TEAMWORK : Valley Crossing

Teamwork is the ability to work together towards a common vision. The ability to direct individual accomplishment towards organizational objectives. It is the fuel that allow common people to do uncommon task. In POM class, Our professor Prasad, discussed one of the best example of teamwork i.e valley crossing . He showed us a cartoon image as below:

 Image itself was self explanatory that 3 people are crossing the valley safely with help of a pole. But is it so simple to do? Firstly, there was a constraint before performing the task i.e no more than 3 people should do this . Secondly , there was no description about gap length, distance between 2 people, length of pole ,height of all 3 people,etc. As being an engineer, all these figures and calculations were running in my mind.
Then including me sir called 3 people to take a pole and perform this activity on a plain ground just for understanding.
To perform this activity , task has to be divided in 9 process or stages where 3 people would be in between these 3 stages -  safe , half risky and full risky. So stages were like :-

Step	State of 1st Person	State of 2nd person	State of 3rd person
1.	Safe	Safe	Safe
2.	Half-Risky	Safe	Safe
3.	Full-Risky	Safe	Safe
4.	Half-Risky	Half-Risky	Safe
5.	Safe	Full-Risky	Safe
6.	Safe	Half-Risky	Half-Risky
7.	Safe	Safe	Full-Risky
8.	Safe	Safe	Half-Risky
9.	Safe	Safe	Safe

We 3 some how performed the activity after looking into those 9 steps. But it was just a task to let us understand that how in an organization if any target is required to achieve with limited resources and constraints, then coordination and effectiveness of team is a must. Basic points that i understood with the activity were:

• Vision - Vision or Goal should be known to every one like in this case , crossing valley safely using a pole was the goal.
• Team Strategy and roles - When we are working in a group of people or a team , each and every one should be clear with the strategy to follow and also what his/her job is. Some times roles of one person in a team is dependent on others , so it should be clear to every one in prior.
• Coordination - Coordination is very important as performance totally depend on it. Like in case of crossing the valley , each person should have taken every next step in a synchronized way.
• Motivation - Moral boosting is very necessary to keep adrenaline flowing through body , which keep energy level high and individual will perform better. Motivation include praising teammates on success, backing up in case of failure and team slogans.
• Effectiveness - Effectiveness is doing right thing at right time. Performance or result of any activity depends upon effectiveness of a team

• Communication - Teamwork is the backbone of effective communication within a company. When employees work as individuals or independently on projects, they may not readily share knowledge or new information. This lack of communication increases the time it takes to complete projects, tasks or the development of solutions. Teamwork promotes conversation between employees regarding the task at hand, possibly preventing employees from working in opposite directions.

Teamwork is not about getting on well together, though that is part of working as a Team. There is a lovely quotation adapted from Henry Ford that really pinpoints teamwork: 

- Coming together is a beginning

- Working together is progress

- Achieving together is success