there are cases like this, the leader has to make a choice depending on situation. In some cases, it is better being harsh on the team members as by doing so it makes sure that their work is completed before the stipulated deadline.
In this situation, Jack was a bit careless on his part and John did some extra work to complete jack’s part as he thought that it might be jack’s code which gave errors during compilation and eventually it became true. It is nice that John had taken the initiative to do jack’s part. If no one had stepped forward to do jack’s part the project would have been incomplete. I personally feel that Jack should have informed the team members that he was sick and it would take some time to finish his code. By doing so, the other members would have finished jack’s part and the program would have finished a way before the stipulated deadline and team members would have had ample time to prepare for the oral presentation. Nevertheless the unexpected happened and I think the team members should instill confidence on jack and hope that he delivers the presentation well.
It is a pleasure to read your blog and I have thoroughly enjoyed reading it.
Regards,
Santhosh
Hey Paul,
Your post is really intriguing. The way the conflict has been described in the blog post attracts its readers to reflect upon the actions of all the people involved in the conflict. Jack’s lack of participation in the team work is not bearable as even his grades are at stake.
If I were the leader of the team, I would personally go and talk to Jack and ask him to participate in the team work as the work of all the team members is important for the success of the team and our project. I would even like to point it out to him that though we all will receive the same grades, the grades might not be what we want if we don’t work properly as a team, as then we might not be able to meet the stipulated deadlines. Most importantly I would talk to him softly to make him believe that he is required by the team and his job is as important as any other member’s.
Regarding the report, I feel I would divide it as I normally would. I would personally make sure that Jack is there to attend all the meeting of the group and gets equal share in the final project work so that even he gets a chance to work for the team after me talking to him.
The rest I would all leave up to my luck and and my teams hard work because I believe hard work always pays.
Cheers,
Saurabh Arora
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