Project team development is the process of upgrading the skills of the team members, improving the interaction between them and enhancing the overall working conditions of the team to increase the effectiveness of the project. HR managers must be able to identify, shape, support, motivate, lead, and inspire project teams to improve their performance and achieve project goals. Teamwork is a critical success factor for a project, and developing effective project teams is one of the most important responsibilities of a project manager. Thus, managers must create an environment conducive to teamwork: continually motivate their team by giving them challenges and opportunities, providing them with timely feedback and support when needed, and encouraging and rewarding good work. High team performance can be achieved through open and effective communication, increased trust among team members, constructive conflict management, and by facilitating problem solving and collaborative decision making.
Training is a short-term form of learning activities of a predominantly practical nature. During training sessions, a group of participating employees master new effective technologies for solving everyday business problems under the guidance of a certified trainer. The problems proposed at training should take into account the company’s market specifics and offer subsequent practical consolidation in the situations of communication, management, and self-management. Training can be a perfect solution when an overall increase in the level of knowledge or skills is necessary. According to Sushchenko and Basyuk (2019), “upgrading the skills of the enterprise’ personnel and their acquiring of new competencies should be based on lifelong learning system and continuous professional training” (p. 1). Continuous staff training allows employees to receive up-to-date knowledge using the latest learning methods.
Professional, well-designed training course increases the perception of the material and the learning ability of the participants in the classes. Ultimately, not only training allows employees to significantly improve their professionalism, but it also serves as the motivation for effective work. Moreover, training proposes a learning strategy that can include employees from different teams and departments, offering opportunities to acquire most important knowledge and skills.
Meanwhile, teambuilding is a systematic process – it requires more careful preparation and an individual approach to each team. Forming an effective team of employees after just one event is unrealistic, and a one-time training will only give a short-term effect. Thus, only a systematic approach that teambuilding proposes can result in well-adjusted and effective business team. Team building takes place sequentially, from one stage to another, and each stage eliminates a number of specific problems. Each training session is tailored to the strengths and weaknesses of specific group – while during simple training, the learning activities are usually the same for everyone. The desired effect can only be achieved with a personalized approach, thus, the complexity of the training, its intensity, and the type of activities vary depending on many factors.
Teambuilding, in the first place, contributes to the establishment of strong and productive relationships between team members necessary for effective work process and healthy environment. Land (2019) supplies that “team building can have lasting, positive, and measurable effects on team performance, especially if the activities are project-focused” (p. 18). Successful work on a common project requires different types of characters, leadership styles, and motivation options. Team building allows employees to get to know each other outside of their social roles, learn to rely on each other, and take into account personal characteristics.
For a virtual team that CapraTek assembled, teambuilding would be more fitting team development activity. Seeing as the team is currently fresh and unadjusted, training would not help with building connection between its members, as it has fundamentally different goals. Teambuilding, on the other hand, would serve as a means to let employees establish relationships before they will be actually required to work together, and it seems more important at the moment. Moreover, a specifically tailored teambuilding process would allow to assess employees’ basic skills and knowledge, evaluate their work dynamic and ability to interact with others. Each team member has their own strengths and weaknesses, and collective activities can offer a valuable perspective on them. An excellent example of a good teambuilding practice could be hosting a Dungeons and Dragons (DnD) session for the team. This game requires high levels of collaboration, adaptability, and resourcefulness which are all crucial for effective teamwork. Overall, any and all teambuilding activity that the manager would come with should be focused on creating a strong positive connection between employees that will allow them to play on each other’s advantages.
In modern conditions, personnel is increasingly playing a role in the main activities of the organization, it makes the product or service unique, and this is the most important factor in the success of the organization. That is why nowadays more and more time is devoted to the professional development of personnel and the search for new methods and approaches to personnel training. Coaching is one of the most promising and actively developing methods of personnel development in an organization. Over the past ten years, coaching has significantly expanded the range of models and methods of working with personnel.
Coaching is a partnership process that stimulates thought and creativity, unlocking personal and professional potential. As Al Hilali et al. (2020) state, “coaching can be considered to serve a single purpose in the interests of the organization, however, it also provides the necessary support to the individual employee” (p. 43). The process of training and development of personnel through coaching has a specific goal – the disclosure of employees’ professional potential. Thus, coaching is the art of creating an environment that facilitates the movement of a person towards desired goals, promoting performance, learning, and development of a person. The advantage of coaching over mentoring is that employees open up new perspectives on their own capabilities which increases their self-confidence. Coaching is able to expand thinking – this method helps to find new extraordinary ways in making decisions. The main advantages of this method are the clarity of setting goals and actions for their implementation and the possibility of using the method both at the individual and at the group level. Moreover, coaching can combine in itself other methods of personnel development, such as training, consulting, and mentoring.
Mentoring is a special kind of supportive long-term relationship in which the mentor works individually with their mentee, believes in them, offers their experience, knowledge, information, and emotional support. In order for a mentee to develop professionally and personally, a mentor uses a range of tools – from direct instruction and action learning to advanced formats such as shadowing and coaching. Despite the fact that mentoring is less efficient than coaching, it has great potential for several reasons. First, it is budget-friendly, which is important when companies need to improve not all employees, but specific ones. Secondly, it is a powerful tool for engaging and retaining Generation Y employees, for whom it is critical that employer companies invest in their development and help them unlock their creative potential. Finally, mentoring is a two-sided tool: it is aimed not only at the development of the mentee, but also helps the mentor themselves to improve their soft-skills.
There are many effects from the introduction of mentoring in the company. The most powerful is the preservation of the integrity of the corporate culture, which can only be transferred from person to person. Mentoring is a conductor of such corporate values ​​as development and trust. The use of mentoring programs increases engagement, as employees have the opportunity to influence their lives and careers within the company. The level of stress in the team is also reduced, since people have someone to discuss their problems with. The employee knows that they would receive support and understanding from their mentor.
Again, it is important to note that the CapraTek virtual team has only been established recently, therefore, there are no developed connection between its members yet. While mentorship is a great tool for enhancing targeted employees’ abilities, it requires a pre-existing mutual familiarity and a level of trust between the mentor and the mentee. Stoeger et al. (2020) also add that “effective mentoring relies on mentors and mentees having clear ideas about what mentoring entails, and what expectations for a given mentoring experience are realistic” (p. 12). For the newly established team, such understanding is yet impossible, as the employees do not have enough knowledge about each other. Thus, in the case of CapraTek team, it would be more logical and efficient to employ coaching approach which can help develop a managing strategy within the team. Coaching can also be defined as a special style of management, which represents the interaction between the manager and employees. If applied properly, it can lead to the establishment of mutual trust in the team, as well as the formation of personal responsibility. The advantages of coaching include the fact that it can complement the already established leadership style, making it more effective.
References
Al Hilali, K. S., Al Mughairi, B. M., Kian, M. W., & Karim, A. M. (2020). Coaching and mentoring. concepts and practices in development of competencies: A theoretical perspective.International Journal of Academic Research in Accounting, Finance and Management Sciences, 10(1).
Land, S. K. (2019). The importance of deliberate team building: A project-focused competence-based approach. IEEE Engineering Management Review, 47(2), 18–22.
Stoeger, H., Balestrini, D. P., & Ziegler, A. (2020). Key issues in professionalizing mentoring practices. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1483(1), 5–18.
Sushchenko, O., & Basyuk, D. (2019). Organization of personnel training in the HR-management system at machine-building enterprises.MATEC Web of Conferences, 297, 07006.