Teams Are Changing: Are Research and Practice Evolving Fast Enough?

Abstract

In the past, there was a fairly strong alignment between what teams experienced, the topics that team researchers were studying, and the practices that organizations used to manage their teams. However, the nature of teams and the environment in which they operate has changed, and as a result, new needs have emerged. Although there have been some innovative advancements, research and practice have not always adjusted to remain aligned with emerging needs. We highlight 3 significant change themes that are affecting teams: (a) dynamic composition, (b) technology and distance, and (c) empowerment and delayering. For each theme, we share our observations, review the related science and identify future research needs, and specify challenges and recommendations for employing effective team‐based practices in applied settings. We conclude with thoughts about the future and suggest that new theories, research methods, and analyses may be needed to study the new team dynamics.

Feedback seeking from peers: A positive strategy for insecurely attached team-workers

“…We suggest that relational dispositions will be highly relevant in flexible teamwork environments (Tannenbaum et al, 2012). In such environments employees work on multiple temporary teams with varying compositions, often focused on a specific project, to achieve shared objectives.…”

Helping fluid teams work: A research agenda for effective team adaptation in healthcare

“…Organizational demands across work domains, and especially in the medical realm, require rapid reconfiguration of teams. This results in what has been labeled "open groups" [8] or more recently, "membership fluidity" [1]. Membership fluidity describes the dynamic flow of members in and out of teams, resulting in a change to the team composition [1,[8][9][10][11].…”

“…This results in what has been labeled "open groups" [8] or more recently, "membership fluidity" [1]. Membership fluidity describes the dynamic flow of members in and out of teams, resulting in a change to the team composition [1,[8][9][10][11]. This process can describe (1) integration of a new member into an existing team, (2) a change in membership where an existing member is lost and a new member joins, or (3) a loss of an existing member without replacement.…”

“…Although membership change is common practice, research into this phenomenon is relatively nascent [2] and generally exists only with regard to ad hoc student teams in various settings. This literature base, however, does provide insight as (1) there is empirically derived, scientific evidence to draw upon and (2) we suggest that some characteristics of these ad hoc teams are relevant to medical teams. To provide examples of these characteristics, the teams utilized in the previously mentioned experiments had varying levels of familiarity among teammates (i.e., some members had known other members previously and worked with them, while others had never worked together).…”

Shifting Paradigms in Information Flow: An Open Science Framework (OSF) for Knowledge Sharing Teams

“…Numerous features inherent to team engagement can serve as challenges to maintaining a culture of high-functioning sharing of knowledge. These can include high diversity of membership (Kozlowski, Watola, Jensen, Kim, & Botero, 2009), large team size (Tannenbaum, Mathieu, Salas, & Cohen, 2012), designing deep integration of knowledge (Drath et al, 2008), navigating goal misalignments (Salazar, Lant, Fiore, & Salas, 2012), permeating team and stakeholder boundaries (Hall et al, 2012), geographic dispersion, and securing high task interdependence (Burke et al, 2006).…”