That other collab assignment essay that I didn't hand in on time

COLLABORATION

What are examples of collaboration?
In today’s society there is a multitude of ways that we can collaborate with each another.
This takes many forms most commonly in day-to-day activities we undertake. For example with Co-workers at your place of employment - whether it is between just two people or in a larger group. Working together to create a better working environment for themselves or making sure that their customers are looked after effectively.
Another way collaboration is evident in daily life is collaboration in a personal relationship such as a couple collaborating over the rasing of their children or their relationship in general.
Collaboration is also a vital part of any sporting teams winning strategy: each member of the team works together to achieve a common goal – to win.
On a higher level in our society collaboration is essential. Particularly in the political arena - if politicians and other groups in our community don’t work together and collaborate effectively the structure of society could very well break down.
In relation to the multimedia industry, Collaboration within working teams is essential to produce a worthy well made product for the client. Each specific team member’s strengths and skills need to be utilized in the best possible manner and together the load is shared evenly.


What are the keys to collaboration?
Communication is the probably the most vital component of any collaboration. For the project to go smoothly each member of a collaborative group must understand what is expected of them.
The team must work together to reach their common goal. To do this each member must communicate clearly and frequently with fellow member’s of his or her team.
Ideally each team member should have equal amount of work as the other team members so that no one feels resentment that someone is doing more or less than them. Because this can cause division between members of the team.
Effective, consistent and frequent communication is essential so that the work/project gets done and everyone knows how far they’ve come along – what everyone is doing/has done and what still needs to be done.
As humans we can communicate in a multitude of ways. Verbally is the most common but with today’s technologies there are several different other ways to communicate email, sms, via phone and internet services such as web logs. If everyone is communicating then the project will be done quicker.
If nobody is communicating then no one knows what to do and therefore the work will not get completed.


CLASS COLLABORATIVE EFFORTS

During the course we have collaborated effectively in some ways. With the recent CARWASH video collaboration we eventually managed to get it together enough to complete the first parts of the overall project. This was done by frequent production meetings where we hashed out planning and creative issues. Having that planning and communication between the players in our project served to make the production on the day go more smoothly and our time was used more effectively.

When the team has failed to collaborate mostly involves the ego in regards to participation and lack of communication between team members. In this collaboration there were problems with some members of the team not having what they felt was a big enough roles while others had more to do. This was difficult to rectify because the nature of the project meant that there was few roles while there was many people. On the other hand some members of the team despite the best efforts of the people around completely failed to complete their given roles adequately. As for communication a lot of this involves people not listening and understanding what’s being said and becoming confused but failing to speak up about this fact. This caused tension between some group members.


We collaborate more effectively in future by communicating better within the group by making sure everything is clearly stated, planned and out in the open. Also all team members will be fully committed to the project and will participate equally. If everyone understands what is going on and do not bring personal problems to the table everything will go more smoothly.