glossary after downloading the team manual, you can type in the...

Glossary After downloading the Team Manual, you can type in the page numbers to go to the different categories. Active Listening – Page 4-7; 10, 15, 20, 43, 95, 99 Activity Lists - 2, 17, 18, 20-21, 33, 39, 41, 43, 45, 47, 50, 53-54, 56, 72 -75, 81, 84-85, 91 - 92, 94, 97-98 Agenda - Page 8, 15, 17-18, 21, 30 – 34. 38-39, 41-44, 47, 49-50, 53 -54, 58, 61-64, 80 -81, 86, 91-92, 96, 98-99 Brainstorming – Page 11,15-16, 29, 39, 42-43, 46, 60, 84, 97-98 Completion Report – Page 41, 50, 65, 67-70, 86, 99 Final Paper – Page 41 Ground Rules – Page 8-10, 13, 15, 17-19, 21-30, 3 -35, 39,42-49, 51, Appendix One, 86-87, 94 - 98 Leader and Leadership – Page 4, 9 -23, 25 -27, 31 -35, 38-39, 41 -45, 49 -50, 53-56, 58,059, 61,-74, 78, 80-82, 85, 86, 90 – 93, Appendix 4 Meetings – Page 12-30, 36, 38 -46, 48-50, 53 -58, 60,-70, 72, 80-84, 87, 91, 92-94, 96-97, 99, Minutes – Page 15, 17, 20-12,, 40,-41, 43 -46, 49, 55-56, 58-59, 61-64, 74-76, 80, 84, 91, 97 Mission Statement – Page 10, 12, 17-18, 23 -25, 34, 39, 47-49, 59, 71, 83, 87, 89-90, 97 Oral Presenter – Page 16-18, 21, 53, 56-57, 64, 73, 78, Oral Presentation – Page 20-23, 27, 29, 41 -42, 49, 57, 86 Progress Report – Page 15-17, 21, 28, 30,-31, 39,-43, 45, 53, 55 – 56, 65, 67, 69, 73, 75, 83, 86, 91, 94-95, 97 Project Management – Page 17-18, 26, 41, 45, 50, 99 Proposal – Page 12, 17-18, 23,27, 41, 49, 53, 55, 57, 65 -69, 83, 86 Recorder – Page 15-18, 20 -22, 40 -41, 43, 49, 53, 55-56, 62, 64-70, 72-73, 75, 78, 84, 94 Reporting Activities – Page 12-13, 17, 24, 38, 41, 43, 45, 49, 98 Team Rotation – Page 22, 69, 78 Strengths – Page 8-9, 12- 13, 16, 18, 20, 22,24 -25, 27, 29, 32 -33, 35, 40-42, 46-49, 51, 60, 68, 72-75, 79, 83, 85,-86, 94, 97-98, Task Process – Page 9-13, 16, 18, 22 -24, 31, Team Formation Model – Page 16-17, 46, Team Leader Transition Report – Page 12, 20, 41, 54, 65, 67-70, 85-86, 95-97 Team Life Cycle – Page 10, 17-20, 31, 40-41, 50, 65, 67-70, 85, 87, 94

Formation – Page 8-9, 12-13, 16-19, 21, 31-33, 40, 47, 94-95 Critcism – Page 19, 31, 33-35, 95-97 Synthesis - Page 31, 34 -35, 96 -97 Accomplishment – Page 31, 35, 37, 51, 96, 98 Completion – Page 31, 36, 37, 51, 98, 99

Team Process – Page 4, 10, 12 -13, 18, 35-36, 39-42, 44, Thomas Killman (TKI) – Page 3, 40-41, 48-49, 50, 65, 67-70, 85-86 Time Management – Page 9-10, 12-13, 17, 20,23,27, 38-42, 45 -47, 87 Weaknesses - Page 8-9, 12 -13, 16, 18, 20, 22, 24 -25, 27, 32-33, 35, 40-42, 46 -49, 51, 60, 68, 72 -75, 79, 83, 85-86, 94, 97-98 Weekly Memorandum (Weekly Progress Report) – Page 20, 39, 41 -43, 45, 48, 53, 55-56, 65 –70, 83-84,86, 95

Copyright Bonnie Burrell van Stephoudt and Alethia Bess Mariotta, 2013 1

Team Manual

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Team Assignments 1. Thomas-‐Killman Conflict Mode Instrument 1-‐1 & 1-‐2. Assignment 1-‐3. Read before Entrance Conference (see Module 1 for TKI Readings Due day of Entrance Conference) 2. Active Listening 3. Team Formation

3-‐1. Preparation for Forming a Team 3-‐2. Definition and Differences Between Team and Task Process 3-‐3. What is a Team? 3-‐4. Brainstorming

4. The Team Formation Model Using the Team Formation Model

4-‐1. Step 1. Exchange Personal Information 4-‐2. Step 2. Rotating Roles 4-‐2.1. Team Leader a. Leadership Activities 4-‐2.2. Recorder 4-‐2.3. Oral Presenter 4-‐2.4. Team Rotation Schedule 4-‐3. Step 3. Strengths and Weaknesses 4-‐4. Step 4. Mission Statement 4-‐5. Step 5. Ground Rules -‐ Meeting Team Expectations 4-‐6. Step 6. Team Life Cycles

4-‐7. Step 7. Reporting Activities


4-‐7-‐1. Agenda 4-‐7-‐2. Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report) 4-‐7-‐3. Minutes (optional) 4-‐7-‐4. Oral Presentations 4-‐7-‐5. Team Leader Transition Report 4-‐7-‐6. Completion Report 4-‐7-‐7. Proposal (link to course manual) 4-‐7-‐8. Progress Report (link to course manual) 4-‐7-‐9. Final Paper (link to course manual) 4-‐8. Step 8. Meetings 4-‐9. Step 9. Project Management 4-‐9-‐1. Time Management 5. Entrance Conferences 6. April Lecture 7. Exit Conferences Appendix One -‐ Ground Rules Appendix Two-‐ Templates Appendix Three -‐ Examples Appendix Four -‐ Team Leader Rotation Tasks


Thomas Killman Conflict Mode Inventory

TKI Readings: (Read before Entrance Conference)

See Module 1


2. Active Listening (adapted from Langlois, 2010)

Module 2

Developing effective listening skills is a basic competency for managing teams. Questioning and observing other team members facilitates sharing of important personal information. Talking without focus can be distracting. The more focused the listening process, the more likely team members will explore alternative ways for doing the project, making the team perform successfully, and discussing individual problems. Active listening is a prerequisite for effective team management. When team members fail to listen, the team can become discouraged effecting self-‐exploration, discussions about pertinent issues, while creating impatience about having to discuss and analyze the task and team processes. Active Listening consists of four listening skills that maintain constructive listening techniques. Active listing techniques support the successful formation of relationships and ultimately the effectiveness of the team’s collaboration. Improving communication skills requires team members to “listen” to both verbal and nonverbal messages. Neutrality maximizes communication skills. Specifically, refrain from making judgments and giving advice, resist distractions, and avoid asking too many questions. The following are examples of past students’ comments when students observed their listening skills while trying to actively listen to another student when describing their project. “By doing this exercise, I have realized how easily and how often my mind wanders when someone is talking to me. I am on my own time, and in my own one-‐track mind. But since I was forced to make a summary of what they were saying, I paid more attention, and had to ask more questions, and they had to help me along with my summary. It is important to be a good listener when you are a team leader, so I have found that I need to improve on that. I am also not that great at communication, because I don’t speak enough in formal terms, I usually talk to friends and don’t need to think that much and use that much vocabulary. But I was having a hard time explaining my experiment to Lilah in very clear and technical terms, I could only describe it very simply.”

“Today’s listening activity was more productive than I thought it would be. I was a little skeptical at first. But after actually making an attempt to listen with


all my focus on the speaker, I realized that there is quite a big difference between conversational listening and active listening. The big difference being that in active listening I am paying attention to what the speaker is saying, trying to remember it, and store it away. I think I should actively listen more when I’m in lecture, because that’s the time when I find myself paying the least attention…”

“…The clarification step is the most useful in my opinion. Many times, we are told something and we think that we understand it, but actually don’t understand it the way it’s supposed to be understood or the way that the person who told us understands us to understand it. By repeating it back to them, or clarifying, we ensure that the message is understood in exactly the way that it was intended to be. Summarizing what you learned is also useful. I consider this to be mostly a supplement to the clarification step. I think that a great deal of summarizing goes on during the clarification step… I have a problem with active listening. I’m more of a passive listener and I often skip the clarification step, to the detriment of my understanding. Now that I know the problem, I can employ my new active listening skills to overcome the problem and to become competent in everyday activities related to basic communication. “

Active Listening Skills (See Table I) consists of the following four stages.

1. Clarification: asking open-‐ended questions that help to clarify ambiguous words, phrases or statements, e.g., “What do you mean by (ambiguous word)?” “Can you explain that a little more?” 2. Paraphrase: deals with the content of the communication; rephrasing content as closely as possible to highlight message that was heard; describes a situation, event, person or idea. 3. Reflection: deals with the feelings associated with the content; serves to label feelings correctly and to encourage further expression; refers to the affect part of the message. 4. Summarization: ties the whole communication together by restating both content [paraphrase] and feelings [reflection] in an integrated manner; conveys the impression that team member has been heard.


Table I. Definitions and Intended Purposes of Listening Responses

(Langlois 2010)

Response Definition Intended Purpose

CLARIFICATION A question beginning, e.g., Do you mean that…”, plus a rephrasing of the speaker’s message.

1. To encourage more elaboration. 2. To check out the accuracy of what you heard being said. 3. To clear up vague, confusing messages.

PARAPHRASE A rephrasing of the content of the speaker’s message.

1. To help the speaker focus on the content of his/her message. 2. To highlight content when attention to feelings is premature or self-‐defeating.

REFLECTION A rephrasing of the affective part of the speaker’s message.

1. To encourage speaker to express more of his/her feelings. 2. To have the speaker experience feelings more intensely.

3. To help speaker become more aware of feelings that dominate him/her.

4. To help the speaker acknowledge and manage feelings.

5. To help the speaker discriminate accurately among feelings.

SUMMARIZATION Two or more paraphrases or reflections that condense the speaker’s messages or the session.

1. To tie together the multiple elements. 2. To identify a common theme or pattern. 3. To interrupt excessive rambling. 4. To review progress.


Using Personal Skills for Effective Interventions (Langlois, 2010)

POSITION #1 POSITION #2 EFFECTIVE INTERVENTION

A

A

C

REFLECT Focus on affect, not content

B

B

C

B

B

A

C

C

A

CLARIFY Focus on boundary clarification

PARAPHRASE Rephrase for greater affect

CLARIFY Focus on content & implications

PARAPHRASE Stop; focus on conflict

REFLECT Join team member on affect

CLARIFY Restate content, ask to explain

REFLECT Empower team member

SUMMARIZE Develop closure; set goals


3. Team Formation

Module 3 3.1 Preparation for Forming a Team

Forming a team develops through an understanding about how individual team members cooperate and articulate how they will behave performing a task collaboratively. Individual learning, communicating, and conflict management styles are not identical. When forming a team, understanding these style differences and how to integrate them into a team environment is an integral building block. Initially, your understanding of how you communicate, work, and manage conflict allows you to explain your styles, your personal agenda, and your strengths and weaknesses in relationship to the tasks being performed on the team to the team supports effective team formation. Successful team collaboration is learning to identify team members’ strengths and weaknesses, understanding individual and other team members’ personal expectations. These understandings form a system that will support using the team’s strengths, while developing the weaknesses where appropriate, and deciding which personal expectations can be fulfilled to attain high performance.

Once the individual expectations, conflict management styles, and strengths and weaknesses are delineated ground rules can be formed. Forming ground rules supports a team in understanding each other’s working, learning, and communicating styles. Once these differences in values and thinking are discussed and integrated into the team’s culture collaboration begins. Not discussing these differences can sometimes create interpersonal problems between team members that can escalate and cause performance problems for a team.

Different working styles can be a source of conflict. Successful collaboration includes separating these differences in working styles. These differences are not a personal issue rather a difference that can be incorporated into performing the task and viewing the differences as an opportunity to learn and adapt both members’ styles into a collaborative system that supports the team’s effectiveness.

An example of a common interpersonal problem on a team is when one team member is a friend with another team member and working with them on a project for the first time, the friends find they have different working styles causing frustration for one of the friends. The friend, whose expectations are not being met, avoids the other friend because the friendship is valued. The third team member, unaware of the conflict and sensing discord, then feels left out. The friends feel alienated because they


are avoiding the new conflict in their relationship. The team becomes fragmented. Discussing all team members’ expectations, strengths and weaknesses in specific areas that will impact the team’s overall performance will eliminate problems like this when done in a collaborative setting. Forming and developing ground rules as systems of team behavior can also help ameliorate common team problems.

Behavior is situation specific. Your leadership, conflict, and learning styles are also situation specific. Because these styles are situation specific, learning how to adapt them to a specific situation is a skill. In the above-‐mentioned example, the two friends, having not worked together in a project setting, created a problem because they were relying on their knowledge of their past expectation in social or leisure time situations to be accurate in the new situation, which is not always the case.

Creating ground rules includes creating a system for dealing with conflict and negotiation. The manner in which conflict is dealt within a team setting is different than the method in which conflict is dealt with in a personal relationship. Successful teams honestly discuss past team experiences by identifying their successes and failures and then develop systems to deal with the past problems they encountered.

Identifying the use of these different styles in specific situations requires knowledge and focus. Deciding the appropriate style or behavior for the appropriate situation, adapting the style or behavior, and practicing these skills in a highly organized environment necessitates a high level of competency. To effectively organize a project, scientists and engineers need to be competent at both the team and task process. Bringing all your skills and abilities to bear upon a problem, creates a successful dynamic working environment that is satisfying and harmonious.

