Effective Teamwork Strategies in the Military

Vanessa, Danielle, Brook

Goals• Clear goals • Defining individual

roles • Communicating

clearly and openly • Making effective

decisions • Balancing

participation • Managing conflict • Creating a positive

atmosphere • Developing

cooperative relationships

• Utilizing participative leadership

What is a Team?

• More input leads to better ideas and decisions.

• Higher quality output. • Involvement of

everyone in the process.

• Shared information means increased learning.

• Increased understanding of other people’s perspectives.

• Increase opportunity to draw on other people’s strengths.

• Ability to compensate for individual weaknesses.

Happy TeamA team is a group of people who are mutually dependent on one another to achieve a common goal.

Responsibiles

It is a leader’s responsibility to link the individual goals of each team member with the common goal to ensure motivation and desire to achieve it.

Motto

• More input leads to better ideas and decisions.

• Higher quality output.• Involvement of everyone

in the process. • Shared information

means increased learning.

• Increased understanding of other people’s perspectives.

• Increase opportunity to draw on other people’s strengths.

• Ability to compensate for individual weaknesses.

Individual goals of each team member with the idealized common goal

ensure motivation and desire to obtain

the goal!

Individual

Clear allocation of work reduces the possibilities of intra team conflict.

They should be able to respect the role of everyone in the team

Every team member should know that there role in the team is crucial and is valued by their boss.

Team Building Exercise:82nd Airborne Does Team-

Building with a Twist

When groups work together, conflict often erupts.  Tell me about a time that conflict occurred in one of your work groups and what you did about it.

Tell me what role you play within work groups and why. How would people you work with describe you? Tell me about the most effective contribution you have made as part of a task group or special project team. Tell me about a time you pitched in to help someone finish a project even though it “wasn’t your job.”  What

was the result? Have you ever been in a position where you had to lead a group of peers?  How did you handle it?  Tell me

about problems you had and how you handled them. What is essential for a team to be successful? Tell me about a time you worked in a cross functional team? Were there different challenges -compared to a

departmental task team? Have you ever worked in a virtual team? If so, tell me about this experience. What were the team dynamics? Was the team successful? What would

you do differently? If not, what do you perceive to be the advantages and disadvantages of this type of team? How would you

suggest creating team cohesiveness in a virtual setting? Tell me about a situation where political power plays affected team dynamics. How did you or could the team

have overcome or avoided this situation?

Interview QuestionsWith Joshua Pearson a Military Officer

Well my group at basic training all had to do a little activity to show how we would work together in a time of conflict. What our recruiters taught us to do was to get the group together and calmly try to solve the problem as a team. A better team means better efficiency.

When groups work together, conflict often erupts.  Tell me about a time that conflict occurred In one of

your work groups and what you did about it.

Tell me what role you play within work groups and why.

• A role that I play within my military group is a teammate. There are no certain roles when were working as a team.

How would people you work with describe you?

• Someone who doesn’t put up with much. I’m not hot headed but when things need t be done, they get done!

Have you ever been in a position where you had to lead a group of peers?  How did you handle it?  Tell me about problems you had and how you handled them.

• In one of our team exercises I was instructed to lead my unit down the course with many obstacles. Right away I took initiative and as a team helped my unit get across the finish line. I made sure everyone crossed the line and then I crossed it as a finish for our unit.

Individually, we are one drop. Together, we are an ocean.

- Ryunosuke Satoro

Tell me about a time you pitched in

to help someone finish a project even though it

“wasn’t your job.”  What was the

result?

• You are going to learn that the people standing to the left and right of you are the ones that you might need to survive and you can only learn teamwork by working together and developing a team cohesion and trust because you guys are going to have to depend on each other.

• Whenever there is a problem in our unit we all pitch in.

• When your in the military the men and women standing beside you, you start to consider them family.

2

What is essential for a team to be successful?• Respect, Participation, Trust, Ownership for reponisbilities,• Teamwork is a fundamental lesson in the military. At basic

training, you learn about being a member of a unit. You do not focus on the first person to cross the finish line. You do not focus on the last person to cross the finish line. What matters most is that every unit member understands that everyone crosses the finish line. We are all in this together

Have you ever worked in a virtual team? • Yes, very often. We are work closely with Station Buffalo and

other commands across the US

Give an example of a successful project you were part of. What was your role? Why was the project successful?• I was to instuct my peers on appropriate bording procedures. The

assignment was successfull becasue we knew what we needed to do. Some had to stay longer to study the material. But the incentive is pursueing a boat going ovewr 70mph. That gets any bodys motivation up.

I am sure that in any work environment there are many situations that are in need of some team work. An example is when i worked in a restaurant and all of a sudden 60 people from a play in Lockport came into the restaurant and lets say about half of those were kids. It was a mad house. We were understaffed and had no idea what to do to control the situation. So my coworkers and I took 5 minutes to come up with some sort of a plan. We later then assigned roles to the 6 of us that were working and then took control of the situation. The situation ended up being under control and after our miniature staff meeting we were able to have a well organized plan.

Describe a situation from your past work experience in which you have determined a team was the best potential solution to a problem, a needed process improvement, or a planned change. How did each

work?

Tell me about a time you worked in a cross

functional team?

People from all departments collaborating

i.e. War

Tell m

e a

bou

t th

is e

xp

eri

en

ce. Working with

different unit was so much

fun. I was able to

dabble in everythin

g Wh

at

were

th

e

team

dyn

am

ics Everyone knew

their jobs, teamwork

really was a huge factor here. If one

person was to make a

mistake, the other person

also knew the job so they

could step in

Was t

he t

eam

su

ccessfu

l? Very

Wh

at

wou

ld y

ou

d

o d

iffere

ntl

y? Everyone has

their specialties, the only thing I

would change is interactions with

other units. Some people

needed to step out of their

comfortable zone. I guess in

war, that is understandable

• Teams membership can provide social facilitation and support for difficult tasks and situations

What do you perceive to be the advantages this type of team?

• When there is lives in danger, we have no second chances

The Disadvantage?

• It would be impossible, we should just pull out of the war

How would you suggest creating team cohesiveness in a virtual setting?

Tell me about a situation where political power plays affected

team dynamics. How did you or could the team have overcome

or avoided this situation?

Depending on what is going on in the US, we are often

being sent to different training

camps.

That effects our station because the people who get to

leave the base aren’t aloud to, duet

o the fact that we are running

minimum officers.

THANK YOU!