So what is a team?

A team is two or more people working together to accomplish a common task.

Effective teamwork is what makes companies and products succeed. When an efficient team starts to work, their efforts turn to productive results.

So what is an effective team?

Just because people assemble together doesn’t make them an effective team. An effective team is more that a group of assembled people. It is a collection of individuals guided by a common purpose, striving for the same results. It is two or more people working together in unity toward a common goal, they thrive to get something done, each member making a significant contribution. Because each member makes a unique contribution, a team is a powerhouse of potential.”

Effective teams are the foundation of every successful organization, and in order for any team to consider itself effective each member on the team needs to move their thoughts from thinking about themselves as an individual to thinking about the entire group, because they need to work with the team and help each individual on the team understand and appreciate those they are working with who are different from them.

If we think we can survive without valuing others on the team we are wrong and we will be weaker for it. It should be clear that, if we need to excel and succeed in all that we do we need each to do that. Many organizations today fail to distinguish between a team and an effective one. To succeed we still have a long way to learn what an effective team is.

To be an effective team we need to realize that there are different gifts and different roles in a team, and none of them are more important than the others. Each member need to learn to appreciate the others to effectively work together.

Evidences/characteristics of effective working team

• They have a very clear purpose.
• They work out the steps they needed to take to achieve that purpose.
• Each member of the team knows the contribution she/he could make
• They are creative in problem solving.
• And they achieve goals.

In order to be an effective team member, we should consider the followings;

• We should have an appropriate view of ourselves 
• We don’t all have the same function 
• It is good to value diversity in the team 
• We belong to one another  (that means we should be supportive of one another )
• We each have different gifts 
• We should use our gifts and use them well 
• We should love one another 
• We should honor one another 
• We should support and care for one another 
• It is important to empathize with others – rejoice and mourn as appropriate
• And we should work at maintaining good relationships