Good and Bad Group Projects Prepare Students for the Real World

Over the past three years at Morehead State University, I have been assigned many various projects. Although the majority of them have been solo, some of them have been group projects. I have one good and one bad group project that really stick out in my memory. From the experiences of those two group projects and others, I have come to a conclusion of the qualities to have and avoid when creating a successful group.

Last semester in my Understanding Visual Arts class, our professor Janet Reiss assigned us a “Common Grounds” project. She divided us into groups and within our group, we had to find something we all had in common and design an art piece dealing with that topic to be placed in Morehead. Our groups were randomly determined and no one in our group had even spoken to each other before the assignment. We communicated with each other and decided to create a windmill out of recycled pop cans woven together in the shape of the recycling symbol to be placed next to the highway near Morehead’s Recycling Center. We divided the project’s requirements up into various parts, each one holding importance. One member liked to do power points, so we put her in charge of that. Another member liked speaking to the public, so we chose him to present our final project. I like to be creative and work with numbers, so I designed the windmill and determined the cost. We met outside of class to make sure we stayed on track with our project’s progression. Members completed their assigned part and everything went smooth once we put it all together. The final presentation went well and everyone loved the concept and design of our project.

My sophomore semester in Desktop Publishing II, we were split into groups of four to create and design a whole new magazine. Yet again, I did not know the members I was working with very well, nor did I know their talents or abilities. We did agree to create some type of celebrity magazine that combined many different topics and came up with the name “Everything Celebrity” and call it “etc.” We also agreed on a color scheme and the celebs to use within the magazine to help carry out the theme. Due to an approaching deadline, each person was assigned a number of pages to write and design. Our final grade consisted of 80% for the pages we completed individually and 20% for the group’s final product. Each person was primarily worried about their own work, so when it came to merging each person’s pages into the magazine, not everything matched. Looking through our final product, you could instantly realize who put more time into their work and who decided to procrastinate. Some pages were extremely text heavy as others had too many low-resolution photos. If I judged the magazine by the cover, I would actually pick it up, but after skimming through a few pages, I would put it right back down.

I believe within a successful group, there should be one main leader. In my past experiences, if a non-reliable person takes the lead, the project may not turn out very well, if at all. The leader should be the communication source and keep up with anything and everything going on within the group. I believe communication is key to being successful. Everyone should put aside their differences and work together. At the same time, the main purpose of meetings should not be to socialize. When meeting outside of class, members should show up and be on time. Not being at a meeting can hold up the group’s progress. The group as a whole should be motivated, determined, share common goals and objectives, and able to imagine the end result.

With the good group projects, come the bad group projects. It’s something a student can’t really escape from, but needs to learn to deal with to prepare themselves for “The Real World.” I believe the experiences from past group projects have better prepared me to work with a variety of different people, who hold different beliefs, and have different skill sets. I am always up for a challenge and try to make the best of every situation, so group projects intrigue me. Can’t wait to be part of another successful group!