Why is teamwork important in projects?

Why is teamwork important in projects?

Project managers all agree that good teamwork leads to faster task completion, higher productivity and a healthy working environment. It improves morale and enables team members to overcome obstacles in project work with ease. Therefore, a collaborative team is critical in project management. In this article, we'll show you why teamwork is so important and what the benefits are, and we'll also look at how to forge a team.

Good teamwork leads to faster task completion, higher productivity and a healthy working environment.

The concept of teamwork

Teamwork is the process of people of different qualities and experience working together to successfully complete a project. Although it may seem like a simple task, effective teamwork does not always work.

Even finding the right team members can be a challenge, but getting professionals to work together effectively without arguments and disagreements requires considerable expertise. It requires patience, persistence, empathy and soft skills from the project leader.

Teamwork means people of different qualities and experience working together to deliver a project efficiently and effectively.

The essence of teamwork: why is it important and what are the benefits?

Effective teamwork is key in project management, as the success of a project directly depends on the cohesion and cooperation of the team. Now let's look at how team strength can support effective work.
  • Smooth achievement of objectives
As opposed to individual efforts, teamwork involves team members working together to achieve project goals, optimising the use of resources and increasing productivity. Projects can often increase in scope, extend deadlines and have difficulty meeting the needs of customers and stakeholders. However, teamwork can ensure easy scheduling and help to solve problems as they arise. It can make it easier to take on extra tasks by allocating resources appropriately, without requiring significant effort and without major delays. This will allow you to meet project milestones on schedule and ensure that the whole project is completed on time.
  • Exploiting personal strengths
Each team member has a set of skills that they are very good at. One may be excellent at planning, while another may be great at coordinating the team. Effective teamwork allows team members to draw on each other's strengths and work in complementary ways to achieve the project's goals.
  • Trust, communication and information flow
Trust is the foundation of good relationships. Teamwork based on trust provides a healthy working environment and better personal relationships. Team members are able to help each other through more obstacles, which leads to greater productivity. Effective teamwork improves communication and information flow between team members, which facilitates the sharing of ideas and suggestions, problem solving and effective decision-making.
  • Flexibility and adaptability
Working in a team provides an excellent opportunity for project participants to adapt to changing circumstances and to be flexible in dealing with project challenges and problems.
  • Liability
A team based on mutual respect encourages each team member to take responsibility for their own work, otherwise the success of the team is jeopardised. Being part of a team and working together to achieve goals helps to maintain motivation and improve performance.
  • Dealing with conflicts
The team members come from different backgrounds, so it is not surprising that there are sometimes disagreements. However, resolving disputes can be time-consuming and takes the focus away from solving problems. Good teamwork helps to manage conflict and build mutual respect. It improves team cohesion and productivity.
  • Efficient management of material resources
Every project requires a certain amount of resources - financial, human - to be carried out. If the team is not cohesive, these resources may be exhausted in a short time, resulting in increased costs. However, with excellent teamwork, there is a perfect allocation and use of the resources needed for the task, which ensures that the project stays within budget.
  • Creativity
When team members trust each other and work well together, they share many more ideas about elements of the project. This leads to more creative solutions to problems that arise on the project. In addition, each individual idea can lead to better strategies for completing the project on time.
  • Greater willingness to take risks
Strength in unity - so the saying goes. Teamwork gives you the strength to take bigger risks. While individuals are more likely to fear failure, the team spirit is supportive and, with each other's help, they can take greater risks without fear of failure. Effective risk management is an important part of the project manager's job. If you can bring your team together, you can easily mitigate all the risk factors that arise.
  •  Effective feedback
However professionally we follow the team's progress, the best feedback comes from the team members themselves during their daily work. Of course, this is only possible if there is a good relationship of trust between team members.
  • Easier delegation
Each task in a project depends on another. It is common, however, to receive urgent and ad hoc requests during the course of work, which tend to increase the workload and dependencies of the team. With effective teamwork, the process of delegating new tasks is smooth, as the team can efficiently share the workload, possibly taking on extra work to meet the overall deadline.
Teamwork is all about achieving joint project successes.

The secret to effective teamwork: tips for project managers

The following can help you build a strong and cohesive team.

Tip 1: Create situations where team members can get to know each other

One of the most important aspects of effective teamwork is that each team member knows his or her team mates. This helps them to communicate better, set more realistic expectations and understand each other's strengths and weaknesses.

It is important that communication is not only limited to the project environment, but that there are joint activities where they can talk openly and freely, and get to know each other better. A team building provides an excellent opportunity to build trust and make communication more effective.

Tip 2: Develop your project management skills

The project leader's job is to lead the team to success without micro-managing. There is no need for the leader to constantly check progress, make suggestions and hold the team back from working independently. Good leadership skills are important to improve teamwork. 

Frequent and clear, yet concise communication is essential to ensure that participants are aware of their role in the project. It is also important that everyone is able to do their job in a relaxed manner. If something is not being done properly, it may be necessary to review processes and make suggestions for better teamwork.

Tip 3: Set clear expectations and provide the right tools

Expectations are critical for project managers as they help determine the contribution of individual team members to the larger project. Even when the tasks to be done are clear, team members can struggle without the necessary tools. 

So it's important to make it clear to the team that:

  • exactly what we expect them to do
  • when they are expected to be completed
  • what quality standards to work to

They should also be provided with the right facilities and resources for the project and asked if they need anything else to work effectively.

Tip 4: Make the project leader available to the team

Team members often turn to the project manager for help with challenges, problems or errors that arise. To ensure effective teamwork, it is essential that the project manager is available to provide support to the team to keep the project moving forward.

It is important to communicate to the participants when and how they can be reached, e.g. in person, by phone, email, project management software.

Tip 5: Make communication your top priority

Communication is perhaps the most important criterion for good teamwork. A good flow of information is essential for results. It is the project manager's responsibility to lead by example, to communicate with the team whenever possible and relevant, to hold meetings to discuss project changes or to bring participants together.

How can we create a teamwork-compatible working environment?

Finally, here are some tips on how to improve team cohesion and cooperation in the day-to-day running of the project.

  • Use project management software

Today, excellent software is available to keep team members informed and is a great way to monitor the progress of a project. They allow you to assign tasks, talk to your team or clients from a single platform without micro-managing.

TIP:  Asana, Airtable, ClickUp, Jira, Teamwork, Basecamp all make teamwork very efficient, and many of their useful features are available for free.

  • Setting a good example is important

As project leaders, it is essential to set an example for the team. Practice honesty, communication, tell them what you expect, set minimum standards for their performance.

It is important that both the leader and the team are accountable. This helps to ensure that each team member can take responsibility for their role in the project, rather than pointing fingers at others.

  • Communicate with stakeholders

The focus should not only be on communication with team members, but also on exchanging information with stakeholders and customers. This way we can be more quickly informed of any changes and communicate them to team members.

If you are a project manager and you think it is important to work well in a team, to communicate more effectively in your work and you would like to improve your skills, then take a look at our current training courses for project managers!