My teacher of Human Resources Management is a new one for me, after 10 semesters. This is because that course is usually part of Industrial Management and the like, while I am just your typical Engineering student who prefers to be in front of a machine rather than people.
Regardless, I had quite an interesting experience today. I arrived a little earlier than normal, I was listening to the Stuff You Should Know podcast episode on Toast bread, waiting for the teacher to arrive. My classmates are all from 4th, 7th and even 2nd semester. From my generation, there were maybe other 3 people, so yeah, I felt kinda old there.
Anyways, the teacher comes in. She’s quite talkative and her vocabulary is quite… rich. She asked us to form teams of three, so we had to abide.
I didn’t know anyone, and I am quite shy, I decided to stick with the only other classmate I had a decent relationship with and team with him. After a quick look around, it seemed to me like everyone else had already teamed up. We all registered our names in a piece of paper and she proceeded to utterly destroy my hopes at being at a management position. Or something.
She noticed there were a couple of teams that were formed of two people. Other than ours. It was at that moment, that I knew…
She used us to teach us about learning to listen to instructions. She asked for teams of three. Fair enough, I was ready to abide, but of course she kept going.
She asked one of the other teams, “Why did you guys made a team of two?”.
“Because we already know each other well.”
“Oh, so you think nobody else is worth teaming up with, huh?”
She asked the same question to another team of two.
“Well, none of us had a team, so even though we didn’t know each other we decided to team up”
She respected that reply, makes sense.
You may be wondering what did I answer?
“Well, everyone else seemed to have a team already, so we settled”
OH BOY did I get scolded. But I was able to see her point.
One of the teams does not feel like inviting some stranger to their team. Me and my team were like “Welp, looks like everyone’s fine” and didn’t look any further. And only one team was willing to do what they could even if they didn’t know each other.
As an Engineer and an overall nerd I feel like I could have replied in many ways. “Well teacher you told us the limit was 3 people, not that it was a must”. “There is no way to prove they actually didn’t know each other, and they still didn’t look for a third person anyways, it seems to me like a reply made to please you rather than telling you the truth”. Whatever, the reality for me, is that I should have been at least a bit more proactive and look for someone to join my team.
In the end, all of the teams were merged to be made of 3 participants, and those two guys who didn’t know each other got to stay together. Meaning I didn’t get to team with my friend, which was annoying, but understandable. I tried to be open with my new team and I think we will be able to work just fine!
Quite an interesting lesson. Even if my way of being has a difficult time following it.The rest of the class was quite the standard affair. Learning a bit about history and concepts and stuff. I didn’t even write anything down. 🙃
I am quite interested on your thoughts on this one. So I’ll expect them!
This is day 20 of #100DaysToOffload
