In order to protect people's right, I won't post any pictures of my teamate onto the blog. Sorry about that!
Do German people smile? That’s really hard to find the answer. A lot of people believe that German is serious and stubborn. These are perceived to be the typical German stereotypes. To be honest, I used to hold the same opinion until I came here and staying here for almost two weeks. For my first Friday presentation, I was actually pretty pleased with my two teammates. We were well organized and highly efficient. The whole process of our cooperation was easy and relaxed. But things don’t always go right. This week, I got a really terrible group. I still remember the time when we had our first meeting. After a very short and brief self-introduction, we went straight to the point. I actually like it, because there is no blahblahblahs, which means we will get everything’s done in a minute. However, in our second meeting, when we were discussing what else should be put in the PPT, she rejected everything I suggested, including what was commented in today’s presentation, the consistency, the background information of the two companies and couple more recommendations. On Wednesday night, she sent me her part, asked me to check the grammar, and wanted me to send them back by the end of the night. Before I read the whole thing, I said okay, but you can never imagine how horrible her part is. First of all, which I am 100% for sure, she did her part in German, and put everything in Google Translator, because none of the sentences made any sense. I had to read all through those nonsenses and to make them work, which would never be done in a few hours. But I made it. I took my whole night checking the stupid handout. However, on the next day, since I spent the whole morning in the Meta Design, I couldn’t find a chance to send her the checked handout, so I ran back to the hostel directly to get my laptop and got everything’s done. But it was still too late, because she already put everything in PDF and didn’t want to make any change. I said to her, “There is no way to go with those bunches of stupid mistakes. If you don’t have time to do that, just send me the original PPT and handout, I will do it.” Guess what? She refused my suggestion again. She told me that she couldn’t send me the original ones, because they are too big. I was freaking out. That’s great! And now, I really wanted to ask one question, “If you really want my opinions, why not leaving me the ones that I can make changes, instead of sending them all back to you and waiting for you to correct them?” I just sent her an email, in a very nice way. And here it is
“Hi, i think we all care about the presentation and want to make it perfect. I have everything here in the email, and they are in the right order. All you need is to copy and paste them. It’s very clear and easy to read.”
During my whole education period, this is definitely the first time I have to beg someone to do something so that we won’t act like idiots in public.
The good news is, she finally made the changes on the day of our presentation. However, the bad news is, the teachers and clients critiqued on all the things that I had suggested before, and obviously, she was not happy with it at all. The whole story ended up in tragedy.
I really understand you anger and frustration. I had a similar situation in my last project and I was very upset. Dealing with people at work, school and life in general is not always pleasant. You will always find different kinds of people, personalities, cultures, etc. The key is to find the positive side of negative things. I really like your final reflection. In an agency or in any other job, working in teams is sometimes required and be prepared to deal with it gives you an advantage.
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