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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Teamwork Skills: Communicating Effectively in Groups by University of Colorado Boulder

4.7
stars
3,203 ratings

About the Course

Recently revised and updated! Effective teamwork and group communication are essential for your professional and personal success. In this course you will learn to: make better decisions, be more creative and innovative, manage conflict and work with difficult group members, negotiate for preferred outcomes, improve group communication in virtual environments, develop a better overall understanding of human interaction, and work more effectively as a team. Our goal is to help you understand these important dynamics of group communication and learn how to put them into practice to improve your overall teamwork....

Top reviews

MA

Apr 27, 2020

Amazing course! I've learned a lot of new theories & ideas of Group Communication! in a simple yet interesting way. I will definitely make use of knowledge gain from this course in my practical life !

ND

Aug 27, 2020

Amazing course! I've learned a lot of new theories & ideas of Group Communication! in a simple yet interesting way. I will definitely make use of knowledge gain from this course in my practical life !

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1 - 25 of 1,051 Reviews for Teamwork Skills: Communicating Effectively in Groups

By Maryna D

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May 23, 2020

I found this course highly theoretical. It's probably a good course for those who study communication in college but it is NOT a course for professionals who want to learn new skills that can be applied to real life situations. The first two (out of four) modules were dedicated to theories of communication and a lot of definitions. The only useful moment was about what the stages a groups goes through when it is formed, which was probably 5 minutes of a lecture. The rest... Why do I need to know that holding on to an initial piece of information is called anchoring? And we don't just communicate but construct our reality through communication? These ideas are worth exploring through examples, or through practical tips on how they should be applied or avoided, or maybe through going deeper into them in assignments. However, the course just named them, the quizes made me go back to the theory because the questions were asking to give the definition to a term or to tell which term applies to a particular situation. As a student, I was left wondering what to do with this information.

By Astha S

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Apr 24, 2020

I learned many things from this course. I feel better to manage conflict and negotiation. Group communication was challenging for me and I will be in a better place to deal with it after this course.

By Mathias L

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Dec 15, 2020

One of the best online courses I've seen so far. Especially liked the the assignments because they forced you to think about the contents - nothing you would be able to find with a simple web search.

By Rajalakshmi C

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Jan 3, 2020

Thank you so much Mathew Sir, My Course instructor for the course where he is a very energetic person I have learnt the course successfully and earned the certificate too. Thank you Coursera

By Nataliya K

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Jul 31, 2017

Amazing course! Extremely interesting lectures and a very surprising assignment. This course is definitely worth taking.

By Will O

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Jun 2, 2020

The material could be effective, but it's drowned out by wordiness and language that distracts from the actual goal, which is communication.

By Marco A S A A

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Jan 10, 2020

I received everything I needed to understand how to connect my teams through communication.

By Maria A

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Apr 28, 2020

Amazing course! I've learned a lot of new theories & ideas of Group Communication! in a simple yet interesting way. I will definitely make use of knowledge gain from this course in my practical life !

By Penny F

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Apr 13, 2020

Trully, really excellent!

It was suggested to me by my manager, and I was happy to do it, but as i have taken part in similar trainings, i did not expect much.

I have to say that the material is very good, very interesting, it keeps you motivated, with assignments that do not burden you but help you to put in practice all that the module was offering.

Extremely positive is the fact that you can finish the course in your own time. I did not want to wait until the deadlines, and thankfully i did not have to.

I would highly recommend it to anyone! Even if not part of a business group, the course will give you many tips on how to improve your communication.

By Dipendra P

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Apr 28, 2020

This is among the excellent course that I have taken through Coursera. The tests in between video lectures kept me concentrated and helped in better learning. The report writing and case study assignment was an excellent technique for evaluation in Online courses. I feel I learned a lot after this course. Also during peer review, I found many students submitting the plagiarism file, some were submitting the provided example file in the course module. So those need to be restricted or punished.

By Paola G T

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Jun 29, 2018

I LOVE IT , VERY GOOD EXPLAIN AND THE HOMEWORK WITH THE FACILITY TO

By Nisha S D

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Aug 28, 2020

Amazing course! I've learned a lot of new theories & ideas of Group Communication! in a simple yet interesting way. I will definitely make use of knowledge gain from this course in my practical life !

By Rafael B

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Apr 20, 2020

The content is highly educational. I'm not going to lie. It was draining for the first timers who will experience the definition of terms in this course but taking this course with my friends and classmate made it a little bit enjoyable. We were able to identify decision-making traps along our conversations and we were able to apply the good communications practices that I enjoyed the most in this course. However, when it comes to case study there are peers who are unfair. I was able to follow the instructions on the Case Study Creation and I was able to grade my peers fairly but I received some lower grades that I deem unacceptable since I follow the average requirement of the course. I hope people or at least there will be monitoring of my peers upon grading my case study creation in the future. Overall, I love this course and I'm going to take more in the future.

