When the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing, in my experience, this can lead to conflict. If you don't provide the story, the story will be provided for you, and many times it won't be factual.

Also, to "skip the step" of briefing the team may sound expedient, skipping steps in a process is not advantageous, ultimately the step will need to be revisited and may add additional cost to the project.

Not to mention, that to keep the team without knowledge is to establish an environment of working in silos.

It is a good practice to make sure your team is well informed and that they understand their roles. People who have a clear understanding of their tasks tend to be more efficient. 

@kellyepcarter I agree Kellye, communication is key to the success of a project.

Time is certainly of the essence when deadlines are looming. However, communication is vital within teams as well as with any stakeholders involved. Without communication, there can be double efforts and even misalignment within the teams.

When there are diverse teams on the same project it is very conducive for the team members of all the teams to familiarize themselves what each role and expertise they possess. In this unique way of managing a project, it will help tremendously if a team becomes short because of a happenstance a team member from another team can possibly fill in for that missing team member(s). I would call it cross-knowledge. 

I agree that it's very important for each team to understand the work of other teams for a better flow of project and bring all groups under one melting pot. A successful PM will always connect each teams through great communication. Each team should understand and respect the deadlines of other teams because often times one team's work depends on completion of another team's work. Having knowledge of other teams responsibilities will help in successful completion of project. For example, if you are in material selecting team and you don't know what regulatory team may require, you are only delaying the process further. Having some basic knowledge of FDA regulations may help eliminate some screening time by the regulatory team. 

Working as a time and familiarizing each other with the general points or themes of the work that each of you is doing is crucial to project team success. It does not require an extensive amount of time to become familiar with each other's work and how your individual tasks affect each other. Familiarizing yourselves with multiple parts of a project can give different insights and perspectives on a project. This can also allow you to assist one another with tasks, if necessary, potentially saving time and budget. 

I believe that it should be a part of a project for each member to have a general idea of other components of the project. I do not believe much time will be taken from project deadline to familiarize each individual with each project component of their teammates. If anything familarization to the rest of project from each member can benefit and even accelerate the project. This is because now there is more crosslinking knowledge and collaboration, which in my opinion leads to a team that is more well balanced and efficient. This cross knowledge can also prove useful if a team member is out or unable to make a day and/or move to a different company, there will be some reassurance that their part can be taken care of by the rest of team without much training.  

It is important for different members of a project team to be familiar with what others are working on to understand the progress of the project and to ensure that the project is being completed successfully. It does not have to be something that takes a great amount of time but it should be something that is done fairly regularly in the form of progress meetings or even through progress reports via email. In some projects, it is absolutely critical to know what other members of the team are working on in order to complete the project. For example, if a medical device company is working on producing a new device, the regulatory department would be working through ensuring that the device meets FDA and ISO regulations, while the manufacturing department would be working on the actual production of the device. If the FDA were to deem a certain part of the device to be against regulations, then the production of the device would be altered, making it absolutely critical for the regulatory department and the manufacturing department to know the status of their work in order to be able to produce a successful device. In order for a project to be successful, communication is key, so avoiding updating other departments and team members would be detrimental to the project. 

I believe it is important to understand what everyone does in the project to a certain extent. It is hard to fully understand what is going on but it is easier to get the main picture of the tasks my team members are assigned. With that information, I can better understand the process and the project and give the appropriate deadline to finish the project. It is crucial to get a sense of it so I can escalate any issues with the stakeholders. Familiarizing with each other's work is essential so the team could be more effective and efficient. That way everyone can collaborate and finish the project faster and more smoothly.

Although ensuring that everyone has an understanding of what everyone project entails may take away time from the deadline I view it as a necessity. A project team can be defined as a group of individuals that work with each other to achieve a common goal or for this class; a project such as medical device development. 

To effectively and efficiently use the total potential of a project team, each member must understand the overall goal and the tasks in between that will help the project remain on time and up to certain standards. With more understanding, things such as risk and time schedule can be handle more effectively because everyone on the team will have an eye for it.

Communication ensures that there is nothing left to assume and everyone has a handle of what the other team is doing. It wouldn't be a waste of precious time to ensure that the teams understand what the others are completing and an idea of their timeline. If there is an issue with the strict constraints of the timeline, then there should be at least one person as a representative of each team to understand what the other team is doing. This allows for similar information on both sides and decreases any ‘waste of time’ there would be learning the information.

It is situation dependent, but if both teams are working on different aspects of the *same* project, then it is essential to take time weekly to make sure that everyone has a working idea of what everyone is doing. Deadlines are important, but they’re only met when the project is smooth sailing and everyone is on the same page about the work being done. This is because different parts of a project affect each other largely, and if teams aren’t aware of what another team is doing, there’s huge potential for clashing components that could derail a project. For example, if the quality assurance team approves a product because it passed all testing, but the regulatory affairs team finds something not meeting FDA requirements, the project would suffer much larger setbacks. If they take the time to discuss this during regular meetings, they can come to a solution quicker. If these meetings did not exist, the problem would be found much later, and the team would have to end up extending the timeline and spend more money anyway. Skipping steps doesn’t necessarily mean that a project is going to be completed faster. The goal of a project is to produce a product (in the case of medical devices) that is efficient, safe, and profitable; not to output products or finish projects as fast as possible.

@hk425