This week you read about the five stages of team development: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. Consider the adjourning phase for several of the groups in which you have been involved. Think about which aspects of the groups made for the hardest good-bye. Are high-performing groups hardest to leave? This is one of the hardest groups to leave. I think that when you leave a group that you think is not high performing, only to end up in a situation where you are disappointed by the dynamics of the team. I think a great example of this is I left a center that was pretty financially depleted and ended up somewhere I thought was going to lead me to a better future because they seemed to be more organized and in a better area. What I didn't realize was that the financial aspects of the center had nothing to do with how the establishment was run. At the time I was treated pretty bad because I didn't have a degree and I ended up getting severance pay because I was so miserable. When you are with a team of people that are all looking to achieve the same goal, it is really hard to start over.

Groups with the clearest established norms? This is also a group that is pretty tough to leave because when you leave to go to another center ( I am just using this as an example) you have already established normalcy and a set way of achieving a goal. I imagine that it is going to be really tough to leave my colleagues when I finish my masters degree because this is normalcy to me. I have been collaborating on projects and researching papers for the past two years. When this is over it is going to be really tough for me to get back into another routine. I think adjourning is essential because it brings closure. I am getting sad now just thinking about it.