Relax and enjoy learning the information. Team building is a growth experience. "While you still have time and resources to maneuver anticipate upcoming limiting forces, which are small now, but can increase as time goes on. You cannot eliminate the limits. You, can however, work with them more effectively, and incorporate them into your next wave of expansion (Senge, 1994).” Collaborating can be very complex and hard to manage in large teams. Mastering collaboration in a small team is a good beginning for learning how to collaborate in a larger team. Remembering that projects begin with forming the team is essential. Forming a team has two essential steps:

1. Team members need to get to know each other quickly. To get to know each other quickly we have organized small group interactive sessions to discuss expectations, similarities and differences, and what strengths and weaknesses each team member possess in the context of the particular project the team is preparing to tackle. In forming your team, openly discussing skills and abilities as rapidly as possible to develop trust. Initially taking the time to talk or “breaking the ice” will develop trust. 2. The teams need an organizational structure that defines boundaries. The structure should include definitions of team roles, ground rules, system for communicating with each other and people outside the team, and a time management plan that establishes boundaries for accomplishing the project.

Competent team members view their team as a living system with a culture of


its own, distinct and apart from the rest of the organization. Being a team member requires becoming a participant and an observer. Effective team membership necessitates knowledge and skill in many areas including knowledge of self, team development, team dynamics, and leadership theory. Other important skills are the development of flexible intervention, observing both the team and the project, diagnosing the team, communication, conflict, and negotiation skills. The topics we will cover in the following discussion are:

1. Definition and Differences Between Team And Task Process 2. What is a Team? 3. Team Life Cycle 4. Mission Statement And How To Create One 5. Ground Rules created as a system of behavior 6. Time Management Plan 7. Conflict Management 8. Development of a Team Culture

3.2 Definition and Differences Between Team and Task Process

Team and task process happens simultaneously when people collaborate on a project and are of equal importance in achieving success. Team and task processes are composed of maintenance behaviors and tasks, structured hierarchically and maintained simultaneously. The first process addressed when doing a project is the team process, to establish effective working relationships amongst the team members. These interpersonal relationships, once structured properly and established as norms within the team, allow the team to effectively communicate, manage conflict, make decisions, and problem solve. Team maintenance behaviors focus on the interaction between individuals while they are accomplishing tasks.

Competent Team Skills are:

1. Active Listening supports the team in competently influencing others, to consider each other’s ideas, and listen actively before directing others to act in a desired manner, which in turn allows the team leader to competently lead. 2. Accountability is defined as understanding the responsibilities of each team member within the team. This ability establishes individual commitment to achieve results by making everyone accountable to equally sharing work and regulating their behavior. An example of the proper use of accountability on a team would be when team members listen to each other’s ideas, then decide which ideas are relevant, and then act upon the decided action. 3. A Bias for Action is when teams collaborate to develop a willingness to work with others to achieve shared success at any time. Working collaboratively develops a Bias for Action, which allows team members to think over a problem before taking action and then appropriately and consistently make decisions when to act and


when to delay. Procrastination on a team can be ineffective. Members must be able to react quickly and move forward after thinking and brainstorming a problem collaboratively. 4. Effective Communication is the ability to utilize multiple communication modes and channels. Effective communication establishes a synergetic team culture that includes recognizing and adhering to Ground Rule Systems developed by the team. A competent team member utilizes all technology available to keep the team high performing and increases resources by being trained in the latest communication technology. 5. Conflict Management involves how to individually and collaboratively plan a negotiation. Competency in this area is being aware of different conflict styles and knowing how to appropriately apply them to different situations. Being able to adapt, be flexible, and work effectively within a variety of situations with team members and others allows team members to understand and manage different perspectives on an issue. Utilizing the knowledge of conflict management styles on a team permits the team leader to understand and expertly use situation specific management skills. Networking helps the team to expertly communicate information to build relationships and use them to accomplish goals and objectives. 6. Team Leadership is the ability to use different leadership styles that are situation specific to achieve high performance for the team. Competency levels on a team are defined as being trained in situational and shared leadership skills. Coaching and supporting each other is acknowledging and utilizing a strong team leader whom is directive and leads by setting firm standards of behavior and accountability through coaching and team building. Teamwork is defined as the ability to lead teams and being a team member who can share work and leadership by individually and mutually being accountable for the equal distribution of work. 7. Assessment of Individual Styles of Behavior allows team members to develop interpersonal understanding of each other. Team members commit to understanding other team members by communicating their behavioral competencies. Competency on a team is learning and developing expertise the use of the assessment tools. 8. Achievement Orientation develops individual critical thinking so the objectives for the team and task process are developed to support each team member’s ability to work to a high standard. 9. Self-Regulation allows team members to regulate their own behavior by using emotional intelligence when faced with negative responses or actions when provoked, in times of conflict or stress. Team members develop a level of competence by becoming aware of their surrounding organizational culture to enable the team to manage the organizational influences to achieve the objectives. The team further develops the ability to utilize informal communication channels and effective decision-‐making to achieve high performance while understanding strategic management. 10. Dedication is the ability to meet objectives under increasingly challenging circumstances while thriving under stress to meet the defined objectives. Most of


the skills and abilities needed to be on a team are already present in each team member. The goal is to recognize and organize these individual skills into efficient and effective systems to perform the tasks. Once the team process is established the task process is planned the goal is to apply the information learned in the Formation Stage of the team’s development to facilitate the execution of the task process. 11. Strategic Orientation is the ability to link long-‐range visions and concepts to daily work supporting the creation of time management plans that creates flexible boundaries and equally distributed workloads for the team. Teams need to understand how to develop strategies in order to develop the ability to facilitate time management to keep the team high performing by managing other people and creating activity lists for the team to follow.

Initial Tasks are: a. Strengths and Weaknesses Identification of the team members in executing

the task is accomplished through the identification of individual technical expertise, which is the specific knowledge, skills, qualifications, or experience required to perform in a particular team. Utilizing this information allows the team to agree on technical skill development, which is the ability to assess technical skills in each other and use them effectively to accomplish the task. The team members apply this knowledge by disseminating the utilization plan amongst themselves and others noting where learning to apply this expertise is still nascent.

b. Personal Expectations and the expectations of others These are written down at the initial meeting for referring to when Team Leader is writing the Team Leader Transition Report.

c. Meeting Times. Most teams decide on meeting times for the entire semester because time management is an issue for most teams it is better to schedule weekly meeting times in advance.

d. A Mission Statement begins the development of applying conceptual thinking to the project. Mission statement development helps team members to feel comfortable thinking of new ways to look at existing problems and detect patterns in systematic reactions to elucidate innovation and application of their existing knowledge. The Mission Statement facilitates defining where the project may still need some development. Mission statements further help the team members to begin to communicate concepts more clearly and accurately in creating a Scope Statement in the individual proposals.

e. Reporting Activities i. Activity Lists are utilized to decompose goals for the team. Team members use analytical thinking allowing the team to consistently use formal and logical deductions successfully, using models and formulas, and scientific solutions to develop the activity lists. Competency in this area is to create goals by analyzing data, applying theory and method while making systematic comparisons of different features, setting priorities on a rational basis, identifying time sequences and causal relationships.


Team Leader Development Model For Team Formation

Leader

Self-‐assessed their own abilities Manages Uncertainty and conflict

Team Process Task Process Know the skill strengths of each team member Know team members’ skill strengths Know weaknesses of team members Know weaknesses of team members Create a team culture Contributions each team member will make? Create concrete, specific, time based goals Provide Logical Framework Is the team risk adverse?

Use Emotional Intelligence and Mindset Management to

Create Systems of Behavior for Team - Ground Rules What are the outside influences on the team?

How will team members communicate? How will team members handle good and bad times?

What type of team leadership will be provided? Clear up areas of uncertainty by providing systems of behavior that is supported by attitudes

and values of team members

Create Logical Framework for Project Discuss individual expertise and motivation Roles and Responsibilities are assigned

Articulate the Vision Establishes scope of project Create direction and focus

Culture

Team Structure Time Management Systems Decision Making Systems

Reporting Activities Power dynamics

How to individually compete Expression of Individual opinions, values and beliefs has been systematized

Action Plans Meeting place

Availability of resources to do the task Individual preferences regarding the environment

Management of environmental changes Conflict Management and Negotiation


3.3 What is a Team?

The basic knowledge of team building begins with learning the difference between a team and a work group. A Work Group is defined as having the following characteristics:

Strong Clearly Focused Leader Individual Accountability

Broad Organizational Mission Individual Work Products Efficiently Run Meetings

Measured Group Effectiveness and Problem-‐Solving Discussions, Decisions and Delegation

Many engineering students exposed to work groups consider them teams. A Team actually has the following characteristics:

Shared Leadership Roles Individual and Mutual Accountability Delivery of a Specific Team Purpose

Collective Work Product Encouragement of Open Ended Discussions

Specific Problem-‐Solving Meetings Performance Directly Measured by Assessing Collective Work Product

Discussions and Decisions about Problem Solving Collaborating and Doing the Real Work Together

(Katzenbach, J. R. & Smith D. K., 1993).

Teams define themselves by the purpose members wish to accomplish, their structure, culture, and environment. Engineers are usually asked to manage or be a member of three types of teams: work teams, knowledge teams, and cross-‐functional teams, which includes research and development teams. A self-‐managed work team responsibly learns how to manage themselves, through shared leadership, organized decision-‐making, and a formal weekly meetings structure.

A knowledge team utilizes team boundaries, shared team leadership, team training and development, participative goal setting, enhanced flexibility, conflict management skills, enhanced creativity, organized decision-‐making, and written and clearly defined participative action plans utilizing technical communication. Knowledge teams require a strong project manager, who can effectively keep open communication with customers and organizational priorities and make the team accountable for their results (Romig & Olson, 1995).

A cross-‐functional team is a team whose participants are from different departments or disciplines that work together in a team to reach a common goal. Shared leadership is very important in cross-‐functional teams because as the action plans for the team develops, different team members lead the team through their area of expertise. Finding a common language and understanding differences in perspective is most important in cross-‐functional teams.


Complex and dynamic work environments require creativity, innovation, effective strategic planning and the ability to define goals and objectives, strengthened by strong decision making. Teams have become an integral part of these environments. Organizations understand that teams can provide rapid consensus across departments, allowing effective prioritization, enhancing creativity, and providing companies with a competitive advantage.

Research on Team Effectiveness: Our research at MIT has shown that the following elements must be present to have continuously effective meetings. a. Meetings are planned by the team leader in advance. Adhering to scheduled weekly

team and faculty meetings for the team throughout the term of the project improve the effectiveness of the project. All members of the team attend meetings if the team is smaller than 4. If the team is larger than 4 members meetings can be effective if a quorum is present at each meeting and the other members are informed of decisions made through the sending of minutes. Decisions that are made without other members being present are placed on the next agenda for review when the team members are present.

b. Agendas are sent out 24 hours in advance of the meeting and other members contribute to the agenda. The agendas are specific and have time estimates that use historic information from past agendas throughout the term.

c. Minutes are taken at each meeting and are sent to each attendee within 48 hours of the meetings. Minutes are used as part of an active listening process, where the notes clarify what was discussed and then each person attending the meeting further clarifies their perspective after reading the recorder’s minutes. Minutes are a collaborative way of continuing the conversation after the meeting is over.

d. Ground Rules need to be effective throughout the life of the team. Rules are reviewed, changed as needed, and followed by all team members. Once the rules are created many teams do not need to refer to them unless there is a conflict.

e. Team leaders are integral to effective planning and successful completion of the project. Team Leaders can make or break a team’s effectiveness.

f. Weekly Progress Reports are filled out accurately so team members can use the and information to plan reports and papers during the term, thereby utilizing the information to save time when writing individual and collaborative reports.

3.4 How to Brainstorming 1. Team Leader sets up an e-‐mail system generating ideas to each other via e-‐mail before a

meeting and come prepared to discuss the ideas at the brainstorming session. 2. Team Leader opens the meeting to discussion, making clear that all opinions will be

respected. 3. Team Leader reviews the problem or subject by asking “why”, “how”, or “what”

questions.


a. Begin by having a well-‐formulated question about the clearly defined problem or subject to be discussed.

b. Ask clarifying questions. 4. Team members need time to think over the problem or subject being discussed. 5. No evaluation or judgment of any of the ideas presented should be voiced, including

nonverbal communications (gestures, etc.), and praise or criticism. a. Remember there are no right or wrong ideas b. Some ideas may not seem appropriate at one moment but may be useful later c. The more ideas the better the brainstorming session d. Build on each others’ ideas e. Combine ideas that are similar if the team agrees f. No discussion on any idea proposed during the generation process g. If your team is pressed for time, you can have team members brainstorm before

the meeting and come prepared with their ideas in writing. This will facilitate the brainstorming session and help the recorder transcribe the ideas.

6. Team Leader is responsible for transitioning the team from the decision-‐making stage of the brainstorming session when appropriate.

7. Recorder is responsible for writing down all expressed idea and communicating them in the Weekly Progress Report as brainstorming session ideas.

4. The Team Formation Model

The following elements are essential for effective team building: 1. Exchange schedules, phone numbers, e-‐mail addresses and record on a team calendar. 2. Choose roles that can be rotated or remain static, i.e. Team Leader, Recorder, Project Planner, Time Keeper, and/or Oral Presenter and know your responsibilities. a. Roles in this course are Team Leader, Recorder, and Oral Presenter 3. Exchange of interpersonal and technical information regarding strengths and weaknesses in the team and task process, including discussing and recording each individual team members’ strengths and weaknesses in the areas that will be utilized to complete the project. 4. Discussion by all involved in the project regarding their expectations of each other. In this course the following expectation will be recorded:


a. Expectations personal for each team member b. Team’s expectations of Faculty Advisor, Teaching Assistant and Industrial Consultant if you have one

c. Faculty Advisor’s expectations of team d. Teaching Assistant’s expectations of team e. Industrial Consultant’s expectations of team 5. Create a Mission Statement to produce a scope statement for a time management plan and for your Proposal. 6. Creation of Ground Rules Systems to be used to perform designated tasks. Including development of a Team System for reporting the team’s activities to other interested parties, i.e. faculty, other team members, team coordinator, and teaching assistants. 8. Weekly Planned Team Meetings, including agendas and recording of the team’s activities. Meetings can be formalized or take place by e-‐mail. In this course meetings are formal and have agendas for both weekly Team and Faculty Meetings.

a. Team Meetings’ focus -‐ preparation, planning, and reporting activities. The meetings have a planned agenda and minutes to record the team’s activities. b. Faculty Meetings’ focus -‐ discussion of recent activities, data and suggestions for future activities.

