Locker Article: Success v. Failures

This article was interesting to me because I have worked in the legal field for some time, both for a government agency and now a corporation. I have seen collaborations as discussed in the article similar to Group 1 and Group 2. Locker highlights the failures in Group 1 to include: power struggle, devaluing team members, poor communication, poor acceptance of criticism, individual not team effort, tasks defined as purely legal, viewed feedback/revisions negatively and lack of organizational culture. At one time or another, we have witnessed some or all of these failures. My employment in the government agency law department fit the decription of the autonomy 'Jim' felt attorneys should have. Attorneys worked on their cases individually, not sharing work effort with others and would only discuss cases with the general counsel if an issue arose. There was a certain 'attitude' amongst the attorneys, whereas, they felt they could 'handle' situations without the contribution of others. The tasks and writing here were narrowly defined and carried out as legal. Although that was the organizational culture of this agency and it usually worked most of the time.

Now that I work in a corporate law department it is interesting to watch the transition legal staff makes from private sector to corporate. Corporate culture is very different from private practice or a government agency. In corporations people collaborate all the time, or they at least try to. Locker discusses the success Group 2 had in their collaboration to include: flexibility, equal team contributions, genuinely cared for each other, good communication, planned and executed together, tasks and writing were defined and carried out broadly (legal / non-legal intentions), informed/educated the audience throught their writing, viewed revision process as a means to improve document and they were acclimated in their oranizational culture. Group 2 had a stellar team. While collaboration occurs regularly in corporations, I find it very challenging because you work with such a large group of people. These individuals are different via their cultures, methods of learning, work experience and the way in which they social interact with one another. I found that to have successful collaboration it helps if you know and understand who you are working with. In my work environment a problem I see is in communication with one another on issues outside of their own specialized areas. Working on a project, I will seldom get emails/correspondence that do not speak to the project group audience but rather to an individual area. People seem to struggle with broadening information to make the email/correspondence understandable and useful to all.

In regards to classroom collaboration, the difference I see is between standard full-time students and the adult learners. I have not had negative collaborations at the university but I have had better collaborations, usually with adult learners. I think that is to be expected considering the additional work and life experience they have. Most of them have learned to collaborate fairly efficiently at this point in life.