STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

jen · Kate Spade

Anyone else HATE groupwork?

Kel · Coach

YES and because of my major i am always doing it. I tend to become the leader (not by choice) because I yell, kick, and scream until everyone does their part. I make sure the project is done a week ahead of time, because I know I will be stuck doing it all if I don't.

RyanJ · Coach

I loathe group work. It is such a horrible punishment.

theotherjess · Chanel

Oh, I hate them! The teachers I have always make one dream team where all the kids are super smart and motivated and then the rest of the groups have one worker and the rest slackers. It sucks because I always end up doing all the work and I feel like a pain in the ass if I have to remind my group more than three times to email me stuff so I can put it together. We have a group research paper (I know, ewww) due next week and there were four subjects and three group members. Guess who ended up with doing two?? I told the boys they were responsible for their one section and then the intro and conclusion between them and they didn't even write a thesis for the rough draft and totally plagarized their outlines.

Bastet · Kate Spade

For the most part, I despised group work in high school because I got stuck doing the work, unless my friends were in my group. I hated that everyone in the group got the same grade. The teachers thought they were "teaching" us how to divide up work and make group decisions, when in reality the dumb kids and slackers got a free ride. Assigned groups are awful in high school because teachers usually pair a few smart kids with a buch slackers. One of my teachers actually had the gall to tell my mother that the reason she put me in the group with the kids who were failing was so I could teach them.

Thankfully, when I got to college, people cared about their work, and the professors didn't assign group members, so those of us who cared formed groups of our own, then I actually liked it.

relrel · Marc Jacobs

another group work hater here! im the obnoxious group leader too, i can't stand it when we get in groups and then spend five minutes looking at eachother without saying anything. dude, just read the instructions and let's get started. im definitely a leader, slightly bossy too sometimes. but yeah...group work sucks. id much rather do the whole thing by myself because then i don't have to depend on someone else for my grade. when i can pick the groups im pretty okay with them, but if they are professor assigned, watch out!

blubirde · Chanel

I'm a dissenter. I love group work. I NEVER take the lead in a group assignment (you all have pointed out excellent reasons why I don't). I always do my share of the work too. The reason I like it is because inevitably, there's some portion of the assignment that I loathe. So I don't do that part. Someone else does the stuff I hate, (i.e. writing the handout for the class). I always volunteer for the fun things like making all the slides and preparing the visual presentation. It's tedious work and it takes a lot of time but it's so much better than writing part of the paper!

So maybe I'm the person y'all hate in the group.

Dizzy · Marc Jacobs

I love group work too BB - mainly because I really enjoy group dynamics (I'm the only person I know who generally likes sitting in meetings).

halleybird · Hermes

I hated group work as a student, but admittedly, it's great for teachers. I always let my kids pick their groups, though (that way, they are responsible for the slackers) and I give them the option of doing it alone if they want.

blink · Coach

totally HATE groupwork. I am kind of a leader because I have found that usually people just sit around and "um" for longer than I can stand. I would prefer to do an entire project myself and I think that group projects (though not across the board) are generally an unfair way to gain merit on a subject. I especially hate those that require lots of out of class meetings and research that has to be scheduled so that everyone in the group can be there at the same time, like I have time for that!

jen · Kate Spade

I am SO F-ING MAD! My group is by far the dumbest group of indivduals I have ever met. I did the whole thing. All of it-cover page, index, synopis of target group, rationale of campaign, and visual aids. What's left? The works cited page. When I asked someone to volunteer to do the ONLY thing I haven;t done, this dumb bitch actually said "what's a works cited pag?" How can you be a junior on college, in your fourties and not know what that is?! Oh, here's another one, I assinged the group (because I became the leader some how) to find 2 articles and write a 1 page summary to include in the project. I get "what are the articles supposed to be about?" Ummm, how about our f-ing topic! "I searched on Google and couldn't find one." Ummm, about about you take your ass to the library and look!

Sorry, I sound horrible now, but I'm trying so hard to get all A's this semester. I havent missed one day of class at all. I really just am almost to the point of a breakdown with everything going on in my life and these people can't even find an article?! I don't have time to do a group project on my own. This is worth almost half of my grade. I'm applying for the College of ED. just started a new job, have a second job, applying for study abroad, just finished cramming for a several hour long fitness test, it was midterms last week, and I have work in all my other classes. I've been working on 4 hours of sleep for the past 2 months. I don't have time to sleep. I'm just so annoyed and mad right now. Okay, thanks for letting me get this out, I just need to vent you know? None if this probably even made since but it felt good to get it out...

Lilykind · Hermes

halleybird wrote:

I hated group work as a student, but admittedly, it's great for teachers. I always let my kids pick their groups, though (that way, they are responsible for the slackers) and I give them the option of doing it alone if they want.

Wow...I would've appreciated that so much.

Not to sound conceited, but I always had trouble doing group projects in school because I was so far ahead of my peers and would constantly go insane because they didn't understand what was to me a simple cut-and-dry topic. People expext me to take the lead because I'm smart and they knew that I would do anything for an A so they took advantage of it.

My BF, when he was in school, has a professor who made the kids take the test as individuals and then in small groups. He was the only person in the class who scored higher on the individual test than the group test. He hates groupwork too.

Dizzy · Marc Jacobs

Journalism is all about the group meeting, and here are some things I've found that make group work less painful:

1) People avoid unpleasantness. Looking bad in front of peers is unpleasant. So if they're embarrassed about their work product, they try to avoid letting people know about it.

Fix: compliment people. "Suzy, it seemed like you knew a lot about this in class, why don't you take this section?" Whenever anyone seems reluctant to do something, ask what they would rather do, or at least try to get to the bottom of their reluctance. If you can up their confidence, you can up their performance by way more than you'd think.

2) If someone is willing to just do the work, everyone else will let them.

Fix: Just stay quiet until someone volunteers something in the meeting. If you can't stand the silence, turn to the biggest slacker and say "I don't know, what do you think?" He'll have to say something, then he's the one out front and you can just keep making suggestions. You're stil in charge, but without the hassle. (It's strategy, he'll always have to make the first move and it's easier for you to respond every time - does that make sense?)

3) If people are uncomfortable with the direction the group is going, they won't confront the leader, they'll just drag their feet more.

Fix: if someone is procrastinating, try to find out why. Maybe she is just a lazy bum, but at least give her the benefit of the doubt. And if she is just slacking, it's embarrassing for her to explain herself. So make her do it for your own fun.

4) If you really are smarter than the group (never been a problem for me) then I guess it sucks that their product won't be as good as what you can do. But it will be easier to fix what they do AFTER they've done it badly. If you discourage them before they're done, you just have to do everything.

Hope that helps. And since I can just feel all y'all type-As rolling your eyes and saying "This sounds like too much work... It's easier to do it myself..." well, if that's what you want. But believe me, this is easier. And from someone who's never been the smartest in the group, it doesn't hurt to get on our good side a little bit. There's more of us than there are of you