9. Discussion of the Team Life Cycles and what tasks are associated with each cycle to maintain the team’s effectiveness.

a. In this course this activity is a reporting activity and is reported in the Weekly Progress Report in -‐ Section #4: How is the Team doing?

10. Creating a Project Management Plan to manage time and develop Action Plans, which can be expanded into flexible weekly and daily activity lists for the team.

a. In this course Weekly Activity Lists are created by the Team Leader and are attached to the Agendas for the Weekly Team Meeting for discussion and adjustment.

Using The Team Formation Model (see Entrance Conference Team Booklet for Exercises) 4-‐1-‐1. Exchange Personal Information -‐ Step 1. Exchange schedules, phone numbers, e-‐mail addresses and record on a team calendar. Schedules and planning are essential components of planning a project. Write down all of the classes and extra curricular activities that you will be participating in this term. This individual information can be posted in DropBox or on a team calendar. 4-‐1-‐2. Team Roles -‐ Step 2. Choosing of roles that can be rotated or remain static, i.e. Team Leader, Recorder, Oral Presenter. If there are more than three people in your team, choose to have two leaders and two recorder and two oral presenters for rotations. The more structure that is provided to a team the easier it is for the team to accomplish the task. Part of the basic structure is to assign roles to members of the team. If the project is of short duration (up to four weeks) the roles can be loosely defined, but if the project is longer it is prudent to assign definite roles. Although roles


can be maintained for the duration of the team project, it is educationally more beneficial for roles to rotate or change periodically. The basic roles are team leader and recorder; other possible roles include timekeeper, weekly task organizer, oral presenter, or editor for written reports. There may be additional roles, depending upon the nature of the team project, the size of the team, and the way in which tasks are delineated. 4-‐1.2.a Team Leader -‐ As a team leader, you will use different skills and techniques to employ at different times during the team process. Your most important duty is to ensure the team attends simultaneously to both the task and the team process. The team leader has to commit extra time to effectively manage the team by performing a variety of tasks: 1. Constructing and adhering to the ground rules. 2. Crafting a pragmatic mission statement. 3. Organizing the team meetings, including planning the agenda and preparing any reports that may be assigned for each of the weekly meetings. 4. Creating activity lists and making sure the team timely follows through on these lists, after discussing whether or not members wish to use their strengths or develop one of their weaknesses during the rotation you lead the team. 5. Administrating the everyday affairs of the team, including settling conflicts, handling team members’ frustrations, communicating effectively with the staff and faculty, assigning tasks and managing the scope of the project. The task process is controlled by two factors:

1. What team life cycle stage the team is experiencing 2. The project management plan (proposal)?

The tasks are stage dependent for the team and task process. In the Formation Stage the first task is for the team leader to identify what skills are needed for the project and what skills each team members possess that will help to complete the project. Being Directive is important in the Formation Stage.

For example, directing other members during meetings by creating agendas and using activity lists to delineate tasks allows your team to function more autonomously. If a team member does not possess the necessary skills, the team leader challenges and supports the team member in functioning properly until each team member develops the necessary skills. Under the guidance of the team leader, the team must articulate and commit to goals and objectives, create activity lists, and carry out its mission.

The proper formation of the team is critical to high performance. Many teams resist learning the team process basics and want to go directly to the task work. A competent team leader avoids this narrowing of focus by simultaneously focusing on task process, team process, performance standards, and by guiding the team into individual and mutual accountability. Guiding the team into mutual and individual accountability is accomplished through the construction of the ground rules systems. The organizational climate where the team is being formed can have an important effect upon the team. If an organization believes in supporting team based projects the team


will organize more rapidly. If upper management exerts stricter supervisory control over middle management this environment may detract from the rapid and effective formation of teams. The team leader is responsible for defining and managing this effect for the team.

Monitoring progress and ensuring that your project plans are completed is important to becoming high performing. The team leader assigns monitoring responsibilities to other team members so that the momentum is maintained and the team is ensured that they are focused on solutions to their problems and that each team member takes actions within their direct control. The team does not want to become bogged down with waiting for other members to change their behavior. Remember, as a team, always celebrate your progress and agree to take new steps to ensure that you can enjoy the fulfillment that comes from achieving your objectives together. Team leaders influence individuals and teams within an organization, help to establish goals, and act as guides toward the achievement of those goals, thereby allowing the team to become effective. Traits of an effective team leader are team members who help maintain internal health and external adaptability. Two key leadership behaviors are initiating structure and consideration.

1. Initiating structure is the degree to which the leader organizes and defines relationships in the team by activities such as assigning specific tasks, specifying procedures to follow, scheduling work, and clarifying expectations of team members. Measures of effective initiating structure activities are creating ground rules, the ability to formulate and suggest new ideas and listening to others’ ideas, encouragement of slow-‐working people to work harder, emphasizing meeting deadlines, scheduling regular team meetings to discuss issues and resolve conflict, the ability to maintain the team’s focus on the mission, and effective team maintenance by keeping the team members collaborating and working to capacity.

2. Consideration is the degree to which the leader creates an environment of emotional support, warmth, friendliness, and trust. Measures of Consideration are doing personal favors for team members, treating team members equally, being willing to make changes in ground rules when they are not effectively maintaining the team, and supporting the members of your team during difficult times. A key example of good team management is when a team leader creates a team culture where team members do not complain but state problems and brainstorm solutions, thereby avoiding the complaint process. The Team Life Cycle -‐ Criticism Stage is a good example of where competent team leadership can use this stage to the team’s advantage where the team explores their problems regarding the scope of the project and resources available and learn to work within realistic parameters to move the project forward.

To use these key leadership dimensions effectively a team leader encourages all team members to participate in initiating and consideration techniques including decision-‐making, setting deadlines, supporting each other, open ended discussion,


problem-‐solving, time management, and participation. Team leaders are skillful at juggling the two dimensions effectively in interpersonal and task-‐related relationships. An example of good leadership in a 1026 team as described in the Team leader Transition Report:

“One problem we had as a team was meeting internal deadlines that were set in advance of actual class deadlines. The new team leader should be more assertive in making sure that assignments are completed by internal team deadlines so that there is enough time for the team as a whole to review them before they have to be submitted. The new team leader should also try to reschedule faculty and team meetings well in advance if necessary in order to accommodate all members’ schedules. In general the team leader should be flexible and courteous and take into account all members’ views before making final decisions. She should maintain a balance of strict deadlines and flexible scheduling understanding. She should also try to maximize lab time by having members work on assignments during our two hour incubation period in lab. The team leader should also consider each team members’ strengths and weaknesses in delegating tasks. All four members have good experimental ability, but our analytical and writing abilities differ greatly as described in the individual strengths and weaknesses sections.”

Developing a team is different than running a working group. A working group has a clearly focused leader while a team shares leadership roles. In a team there is mutual and individual accountability while in a working group there is only individual accountability. A team is characterized by common commitment (Dubrin, 1995). A team generates collective and individual work products. Team leaders support the development of norms and encourage collaboration. The leader understands that commitment to the task is primary. The leader helps define the mission of the team during all the Team Life Cycle stages. 4-1.2.b Team Recorder - The Recorder’s major responsibility is to write and e-‐mail the Weekly Memorandum (template Appendix 2) and to accurately reflect the agreed upon perspective of the team members. The Recorder for the team uses active listening, to clarify the points that are being transcribed during the meetings. During the week, the Recorder is responsible for keeping the Weekly Activity Lists up to date once the Team Leader creates the lists. If there is not a separate timekeeper the recorder is also responsible for keeping the team on time during meetings. The role of Recorder is rotated on the same day your team rotates the Team Leader and Oral Presentation role. The Recorder is responsible for keeping track of the team’s discussions at meetings and during laboratory time. Although optional, preparing minutes and e-‐mailing them to the team can help the team prepare the Weekly Memorandum that is distributed to team members, team coordinator, industrial consultant, teaching assistant, and faculty advisor. Minutes include daily and weekly assignments for each lab session and team meeting, name of person doing the task and estimated time to do the tasks. It is a good idea to spend five minutes at the end of each meeting to review minutes with the team. Once the Team Leader and the team assigns the tasks for the


week or the laboratory period, the Recorder is responsible for keeping the activity list of the daily and weekly task assignments, lab sessions, and team meetings up to date. Why should the Recorder take notes at a meeting? Minutes help the team to focus their attention on what is important. In this way the whole team does not have to take notes and two team members can focus completely on listening and can help the recorder after the meeting clarify some points he/she may have missed. Minutes help to establish and legitimize all points of view. Taking notes encourages participation. Minutes are a collaborative tool because when they are distributed after a meeting the information can be clarified and can open up discussions about points that remain unclear or need to be acted upon by the team. Minutes once read by the team can be sued to clear up misunderstandings and inaccuracies or unclear concepts the team thought were clearly defined. Learning to record minutes properly is a skill. To take competent notes, record key words on flip charts or on a computer screen. Use speaker’s words and don’t interrupt. Ask group to slow down if necessary. Minutes provide a record of what took place at a meeting. In the notes record ideas, data, questions, actions, and agreements. Do not record “Who said what”. Record what was agreed upon, what is to be accomplished by the next meeting, who is responsible for what task, what is the schedule for the next meeting, and assignments in the following week. Using the notes, the Team Leader can prepare an agenda for the next meeting. Minutes can vary in format and level of detail. What needs to be recorded is predicated on what will be used in the next week by the team and what will be needed to prepare a cohesive and clear Weekly Progress Report that follows the guidelines set by your faculty advisor. Minutes should be organized including at the beginning actions and decisions and then detailed explanations. IT IS IMPORTANT TO NOTE THAT SOME FACULTY ADVISORS FEEL THAT RECORDING MINUTES INTERRUPTS THE FLOW OF A MEETING. PLEASE CHECK WITH YOUR FACULTY ADVISOR ON WHETHER THEY FEEL THAT MINUTES ARE AN ITERRUPTION TO THEIR MEETING. There are different types of recording techniques. E-‐mail has made many of the initial recording techniques obsolete. Using a laptop or an IPAD at a meeting is the best technique. Here are a few essentials; title with date, Team number and number pages if the minutes are longer than one sheet, identify minutes as being part of which sequentially numbered Weekly Progress Report, separate ideas with a line, mark an idea with a bullet, leave margins, maintain minutes on a server or document manager system (using a collaboration tool like Drop Box is a good idea or post on Stellar, or create a team web page), via e-‐mail publish timeline changes immediately to team and have an electronic space where they can be referred to in subsequent meetings. The Recorder must also check in with the Team Leader and make sure that the Team Section of the Weekly Progress Report is filled out accurately. 4-‐1.2c Team Oral Presenter -‐ Responsible for creating an oral presentation plan with the CI instructor and other team members at the beginning of each rotation. The team creates an oral presentation system in the ground rules and makes corrections in the system when necessary so that the system meets their needs. The CI instructor will conduct an Oral Presentation Session, which will be about 2 weeks before the first presentation, giving your team a chance to chat about your presentation outline and


how the team will collaborate on the presentation. The presenter will make the plan more concrete. Then, after the 1st presentation event and during the weekly CI meeting, the team can reflect with the CI instructor on how the oral presentation collaboration was accomplished successfully or what needs to be changed to make it more productive for the team. This reflective time will be held for the second rotation as well and the same procedures will be continued. 1. In charge of organizing data and communicating changes in the presentation to the

other team members. 2. Will make slides; team members will make suggestions and act as sounding boards. 3. Practice at least twice in front of other team members, teaching assistants or faculty

advisor. 4. In control of organizing and planning the presentation. 5. Expected to thoroughly understand the material in order to field questions. 6. Consults with the team and faculty advisor and agrees upon what information

regarding the project's progress, including data and experiment plans, will be presented. The presenter is responsible for accurately presenting the information.

4-‐1-‐2d. Team Rotation Role Planner (part of Entrance Conference Team Booklet used during

teambuilding lecture) - In this course you must rotate roles on the evening of the Oral Presentation. Once the team has decided on their Rotation Schedule, the recorder will access the website through the Announcement Section on the team building website

called Rotation Schedule http://web.mit.edu/collaborationtbox/index.html and type in

the Rotation Schedule information. For each Role for each Rotation please include the

person’s name, e-‐mail and telephone number. Please complete by February 12. Do not touch any other team’s work on this website because you could delete another team's information. FOLLOW DIRECTIONS AND FORMAT EXPLICITLY.

