Who Am I in the Team?

A person’s role in the team is often pre-determined by the position and responsibilities associated with the role. However, how a person views his/her role in a team is subjective.
Use this method to gain a more comprehensive understanding of how a team member perceives his/her role in the team or project. This provides focus on what a team member wants to add and remove from their individual roles, and opens the space for sharing and feedback.

• Discover potential or current conflicts within the team.

• Enhance communication between team members.

• Create actionable plans to improve team satisfaction.

• Picture card sets

• Writing materials like pen and paper

• Art materials like colored markers, scissors, magazines, and glue. You may choose according to your preference or whichever is available.

• Set the space. Arrange the participants’ seats around you, the facilitator, in the form of a circle. Make sure to arrange the seats inwards with your participants facing you. You may either provide chairs or cushions for sitting. Choose a picture card set and spread the images on the floor, at the center of the circle. Ensure that you also have art materials available within the circle or space.

• Choose an image for the role. Guide your participants to choose an image that answers questions like: “Who are you in the team?” or “What symbolizes your role in the team?” This image represents how they see themselves in the team.

• Provide a space for sharing. Once all participants have their cards, open the space for sharing. Invite someone to share why they chose their card. For a better flow of sharing, ask the starting participant to set the sequence by choosing where the discussion goes; to his/her left or right.

  • Depending on the group size, you may divide the participants into sub-groups. It is suggested that they be grouped with those they work closely with. You may consider groupings by project undertaken, by team, or by department.

• Identify possible sources of dissatisfaction. After sharing why they chose their picture card, open another round of sharing. This time, the sharing will revolve around the question: “If you could, what would you remove from the image? What does this mean for your role?” This brings the participants to share which elements in the picture they see as unnecessary or dissatisfactory in their roles.

• Introduce the art materials available. Bring the attention back to the main session and introduce the availability of art materials in the space. These may include colored markers, scissors, magazines, and glue.

• Identify areas of improvement and uncover individual wishes. Invite the participants to use the art materials available to make changes to their chosen picture card. Let them answer the question: “What do you want to add?” And allow them to create their new version of the image.

  • Open the space again and allow the participants to present and share what they did with their picture card and how it relates to the question on what they wanted to add in their role.

• Wrap up the process. Ask everyone to reflect in silence for a few minutes. Let them write down how they wish to proceed with their learnings on paper. Depending on the participants' consent, you can optionally collect these for management reference.

• Close the session. Give thanks to the participants and invite everyone to share their main take-away for the session in one sentence.