Select one collaborative experience from your past that involved some disagreements or significant differences of opinion.

Instructions

Consider your experiences at work, school, and in your personal life. You have, at some point, been asked to work with a group to achieve a particular goal. It might have been a group research project, a new marketing plan, a learning plan, a schedule to roll out new technology, planning a wedding, or even planning and creating a large family meal. In many collaborative efforts like these, there are disagreements. Select one collaborative experience from your past that involved some disagreements or significant differences of opinion.

Write a short (2-page) paper in APA style discussing the following elements:

• Describe the project that you were working on, including the people involved.
• Explain the problem that you encountered with the group. How was that problem overcome? What was the end result of encountering and dealing with that problem?
• What do you think was the cause of the problem? How much of the problem came from miscommunication, either from you or from other people involved? What did you do to help resolve the problem?
• If you were able to relive that experience, how would you change the way that you approached the encountered problem? How would you communicate differently?
• How, ultimately, was the conflict resolved?

Criteria

• Example selected is clearly relevant to the ideas of collaborative communication and problem solving
• Problem encountered is clearly described and fully explained. Solution reached is defined clearly with significant detail.
• New approach to the situation offers significant changes from the original experience in definable ways, with some detail to explain potential differences as well as a clear discussion of how this should change the experienced results.
• Contribution to the solution of the problem is clearly included with detail, explanation, and insight into the value of this contribution. Resolution of issue is included with clear detail and explanation.
• Language shows proper formal professional English with no lapses of informality or slang.