8/7/2019 Team Role Play

1/4

Example: a software company learns that customers are unhappy with customer support and this is causing a

loss of customers. In order to improve customer support, the company decides to use team role playing. Atrainer brings together a group of 12 software developers and customer support representatives.

The trainer introduces the problem and encourages an open discussion in order to put all the relevant issues onthe table and get participants thinking about the problem in depth prior to the team role playing.

While discussion is still relatively lively, the trainer interrupts, divides the participants into two groups.

Participants should be randomly assigned to groups, such as by having each person pulling a paper, indicatinggroup membership, out of a hat. It is important that the participants do not divide themselves into groups.

Getting people who do not normally work together to do so creates new synergies which should promotegreater creative thinking.

Group A (playing the role of a customer support person) receives a card which states:

"This customer is very influential. To lose them would be highly damaging to the company. You must doanything within reason to retain them"

Group B (playing the role of the customer) receives a card stating:

"You have seriously overspent your software budget and while you are not unhappy with the product, you must

convince the customer support person to take back the product and refund your money. Since you cannotadmit the actual situation (as it would clearly not be legitimate for a refund), you must find problems with the

software sufficient to legitimise the return and refund."

The groups meet separately for five to ten minutes to discuss strategy and who will be the actor. Then the twoactors go to the centre of the room to perform the role play. At any time during the role play, the actors can

look to their teams for advice. Likewise teams can offer unsolicited advice. Normally the teams are physicallyseparated from their actors. However, each team can call one "time out" to have a private discussion ofstrategy.

In a lively role-play, a team member may very well offer advice to the actor of the other team. There is

nothing wrong with this and the trainer should not prohibit it, although the teams themselves may do so.

Eventually, a solution of some sort will be found. If the conflict is not apparent to both sides and there is stillsufficient enthusiasm in the teams, the trainer may ask the teams to find another solution.

Once it is clear no more solutions are to be found, the groups are brought together and discuss the role play,

their strategies, their solution, relevance to real world situations, and alternative solutions.

Optionally, each team can draft a short "lessons learned" paper about the role play. The papers can be

combined an copies distributed to all role play participants and any other staff who might learn from the role

play.

In a situation similar to the example, there would probably be several team role playing sessions with different

people and different conflicts. In addition, some conflicts would be specific to the company's product orprocedures.

y go first

The computers during the period 1965 to 1971 are regarded as the Third Generation Computers. Thedevelopment of Third Generation Computers resulted in the end of the usage of first and second generation

computers. Though transistors used in Second Generation Computers were clearly an improvement over thevacuum tube used in First Generation Computers, Second Generated Computers still generated a great deal of

heat which resulted in the damage of sensitive internal parts of the computer. This problem was later

eliminated by the use of quartz rock.

8/7/2019 Team Role Play

2/4

third generation computer

In 1958, Jack Kilby who is an engineer with Texas Instruments, developed the Integrated Circuit (IC). TheIntegrated Circuit combined three electronic components onto a small silicon disc, which was made from quartzrock. Scientist later managed to fit more components on a single chip, called semiconductor. As a result of it,

more components were able to squeeze onto the chip and thereby computers became ever smaller. Anotherthird generation computer development included the use of an OS (operating system) that allowed computersto run multiple programs together with a central program that monitored & coordinated the memory of the

computer.

Characteristics of Third Generation Computers

Characteristics of Third Generation Computers in comparison with that of previous generation computers are

1. Third Generation Computers were based on integrated circuit (IC) technology.

2. Third Generation Computers were able to reduce computational time from microseconds to

nanoseconds

3. Third Generation Computers devices consumed less power and generated less heat. In some

cases, air conditioning was still required.

4. The size of Third Generation Computers was smaller as compared to previous computers

5. Since hardware of the Third Generation Computers rarely failed, the maintenance cost for it

was quite low.

6. Extensive use of high-level language became possible in Third Generation Computers.

Manual assembling of individual components was not required for Third Generation Computers, so itreduced the large requirement of labour & cost. However, for the manufacture of IC chips, highly

sophisticated The first computers of this generation were

developed for the atomic energy industry.

Third Generation - 1964-1971:Integrated Circuits

The development of the integrated circuit was the hallm ark of

the third generation of computers. Transistors were

miniaturized and placed on silicon chips, called

semiconductors, which drastically increased the speed and

efficiency of computers.

A nonmetallic chemical element in the carbon family of

elements. Silicon - atomic symbol "Si" - is the second most

abundant element in the earth's crust, surpassed only by

oxygen. Silicon does not occur uncombined in nature. Sand

and almost all rocks contain silicon combined with oxygen,

forming silica. When silicon combines with other elements,

such as iron, aluminum or potassium, a silicate is formed.

Compounds of silicon also occur in the atmosphere, natural

8/7/2019 Team Role Play

3/4

waters,many plants and in the bodies of some animals.

Silicon is the basic material used to make computer chips, transistors, silicon diodes and other electronic circuits and switching

devices because its atomic structure makes the element an ideal semiconductor. Silicon is commonly doped, or mixed,with

other elements, such as boron, phosphorous and arsenic, to alter its conductive properties.

A chip is a small piece of semi conducting material(usually silicon) on which an integrated circuit is embedded. A typical chip isless than -square inches and can contain milli ons of electronic components(transistors). Computers consist of many chips

placed on electronic boards called printed circuit boards. There are different types of chips. For example, CPU chips (also

called microprocessors) contain an entire processing unit, whereas memory chips contain blank memory.

Semiconductor is a material that is neither a good conductor of electricity (like copper) nor a good insulator (like rubber). The

most common semiconductor materials are silicon and germanium. These materials are then doped to create an excess or lack

of electrons.

Computer chips, both for CPU and memory, are composed of semiconductor materials. Semiconductors make it possible to

miniaturize electronic components, such as transistors. Not only does miniaturization mean that the components take up less

space, it also means that they are faster and require less energy.

Related Article: History Behind It All

Instead of punched cards and printouts, users interacted with third generation computers through keyboards and monitors and

interfaced with an operating system, which allowed the device to run many different applications at one time with a central

program that monitored the memory. Co mputers for the first time became accessible to a mass audience because they were

smaller and cheaper than their predecessors.

7.

8. The Industrial Era

9. 1972 - 1973

10. The Third Generation computers started approximately inthis era. These computers were mainly characterized by

electronic models and were fully programmable.

11. The first consumer game is published, diagramming

techniques for software development were defined, the Hewlett

Packard handheld scientific calculator HP35 is now available.12. In January Magnavox (USA), member of the North American Philips group, started selling a game

computer running "Odyssey".13. This game was already written in 1968(1) for a mainframe computer by the American Ralph Baer. But

as with most advanced ideas it was too early for consumers, not ready at that time to adaptsomething like a video game. Commercially it meant a disaster and the 100 U$ game console

gathered dust.

14. On 24 August 1972 INTEL released the 200 kHz 8008, an 8 bit version of the 4004.15. The speed was 300.000 instructions per second, could address 16Kb memory. It contained 3500

transistors based on 10 micron technology. It was the first processor able to recognize all characters

of the alphabet (letters and numbers).The processor was originally built for Computer Terminal Corporation,- later called Datapoint. This

processor will instantaneously be popular with manufacturers of small computers.

8/7/2019 Team Role Play

4/4