4-‐3. Strengths and Weaknesses (part of Entrance Conference Team Booklet used during teambuilding

lecture) - Step 3. Exchange of interpersonal and technical information integrating strengths and weaknesses into the team and task process, which includes a discussion and recording of each individual team members’ strengths and weaknesses in the areas that will be utilized in the team and task process. Team members, during the teambuilding lecture, list their strengths and weaknesses in specific areas (Appendix Two). Also list your individual expectations and team expectations. The team uses this personal information to delegate tasks and form ground rules. Student team leaders assign tasks and should assign tasks by following the expectations of the team. Teams can allow members to develop their weaknesses into strengths and/or utilize each team members' strengths to establish a high performing team. In 10.26/27/29, a team is considered high performing when a team allows members to choose a weakness to develop into a strength and the team members support the development of that individual weakness into a strength. If the development of that weakness into a strength becomes too cumbersome to the overall


mission of the project and the team, the team can decide to allow another team member who is strong in that area to take over the task. The major tasks that the team cannot reorient are: Team Roles and Writing the Individual Proposal. It is important if you are strong at leading others that when another team member is leading the team and is less capable at this task to "sit on your hands" and be supportive of the other team member's time as team leader. Be supportive and make suggestions but do not take over the role to move the project along. If the problem is deterring the success of the project the team coordinator and the faculty advisor should be informed. Team Coordinator discussions are confidential and should be utilized because corrective measures can be instituted to support the team's success. The proposal and the oral presentation are collaborative processes only the actual writing of the proposal and the actual presenting of the information about your project are individual accomplishments. 4-‐4. Mission Statement (part of Entrance Conference Team Booklet used during teambuilding lecture) -

Step 4. Creating a mission statement that can be utilized to create a scope statement for a time management plan. A mission statement can generate a mental image to stimulate an emotional response that can serve to invigorate and motivate the team. A mission statement describes the best possible outcome and asserts the team’s ability to articulate and execute a vision. The mission statement determines the creativity, quality and originality of a team’s ideas and solutions. A powerful mission statement should stretch expectations and aspirations helping the team to jump out of their comfort zone. The team leader facilitates the team in the creation of the Mission Statement. A vision statement can be a corporate long term goal. Your mission statement will be your team’s long term goal for the project with specific references to how you will interact as a team as well as how you will plan the project. The success of a project is the ability of the team to make the transition from idea to action. New projects can become stalled during the transition from forming ideas to accomplishing them. Teams need to organize the project development process by creating a mission statement, prioritizing tasks, and evaluating team performance through developed systems of behavior called ground rules. The Mission Statement consist of three elements:

One, define the Project's primary goals. Goals are the foundation and the reasons for coming together to accomplish the project. This element may be augmented and expanded or change direction during a research project therefore reviewing the Mission Statement for accuracy is important. Discussions are focused on:

1. Defining flexibility and ability to continuously improve team and task process 2. Explain the team’s commitment to innovative approaches for maintaining quality

task approaches to problem solving 3. Define the purpose, values and direction of the team by providing a clear and

compelling statement of the team’s direction 4. What the team will be doing long term 5. State the team’s objectives


6. Discuss how you are going to achieve extraordinary goals Two, define the project's formal organizational structure. Use ground rules, meetings, reporting activities and other team structures to support the organizational structure. This element changes to facilitate the project's goals. Discussions are focused on: 1. Definition of your team culture 2. Authority for team to improve 3. Team’s commitment to innovative approaches for maintaining quality team

approaches to problem solving 4. Sources of the team’s competitive strengths and advantages (use exercises). Three, define the project's daily operational structure. Use your knowledge of each other’s strengths and weaknesses and time availability to create daily operational structure. This element may change to meet the project's goals within the context of resources available. Discussions are focused on: 1. Describing communication structure 2. Plan how to be flexible and to continuously improve team and task process. 3. Discuss a system to be used for innovation and quality 4. Create a system for problem-‐solving 5. How to implement qualifications for a quality work product. How to Use a Mission Statement in a Project Setting: 1. Mission statements are the first collaborative effort in the team. 2. The team periodically reviews the mission statement to make any revisions the team

deems necessary. 3. Use the mission statement and ground rules to empower the team and create

systems of behavior that the team can follow to fix and prevent problems. 4. Ground Rules develop team norms that encourage successful task completion and

promote an equal work distribution. 5. Commitment to a vision improves teamwork and helps the team to establish an

ethical system of research.

Projects have specific objectives that need to be supported by their own project culture. Projects include an assemblage of people enveloping a concept or idea and particular action. Discovering, and even more important creating, and maintaining the character of that persona, is an important job of the project manager and supporting organization. If a project team truly intends to complete their mission, they must deflect the temptation to depart from their statement unless as in some cases the project may reinvent itself as research leads in a different direction, therefore any mission statement created for a research project team must include the idea of flexibility, the ability to collaborate and change their mission and follow where the


research leads your team. If your team stays true to a flexible strategy, and maintains a purposeful ethical persona that is articulated in the mission statement your chances for a successful conclusion to the project are enhanced. (Adapted from Nahavandi, A., 1997. The Art and Science of Leadership. London, UK: Prentice Hall International Dubrin, A.J., 1995. LEADERSHIP Research Findings, Practice, and Skills. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.)

10.26 Mission Statement Example -‐ The team will pursue our goal of creating a bifunctional catalyst for dry reforming of methane, while encouraging members to share their strengths and abilities. An open and collaborative environment will be promoted to allow each individual to gain engineering experience, permitting the mastery of interpersonal skills needed to achieve success in an industrial or research setting. The team is committed to work efficiently and to continually assess each individual’s and the team’s progress to ensure a successfully well tested, quality catalytic design that is reproducible.

Examples of Company Mission Statements are provided in Appendix Two. 4-‐5. Ground Rules -‐ Meeting the Team's Expectations - Step 5. Creation of ground rules including expectations of individual team members, faculty and consultants. A system maintains its existence through the mutual interaction of its parts. The key emphasis is that a mutual interaction is occurring between the parts, over time, which maintains the system. A collaborative system is different from a hierarchy where the mutual interaction is predicated upon the power dynamic. Systems Thinking Theory view individuals and organizations within the context of their environments. Systems Thinking is based on the work of Ludwig von Bertalanffy. By grasping the fundamentals of how an organization functions, as a system within a set of larger systems, it is possible to work through the complexity and arrive at real, effective solutions to difficult individual, business or organizational problems. People and an organization do not exist as an island, but as part of a larger matrix of systems that function, more or less independently, yet interdependently. Viewing a project as a system of behavior allows the team to investigate systems that support understanding of the project and how each individual can contribute to reach the goals of a successful conclusion to the project. Often the understanding is an emergent result of trial and error. The ground rules are a tool to help the team develop understanding of how the team will work collaboratively to complete the project.

Emergent behavior can result from most ground rules systems. Individual behavior not accounted for within the ground rule system can emerge, therefore it is important that the team members accurately describe their strengths, weaknesses, motivations, and how they behave in regard to lateness to meetings, working collaboratively and how they manage their time.

Ground rules are systems of behavior that the team will use to establish boundaries amongst themselves, clarify how they will implement tasks, and how they


will behave while accomplishing the project. Creating a Ground Rules System is used to promote understanding of the project, including creating patterns of behavior resulting in successful completion the task. Once the team members commit to the project the leader manages the underlying structure responsible for the patterns of behavior. Being interested in successfully completing a project and understanding the underlying structure will enable the team to identify the most appropriate rules that define the optimum behavior that will support effective project management. This is the ground rules system.

The first step in creating the system of ground rules is to define each situation everyone believes the team will encounter while doing the project.

1. Are you going to write a collaborative paper or are their papers being written individually? What rules will be needed to make this task run smoothly?

2. Who will be the spokesperson for the team and will the spokesperson be determined by technical expertise or by appointment.

3. How will tasks be delegated? 4. When, where and how will the team meet? 5. How will the team meetings be organized and will one person take

notes? The ideal is to have the team learn to anticipate problems they may encounter

while doing the project and incorporate solutions to these problems into the ground rules. Asking the right questions is imperative to success. If when initially questioning each other, the inquiries are data focused then data focused rules will be created. If the questions are relationship focused, i.e. cause and effect, then the questions will seek to employ cause and effect relationships. But if the team leader can promote asking questions that seek out solutions to understanding the patterns responsible for the situations ground rules that represent knowledge of the project and the individuals performing the tasks associated with the projects will ensue. (adapted from http://www.systems-‐

thinking.org, Gene Bellinger. Z 2009) One of the most important aspects of a ground rules system is a collaborative

feedback loop. In many teams the feedback loop created is a negative feedback loop rather than a collaborative one. Team Leaders are responsible for creating positive collaborative feedback loops that are incorporated into the ground rules system. It is essential when deciding what activities need to be clearly defined to determine where to draw boundaries. Limiting and expanding will always create compromises. Excessively limiting what activities need to be clearly articulated may narrow the rules as to omit some of the relevant interactions essential to making the ground rules relevant to managing the team. Further some teams create cultures with extensive ground rules which work exemplary while others create few ground rules ultimately running into problems as behaviors emerge that were not well defined in the ground rule system.

Revisiting the ground rules on a regular basis, especially during times of stress, should initially support the team to question if changes to the ground rules system are needed to make working together more effective and efficient. The ground rules


system should include a combination of balancing and reinforcing structures. Bertalanffy's initial premise is that there are fundamental structures, which interact across all systems and, if one learns the structures, when transferring from one discipline to another, much of the learning can be transferred. When studying a new discipline, one simply has to learn the labels on the structures in the new discipline. Therefore agreeing upon the definition ambiguous labels (as in the Competency Dictionary) such as respect, being non-‐judgmental, honesty, and trust support the system being functional. You can consider the balancing and reinforcing structures as building blocks, which can be combined in numerous ways to describe more intricate interactions. Therefore, when revisiting the ground rules have a set of problems that have come up during the project’s execution and ask how the problems can be solved by incorporating changes to the system already developed. An example from a past team follows:

“The Ground Rules proved to be a very effective way of managing team tasks and we referred back to them once the Proposal and Oral presentation deadlines were approaching. Referring back to the rules helped to keep each person on track with their responsibilities to the team and was a good indicator of why things may not have worked. In my opinion, our ground rules were very comprehensive and should be carried forward into the next rotation without any changes. There was one area of the ground rules that was not adhered to which led to some difficulties in the preparation of the oral presentation. Flexibility was allowed with who modified the presentation. However, we realized that this was not an effective means of preparation. So we consulted with our faculty advisor who gave us excellent feedback on how to move forward with our time management and delegation of tasks.” It is important to have a system of follow-‐through involving the team, your industrial consultant, your teaching assistant and faculty advisor in the problem-‐solving process. The system’s key elements should build short-‐term momentum by implementing the 10.26 procedures and continuing to deepen people’s understanding about the procedures as changes are made. Whenever possible, team leaders involve all team members by first helping to develop your own insights about why the team’s systems function as they do, and as time goes by encourage clarification on what the team has initially created. Part of your ground rules system will be a procedure for Principle-‐Centered Negotiations used when the team encounters internal and external conflicts. The ground rules system when designed appropriately initiates negotiation and consensus building.

Individual behavior not accounted for within the ground rule system can emerge, therefore it is important that the team members accurately describe their strengths, weaknesses, motivations, and how they behave in regard to lateness to meetings, working collaboratively and how they manage their time. When emergent behavior results from your ground rule system, the team should clearly define the emergent behavior and decide whether or not to adopt the behavior and change the ground rule system it is effecting or to have the Team leader monitor the emergent behavior and extinguish it. An example of a behavior a team may want to extinguish is:


“Our biggest weakness continues to be our tendency to procrastinate, though there has been an improvement over the course of the semester. The busy schedules of the group members often make it difficult for us to meet our internal deadlines. However, there was a marked improvement from the writing of the original progress report to the revisions of the progress report. The writing process for the original progress report was poorly organized and procrastinated (and rushed through) to the very last minute. The group had a long (voluntary and unofficial) group meeting to work on the progress report revisions together in which the team was able to bond as well as efficiently complete the revisions.”

Here are some areas that may need further defining in order to continue a collaborative environment for the team: 1. “Accidental Adversaries” are problems that emerge that are no one’s fault, including

but not limited to, scarcity of resources or resources that did not arrive on time, equipment failures, inability to meet with stakeholders that you need to help further the project, and health issues. This part of the system points out how myopic local activity, with the best of intentions, can lead to an overall limiting development for completing the project, and can actually inhibit moving the project ahead on time.

2. “Drifting Goals” is when one set of goals or expectations actually inhibits the goals and expectations of another system. A gap in understanding what is occurring happens and frustration mounts, then discussions and actions need to be taken to reduce the anxiety and develop better understanding on how to move forward.

3. “Escalation” is the system that allows the team to take their results, no matter whether than are viewed as negative or positive and reframe then into an system that produce better understanding of themselves and the project and allows the team to work more productively.

4. “Fixes that Fail” are when decisions are made by the team or an outsider that disrupt the flow of the project and changes that need to be made in the underlying ground rule system are not adapted to the changes.

5. “Growth of Time Investment” is when the project as initially structured is changed because of changes to the project, deadlines changed or after the project is underway the team realizes that more time investment is needed to complete the project successfully. Ground rules may need to be reorganized

6. “Underinvestment of Time” is when the team members’ focus has been deliberately changed to other pressing matters and the project begins to lag.

7. “Limits to Success” is when the team realizes that their initial model of success needs changes due to outside or inside pressures and limits.

8. “Shifting the Burden” is when the project is being pulled in a direction by foreseen and unforeseen circumstances which is creating an undesired result.

9. “Success to the Successful” is creating self-‐fulfilling prophecies, which are actually the result of unperceived influences.

10. Tragedy of the Commons is when the team initially uses a resource but after time the total activity of the reinforcing structures exceeds the capacity of the resource, which results in a reduction of the growing action for each of the reinforcing structures.


THE GROUND RULES SYSTEM – INCORPORATING KNOWLEDGE INTO A SYSTEM Setting the Ground Rules

Ground rules are established during the initial team meeting. There is a list of past ground rule examples are provided under Appendix One. The rules are reviewed as problems become apparent in the team. Ground rules support the team members in understanding the framework or structure of the team. Ground rules help to establish, clearly define, and develop mutual understanding about the team's culture. Knowledge teams working in laboratories function in six major environments:

1. Laboratories, 2. Writing papers, 3. Individual oral presentations, 4. Communicating with your faculty advisor and/or industrial advisor, and the team

coordinator. 5. Team and Meeting decorum 6. Conflict management

“Norms” (rules which will predicate how you will act as a team member) will need to be established in all five areas. These are your ground rules. These rules are in writing. The rules are specific, clear, and concise. Copies of the ground rules are sent to designated people. Ground rules are systems of behavior. Procedure to follow to formulate ground rules:

1. Choose ground rules from list provided on website and then 2. Develop others that would be unique to your team 3. Make sure to cover all areas of team interaction and plan ahead.

Overall Participation: 1. Discuss team ethics 2. Make an agreement to help each other to meet the team's goals 3. Commit to fulfilling your personal responsibility 4. Commit to sharing ideas 5. Commit to support each other in work 6. Reinforce positive ways to communicate support to each other and utilize the

team's strength to be high performing 7. Commit to being on time 8. Commit to preparing materials in advance 9. Share the work equally 10. System for brainstorming, including how you will present your ideas and narrow your

decision 11. System for decision-‐making 12. System for Identifying, defining, and setting the quality requirements for the team 13. System for reviewing the task assignment process including data analysis, writing

assignments and oral presentations. 14. System for holding meetings

a. Decide on regular times for weekly team and faculty meetings. b. Decide how team will conduct short informal meetings, to maintain

communication between the weekly, formalized meetings.


c. Plan with the team what evaluation criteria your team will use to assess if the meeting and how to implement evaluation process.

15. System for conflict management. 10.26/27/29 GROUND RULES FOR BEING TIMELY The following are NOT excuses for not being timely with assignments, showing up for team meetings, labs, or timely E-‐MAILING Weekly Progress Reports, or agendas.

