Monday, March 26, 2007

Ship with two sailors...


Of course leadership is an important factor in any teamwork success, leader guide people to the right way (achieve goals), motivate team members and finally monitor and measure the work progress
absence of leadership means non of the above will be done :(
in other hand if team has more than leader unfortunately also non of the above will be done :O

how come ?!!! a team leader can do that all, so if we have two team leaders they should perform better !!

unfortunately that is not 100% right, two leaders inside single team can lead team to nothing, because most probably if they are lazy they will depend on each other and if they are active they will give contradictory decisions that make confusion for team members

decision making process should be centralized as much as possible, no problem to let members share in some decision as team may include talented personalities but always final decision should be approved by team leader;

Finally there is an old Egyptian quote says,
“ship with two sailors must be sink” :)

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

Constructive feedback


Feedback is process of learning more about us and our behavior with others,Without feedback it is impossible for people to learn how to be more effective in their work; two methods for giving feedback destructive feedback and constructive feedback.

Unfortunately most of people are perfect in giving feedback using the first method (destructive feedback) ;)
Now the questions, what are differences between constructive and destructive feedback?!
The following wonderful comparison explain some differences between two types of feedback

Constructive feedback

Destructive feedback

Solves problems

Intensifies problems

Concentrates on behavior/performance

Concentrates on attitude / personality

Strengthens relationships

Damages relationships

Builds trust

Destroys trust

Is a two-way process

Is one way

Reduces stress and tension

Adds to stress and increases tension

Manages conflict

Causes conflict

Helps development

Obstructs development

Is assertive

Is aggressive or passively aggressive



Mmmmm, great so I wonder how I can give constructive feedback to my colleagues.
Good question :) , simply there are some rules and steps you may follow to offer constructive feedback such as,

1. Start with positive

2. Be specific

3. Refer to the behavior that can be changed

4. Choose a good time for giving the feedback

5. Offer alternatives

6. Leaving the recipient with a choice

Sure the above steps are not everything to give good feedback, but it can help us to give constructive feedback.

Thursday, March 01, 2007

Resolving conflicts inside teamwork

Teamwork may suffers from a lot of problems between team members such as misunderstanding, poor communication, selfish …etc

These problems have to be resolved because it is considered as obstacles in team success,
Some leaders like to face the problem bravely and try to resolve it in public meeting with all team members to make sure the problem won't occurred again with any other team members

While others like to keep the problem as local as possible and pretend there is no problem at all and let the time resolve the problem.
Resolving the problem in public meeting is a good way to end the problem early but in the same time it is risky as u may miss the control on problem owners so the problem become more complex, while letting the time resolve the problem and pretending there is no problem at all won't solve the problem, just it will keep the problem owners silent for sometime but sooner or later the problem will be explode
In my personal point of view we can obtain better solutions by merging between the two strategies, so u may face the problem bravely but in the same time u have to keep it as local as possible, so that we decrease the probability of increasing problem complexity and catch the problem early to not explode after a while
Resolving conflicts is a regularly one of the team leader responsibilities so he should be aware of all conflicts occurred between team members