Context-specific definitions of organizational concepts: Defining ‘team effectiveness’ with use of the Delphi Technique

Abstract

Definitions are social constructions rather than objective descriptions. They set clear boundaries for what is considered normal in a situation. Common words in organizations, like effectiveness or success, carry different meaningss in different contexts. In this paper, we evaluate the Delphi Technique as a method for explicating context-specific definitions and illustrate its use in formulating a context-specific definition of ‘an effective health care team’. Eight multi-disciplinary organization members participated in the study and reached consensus on characteristics assigned to team effectiveness in three rounds. The final definition implies the influence of organizational values, underscoring the importance of context specificity in organization studies.

Media entrepreneurship: a consensual definition

“…The reason for this selection is the success of this research method in similar cases e.g. Omer Attali and Yemini (2016), Capra et al (2014), Lohuis et al (2013). The Delphi technique is a widely used and accepted method for gathering data from respondents within their domain of expertise (Hsu and Sandford, 2007).…”

Narrative Reflection as a Means to Explore Team Effectiveness

“…At Level 3, we compared the storylines and positioning at Levels 1 and 2 with the organizational definition and story of team effectiveness, developed within the context of the solution-focused approach, which we developed in a previous Delphi study. The context-specific definition and consequent storyline of team effectiveness which was previously developed (Lohuis, van Vuuren, & Bohlmeijer, 2013) was (a) professionals, (b) who work together, (c) using their strengths, (d) to achieve their goals (e) in a healthy organization. By framing the context-specific definition according to the five story elements that make up storylines (Burke, 1969), we aimed to facilitate systematic evaluation of effectiveness on the third level of analysis.…”

Critical factors for organisational effectiveness: The case of Saudi Arabian seaports

“…However, as there is no fixed measure to define the consensus level (Becuwe et al, 2017), variable statistics were used for consideration of the consensus level as suggested by various studies (Richardson, de Leeuw, & Dullaert, 2016;Gracht, 2012;Harmsen et al, 2015;Tharisara, Kanchana, & Turner, 2016;Williams, 2016;Hasson, Keeney, & McKenna, 2000;Hsu and Sandford,2007). Following (Bulger & Housner, 2007;Green, Jones, Hughes, & Williams, 1999;Lohuis, van Vuuren, & Bohlmeijer, 2014;Neuer Colburn, Grothaus, Hays, & Milliken, 2016), this study uses a consensus level of four for five-point Likert scale questions. Thus, factors with the mean scores ̅ ≥ 4 were retained, while factors with the mean ̅ < 4 would be further evaluated in the second round.…”