t-e-i-a-m. i miss teamwork man. that's really one of the things that i don't get enough of these days. a group of people working towards a common goal. teamwork as in getting together with a group of your friends to do something constructive. maybe it's throwing an event, maybe it's making a project, maybe it's working together to hand out CDs, whatever. teamwork is hard to come by nowadays. my friends in other cities are a part of teams -- music groups, dance groups, magazine start ups, entrepreneurships, families. while it may not always be fun and games, working with other people for a common purpose always reveals interesting group dynamics.

i think that once you put people into a position where they have to work together, and not just hang out together, all sorts of personality issues arise. some people turn out to be sour grapes, some people can't take any stress, some people don't pull their weight, some people emerge as unsung heroes, some people turn out to be natural motivators, it's just an interesting thing, to be able to see a different side to your friends. that's why watching the real world / road rules challenges can be so interesting. you're seeing the gamer side of everyone, not just their social side. actually, most of the time we're only seeing their gamer side. is someone a bitch or a snake? that quickly becomes apparent. is someone super manipulative? as omniscient viewers, we're able to see that before most of the other players realize it. and it's interesting how your view of these people can be (dis)colored by their success on missions. karamo may be the nicest, coolest guy but man does he suck at missions.

and with teamwork comes accomplishment, ideally. once you've put in the time and the effort, you've got something to show for it. in my experience, accomplishing something usually brings people together. it builds memories of success, it fosters warm and fuzzies, it makes a mark. more often than not, a project over-succeeds -- and that feeling, that feeling of "wow, we did a great job" is worth any of the drama that you had to undergo.

that's why i think about the leadership camps that everyone used to go to. the ones with the frightening rope courses and the stupid "make twelve legs, three feet, sixty five fingers and then walk on these planks" objectives. those were fun, those were memorable, those revealed. it's also amazing how many people are actually really terrible teammates -- i may have to blog this separately. i would say that maybe sixty percent of people are bad teammates, with twenty percent being okay, ten percent being good and the last ten percent being stellar. that's a whole lot of bad to average teammates.

the closest i get to teamwork nowadays is playing basketball -- and even that's usually ninety percent miscommunication and ten percent actual teamwork. but even in those brief fleeting moments, it's amazing to feel like you did something together. and i suppose playing wingman/wingpeople could count as teamwork but that isn't really a team success even when it's a team effort. it's more of a "my turn, your turn" exchange of efforts. and some people feel that teamwork at work can replace actual teamwork, but i disagree. at work, you have a designated leader, you have a set hierarchy, you have your "work mode." so that's not a team, that's a formal delegation.

for me, the best part of working together towards something is undoubtedly when someone you don't expect totally steps up and becomes a star. you don't see it coming at all but then someone suddenly emerges as the most significant cog in the machine. that's just great. i love it when people get a chance to shine, and i love it more when that moment is totally unexpected. like, "wow, did he really just do that? i had no idea he was capable of that."

yo joe.