Effective Teamwork and Project Management: Roles, Communication, and Conflict Resolution, Lecture notes of Electrical and Electronics Engineering

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Teamwork

A design team may be defined as a group of undividuals with complementary expertise, problem solving skills, and talent who are working togethere to solve a problem or achieve a common goal.The goal must be providing a service; designing, developing and manufacturing a product; or improving an exsisting service or product.

A good team is one that gets the best out of each other. Communication is an essential part of successful team work.

Common Traits of Good Teams

1.The project that assigned to a team must have a clear and realistic goals. These goals must be understood and accepted by all members of a team.

2.The team should be made up of individuals with complementary expertise, problem solving skills, background and talent.

3.The team must have a good leader.

4. The team leadership and environment and which discussions take place should promote openness, respect, and honesty.

5.Team needs and goals should come before individuals needs and goals.

In addition to these characteristics that make up a good team.

The organizer is someone who is experienced and confident. This person is trusted by members of a team and serves as a coordinator for the entire project.

The creator is someone who is good at coming up with new ideas, sharing them with other team members, and letting the team developed the ideas further. The creator is also good at solving difficult problems, but may have problems with following certain protocols.

The gatherer is someone who is enthusiastic and good at obtaining things, looking for possibilities, and developing contacts.

The motivator is someone who is energetic, confident, and outgoing. The motivator is good at finding ways around obstacles.

The evaluator is someone who is intelligent and capable of understanding the complete scope of the project. The evaluator is also good at judging outcomes correctly.

The teamworker is someone who tries to get everyone to come together, because he or she does not like friction or problems among team members.

The solver is someone who is reliable and decisive and can turn concepts into practical solutions.

The finisher is someone who can be counted on to finish his or her assigned task on time. The finisher is detail orientated and may worry about the team's progress toward finishing the assignment.

There are many other factors that influence team performance including:

-the way company is organized;

-how projects are assigned;

-what resources are available to a team to perform their tasks, and

-the corporate culture: whether openness, honesty, and respect are promoted.

Communication, the decision making process, and the level of collaboration are examples of factors that are controllable at the team level.

Conflict Resolution

Accommodating team members are highly cooperative, but their low assertiveness could result in poor team decisions.

Compromising team members demonstrates a moderate level of assertiveness and cooperation. Compromised solutions should be considered as last resort.

A better approach is the collaborative "conflict resolution'' approach, which demonstrates a high level of assertiveness and cooperation by the team.

Good communication is an integral part of any conflict resolution. One of the most important rules in communication is to make sure that the message sent is the message received without misunderstanding.

Project Scheduling and Task Chart

Project scheduling is a process that engineering managers use to ensure that a project is completed on time and within the allocated budget. A good schedule will assign an adequate amount of time for various project activities.

Evaluating Alternatives

Start by assigning level of importance (I) to each design criterion. For example, you may use a scale of 1 to 5, with I = 1 indicating little importance, and I = 5 signifying extremely important. Next you will rate (R) each workable concepts interms of how well it meets each design criterion. You may use a scale of R = 3 for

high, R = 2 and R = 1 for medium and low, respectively. The design criteria vary depending on a project.

Patent, Trademark, and Copyright

Traded information and invention, if not protected, can be stolen. So in order for a government to promote new ideas and inventions, it must also provide means for protecting others from stealing someone's new ideas and inventions, which are considered intellectual property.

Patent

Patent when you come up with an invention, in order to prevent others from making, using, or selling your invention, you may file for a patent with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling.

Trademark and Service Mark

A trademark is a name, word, or symbol that a company uses to distinguish its products from others.

A service mark is a name, word, or symbol that a company uses to distinguish its service from others. A service mark is the same as a trademark, except that it applies to a service rather than a product.

Copyright

Copy right is a form of protection by the laws of the United States to the authors of "Original works of authorship".

The copyright law protects the author's work from others copying the exact way things were explained or described.

Engineering Standard and Codes

Today's existing standards and codes ensure that we have safe instructures, safe transportation systems, safe drinking water, safe indoor/outdoor air quality, safe products and reliable services.

Why Do We Need Standards and Codes? Standards and Codes have been develop to ensure product safety and reliability in services. The standardization organizations set the authoritative standards for safe food supplies, safe structures, safe water system, safe and reliable electrical system, safe and reliable transportation systems, safe and reliable communication systems, and so on.

• Products that we all are familiar with.

• Simple examples demonstrate the need for uniformity in the size and the way products are labeled.
• It works in all the ATM machines or store credit card readers in the world.

International Organization of Standards (ISO)

• that most national/international engineering organizations create, maintain, and distribute codes and standards that deal with uniformity in size of parts and correct engineering design practices so that public safety is ensured.