Team Dynamics and Wiki Experience

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Personal Wiki Experience and Team Dynamics

Jeanelle Bernard

I never truly paid attention to the fact that while getting information off of Wikipedia, that I was in a wiki. That lack of attention came about because my curiosity for technology has waned over the past few years. I was never curious as to what a wiki was. Having to work in the environment initially intimidated: suppose I got it wrong. Nevertheless, I ventured forward and found it to be a rather interesting forum and it really cannot be messed up too much. Investigating the ways in which wikis work opened my eyes to the ways in which wikis are used and how I could use it. Being able to collaborate online is the best feature in my opinion. I have begun using wiki for collaboration with others outside of this course. Discussing wiki attributes with my team and other teams has been very interesting because there seems to be always something I can learn about wiki from them.

A bit of discomfort came my way knowing that all information on a wiki is available to all people with access to the internet. It made me know that I must do in-depth research before putting out any information. Even so, the attribute that allows others to correct/amend a document means that your information can be corrected or improved. Like all other internet tools, wikis can be accessed at times convenient to me, the user. The fact that there may be loss of material if more than one person is editing or typing did lead to some frustration because I lost information; it made my wiki experience less of a real-time experience.

TEAM DYNAMICS

I call our team, Team BDGMNR and I volunteered myself to be team leader, since I had the time and I also saw it as a wonderful experience to work with my cohorts, most of whom are younger than I. While we use the words team leader, I saw my role as being that of a guide or mentor, not the ultimate leader. I expected that team members would want to contribute their experiences and expertise. To aid in that expectation we did hold meetings where I encouraged members to speak openly about themselves, in terms of likes, dislikes and expectations in the business environment. I felt that in getting to know each other we would be able to bond quickly since this programme requires fast, efficient, and smooth workings. Further, I communicated frequently and by all known media expect the post and newspaper. I even felt that I bared myself more than which I was comfortable: all in the attempt to encourage team building. I do not believe that I was successful.

Our team is truly a new team. The team gained me by default last semester for one exercise only and this semester, we gained two (2) new members. The trust has not been fully developed within the team, although there are some members who are very close and work well together. As a team we have had sufficient cohesiveness to develop our course work: those who were more familiar with wiki imparting their knowledge, being willing to answer the ‘stupid’ questions but not without exasperation being evident. Others who were familiar with what was expected of the assignments chose not to share this information until it was realized that the the team was not doing the assignment properly. One of the issues, I observed was the need for my cohorts to like someone to work well with them. It is a team dynamics issue, that I acknowledge, while not understanding fully. Because I don’t fully understand it I could not take advantage of it to effect stronger ties within the team.

It seems that Team BDGMNR is not unique after all; we have displayed much of the classic conditions of team dynamics. There is need for those who are more quieter to be more open. We all need how to speak openly rather than being hesitant. We have been able to be respectful of each other. My personality is such that I seek the good in everyone so I have admired the skills of my colleagues and learnt from them and I while I did have to seek support from outside the team, I would not leave the team because I truly believe we can make a strong team.

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