Group Projects- OH, THE JOY!

Like some people, I absolutely despise group projects. Not necessarily on the job, but definitely in the classroom. I feel like my entire college career has been bombarded with useful group projects, while I'm paired with useless people!

Let me tell you all about my recent Corporate Finance Project. Ready for this? On the second day of class, a guy that I know asked if I'd had a group yet. Of course I didn't, since the project was just announced. He's a great student, so I knew being in his group would be a good idea. Plus, I didn't know too many other people in the class. Everyone that he had picked for our group, he knew them, so that was great! Unfortunately, he dropped the class and left me with 4 other random people that I had never seen before!

Not knowing their work ethic, I signed up to be the Group Leader. The project had 3 parts, one part that needed to be done by two people (it was pretty extensive). Anywho, I assigned the 3 parts to 4 of us, and the PPT and report write-up I assigned to the last person. Great, right? Everyone knew their portion of the project in ample time!

So, one of our members had a conference to attend and another project to work on. She missed two weeks of class, and upon her return she sent an email to the guy who was helping her with that extensive part of the project. But, she emailed the wrong guy! This email was sent this past Sunday, and the project is due tomorrow! The guy who she mistakenly emailed leaves class early every day, usually during our 15 minute break. So it was no surprise that during the 2nd half of class last week, the professor was going over the lesson for his part of the project. So yea, he missed it. She even gave us information that we wouldn't be able to find! He answered no emails all weekend, and no one had his phone number!

At this point I'm sure you can tell that my blood was boiling! We all agreed to meet yesterday, 2 hours before class. Guess who didn't show up until 20 minutes before class, with the wrong part of the project done! You guessed it!

By this time, I'd already given up hope on this guy and began to work on his part, since I'd been done with my stock analysis for over a week. I was really just trying to give people the benefit of the doubt. Come to find out, the other guy in our group hadn't started his portion either (yes, 2 days before the due date)!!! Can you say infuriated????? Very much so!

Yesterday after class, everyone got together and helped each other out. To my surprise, the project is 100% complete, PowerPoint, report and all!

This has really taught me to put a little more trust in people and their abilities. It has also taught me to have a little patience. Maybe group projects aren't so bad after all :-)

Ever had a group project dilemma??? Tell me all about it!!!