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roadblockHave you ever worked on a group project which seemed doomed to failure? I think most of us have been there at least once. At the point where a project gets stalled it’s extremely important to get past whatever obstacle is impeding your project because your morale will suffer and your deadline will soon approach. This article will provide some advice for removing road blocks and getting your project back on track.

To begin with it’s important to identify what types of problems groups typically run into. I would say that most road blocks fall into three broad categories;

  1. 1. Arguments over management – These arguments arise from differences in working style, approach to the project or quite simply from different personalities clashing. It can be a serious problem when one (or more) strong headed person(s) want the group to do something because they think its best.

Solutions: This is a problem of communication, each side needs to come to understand and respect each other’s ability, style and ideas. Respect can only emerge when people get to know each other and there is a genuine sense of trust and commitment to the project. A good way to gain respect and trust is for everyone in the group to spend some time getting to know each other on a personal level before starting the project. Set up an informal session where people can grab a coffee together and talk. The group should try to learn how people work, what their schedules are like and more importantly what kind of people they’re going to be dealing with. The group must be upfront about ground rules such as; how much time they will commit to the project, how they will work together, when they will meet and an agreement to compromise.

  1. 2. No consensus on project decisions – This problem arises when group members have very different opinions on how the project should be completed. One person thinks it should be a Power Point presentation, while another wants to do a skit and so forth. Furthermore, problems can arise when no one can seem to find ANY good ideas for the project. This can come about when the project is very difficult, the group hasn’t approached the subject properly and/or there is a lack of leadership in the group.

Solutions: In the case where there are strong opinions on which path to take, your group should examine the strengths and weaknesses of each idea and then take a vote. If the democratic method doesn’t make everyone happy then see if you can either combine ideas in some way or make compromises. In the case where no one can think of ideas, or none of the ideas that you came up with seem like winners then you need to get down to basics. First make sure the objective of the project is clear and then do some research on the topic. After that try to get the group together to do some brainstorming. Another useful tool is ‘Mind Mapping’, which is a form of visual notes. In a mind map, the group starts off writing the main subject of the project on a whiteboard and then draws nodes from it which represent related topics. The group continues to draw sub-nodes and further sub-nodes until they have ‘mapped’ all the pertinent ideas surrounding the project subject. The point is to achieve an understanding of the context of your subject and to foster creativity with regard to potential project ideas.

  1. 3. A minority of the group is doing the majority of the work – A recurrent scenario in group projects is where you have some members who are very determined to succeed (and very afraid of failure) paired up with members who are willing to ‘go with the flow’. This tends to produce situations where the type ‘A’ personality is allowed to hijack the project because they want to make sure the project is done correctly and on time. While this may seem like a good compromise for both parties it can be a big road block since you may have too few people working on too big a project. Furthermore, the project will end up with the input of a small number of members. The point of a being in a group project is to learn to work with people and how to collaborate.

Solutions: People who obsess with grades tend to be frightened of deadlines. Therefore to persuade them not to take on more work than others they need to be assured that their colleagues are committed to the project and are capable workers. It also helps if everyone agrees to break down the project into tasks and distributes the work evenly. If the problem persists then you need to bring it up at the next group meeting. Remind the group that EVERYONE has a stake in this project therefore everyone has to be involved.

Sometimes when we encounter the roadblocks I’ve described above it may seem that there is no way around them. Our problems are usually never as bad as we envision them at the time so we need to take a step back, remove ourselves from the situation and think about some of the solutions outlined above and things will undoubtedly improve.

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