Suggestions from past supervisors
(though rose-colored glasses)
TEAM COLLECTIVELY
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Meet with team regularly - at least once a week. If any team member
misses two meetings, inform the instructors immediately (with
cc to team member).
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Force teams to circulate work amongst each other.
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Teams feel they must hide their problems to get a better grade. Help
them understand that this will make for more problems remaining in the
final system and hence yield a worse grade.
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Shuffle roles - spread them around. That gives team more experience
and greatly reduces risk of problems being hidden or overlooked.
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Discuss QA plan with team. Ask each team member to interpret.
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"Don't trust teams. Given an opportunity they'll do something bad."
TEAM INDIVIDUALS
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When a team member does not perform adequately, inform them
(gently) at the first occurrence of this behavior.
Postponing this (unpleasant) feedback does not make it any easier
but will lead to problems down the road. Make sure to copy the
"management".
MID-SEMESTER ASSESSMENT
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Do a "dry-run" of the assessment that you will do at the end of
the term and give that information to the individual team members.
This allows you to distinguish between team members who are
effective but quite and those who are just slacking-off.
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Say whether each individual has appeared to perform above or
below average on all visible components.
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Give complements as well as criticisms, but sparingly since
this may lead to complacency.
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team member: "You've misunderstood me."
super: "Show me I'm wrong."