Learn Hardcore German: Ich finde, alle im Team verdienen Respekt, egal welche Aufgabe sie haben. - I think everyone on the team deserves respect, no matter what task they have.

In German, verbs like finden, denken, glauben often introduce what you think or feel, and the content of that thought is another clause.

Formally, alle im Team verdienen Respekt is an object clause of ich finde (what do I find? → that everyone on the team deserves respect).
German can introduce this clause either:

with dass: Ich finde, dass alle im Team Respekt verdienen.
or without dass: Ich finde, alle im Team verdienen Respekt.

When a full clause follows like this, German writes a comma before it, even though it looks like a main clause in word order.

Can I also say Ich finde, dass alle im Team Respekt verdienen? Is there a difference in meaning?

Yes, Ich finde, dass alle im Team Respekt verdienen is perfectly correct and very common.

The meaning is the same. The difference is mainly style:

mit dass: slightly more explicit/structured, sometimes feels a bit more formal or careful.
ohne dass: a bit more conversational and natural in spoken German.

Both are fine in almost all contexts.

What’s the difference between Ich finde, Ich denke, Ich glaube, and Ich meine in a sentence like this?

All four can introduce your opinion, but they have slightly different nuances:

Ich finde – “I find / I feel”: often used for value judgments and opinions, including emotional ones.
Ich denke – “I think”: more neutral, can sound a bit more rational.
Ich glaube – “I believe”: suggests belief or assumption; sometimes a bit less certain.
Ich meine – “I mean / my opinion is”: often used in discussion or argument, sometimes a bit stronger or more insistent.

In this sentence, you could say Ich denke, Ich glaube, or Ich meine instead of Ich finde, and all would be understandable; Ich finde is very natural for expressing this kind of opinion.

Why is it alle im Team and not something like alle im TeamEN?

im is already in dem, so it’s marking the dative case for Team:

in dem Team → contracted to im Team (dative singular, neuter)

alle here is a pronoun meaning “everyone / all (of them)”. It’s not directly declining with Team; it’s more like:

alle (Leute), die im Team sind → shortened to alle im Team

So you don’t add another ending like -en to Team; the case is already shown by im.

Could I also say jeder im Team verdient Respekt instead of alle im Team verdienen Respekt?

Yes, that’s possible:

Ich finde, jeder im Team verdient Respekt.

Differences:

alle im Team verdienen Respekt – plural; focuses on the group as a whole, but grammatically plural.
jeder im Team verdient Respekt – singular; emphasizes each individual person one by one.

Both sound natural; the meaning is almost identical in practice.

Why is Respekt used without an article? Why not den Respekt?

In German, many abstract, uncountable concepts are often used without an article when you mean them in a general sense:

Respekt verdienen – to deserve respect (in general)
Liebe, Freiheit, Gerechtigkeit etc. are similar.

With an article, the meaning changes:

den Respekt verdienen – to deserve that specific respect (for example, the respect of a particular group, already known from context).

In your sentence, it’s about respect in general, so no article is the most natural choice.

Does verdienen here mean “to earn” or “to deserve”? And why isn’t it sich verdienen?

verdienen has two main meanings:

“to earn” in the sense of money:
- Ich verdiene 2.000 Euro im Monat.
“to deserve” in the moral/merit sense:
- Du verdienst eine Pause.
- Alle im Team verdienen Respekt.

For the meaning “to deserve”, you normally just use verdienen, not sich verdienen.
sich etwas verdienen is possible but means “to earn something for oneself through effort”, often with a stronger idea of effort or reward:

Er hat sich den Urlaub wirklich verdient.

In egal welche Aufgabe sie haben, what exactly does egal do, and what case is welche Aufgabe?

egal here means “no matter” / “regardless”. The pattern is:

egal + Fragewort (welche/welcher/wer/was ...) + Satz

So egal welche Aufgabe sie haben = “no matter which task/role they have”.

welche Aufgabe is in the accusative, because it’s the direct object of haben:

Sie haben welche Aufgabe?
→ accusative object → welche Aufgabe.

Why is it Aufgabe haben and not Aufgabe machen?

In German:

eine Aufgabe haben = to have a task/role/responsibility
eine Aufgabe machen = to do/complete a specific task (homework, exercises, etc.)

In this sentence, Aufgabe refers to someone’s role or function in the team, not a specific task they are currently performing. That’s why haben is the natural verb.

Why is the pronoun sie in egal welche Aufgabe sie haben plural, and what does it refer to?

Here, sie refers back to alle im Team.

Because alle is plural, any pronoun referring to it also has to be plural:

alle im Team → sie (they)
alle im Team verdienen Respekt, egal welche Aufgabe sie haben.

If you used jeder im Team, you’d use singular:

Ich finde, jeder im Team verdient Respekt, egal welche Aufgabe er oder sie hat.

Could I change the word order, for example: Ich finde, alle verdienen im Team Respekt? Does that sound natural?

Ich finde, alle verdienen im Team Respekt is grammatically correct and understandable, but the emphasis shifts slightly.

alle im Team verdienen Respekt: keeps alle im Team together as a clear noun phrase (“everyone in the team”), which sounds very natural.
alle verdienen im Team Respekt: sounds more like “everyone deserves respect in the team”, with a bit more focus on the place/context.

Both are valid, but alle im Team verdienen Respekt is the most straightforward, idiomatic version here.