By Manuel F

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Jul 22, 2020

This course represents a great introduction aimed at enhancing a person's understanding of the parameters that affect - positively and negatively - communication in a group setting. Alas, keep in mind that this is a beginners-level class with material apropos for that level of knowledge. The lectures are engaging and enhanced with visual cues, just like you would expect in a physical setting. Throughout the video lectures, prompts encourage you to stay engaged and check your comprehension of the presented material. Quizzes are appropriate in scope and difficulty. Matt Koschmann is easy to listen to and delivers information in a clear and concise manner that manages to keep a student's attention throughout the entire course.

By Dharmaveer T

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May 15, 2020

Matthew A. Koschman is a very efficient lecturer who packs the punch in his presentations. He is brief, clear and to the point about his topics. His video lectures are well made with a lot of thought and preparation behind them. He has a pacifying presence when speaking, and that helped me absorb his material like osmosis :) ... He is one hell of a lecturer! It's a great course... I'm a consultant physician and I work in a group. Before I stumbled upon this, I mistakenly thought that it would be another 'run of the mill' course, only to be pleasantly surprised about the contents of this course. The assignments are novel and testing. It's well worth the time spent! Thanks a ton Mr.Matthew.

By Alexandra B

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Aug 6, 2020

The instructor does a decent job in the video portion, but the peer review portions are not good at all. The first assignment expects movie watching to be something that learner's are able to do and precludes people with disabilities that do not allow them to watch movies (but who are able to use the videos due to the closed captioning, lack of background noise, etc) or who don't have access to movies to watch (especially in a pandemic). The fact that the assignments go weeks without being "graded" is a waste of time. If assignments aren't "graded" by peers within a certain number of days from submission, the assignment should be considered passed so the learner can move on. Overall, I don't recommend this course because of the nature of the peer review assignments and how it, essentially, holds the learner hostage in a course that would otherwise be completed.

By GLADSON V C

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May 4, 2020

This course is a great source to get better at group communication, we learn things that we have never possibly thought could influence our skills on teamwork, but they do. Also, the classmates seem to enjoy a lot the content, as their application on the proposed peer-reviewed assignments is very nice and pertinent. I recommend it.

It is wonderful to learn so many useful hints about communication in the team, ranging from language usage, decision-making traps, practices of good decision making to conflict management. And it is also useful to understand how technology can affect our communication.

By Win K K

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Jul 8, 2020

This is the best course that I have ever attended online. I very much enjoy the way how Mr. Matthew A. Koschmann which is almost flawless. I believe he is very good at delivering this kind of online course and I love it. The best part is highlighting important phase or points on screen which is very helpful to take notes for me. I have some concerns about peer to peer review assignment as some people want to cheat on it. Your recommended books are also very helpful for further self learning. Thank you very much!

By Igor K

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Apr 25, 2020

This is a fantastic course and highly recommended for any juniour leader / manager at any stage of their career! It is not too late to improve communication skills. This is also the best online course package I have seen on Coursera from the production value perspective. Not only does the professor presents info, which is well synthesized, the videos look very well rehearsed and kept my attention throughout. Well done to the Boulder team for how this turned out!

By Anitha M V

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May 23, 2020

I have benefited immensely from the course. Understanding the dynamics of a group is essential to succeed in different walks of life and the insight the course throws into various aspects of group communication will help me develop as an individual. Thank you Coursera.

By Jessica S

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Apr 26, 2020

This class had a great deal of good information on communication. I liked the mix of more interactive assignments and quizzes, and the lectures were professional and interesting throughout. Would definitely recommend to others. Thank you for putting this together!

By Aninkan G

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May 9, 2020

The course helped me a lot in improving my teamwork skills and in my practical field of study.Thank you Coursera for providing a wonderful course which enhanced my communication skills in groups and made me suited to work efficiently within a particular group.

By Samuel S

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May 25, 2020

I enjoyed this course from much as it provided me insights with how to deal with group conflict. The videos used in the lecture were also appropriate. For one of the coursework assignments, I wished they provided a movie that could be easily accessed.

By Dirk M

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Aug 23, 2021

This course is too theoretical and generic. The lecturer might be highly qualified but in my opinion struggles getting beyond the sole definitions. The goal of this course should be to enable the students to apply the acquired knowledge in praxis but I doubt that one can communicate effectively in groups after this highly theoretical course.

To show you what I mean I give you an example. In the chapter "How to Have a Good Fight" he cites an article with the same title and runs through several characateristics of successful (!) teams such as "Successful teams work with more information & debate on the basis of facts" or "Successful teams maintain a balanced power structure" and alike.

Or freely quoted "It is communication that leads us into the traps, and it is communication that leads us out of the traps" and "We should see decision making as a process, not an event". These theoretical and generic statements leave the student wondering how to apply this in the real world.

In the end, maybe the solution to all communication problems is humor (which coincidentally happens to be also a trait of successful teams).

By Rhayanne F C

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Sep 13, 2018

This course is a great source to get better at group communication, we learn things that we have never possibly thought could influence our skills on teamwork, but they do. Also the classmates seem to enjoy a lot the content, as their application on the proposed peer reviewed assignments are very nice and pertinent. I recommend it.