Figuring out team structure and rethinking how management works is quite the task and learning experience. I've found two variables that play a large role in determining team success, but the difficult part is that these two variables affect each other which leads to a more complex way to nurture and maintain both.
The first factor, communication and goal setting (short-term team ambitions), is where my brain lead me to first. The root of this directly stems from how productive team meetings are and how well the team is communicating: both of which are lead by the admin team. I thought of this first since the path to improve at this is pretty clear; the whole admin team needs to set a good example and make sure that there are extremely clear goals for everyone to grasp onto. The more planning that takes place, the less stressful and wish-washy the rest of the work is. A potential concern would be that too much planning around the goal might limit creativity and freedom, but this has not been the case since there is still so much to be creative about (especially since there are so many different approaches to try and learn about with all areas of our activities). In addition, we know that it has not worked when we don't give clear goals. During our eight week period of testing out new team structures, we found that groups that may not have had as clear of a picture of what their goals were didn't output as much work and the efficiency and engagement was way down.
This lack of efficiency and engagement then leads to our next factor which is individual motivation and work ethic. One of the most important drivers is motivation: both intrinsic and extrinsic are important to consider. Intrinsic motivation in our case is the ability to see value in developing our own professional, creative skills and our extrinsic motivation is the ability to see the long term and short term impact that we can and have made. Both types of motivation directly relate to work ethic as well. One key indicator that we found was the work ethic when our outside schedules got crammed with tests, homework, or EC activities. This was interesting to analyze since there are so many explanations as to why our engagement might waver if our outside schedules got busier, but from the perspective that motivation affects work ethic, I hypothesized that the work ethic difference could be attributed to a difference in extrinsic motivation: long term and short term. When we are focused on the long term impact and the allure of what is possible for us to accomplish, learn about, and explore, our work is extremely meaningful. When we are focused on the volunteer hours and just showing up for meetings, our work becomes limited to just the hourly commitment rather than the commitment to the flow of ideas and ambitions. So when there's a busy schedule set in front of us, the thought in our mind is, "Do I have time to fit in an extra hour of work?" or "I wonder if this topic would be interesting for future students to learn about".
So obviously a team's health relies on the individuals that make up the team and the way that team can work together to get things done. Thanks for telling us nothing Jeremy!😂 But understanding this doesn't just end at knowing it. It provides an opportunity to grow and reflect on some ideas as well as think through them. There's a lot of actionable things that can occur when these surface level events get analyzed. For me, I made sure to list out some motivations, some areas of strength, some areas where I can do better, and some interesting topics to explore and I thought I was super productive. So please agree, disagree, clarify, propose, comment, just engage with this post.
📌To Do:
Implementing revision plan for the Schedule
Email Hopkins Professors (finding mentors) + Health/Education Professionals
Research Funding Opportunities
Marketing!
Brainstorm Intro Video
Send out E-forms to sign (Jeremy)
Revising Course Agenda (Operational Team)
We will be revising the Course Agenda in groups. Please revise before 7/8 Thurs
Here are the groups and which days they will revise:
Group 1: Josh, Jaydon, Mira, Aditya - Day 1,2
Group 2: Rohan, Jonathan - Day 3
Group 3: Milla, Zach - Day 4
Group 4: Jeremy, Volunteers - Day 5,6
What does this look like?
Go to the document and turn on suggesting mode, think through all the activities that are planned for your assigned days.
Decide whether the activity is fun/engaging/interesting and edit and revise it. You have full flexibility and can add, subtract, modify any events!
👀Be on the Lookout for:
Sending Emails to Professionals (Operational Team)
We'll be sending emails to professionals to brainstorm more applicational scenarios + revising the curriculum
Revising Course Agenda
Individual Check-ins about the curric - 7/15 (Operational Team)
Sending emails to Hopkins Public Health professors - looking for advisors! (Admin Team)
Emailing at least 25 professors by 7/8
Looking into Funding and recording some feasible ones (Admin Team)
Deep dive into Hopkins Funding
Looking into gov COVID funds
Finding more Coords?? - 7/8 (Admin Team)
Sending out E-forms for peeps to fill out (Admin Team)
Brainstorm Care for Them Intro Video (Relations Team)
Revise content calendar for July (Relations Team)
🔥Recap of what happened:
Fun Sunday Meetup!🎉
Coordination Team has been updated!
Operational Coords
Aditya, Jonathan (Liaison), Josh
Administrative Coords
Milla, Jeremy
Board
Zach
Admin Update
Looked into Funding pt. 2 (still bleak)
Emailed Hop Prof, recommended to look into Center for Adolescent Health
Event uploaded to youtube
📝Meeting Notes
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