July 16, 2015

In our line of work we are grouped into teams. We are constantly trying to instill a sense of team work and focusing on the whole rather than only individuals. It can be kind of a difficult balancing act at times due to the different personalities and backgrounds of the team members. As noted in the text there are several principles of systems thinking that I feel can be applied to building strong teams and communication between team members.

First, is that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. This particular principle is important for me in a sense that each team member has particular standards and processes that they personally need to reach, but them doing so also affects the team as a whole. Each team member has certain abilities and skills that another member may not be quite so good at. Together they can balance out the others. One individual can compensate for another person's weaknesses. This is reflected in our team scores. I may have 90% of my team doing fantastic and 10% that struggles but our effort as a team balances out and we reach our goals. In an effort to improve group performance we do have processes in place to help each individual reach higher and do better on any number of standards. Helping the individual in turns helps the team.

Another principle that interested me was that systems must constantly learn and renew themselves. We are a business that services customers' needs. We dictate calls for the hard of hearing so that they can communicate with those around them. In order to do this we need to have improving ideas for technology that help with the ease of this. We as a company cannot be competitive without learning new things. This has a ripple effect because of course, those new things necessitate learning within the groups as well. We have to communicate new standards and processes to the individuals in order to press forward with those changes that are being implemented.

Part of this learning and renewal is also the adding of new people into the mix. We are in an ever changing atmosphere. We have employees that come and go. So, there is a constant change in the dynamic of personality, perspective, and ideas. These variances allow for creativity and brings a great balance within the center.