Hyderabad Blues: [HM:255281] Teamwork – The Essence Of Workplace Productivity

Can you imagine yourself working on a project all alone in the office and no one to support and assist you? The first reaction would always be, definitely not! This is because we are all bound to be a part of a cooperative group to accomplish our daily tasks at the workplace, and this is what we call 'teamwork'. Teamwork is defined as an activity or a set of inter-related activities undertaken by a number of people, in order to achieve a common objective. Whether it is a cricket ground, a movie production or the corporate world, working in teams is inevitable because the productivity ratio of multiple people, working on the same task, is always greater than one person, and the ROI is always higher.

A widely understood and interesting concept in the management jargon, extended form of the word TEAM, is:

T – Together
E – Everyone
A – Achieves
M – More

The concept of Together Everyone Achieves More itself conveys the importance of teamwork at the workplace and other places. For years now, organizational leaders have recognized the added value that comes from having employees work in formal or informal teams. However, over the last two decades, even greater emphasis has been placed on working together in a team. Team-building and team-work skills are essential in the workplace and highly desirable skills to possess when seeking a new job or promotion. Teams working at their potential generate more productivity and offer better solutions than if all of them work independently.

Significance Of Teamwork At The Workplace

Teamwork in a company or organization has great importance for more than one reasons. Companies, who have adopted this concept, have reported increased performance in work production. This group project approach has improved employee morale and increased input when managed correctly. The benefits of teamwork can make a positive effect on the company that incorporates this type of teamwork approach. Let us discuss the significance of teamwork in the workplace, which can benefit the employees in a number of different ways:

Sharing Workload

Working in a team has the biggest advantage of the workload getting shared amongst all the team members involved in a certain project. With work properly distributed among the employees, all dealing with their own particular task, no member of the team can feel over-burdened or extra pressurized in the overall project. A fair work distribution ensures that every person or every working unit executes the task at hand, with the best possible efficiency. The division of work, also, ensures that the work is done on time and deadlines are not extended.

Building Mutual Associations

Continuous interaction among the team members, and working in a group for the whole day, helps in building a mutual association or bond of friendship and unity among the employees. In some employees, this bond of friendship lasts for a life time. The effects of mutual associations make the work easier and goals more attainable.

Increased Work Pace

It is a fact that when people or professionals work in teams with mutual cooperation, the tasks get accomplished at a faster pace. Teamwork is one of the best ways to ensure the timely completion of any work, with the maximum possible efficiency. With many people handling a single project and doing the assigned work properly, the overall work speed increases, and the team is able to complete the project well, within the given time frame.

Learning Opportunities

While working in a team, the employees tend to learn things at a faster pace. The exposure to a team of diverse members and the knowledge of the older team members help you to grasp the new concepts quickly. At the same time, being working in a team enables the team-members to avoid mistakes and proves to be a bonus for the overall image of the team.

Lessening Risks

One of the best advantages of team-work at workplace is that the burden of responsibility is borne by all the members of the team, and it does not fall on the shoulders of just one person.
When a certain project is executed with the maximum possible efficiency of a number of professionals working together, there is a reduction in risk or committing a mistake.

First-rate Output

Most of the time, team-work ensures high quality output of an assignment or a project. The tasks carried out by a group of employees produce far greater and high quality results as opposed to the efforts of a single professional. No matter how efficient and competent an employee is, the results of his efforts are no match for the performance given out by a variety of professionals, working with similar efficiency.

A Healthy Competition

While working in teams, professionals compete with each other and try to excel in every way. At the same time, they help and assist each other in work-related as well as personal difficulties and problems. The signs of great productivity and maximum efficiency are achieved only through team-work and mutual work practices.

Mutual Creativity

While working in a team, you will never be alone while coming up with an idea; you will always have some other professionals thinking on the same lines, who might suggest a better idea. Suggestions, advices and mutual brainstorming can help employees in generating novel ideas and bringing out the creativity in their projects.

Job Satisfaction

Team-work can be an important source of job satisfaction and professional fulfillment for employees. The reason behind it is that working in a team improves employee performance as well as makes the work enjoyable for them. This is also favorable for employee motivation and workplace enthusiasm.

Mutual Organizational Interests

When employees work in team, they automatically work for mutual organizational interests; their personal interest is subordinate to the organizational interests. This ensures that all the team members put in the maximum possible efforts, focusing on the same goal, thereby ensuring a high quality and timely output.

Overall Reputation Of The Organization

Teamwork also increases the goodwill and reputation of a company or an organization. The goodwill created by mutual cooperation of professionals in an organization, in fact, plays a highly instrumental role in bringing in more business and public trust.

Concluding Ideas

You must have noticed that the list of advantages points out to two basic facts that work, when distributed, reduces workload, and a reduced amount of work ensures optimization and efficiency. Effective teamwork in the workplace benefits the organization by increasing the individual productivity, which is important in order to achieve the targets and fulfill commitments. Also, teamwork decreases the non-productive hours, which therefore increases productivity and ensures maximum utilization of manpower. This is the reason why companies are promoting teamwork at workplaces.

For some professionals, it might be a bit difficult to adjust to a group environment, but I am sure, they will gradually start loving to work as a team as they will see themselves developing as productive employees as well as better human beings!
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