At Chonnam National University, team spirit is manifested strongly on the campus through the university curriculum and extracurricular projects. Korean culture encourages teamwork; the university also follows the same path. How about foreign student integration while doing a team project?
    I am often assigned to work in team projects as a part of the university curriculum. As an MBA student at the university, team projects have an integral role in forging successful business consultants to be good team players in the business environment. Working in a group helps students to acquire the needed skills and efforts to achieve common goals. In the Business department, working within a team is crucial in most of the courses. However, I still recall my most enriching team project experience during a consulting management course. In this course, our team is required to compete with other teams in the class. Every week, one mission is assigned to us, we need to provide new business solutions and present it in front of the other teams.
    In our team, we emphasize harmony; we often organize dinner together in order to enhance harmony within the team. Working in a team can be tough, but managing a team project can be way tougher. Because of the ease of communication between my Korean teammates, team management is often assigned to a Korean person; He is responsible for planning meetings. Planning dinner together is a way to encourage mutual respect and enforce collaboration between the members.
    “For me, trust and organization are determinants for a successful team project,” says Molka Mazghouni (PhD. Student, Dept. of Business Administration). All my teammates are seniors; they are the leaders of the group. Their organization skills impress me the most. We travelled together to Jeju Island to attend a research conference. All the details of the trip were well thought out, well planned and they ensured to balance work and enjoyment at the same time. On the other hand, there are barriers that I still can’t cross such as language and cultural barriers. Because of cultural differences, trust may become an issue within the team which can also lead to a conflict.
    “Communication is not an issue,” says Bai Chuan Lai (Global MBA Student, Graduate School of Business); in my team, we often communicate in English and understand each other’s point of view. First, we plan our first meeting in which we discuss our project and divide tasks. However, because of a lack of time management, we tend to finish work at the last moment before the deadline. Therefore, we spend the whole night together working on our project in the meeting room until we finish all the work.
 

By Sana L’ouahidi, Mater’s Student, Global MBA