End Product

Member Attitudes:

The dynamics of our team brought five members together with different experiences and educational backgrounds. We had people from different states and locations come together because we all felt passionate about helping Big Brothers Big Sisters. In the book, it refers to a team as “a group of three or more individuals who are intentionally and consciously working together to achieve a common objective such as a product or process improvement” (de Janasz, Dowd, & Schneider, 2015). Effective teams must be able to collaborate, commit, be supportive of one another, possess leadership, and overcome. Our team collaborated with one another to determine the overall goal along with how we would accomplish this. This was done through scheduling meetings and then creating goals for one another each week. We committed to making a difference for BBBS and all were intentional with our actions. We stayed committed to making a difference even when our project had to change drastically due to COVID-19. We came together in this difficult time and supported one another to find an alternative idea other than having a mixer. The main event we had to overcome was when we were no longer able to meet in person or hold the event that we had been hoping to have. The conflict was something that we handled well with our group. In the beginning, we had difficulty finding a source of food for our mixer along with having difficulty finding a time that worked with all of our schedules. These issues could have easily resulted in conflict, but instead, we supported one another and adapted as a group. We collaborated with one another to be proactive rather than deal with conflict when it occurred. We were proactive by making sure we had specific goals made for each person in our group and then communicated efficiently throughout the entire semester. We clearly defined that our problem this semester at the beginning of the semester changed once we were no longer to meet. We decided the clear solution was to fundraise and help BBBS to receive nonperishable donations so that we could help the organization and the families involved in a time of need. We tried our best to get new “bigs,” which resulted in us finding five new volunteers this semester. Our goal had originally been ten volunteers, but along with getting half this, we were also able to fundraise above our original goal. We came together in a challenging time and were able to help an organization in more ways than once. Adapting and overcoming are two things that we discussed early in the semester, but our group was really able to prove that we had the ability to beat the odds and deal with a troubling time by still making a difference.

Behavioral Outcomes:

This semester is one that none of us saw coming. In the beginning, we felt prepared for a semester where we held a mixer and found ten new “bigs” for BBBS. Unfortunately, this was cut short but we were still able to find five new volunteers. Halfway through the semester, we had to adapt and change our overall plan from new volunteers to fundraising and donations. We became more developed leaders because we came into this semester with simple objectives and goals but faced challenges we never saw coming. We found out what it meant to be a true leader because even in a questionable time we had to develop an alternative plan and still accomplish our adjusted goals. We had more challenges than we ever imagined but were able to support one another and collaborate as a team to still have a successful semester. Our ability to lead, adapt, and communicate has increased tremendously this semester. This experience showed us that not everything in life is going to be an easy path, but even when things get difficult we cannot give up. We all proved that we are authentic leaders because we built our credibility by showing that our actions meant just as much as our words. We also stayed true to our values and stayed transparent with BBBS and our donors. Change is one of the most important parts of the leadership process. The goal is typically to create change but sometimes leaders have to overcome change as well. Adaptive leadership is one of the leadership styles that we utilized the most this semester. We had to tackle the challenges faced and adjust the objectives to be more fitting to the community during this time. Our team came from different geographic locations, work experience, religions, family status, and brought our own views into this semester. We came together to create a team culture that used referent power to have donors to provide us with enough money to meet our goal of $500. Our entire group had taken Leadership 300 and 302 prior to this semester. This semester was a test of bringing the concepts into action. We took what we had learned in our previous courses and applied them to make the biggest impact we could with the circumstances given.