1. Being a Double Major 2. Athletic Practices 3. Extra Curricula Activities 4. Ineffectual Organization of Team or Collaborative Experience in ICE 5. Lack of Organization in ICE by leaving ICE assignments to last minute 6. Having to track you down and get you to do an assessment 7. Other team member has part of assignment and you can not locate them 8. Faculty Advisor says you do not have to do it

Excuses for missing an assignment are 1. Job interviews 2. Graduate School Interviews 3. Confirmed Illness

Accepted excuses must be communicated in advance with alternative plan to make up the assignment. References Beer, S. (1975). A Platform for Change. New York: John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Clemson, B. (1991). Cybernetics: A New Management Tool. Philadelphia: Gordon and Breach. Davidson, M. (1996). The Transformation of Management. Boston. Butterworth-‐Heinemann. Extend. Imagine That Inc Goodman, M. & Karash, R. & Lannon, C. & O'Reilly, K. W., & Seville, D. (1997). Designing a Systems Thinking Intervention. Waltham, MA. Pegasus Communications, Inc. ithink. isee Systems (Previously High Performance Systems). myStragey. Strategy Dynamics Inc. O'Connor, J. (1997). The Art of Systems Thinking: Essential Skills for Creativity and Problem Solving. London: Thorsons, An Imprint of Harper Collins Publishers. Richmond, B. (2001). An Introduction to Systems Thinking. Hanover, NH. High Performance Systems. Senge, P. (1990). The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization. New York: Doubleday Currency. Vensim PLE & Vensim. Ventana Systems. Warren, K. (2002). Competitive Strategy Dynamics. West Sussex, England. John Wiley & Sons.


4-‐6. Team Life Cycle Stages -‐ Step 6. Discussion of the Team Life Cycle and what tasks are associated with each cycle to maintain the team’s effectiveness. Teams develop and move through stages and have an agreed upon defined structure, equally maintained by all team members while a work group has a defined leader, who is defining, assessing, and directing the other group members in developing and performing the task. Teams can develop more flexibility than a work group by providing the members with a structure that allows the team members to become mutually and individually accountability to the team as an entity unto itself. To create this mutual and individual accountability a team needs structural, behavioral, and communication models that provide rules and boundaries. Team members get to know each other, learn about each team member's personal competencies, needs, mind-‐sets, and negotiation and conflict management skills. Teams function in organizational environments that are ever changing. Providing team members with the proper tools and structure to make the team into a distinct entity with its own culture assures that the team can effectively communicate their accomplishments with others in the organization. Because the work environment is ever changing, teams are ever changing. These changes are called team life cycle changes. The five stages of team development are formation, criticism, synthesis, accomplishment, and completion. Understanding these stages is critical because teams progress and regress through these stages of development. When a high performing team looses a team member, the team is pushed back into the formation stage of development and has to explain the goals and boundaries to the new team member. Equipment failure can make a team who is in the accomplishment a stage be pushed back into the criticism stage. Understanding the progress and regression of stage development is useful in these circumstances because different sets of tasks need to be accomplished when a team is in a particular stage in order for the team to effectively maintain the team and task processes. To understand team stage development, there are mitigating factors that must be kept in mind when collaborating with others. All team members have personal agendas that they wish to maintain while working collaboratively. These are the outside pressures that team members feel in a team. Part of each person’s personal agenda includes the desire to work and be viewed as competent. Assessment of yourself and other team members help to structure each member’s competencies to support the performance of a team. Reporting on the changes in the Weekly Progress Reports Section 4. Is not a competition to see if your team can move through the stages quickly. Identifying the stages is to present to the faculty and the team coordinator your knowledge of how the team is operating using an identification system that supports effective communication. Bruce W. Tuckman, a psychology professor at Ohio State University developed in the mid-‐1960s the most common framework for a team's stages of development. We have modified the names and descriptions to more fully describe a 10.26 team. The five team cycles are Formation, Criticism, Synthesis, Accomplishment, and Completion. Team Life Cycles: (The Life Cycle of Teams by Sharon Feltham, Excellerate) (Bruce W. Tuckman,


“Development Sequence in Small Groups”, Psychological Bulletin. 1965. In 1977 Tuckman (in collaboration with Mary Ann Jensen) updated the model to include the fifth stage – adjourning)

STAGE 1 FORMATION

“Honeymoon “ period

Excitement, anticipation, and optimism Initial, tentative commitment to the team

Suspicion, fear and anxiety about ability to accomplish the task Skepticism about what role team member will play on team

Idealistic discussion of concepts and issues Impatient about having to discuss the process

Complaints about barriers to the task Resistance to building team, focus on task

Team members strengths and weaknesses are discussed but not accepted Ground Rules are established

Challenge – Creating a purpose and managing team membership. What does it look like? Team members are reserved and polite, putting on their best behavior to create a good first impression. Conflict is avoided at all costs because of the need to be accepted into the group. There may be a sense of excitement and opportunity, but also cautiousness and uncertainty about the future. Team members reflect not only on the tasks at hand, but also about each other. Initial ground rules are established as the team begins to discover how to work together. Feelings -‐ During the Formation stage of team development, team members are usually excited to be part of the team and eager about the work ahead. Members often have high positive expectations for the team experience. At the same time, they may also feel some anxiety, wondering how their personal agenda will fit into the team and if their performance will measure up. Behaviors -‐ Behaviors observed during the Formation stage may include being inquisitive by asking a multitude of questions, reflecting both their excitement about the new team and the uncertainty or anxiety they might be feeling about their place on the team. They share insights into personal and group process and are aware and share their own (and each other's) strengths and weaknesses. Team members explore how they will work together by identifying the boundaries of both interpersonal and task behaviors. Time is spent assessing other team members and their commitment to the project. Team evaluates potential risks and rewards Time is spent establishing relationships with leaders and other team members. Team Tasks -‐ The principal work for the team during the Formation stage is to create a team with clear structure, goals, direction and roles so that members begin to build trust. To develop a good orientation for team members, the team discusses the development of ground rules and their personal expectations of themselves, the team, the project, and any other person involved in the project. These discussions help to ground the members in terms of the team's mission and goals, and can establish team expectations about both the team's product and, more importantly, the team's process. During the Formation stage, much of the team's energy is


focused on defining the team so task accomplishment may be relatively low. Having the team leader create weekly activity lists allows the team to move in a specific direction. Questions -‐ What are we supposed to do together?

Do I want to get involved in this? Is everyone committed to this? How can I contribute? What is expected of me? What are the pros and cons to being on this team? What are the personal agendas of the other team members? Will we get along? What will you contribute?

Can I trust you?

STAGE 2 CRITICISM

Ground rules are ignored Near panic sets in over the realization of how much work lies ahead

Resistance to the task Sharp fluctuations in attitude about the team

Skepticism about the project’s chances of success Argument begin amongst team members although there is agreement on the real issues

Defensiveness Competition

Doubt over the competence of superiors who chose the project

Challenge – Managing expectations and roles. What does it look like? Differences in opinion are more common and are expressed more openly. Conflicts emerge around interpersonal issues and task needs. Power struggles may emerge as leadership is challenged and factions begin to form. Team members compete for positions, challenge goals, the group influence and resist task requirements. Note: Many groups commonly stall at this stage. If the ground rules, strengths and weaknesses and personal expectations have been discussed properly in the Formation Stage many of these characteristics are not present such as ignoring ground rules, sharp fluctuation in attitude and competitiveness. Feelings -‐ As the team begins to move towards its goals, members discover that the team can't live up to all of their early excitement and expectations. Their focus may shift from the tasks at hand to feelings of frustration or anger with the team's progress or process. Members may express concerns about being unable to meet the team's goals. During the Criticism stage, members are trying to see how the team will respond to differences and how it will handle conflict. This is when the ground rules systems for conflict and negotiation become relevant, and the team leader will need to organize how the team’s strengths and weaknesses will be utilized or compensated for. Behaviors -‐ Behaviors during the Criticism stage may be less polite than during the Formation stage, with frustration or disagreements about goals, expectations, roles and responsibilities being openly expressed. Members may express frustration about


constraints that slow their individual or the team's progress; this frustration might be directed towards other members of the team, the team leadership, the team coordinator or the faculty advisor. During the Criticism stage, team members may argue or become critical of the team's original mission or goals. Some of the behavioral pitfalls are: challenging the team’s purpose, splintering into subgroups, struggling for power and control, resisting tasks and authority, and avoiding dealing with underlying tensions and hidden agendas. Team Tasks -‐ Team Tasks during the Criticism stage of development call for the team to refocus on its goals, perhaps breaking larger goals down into smaller, achievable steps. Reviewing the Mission Statement and changing specific elements can help the team to foster more cohesiveness. The team may need to develop both task-‐related skills and group process and conflict management skills. A redefinition of the team's goals, roles and tasks can help team members past the frustration or confusion they experience during the Criticism stage. Questions -‐ Why are we doing this?

What’s the point? Why are we doing it this way? Why don't we do it that way?

STAGE 3 SYNTHESIS Team members learn to work together successfully

Resistance fades Collaborative efforts are initiated

Team members begin to give each other positive criticism Members begin to reestablish a harmonious team culture

Commitment to the task Realistic planning takes place

Conflict management is established and agreed upon The team’s mission is beginning to be realized

Team and personal goals are discussed and implemented Ground rules are implemented

Maintenance of team is established Discussion begins on how to maintain the team culture Beliefs, assumptions, and values are acknowledged

Progress on the task is significant

Challenge – Managing relationships and task efforts. What does it look like? A sense of renewed optimism as the team begins to feel a sense of team identity. Team members experience increased cooperation as roles and responsibilities become clearer and agreement on the team culture and expectations for behavior are reached. Feelings -‐During the Synthesis stage of team development, team members begin to resolve the discrepancy they felt between their individual expectations and the reality of the team's experience. If the team is successful in setting more flexible and inclusive


norms and expectations, members should experience an increased sense of comfort in expressing their "real" ideas and feelings. Team members feel an increasing acceptance of others on the team, recognizing that the variety of opinions and experiences makes the team stronger and its product richer. Constructive criticism is both possible and welcomed. Members start to feel part of a team and can take pleasure from the increased group cohesion. Behaviors -‐ Behaviors during the Synthesis stage may include members making a conscious effort to resolve problems and achieve group harmony. There might be more frequent and more meaningful communication among team members, and an increased willingness to share ideas or ask teammates for help. Team members refocus on established team ground rules and practices and return their focus to the team's tasks. Teams may begin to develop their own language (nicknames) or inside jokes. Leader spends time implementing the team’s performance expectations, re-establishing specific roles and operating procedures. Roles are defined for problem solving. Ground rule system for settling conflicts is clarified. The team culture is reorganized and established with more concrete boundaries. Team Tasks -‐During the Synthesis stage, members shift their energy to the team's goals and show an increase in productivity, in both individual and collective work. The team may find that this is an appropriate time for an evaluation of team processes and productivity by assessing how the team is using their strengths and developing their weaknesses into strengths. Questions -‐ Who does what and when?

How often will we meet? How do we settle problems? How do we make decisions? How do we handle conflicts? What makes our team special?

STAGE 4 ACCOMPLISHMENT

Members skillfully discuss their strengths and weaknesses Members use knowledge of strengths and weaknesses to accomplish their task

Team members understand their roles on the team Team members are satisfied with the team’s progress

Members are committed to the team’s goals Team as a unit can implement change

Members are effective at problem-‐solving and decision-‐making Dialogue amongst team members is established

Challenge – Managing task completion, evaluating results, striving for improvement. What does it look like? Reaching this stage is largely dependent upon the successful transition through the previous stages. The team knows clearly what it is doing and why. Relationships are strong and while disagreements may occur they are resolved quickly and positively. Roles become flexible and functional, and group energy is channeled into


the task. There is maximum work accomplishment, interdependence, personal insight and constructive self-‐change. Feelings -‐ In the Accomplishment stage of team development, members feel satisfaction in the team's progress. Members feel attached to the team as something "greater than the sum of its parts" and feel satisfaction in the team's effectiveness. Members feel confident in their individual abilities and those of their teammates. Behaviors -‐ Team members are able to prevent or solve problems in the team's process or in the team's progress. A "can do" attitude is visible as are offers to assist one another. Roles on the team may have become more fluid, with members taking on various roles and responsibilities as needed. Differences among members are appreciated and used to enhance the team's performance. Alignment is created where each person has an integral role in the team. People and the team as a whole are meeting and exceeding role and task expectations. Cohesion is created with the team feeling like a “team. Commitment is established to each other, the team and to accomplishing the team’s goals. Loyalty and trust are firmly established. Team Tasks -‐ In the Accomplishment stage, the team makes significant progress towards its goals. Commitment to the team's mission is high and the competence of team members is also high. Team members should continue to deepen their knowledge and skills, including working to continuously improving team development. Accomplishments in team process or progress are measured and celebrated. Questions -‐ How can we improve this?

Is there a better way? What more can we do? How can I help? STAGE 5 COMPLETION

Team members assess if team reached their goals, both collectively and personally Members emotionally accept situations where their expectations were not met on the team

Members acknowledge the personal goals they did not attain Member acknowledge the personal goals they attained

Team members discuss openly changes they would make the next time they are on a team

Members say goodbye to each other Archival materials are stored and given to proper authorities Communication systems used by the team are closed down

Challenge – Managing the completion of tasks. Assisting the team to let go of the group structure and move on. What does it look like? Completion is typically related to the end of a project team however; it is also relevant when the purpose and structure of team changes substantially due to merger or a restructuring process. This stage can be particularly stressful where the dissolution of the team is unplanned. This stage involves the disbandment of the team, termination of roles and the completion of tasks. This stage is


also referred to as 'mourning' given the sense of loss experienced by some team members. Feelings -‐ Team members may feel a variety of concerns about the team’s impending dissolution. They may be feeling some anxiety because of uncertainty about their individual role or future responsibilities. They may feel sadness or a sense of loss about the changes coming to their team relationships. And at the same time, team members may feel a sense of deep satisfaction at the accomplishments of the team. Individual members might feel all of these things at the same time, or may cycle through feelings of loss followed by feelings of satisfaction. Given these conflicting feelings, individual and team morale may rise or fall throughout the ending stage. It is highly likely that at any given moment individuals on the team will be experiencing different emotions about the team's ending. Behaviors -‐During the Completion Stage, some team members may become less focused on the team's tasks and their productivity may drop. Alternatively, some team members may find focusing on the task at hand is an effective response to their sadness or sense of loss. Their task productivity may increase. Team has conflicting emotions (sadness, anger, gratitude, happiness). Members are uncertain about how to end the project and their future. Team members deal with this stage in different ways: Avoiding tasks, Arguing over minor details or past arguments resurface; Denying: pretending the team will continue; Pollyanna: focusing only on the positive experiences; or Acknowledging: facing the good, the bad and the ugly, letting go and saying goodbye. Team Tasks -‐ The team needs to acknowledge the upcoming transition and the variety of ways that individuals and the team may be feeling about the team’s impending dissolution. During this stage, the team should focus on three tasks: 1. Completion of any deliverables and closure on any remaining team work

2. Evaluation of the team’s process and product, with a particular focus on identifying "lessons learned" and passing these on to the team coordinator for future teams to use

Creating a closing celebration that acknowledges the contributions of individuals and the accomplishments of the team and that formally ends this particular team's existence. Questions -‐ What will I do now?

