Control crews are highly trained teams responsible for monitoring complex systems, performing routine procedures, and quickly responding to nonroutine situations. Previous literature suggests that higher-performing control crews engage in adaptive behavior during high-workload or crisis situations. Other work suggests that higher-performing crews use periods of lower workloads to prepare for future problems. To understand which behaviors performed during which situations better differentiate lower- from higher-performing crews, we conducted a study of 14 nuclear power plant control room crews and examined adaptive behaviors and shared mental model development in the crews as they faced monitoring, routine, and nonroutine situations. Our results suggest that few differences in adaptive behaviors exist between higher- and lower-performing crews during monitoring or routine situations, but that information collection and shared mental model development activities, and intracrew processes used during model development, differ significantly between lower- and higher-performing control crews during nonroutine situations.group dynamics, teams, shared cognition, mental models, nuclear power
We describe a whole person learning experiential/behavioral skill pedagogy developed in an executive skills course. The pedagogy was designed to address recent criticisms of MBA education relative to program relevancy and the skill sets of students entering the workforce. We present an experiential learning model based on the concept of whole person learning, discuss how the model is used in the class, and provide an empirical assessment of skill improvement over a 5-year period. Using a pre-posttest with control group design to test student skill levels by way of an assessment center, the effectiveness of the pedagogy was supported. The skills assessed included communication, teamwork, leadership/initiative, decision making, and planning/organizing. Guidance is provided for implementing the pedagogy into MBA curricula.
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