Organisation, Team building and Inclusion – BORG Dreierschuetzengasse

The start of a new project is always exciting. Facing the new challenges it initially is essential to find motivated, reliable and inspiring members for the new project team in order to implement the project and the work related to it the most prolific way. Naturally, in many cases teams easily develop among people who are close to each other and/or the team leader or among those who have already participated in a project and have thus required knowledge and experience. It goes without saying that good teacher cooperation is essential for a project’s success and involves team members cooperating to lead, instruct and support students with the objective of improving their skills, achievements and performance.
Moreover, teams expand according to the tasks that are to be dealt with depending on the project, its characteristics and requirements.  The more diverse a project is, the more specialists and experts are needed to cover all areas necessary. This is why team members will also be appointed due to their specific knowledge and skills needed for the project. Additionally, some might even volunteer to work in the project simply because they are interested in the topic, the specific design and its success.

When teaching or working in a team it is of extraordinary importance that the team members get along well with each other and have a good understanding of what the other teacher/team member expects from them and the students. Since team teaching of enthusiastic teachers is beneficial for students as they get to know an interdisciplinary spirit and experience didactic styles it is essential that the team members can rely on each other and discuss methodological-didactic approaches, learning designs, objectives and learning results carefully before they are in class.  Put in a nutshell, team members should be highly motivated, creative, cooperative and interested in team work as only this way a project will be successful. At the beginning of a project and/or in class students must be clearly informed about the aforementioned aspects to ensure the quality and success of the teaching co-operation and the project results. Moreover, learners do not only benefit from different learning approaches, but also from the additional time the teaching team have for their students.

Yet even if the members of the project team get along well with each other, especially when they stick to expected rules of conduct and show friendliness, honesty, respect, reliability, support, understanding and perseverance, coordination and cooperation might not always be easy since difficulties and tricky situations might arise from varying opinions on a project’s contents, working time, didactic approaches, evaluation or how to cope with unexpected problems. Therefore, the team leader should regularly motivate his team members to be cooperative, mutually understanding and additionally evaluate the process and the progress, especially with a bigger team. Regular feedback, no matter if orally or in written style, is another strategy to discover problems. It is tremendously important that team members treat each other with respect, listen to worries and try to find solutions to problems together.

Problems (which can of course always occur unexpectedly) should never be negated, but frankly discussed, no matter what area of the project they concern. Furthermore, to guarantee a project’s as well as the cooperation’s success team meetings should be held on a regular basis to discuss and review work on the project, progress and the project result.

Our project team is proof that considering all of the aforementioned secrets and strategies, working in a team is inspiring, motivating and beneficial for all parties involved. For us it definitely worked excellently 😊.