What will it be like now? Shall I stay with this project or shall I go?

Once the Accomplishment stage is reached, there is a risk that some teams will neglect the task of maintaining commitment. This neglect will see the team slide gradually into complacency. During this time, the team becomes satisfied by past achievements they are content to leave challenges to “someone else”. This is not a defined stage and most teams do not experience the following during the Accomplishment Stage but the challenges, behaviors and questions are worth mentioning.


Challenge -‐ Avoiding these behaviors by maintaining the commitment and focus of the team. Behaviors – The team becomes complacent and a cozy togetherness ensues. Self-‐preservation is the dominant issue. The team may be attempting to extend the life of the group. Mediocrity begins with a lackluster performance eventually leads to a decline in the quality and quantity of task activity. Comfortable routines are established and enforced i.e. don’t rock the boat. Questions -‐ Have you followed the appropriate channels?

Why should we change?.. We’ve always done it this way We’re doing OK as we are When will this lab session be over?

The previous section is adapted from MIT Human Resources website: Stein, Judith, USING THE STAGES OF TEAM DEVELOPMENT; http://hrweb.mit.edu/learning-‐development/learning-‐topics/teams/articles/stages-‐development and from Influential Teamwork Theories http://www.team-‐building-‐bonanza.com/stages-‐of-‐team-‐development.html and from Reference: Bruce W. Tuckman, “Development Sequence in Small Groups”, Psychological Bulletin. 1965. In 1977 Tuckman (in collaboration with Mary Ann Jensen) updated the model to include the fifth stage – adjourning. And from Sharon Feltham, Excellerate, The Storm before the Team Performs. The Life Cycle of Teams

4-‐7. Reporting Activities for the Team Step 7. Development of a Team System for reporting the team’s activities to other interested parties, i.e. faculty, other team members, and teaching assistants. 4-‐7-‐1. Agenda The Team Leader prepares Agendas for weekly faculty and team meetings. Both the team and the faculty meetings are held weekly. The following items should be on every agenda when having a team or faculty meeting. There are always issues to be discussed about time management, team communication issues, or ideas to be brainstormed. Thinking in this manner is efficient and effective. Allowing time for dialogue amongst team members regarding time management, making time for creativity to be sustained, and individual and collaborative development to be nurtured is essential to high performance. High performance can only be accomplished through detailed planning and organization, effective communication, followed through by providing an atmosphere where fruitful dialogue can be nurtured, where all ideas are valued, and time to plan and organize tasks is the paramount objective of the team. Agendas are used to promote team creativity and self-‐management in action planning, decision-‐making, problem solving, work process improvement, goal setting, and mission development.

Set a realistic agenda to provide the structure and format to be used by the team. Use the template provided. Consider the agenda the action plan for the meeting. The first step to accomplishing effective time management and organization is to create dynamic agendas for your team. There are steps to follow:

1. Establish the key topics for the meeting a. State any problems from last meeting to discuss

2. Specify decisions that need to be made.


3. Identify time frame for the meeting. 4. Preparation -‐ what needs to happen before the meeting or task? 5. Brainstorming activities (specify areas where ideas need to be generated)

a. Leave time to brainstorm solutions in agenda and time to prioritize and categorize the solutions.

b. List any solutions you feel would be helpful 6. Priority -‐ is this more or less important than other items? 7. Time Management -‐ Identify a time frame for the different items on the agenda 8. Leader -‐ will someone other than the team leader lead because the other team

member's expertise is essential to performing the task more efficiently? It can be more effective to allow that team member to run the meeting once you have the agenda completed.

9. Always leave time for summarizing the meeting. 10. Data analysis to be reviewed should be sent as attachment if not up to date in Weekly

Memorandum (Weekly Progress Report). Weekly Team Meeting Agenda Items:

1. Leave ten minutes or more on the agenda to discuss team issues. 2. Action steps and time management plans are essential agenda topics before the end of

each meeting. 3. Create Weekly Activity Lists: a. Any tasks you feel will have obstacles. List the obstacles so solutions and time to implement solutions can be assigned to team members during meeting b. Decide tasks to be done by each team member or leave time to decide which tasks each team member will perform or put as agenda item on agenda if your ground rules state the team does this activity together c. Some teams allocate time in the laboratory to do the activity lists. This should be stated in ground rules d. Attach the Weekly Activity Lists, which identify time frames to accomplish each task discussed and then assign tasks to team members. e. Deadlines for submitting these Activity Lists are essential. f. Complicated tasks can be assigned to specific team members to create action plans to distribute to all team members. g. Assignment of these tasks can be planned before the meeting or in the laboratory and placed either on the agenda or in the Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report). h. Summarize meeting for team.

Templates and Examples are in Appendices Two and Three. 4-‐7-‐2. Team Section of Weekly Progress Report Section 4. In order to fill out 4. Team Section of the Weekly Progress Report properly certain ground rules need to be followed.

1. In Week Three when the first Weekly Progress Report is submitted the team section will include the following:

a. Ground Rules b. The Mission Statement goes in the first Section of the Weekly Progress Report.

2. Starting in week 4, the second Weekly Progress Report, the Team section of the Weekly Progress Report should begin to accurately state what the team process has been over


the week. USE THE TEAM READINGS TO DESCRIBE THE TEAM PROCESS. MAKE SURE THAT YOU ACCRATELY RECORD EACH WEEK WHAT STAGE OF THE TEAM LIFE CYCLE THE TEAM IS ENCOUTERING AND USING THE DESCRIPTION OF THAT LIFE CYCLE ACCURATELY STATE WHAT THE TEAM IS EXPERIENCING.

a. DO NOT SAY, “EVERYTHING IS FINE WITH THE TEAM.” DO NOT REPEAT THE SAME COMMENTS WEEK AFTER WEEK. IF YOU DO YOU WILL HAVE TO REDO THE WORK.

3. Use the TKI results to record what is happening during disagreements. Remember conflict is only a difference of opinion.

4. Describe any issues or problems related to functioning of your team that should be brought to the attention of the team coordinator and your faculty advisor.

5. Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of your team and how you plan to rectify these weaknesses. Indicate any communication problems with your team and your 1026/27/29 personnel.

6. What team life cycle stage is the team in? 7. How is the team addressing time management issues? 8. How is the team delegating tasks? 9. Obstacles to getting the project done? 10. Do not cut and paste the same information into every report. 11. Give an accurate, thoughtful assessment of what the team process is.

Weekly Progress Reports (reprint from Course Manual 7.6)

Length: as needed, single-‐spaced, with an emphasis on conciseness. Individual or collaborative: both – team recorder takes lead; other team members contribute as needed. Revision? No.

The Weekly Progress Report is an internal communication in memo form that updates your faculty advisor, team, and related personnel on the status of your investigation, in particular, the work recently carried out and work upcoming. Progress reports will start in the third week of the course. The report for your team should be sent out weekly no later than the day before the meeting with your faculty advisor; it should be e-‐mailed as an attachment to the team email address. The report is due even if the meeting is canceled for any reason. Although the recorder is responsible for writing the report, all members of the team should contribute to the content. Brevity and conciseness are strongly preferred. Your faculty advisor will review these brief weekly reports for writing quality, content, and effectiveness. It may be returned to you with comments at the discretion of your faculty advisor. The Weekly Progress Report should be prepared according to the guidelines displayed in Figure 7.3 (Appendix Two-‐ Templates). 4-‐7-‐3. Minutes: Minutes are optional. Many faculty advisors do not like students to take minutes during the faculty meetings. They find it a distraction and prefer to have students engaged in the meeting. Furthermore, a summary of issues, conclusions, and plans of prior meetings during the week should already be included in each Weekly Progress Report. Check with your faculty advisor as to their preference. Check with you faculty advisor as to their preference. If they do not have a preference discuss with your


team members and make a decision how you wish to handle minutes to meetings. Never have all three of you taking minutes to a meeting, delegate the recorder to do this task if you decide minutes should be taken. (Appendix Two -‐ Templates). 4-‐7-‐4. Oral Presentations (see Course Manual) 4-‐7-‐5. Team Leader Transition Report The Team Leader writes the Team Leader Transition Report at the end of the first and second rotation. The report's main object is to summarize the team process throughout the rotation, using the team concepts taught at the beginning of the course. The team concepts that must be present in the report are:

1. Team Life Cycles 2. TKI 3. How Ground Rule Systems are working in each of the following area:

i. Writing Papers ii. Meeting Effectiveness and Decorum iii. Conflict Management iv. Oral Presentation Planning v. Reporting Activities vi. Time Management vii. Project Management

a. Activity Lists b. Milestones being met

4. Detailed description of how team is meeting expectations 5. Detailed description of how team is utilizing individual strengths and turning

weaknesses into strengths 6. How the task associated with the Team Life Cycle the team is presently in have

been accomplished (Appendix Four). 7. Suggestions for new team leader 8. Suggestions for changes

There is a template in Appendix Two and Examples in Appendix Three; Use Appendix 4 to explain how your team is functioning in relationship to the Team Life Cycles. 4-‐7-‐6. Completion Report The third rotation team leader writes Completion Report. The Completion Report is due the evening before the team's Exit Conference. The Report utilizes all of the team concepts, summarizing what the team accomplished as well as how effective the different tools used in 10.26/27/29 worked for the team i.e. websites, collaborative tools, feedback systems. It is important for the team leader to assess that all the tasks for these stage are completed and discussed in the Completion Report. There is a template in Appendix Two and Examples in Appendix Three. 4-‐7-‐7 -‐.9 Proposal, Progress Report, and Final Paper (see Course Manual) 4-‐8 Meetings for the Team Step 8. Weekly Planned Team Meetings, including agendas and recording of the team’s activities. Meetings can be formalized or take place by e-‐mail. The focus for team meetings is on preparation, planning, and reporting activities. The meetings should have a planned agenda and be summarized in the Weekly Memorandum (Progress Reports) to record the team’s activities.


1. Weekly Team and Faculty Meetings -‐ In order to create and sustain a time management plan, organized regular meetings are essential. Learning to plan and facilitate a meeting is critical to facilitating powerfully energized discussions. Facilitation at a meeting is the difference between wasting your time and accomplishing the goal. In 10.26/27/29 the facilitator of team and faculty meetings is the Team Leader. Team meetings fulfill the social and communication needs of the team. The team’s needs are communicating data and results, recognition of being part of a successful team, involvement in decision-‐making, goal setting, problem-‐solving, work and improvements in work delegation, and the mutual support and enhancement of the self-‐esteem of the participants to promote creativity. 2. How often should you hold a team meeting? You should hold a team meeting for one hour at least once a week with your team members. You also hold a faculty meeting once a week with the entire team and the faculty advisor. All meetings should have an agenda, which is e-‐mailed to all participants by the team leader 24 hours in advance. A team meeting is used to coordinate work, do goal setting, work planning, progress review, time management, problem-‐solving, brainstorming, preparing an oral presentation, writing a paper and discussion of team process. Meetings are structured to promote creative participation by all members and to support self-‐management of tasks. At the first weekly team meeting teambuilding exercises, formulating team ground rules and time management plans must include the following:

a. Goals b. Measurement indicators c. Information on Strengths and Weaknesses and Expectations from Team Booklet

Activities needed to accomplish the Project d. Ground Rules

Weekly faculty meetings are used to update the faculty on your progress, discuss issues you are having in accomplishing your goals, and brainstorming how to do accomplish the goals. Weekly Progress Reports are sent to the team e-‐mail address the night before the faculty meeting so everyone can read the report before the meeting. 3. Planning a Team and Faculty Advisor Meetings ; Meetings have specific guidelines to support effectively planned meetings. The guidelines are:

a. Plan Logistics. I. What time are you going to meet? Team Leader looks at team members'

schedules (Schedule for the term is created in Team Booklet and sent out to all involved in project in first Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report).

II. Team leader decides with the team when it is appropriate to hold meetings. Most teams have a fixed weekly time that they meet with their team and when they meet with their faculty advisor.

III. Team Leader and/or Faculty Advisor can decide on the purpose of the meeting.

b. Determine participants. I. Do you need to involve staff or faculty in the meeting to facilitate organizing the

task? If you need to involve faculty in a meeting, check their availability before sending out a time.


c. The Team Leader creates an Agenda for the team and faculty meeting and sends it out 24 hours in advance for both meetings.

d. Communicate with the teaching assistant assigned to your team and set up the meetings so the teaching assistant can attend the faculty and/or team meetings if they wish.

e. Secure the meeting place and/or establish a specific meeting place for the entire semester for the weekly team meeting and the faculty meetings.

f. Team Leader decides with the team in the team meetings the resources needed by the team for the week and create a Weekly Activity Lists (sample on website and in Appendix Three), which is incorporated into the Weekly Progress Report (Weekly Progress Report), attached to agenda and/or posted on the collaboration tool (Drop Box, Google) whichever the faculty advisor and the team decides.

I. Define and get agreement on Agenda: Prepare the appropriate Agenda (see agenda section of manual; sample on website and in Appendices Two and Three) for every meeting and distribute 24 hours before the meeting requesting additions, and suggestions from team members, teaching assistants, faculty advisor, and industrial advisor when appropriate.

