advertising group projects

I have worked in group projects many times before and most of the time I have been pretty fortunate to be have people in my group who were all willing to pitch in. This last week, however, was a bit of a shock for me. In my advertising class we were divided into groups of two to create a billboard ad. One person who wanted to do the design portion of the ad and one person who wanted to do the marketing portion and write the ad plan for the billboard ad. I chose to do the design portion because that's what I really prefer to do. I was paired up with a girl who ended up being very difficult to work with.

After our groups were decided she told me she didn't know how to write an advertising plan and that she wanted to do the design. We debated about this for a while, but I finally decided we weren't going to be able to proceed with the ad unless one of us gave in. I said I would do the ad plan and she could do the design. Sadly, the day before the ad was due, she informed me that she didn't know how to use any design programs to create the design of the ad; therefore, I ended up pulling an all-nighter to complete the ad design and ad plan.

I was extremely frustrated at first, but I realized that I learned a lot of valuable lessons from this experience. This is how it will be in the real world. People's personalities don't change from being unreliable to reliable once they step out into the real world. I know I'll probably have to deal with unreliable people in the workplace, no matter where I find a position. People will always be people and I'll just have to learn how to get along with them.