II. Effectively communicate all Agendas, Minutes (optional) and Weekly Memorandums

g. (Progress Reports) via e-‐mail to faculty advisor, team members, and team coordinator. h. Bring copies of the amended agenda to the meeting or have it on a computer screen

that everyone can observe. 4. Beginning the Meeting with Team Leader facilitating

a. Set the tone of the meeting with your opening remarks. b. Spends five or ten minutes socializing to elicit team members’ mood. c. If you do not have a team member who is the timekeeper, the recorder can be the

timekeeper and help keep the team to its agreed time frame. d. The Recorder records the Minutes, which are optional. The team and/or faculty

advisor must decide if collaborative minutes will be taken. Support Reporting Activities by recording ideas, results, and support the communication of these ideas and results to the appropriate people on a weekly basis.

e. Guide the process along towards some form of agreement, unless the meeting is specifically a brainstorming session.

f. Ensure that the ground rules are observed. Support goal clarity and goal acceptance using Active Listening Skills:

I. Summarize and bridge II. Use a process time out III. Facilitate communication by supporting, differing, participating, reflecting,

providing visual reinforcement, and encouraging full expression of views. IV. Make sure all team members understand decisions by asking clarifying

questions to test comprehension, summarize by restating the content, and seek and give information. React to what team members say by disagreeing,


supporting verbal and nonverbal expression, and involving other team members by inviting discussion and expecting an expression of their opinion.

g. Ask open ended questions, suggest ways to organize and communicate, and check for consensus

h. Make sure each team member has an opportunity to contribute. Ensure balanced representation. If a person has not spoken for sometime during the meeting, ask them for their opinion about what the team is talking about. Establish the fifteen-‐minute rule that all team members will participate in a meeting in the first fifteen minutes of the meeting. Obtain agreement from all team members to move the facilitation process along.

i. Initiate new ideas through dialogue and creativity. Support productive dialogue within the team by building on other team member's ideas. Manage decision making by facilitating the raising of major issues, the identification, and thorough examination of information and alternative. Remember to influence decisions so that they are based on task-‐relevant knowledge and skill rather than external status or personal dominance. Make sure the entire team takes responsibility for tough decisions. The tough decisions you will encounter in meetings are varied. Examples are how can you schedule more time to work on the project after an equipment failure or how do you deal with one member who is not carrying their equal share of the work and is imposing on the other members because they are over extended.

j. Encourage initiative and leadership by team members who have appropriate skills to do specific tasks.

k. Facilitate the development of appropriate norms for the team. “Norms” are ground rules or habits that govern a group (Coleman, 2002, pg 173). Norms represent protocols or commitments developed by each team to guide members in working together. Norms help team members clarify expectations regarding how they will work together to achieve their shared goals (Learning by Doing, pg 219).

l. Legitimize individual differences vs. conformity and maintain collaboration through an agreement in ground rules that no team member will withhold information from the team in regard to the project to maintain the collaborative culture.

m. Facilitate by promoting a team process of self-‐assessment and improvement by being neutral.

n. Encourage task disagreement vs. norms that suppress conflict. When conflicts or frustrations arise from inside or outside pressures on the team use productive.

o. Conflict Resolutions Skills, which team has clearly outlined in your ground rules to handle the pressures.

p. Focus team energy on the project. q. The Team Leaders use their Influence by being positive and compliment your team

members during discussions. r. Brainstorm and bring pressing issues out into the open and discuss them fully or make

time for unexpected pressing issues on the next agenda or get agreement on extending the meeting time to resolve pressing issues.

s. The Team leader effectively brings the meeting to a close by: I. Actively listen by using summarization of the discussion and decisions.


II. Update the Activities List by summarizing the activities for the next week. III. Delegate tasks and record the estimated times and the team members doing

the tasks. IV. Survey team members to evaluate the meeting’s content and process. Ask

clarifying questions. V. How productive was the meeting? VI. If faculty meeting: How well did the team and faculty advisor communicate? VII. Review team goals at the end of every meeting. VIII. Ask if all team members are comfortable with their ability to use their

knowledge and skill to do the tasks they are performing. IX. Set next meeting time X. Acknowledge the Reporting Activities for the team. i.e. Write and e-‐mail

weekly Team Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report). XI. Review the team's time management plan and make any adjustments needed

for the team member's schedules until the next meeting. 4-‐9. Project Management Step 9. Project Management is creating goals, and a Time Management Plan to develop Action Plans, which can be expanded into flexible weekly and daily activity lists for the team. Time Management is what makes teams run efficiently. Discuss how each of you perceives time.

1. How do you perceive time? 2. Do you procrastinate and/or do you get things done? 3. Do you leave papers to the night before the deadline? 4. Are you frustrated when others do not communicate accurately about how

they accomplish a task after they have committed to a specific time schedule?

5. How do you react when people are not timely with written work? 6. How do you react when people are late to meetings and do not call or do

not come at all to an agreed upon meeting? As you are aware your decisions and actions form your perceptions of reality. Your time perspective is part of that reality. When teams clearly define goals, execution is carefully planned and efficiency increases. Time is a commodity and resource to be carefully considered when doing a collaborative project. Good time management is synonymous with well-‐defined, clearly stated goals.

Organizing time as an individual is difficult and requires planning. In teams, changes have to be made in how individuals collectively perceive time management because team members bring their own unique perspective on how they manage time to the team. Teams experience special time concerns. Some recurrent examples are some team members may find that a substantial chunk of their time is flexible, while other team members may be over committed. When creating a time management plan and ground rules for the team, the first question the team leader must discuss at the first team meeting is: 1. How will the team handle over commitment by an individual team member? Do the other team members do extra work, taking away some of their personal time,


or does the team discuss with the other team member expectations they have about the equitable delegation of work? It is possible that one team member is over committed at the beginning of the term while another team member is over committed at another time during the term. Ground Rules:

a. Delegate equal task distribution over the entire term rather than weekly and make the distribution dependent upon each team member’s outside work commitments.

b. Team members will submit schedules of outside prior commitments for the term at the first team meeting and it will be updated as changes occur. Prior commitments and the team’s priorities will be the over ridding criteria for equal work distribution. Everyone allocates time for the different activities in their lives. Some are disappointed with their ability to plan, keep to deadlines, and produce quality work. Others are disappointed with how their team members’ plan, keep to deadlines, and produce quality work. Using Ground Rules to establish criteria for these frustrations eliminates discussion and anger later in the term. Another organizational tool is to create a Team Monthly Calendar on your collaboration website to help the team to organize an equitable distribution of the assigned tasks. If a task is not on the team schedule, it may not get done efficiently. To help with time management, use the steps in the Team Formation Model to understand how each of you perceives time.

Many people assume that they know how to use their time effectively. The major complaint about collaborating with others is that the workload is not shared equitably. Usually everyone begins with what they consider an effective time management plan. Provide each other with phone numbers, schedules and availability and then plunge right into the task. What more could the team members need to know? What about the outside obstacles to getting the task done? When viewing other team member's schedule or your own are you observing whether the team member or yourself left enough time to efficiently perform the goals that are being set by the team?

Team members have to be able to skillfully handle discussion periods and utilize brainstorming to create productive dialogue. Each team member needs to pay careful attention to the other person's mindset including their expectations of each other, and their strengths and weaknesses in the areas of time management, communication, their competencies, and their technical capabilities. Team members need to learn each other’s working and thinking styles. Are you all thinking idealistically about how to accomplish this project or is one of you thinking pragmatically about how much actual time you have to work the project.

As you develop an understanding of team time management, you become aware that what is being stressed is that individually many of these time management tasks are done mentally. But effective team management is only accomplished by recording the thinking process involved in planning and communicating the agreed upon milestones and commitments in writing to clarify the team's goals and how and when they are going to be accomplished. Imagine


your life without a Weekly Planner, or a To Do List or if you completely stopped communicating your plans to others. How effective would you be?

Planning has played a major role in your success to date. Most of the planning you have done has been on an individual basis. Planning team and collaborative activities takes more flexibility and patience. In the initial stages of team development planning can be frustrating and slow, but once the team is formed properly collaborating can save you time. Once you learn how to plan in advance with other people, collaborative time management becomes as effortless as individual planning. The key to effective team planning is good communication. Using collaborative electronic workspaces with a Team Monthly Calendar, Milestones, Activity Lists, and Agendas is effective communication. The results can make you and the team more efficient and effective. 2. Tracking Time -‐ To check whether your time management is effective, use time tracking as the device. Time is not infinite; therefore how you use it is a valuable skill. The overall goal of the team is to become high performing at the project. Setting goals, breaking them down into manageable chunks, allocating those chunks to specific time slots in the team's schedule, ensuring that the Activity Lists are effective on important tasks and keeping each individual team member on track may seem like more work than it is worth. To keep the amount of work involved in perspective, remember that goal setting will take considerable time. But once your goals are set, your planning for the rest of the term should take you no more than an hour or so each week as a team. Without a systematic plan you would spend more time setting sub goals and planning tasks. 3. Creating Goals -‐ A goal is a desired and valued circumstance toward which people are working (Katzenbach and Smith, 1994). In a team there are two strata of goal setting, personal goals and the team goals. Understanding the difference will help build the efficiency of the team. Setting realistic goals both personally and as a team is the hardest part of being effective at creating an effective time management plan. As shown in the Team Booklet learning both personal team member expectations and a team members strengths and weaknesses when forming a team helps the team to develop their vision. Clearly defined team goals are the first step to developing a team vision, motivating the team to effectively perform with a common purpose. The most important step in team building is establishing clearly defined goals with specific planned steps to create successful accomplishment of these goals. Activity Lists support time management. When teams commit to goals, many outside and inside pressures need to be taken into consideration.

Building a team culture is personal and collaborative. The future success of your team depends on your decisions and actions. The method used to plan and organize your team culture will significantly impact upon how you will think, feel, and behave while on the team. Planning your collaborative effort carefully is of paramount importance. Using the a Mission Statement and creating a functioning set of Ground Rules so your team can create a shared vision, which will motivate each of you to high performance.


Once your team collectively and individually understands the team’s expectations, strengths and weaknesses your team can create a Mission Statement and Ground Rules. In order to develop a high performing team, it is important to clearly determine what you are trying to accomplish. Clear, congruent, and specific personal goals leads to clear and specific team goals. Goal Setting is an exercise for your team to perform at the second meeting.

5. Entrance Conference Entrance conferences are held in the first three weeks of the course to help the individual teams familiarize themselves with the course format and teambuilding activities. Individual teams meet with the team coordinator once they have accomplished the following:

1. Submitted their Rotation Schedule to team coordinator. 2. Had a team meeting and created Ground Rules from Appendix Three

and expectations you listed in the Team Booklet. 3. Mission Statement. 4. Completed the Team Booklet (exchanged schedules; listed strengths and

weaknesses; listed expectations). 5. Met with Faculty Advisor, Teaching Assistant and Industrial Consultant

(if your project has one assigned). Had a discussion about the faculty advisor’s, teaching assistant’s expectations of the team and you will record these in the Team Section of the First Weekly Memorandum

6. Completed the TKI and read the Background Information. 7. Read the Team and Course Manual. 8. Completed the Safety Questionnaires on the EHS website. 9. Scheduled a Library Tour. 10. Made an initial appointment with the CIM Instructors. 11. Became familiar with laboratory space for your project. 12. Decided upon when and where the faculty and team meetings will be held. 13. Set up your Drop Box and invited your TA, faculty advisor, industrial consultant

the team coordinator to be part of your Dropbox. A list of times will be given to you on the first day of class. Your team must choose

three times you can meet, two on days during class hours and one from the alternate


days list. On the second day of class you will be given a sheet to record these choices for your team. All team members must attend the Entrance Conference. The recorder must send the following items electronically to the team coordinator and the other team members the evening before the conference is held. These items must also be posted in the collaborative space(DropBox) your team has created for the project. The team must allow the team coordinator access to the electronic collaborative space.

1. Ground Rules 2. List of Strengths and Weaknesses by team member's name 3. List of each team member's expectations 4. Mission Statement 5. Any questions the team may have about the project

The Team Leader brings the following hard copies to the Conference: 1. Ground Rules 2. Mission Statement

Members should be on time for their conferences. If a team member cannot show up for the meeting the team coordinator and other team members should be contacted at least four hours before the conference and an alternative date needs to be planned via e-‐mail. The team building TA and the team coordinator should be notified of this change and be consulted regarding the new conference time. Teaching Assistants should come to the Entrance Conferences. If not attending they should notify team and the team coordinator via e-‐mail 24 hours in advance of the conference. All team members will read the team and course manual and be prepared to discuss the TKI Background information in detail.

Team Entrance Conference Agenda

Time and Date of Meeting: Individual announcements sent Basement: 66-‐0001 for one hour Attendees: All Team Members, Teaching Assistant and Team Coordinator Key Topic of Meeting: Forming your Team Importance: Team must be formed before Individual Proposal is written 1. Socialize 5 Minutes 2. Project Information 10 Minutes

a. Understanding the Project b. Proposal c. Team Culture to Effectively Manage Project

3. Questions about the Course 5 Minutes 4. Ground Rules 10 Minutes

a. Systems for Ground Rules 1. Writing the Technical Papers 2. Managing Conflict 3. Meetings 4. Team Role Responsibilities 5. Oral Presentation 6. Reporting Activities


a. Memorandums b. Agendas c. Team leader Transition and Completion Report d. Activity Lists

5. Team Life Cycle and Rotating Roles 5 Minutes a. Manual, Appendix A 6. Thomas Killmann Conflict Mode Inventory 5 Minutes a. Read before Conference 7. Project Management Issues Team will be encountering 5 Minutes 8. Summary 5 Minutes

6. April Lecture Information regarding this lecture is distributed before the vacation.

7. Exit Conferences

Exit conferences are held the last two weeks of the course. Individual teams attend and all team members must be present. The conference is one hour in duration. Your team will be able to sign up for your conference on the fourth week in April. Your team must choose a time you can all meet. A schedule will be created by the Teaching Assistant and the URL to sign up for the conferences will be sent to individual teams as well as be posted on the course website. The Team Leader creates the agenda for the Exit Conference. The Team Leader should have a team meeting to discuss what issues the team wishes to be articulated in the Completion Report. Although the team leader is writing the report it should reflect what the entire team wants to suggest as improvements. The Team Leader also e-‐mails the Completion


Report the night before to the team and the team coordinator. Hard copies for attendees are brought to the conference. By the time of the conference most teams are in either the Accomplishment Stage of team development or the Completion Stage. STAGE 4. ACCOMPLISHMENT

1. Skillfully discuss their strengths and weaknesses 2. Use knowledge of strengths and weaknesses to accomplish task 3. Team becomes strategically aware of what they are doing and why 4. Team has shared vision is established 5. Members understand their roles on the team 6. Conflict is managed skillfully 7. Make necessary changes to ground rules and scope 8. Satisfied with the team’s progress 9. Committed to the team’s goals 10. Team as a unit can implement change 11. Effective at problem-‐solving and decision-‐making 12. Dialogue amongst team members is established

STAGE 5. COMPLETION

1. Assess if team reached their goals, both collectively and personally 2. Members emotionally accept situations where their expectations were not met

on the team 3. Acknowledge the personal goals they did and did not attain 4. Discuss openly changes they would make the next time they are on a team 5. Say goodbye to each other 6. Archival materials are stored and given to proper authorities 7. Communication systems used by the team are closed down

APPENDIX One Ground Rules

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Ground Rule Explanations:

Generate a List of Ground Rules for your Team. Do Not Use all of these Ground Rules.

Discuss and Agree on the Rules. . Discuss the ground rules you wish to add to your team’s ground rules. Post them on Dropbox and include them in your first Weekly Memorandum Progress Report so your faculty advisor can review them. Team Role Responsibilities: Team Leader Responsibilities: This category of rules covers what is expected of the team leader during his/her rotation. Recorder Responsibilities: This category of rules covers what is expected of the team recorder during his/her rotation. Oral Presenter Responsibilities: This category of rules covers what is expected of the team presenter during his/her rotation. Team Role Responsibilities: This category of rules covers what is expected of the team leader during his/her rotation. Example #1: 1. Team leader has primary responsibility for keeping in touch with the faculty and technical advisors and scheduling meetings with them.

a. Team leader is responsible for convening and facilitating a meeting at a team member or faculty’s request. 2. team leader is responsible for writing agenda for weekly team and faculty meetings and sending it out at least 24 hrs in advance. 3. During faculty meetings, the team leader should report to the advisor previously formulated proposals and thoughts. 4. The team leader should make sure that each member is contributing to team discussion and the delegated tasks. 5. Team leader is responsible for reminding the group of upcoming deadlines, tasks, etc. via e-‐mail. 6. Team leader will create Activity Lists (lab schedule; list of tasks to accomplish that day in lab) for the week. The lab schedule will be discussed and changed as team sees fit during team meetings and during lab as needed. 7. All team members will delegate tasks unless complications arise, and then Team Leader will decide. 8. The Team leader is responsible for updating the team Google calendar and

sending reminder emails to team members in a timely fashion. 9. The team leader mediates any "heated" discussions during team or faculty

meetings or in lab.

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10. The team leader also acts as a ‘team coordinator’ to mediate any conflict and argument that may arise during discussion. 11. The team leader should not have absolute authority and say over argument or dispute. He/should take into account different opinions and try to propose a middle ground that everyone agrees upon. In case of a conflict or argument that cannot be easily resolved, the team will vote using “majority rule.” 12. The team leader will be responsible for giving final proof to a written report before turning it in to faculty advisor or CI instructors. 13. Team Leader is responsible for organizing a discussion about information being presented in Team Leader Transition Report and then writing the report. Example #2: 1. Team Leader facilitates team meetings and faculty meetings. Making sure the

meetings stay relevant to the project and that every member has time to voice his or her opinions.

2. Schedule weekly team meetings as appropriate and when requested. There will be a designated weekly time and place for the weekly team meeting.

3. Remind the team of important deadlines and tasks. 4. Keep in touch with faculty advisers and industry representatives as needed and

schedule meetings with them. 5. Present previously prepared group data, thoughts, concerns, and conclusions to

faculty advisers during faculty meetings. 6. Create task lists (Activity Lists) lab schedule; to accomplish that day in lab) for the

week and laboratory schedules for the team to use as a guideline. These should be discussed and approved by the team. They can be dynamic and are brought up for discussion during team meetings.

a. The lab schedule will be discussed and changed as team sees fit during team meetings and during lab as needed.

b. In case of dispute, final say on task delegation goes to the team leader. 7. Delegate tasks needed to be done in the case of emergencies (e.g. when a member

has valid reason for being unable to complete an assignment he previously was delegated to do. ‘Valid reasons’ include, but are not limited to: confirmed illness, job interviews, internship interviews, death of a family member)

8. The team leader will create the agenda in advance, allowing a period of review from teammates. They will then submit the final document 24 hours in advance and print for meeting attendees for weekly team and faculty meetings.

9. Team Leader is responsible for organizing a discussion about information being presented in Team Leader Transition Report and then writing the report.

Example #3: 1. The team leader is responsible for facilitating the weekly team and faculty meetings 2. The team leader is responsible for writing agenda for weekly team and faculty meetings

and sending agenda at least 24 hrs in advance. 3. Team leader is primarily responsible for writing lab schedules for daily lab activities, in addition to activity list during weekly team meetings. 4. Team leader is responsible for updating the team Google calendar and sending

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reminder emails to team members in a timely fashion. 5. Team leader is primarily responsible for contacting faculty and technical advisor and formulating agenda before the faculty meeting. 6. During faculty meetings, the team leader should report to the advisor previously formulated proposals and thoughts. 7. The team leader also acts as a ‘team coordinator’ to mediate any conflict and argument that may arise during discussion. 8. The team leader should not have absolute authority and say over argument or dispute. He/should take into account different opinions and try to propose a middle ground that everyone agrees upon. In case of a conflict or argument that cannot be easily resolved, the team will vote using “majority rule.” 9. In case of dispute, the team will work collaborate to dissipate conflict. 10. The team leader should make sure that each member is contributing to team discussion and the delegated tasks. 11. The team leader will be responsible for giving final proof to a written report before turning it in to faculty advisor or CI instructors. Recorder Responsibilities: This category of rules covers what is expected of the recorder during his/her rotation Example #1: 1. Team recorder should prepare and send meeting minutes 24 hours after each team meeting. 2. Recorder will record all pertinent information from the meetings. 3. Recorder is responsible for making sure that data and other important things are updated and shared. Team members are responsible for recording data that they obtain. In the case that more than one person needs the lab notebook, the recorder is responsible for making sure that the original copy of all data (even if it’s written on scrap paper) is attached securely into the lab notebook by the end of the day. 4. Recorder will be responsible for assembling the written report from the individual sections and distributing copies to all team members. 5. Keep a neat and orderly lab notebook by following the instructions in the manual and in the ground rules. 6. Recorder maintains the Team Calendar, which contains the time and place of meetings, team’s milestones, goals, and scheduling conflicts 7. Recorder should organize and send Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report). All members will provide content for these reports. Example #2: 1. Team recorder should prepare and send meeting minutes 48 hours after each

team meeting. 2. Recorder will record all pertinent information from the meetings. 3. In lab, the relevant person will record their data in the lab notebook. The recorder

will ensure that all members follow the instructions in the manual when recording information in the notebook.

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4. Recorder will be responsible for assembling the written report from the individual sections and distributing copies to all team members.

5. Recorder maintains the Team Calendar, which contains the time and place of meetings, team’s milestones, goals, and scheduling conflicts.

6. The recorder is responsible for updating the Activity List, and notifying the team leader if any goals are not met on schedule.

7. Recorder should organize and send Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report). Example #3: 1. Prepare and send meeting minutes to the team via e-‐mail. This must be done within

24 hours after the end of the meeting. Corrections to the minutes will be submitted via email to the recorder and the team recorder will resubmit the minutes as necessary.

2. Maintain the team calendar, which includes: team milestones, goals, schedule conflicts, and the time & meeting place of meetings.

3. Recorder has authority over the lab booklet and assuring that it is clear, neat, and orderly. Record data if available. If not, delegate the task to another member and make sure the data is recorded.

4. Assemble class and project related documents to compile a central database. In particular, assemble individual team building answers for the entrance conference.

5. Sends out action items within 24 hours of the team meeting. 6. Organize and send Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report). Example #4: 1. Maintain the team calendar. 2. Make sure the notebook follows the instructions in the manual. 3. Team recorder should prepare and send meeting minutes 48 hours after each team

meeting. 4. Recorder will record all pertinent information from the meetings. 5. Recorder records data if recorder is available. If multiple data sets are being

recorded, the relevant person will record it. 6. Recorder will be responsible for assembling the written report from the individual

sections and uploading to Dropbox for members to see. 7. Keep a neat and orderly lab notebook by following the instructions in the manual

and in the ground rules. 8. Team members maintain their own calendars. 9. Recorder should organize and send Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report).

Oral Presenter’s Responsibilities This category of rules covers what is expected of the oral presenter during his/her Rotation Example #1: 1. In charge of making sure the data are organized and presentable. 2. Make power point slides. Other team members will help, but it is the oral

presenter’s responsibility to delegate tasks and make sure the presentation is ready by the due date.

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3. Practice the presentation in front of other team members at least twice before the day the presentation is scheduled for. One of those must be at least three days before the scheduled presentation date.

Example #2: 1. Oral presentations are primarily the responsibility of the oral presenter at the time. 2. The team will meet to discuss the presentation, delegate responsibilities, and to help

the oral presenter practice the presentation. 3. The oral presenter must practice the presentation in front of the team at least twice

before the day the presentation is scheduled for. One of those must be at least three days before the scheduled presentation date.

4. All team members will actively participate in gathering information and creating slides.

5. The presenter has the task of recording data in the lab notebook and will transfer data into excel the same day the data was recorded.

6. This will enable the presenter to be most familiar with the data and results of experiments and allow for a better presentation.

Example #3: 1. The student who is presenting should take the responsibility of preparing an outline

of the contents and of the visual aids to be used. 2. The other team members will help to revise and polish the outline; help to design

and prepare visual aids; and listen to the presenter practice the presentation and provide suggestions for improvement.

3. The presenter should refer to the manual on guidelines and tips for presentation. 4. The presenter should be prepared for the rehearsal with the CI instructor. 5. The team members will listen to at least two rehearsals before the real presentation. 6. All team members must also prepare for any possible questions that may be asked

after the presentation. 7. Each team member will have a delegated subject to which they should be subject

matter experts. Example #4: 1. Oral presenter is in charge of organizing data, tables, and graphs to be put inside

the presentation. If the presenter needs help, the work will be divided amongst the other group members.

2. Oral presenter will make slides; group members will help with layout. 3. Oral presenter should practice twice at least in front of other team members and

once at least in front of faculty advisor and TA by 3 days before the presentation is to occur.

4. In faculty meetings, the oral presenter will present the previously prepared group thoughts/proposals to the advisor.

Decorum and Ethical Guidelines: These are general rules about how team members should treat one another and all people involved in the project. The team while executing the project will practice ethical standards.

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Example #1: 1. Respect each other’s opinions and decisions. 2. Minimize unnecessary interruptions during meetings and while another person is talking. 3. No one should be controlling/monopolizing the discussion. Everyone should have the

opportunity to share his/her opinions. 4. Inform other members of possible absences in advance. 5. A professional atmosphere should be maintained and distractions should be kept at

minimum at meetings. 6. All members should be well-‐prepared before team and faculty meeting. 7. Everyone’s opinions should be regarded as of equal weight. 8. Team leader is primarily responsible for writing lab schedules for daily lab activities, in

addition to agenda. 9. Unethical and inappropriate manipulation of data will not be allowed. Example #2: 1. Team leaders will enforce the following the ethical guidelines. 2. Team members will not force other team members into something they are not

comfortable doing. 3. Team members must allow other members to speak and not interrupt them. 4. Changes in schedule must be announced to all team members. 5. All team members’ ideas have equal weight. 6. There should be no interruptions in team meetings, cell phones should be put on

silent. Example #3: 1. Members will only speak when others are not. But if one member is controlling discussion, the team leader will inform him/ her to let others speak. 2. Interruptions during work/meeting time kept at a minimum. 3. Members are expected to maintain a formal atmosphere and to minimize

distractions at team/faculty meetings. 4. Members will be prepared for discussion prior to the meeting. 5. Each meeting will end with a summary of what has been covered and what still

needs to be done/ assigned. (5 minute wrap up) 6. Everyone will listen to each other and not interrupt the person speaking. Each

member has the opportunity to speak. 7. Plagiarizing is not acceptable; maintain academic integrity 8. Unethical and inappropriate manipulation of data will not be allowed.

Effective Communication (Coalition Building): These rules outline how to work as a team. They emphasize the need for good listening skills and open mindedness. Example #1: 1. Be prepared for the experiments, having read the necessary material and completed assigned work. 2. Spend a few minutes reviewing day’s work prior to beginning experiments.

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3. Be open and nonjudgmental when communicating 4. Use constructive criticism 5. In times of conflict, refer to the mission statement for conduct 6. Include all team members in discussions. 7. Communicate any issues one might have, whether it is with the lab itself or issues with another team member, advisor or teaching assistant. 8. Be respectful and understanding of the abilities of other team members. 9. Keep discussion focused on relevant topics 10. Communicate with everyone whenever you are uncomfortable or unhappy with a certain task. 11. All team members must be aware of each week’s activities. Team members must be included in discussions and must contribute as much as possible to discussions. 12. Team members must be attentive to what other members have to say and give them a chance to speak without interruption. 13. Team members must be courteous to other team members and refrain from using offensive language. 14. Team members will communicate via email out of lab. All team members must check their email at least twice a day, once before 12 noon and once by 12 am. 13. If you will be unable to complete a task let other team members know ahead of time. Example #2: 1. Team members will delegate tasks evenly, unless complications arise, in which Team

Leader will delegate and mediate. 2. Team members will mutually keep track of deadlines and ensure one another are on

the same page. 3. Be prepared for all experiments, read necessary materials, and complete assigned

work prior to lab. 4. Be considerate and respectful of team members, especially when providing

constructive criticism. 5. Collaborate, and help each other out as needed. Similarly, ask for help if you need it. 6. Include all team members in discussions and email correspondences. 7. Be prepared for the experiments, having read the necessary material and

completed assigned work. 8. Spend a few minutes reviewing day’s work prior to beginning experiments. 9. Follow common courtesies (golden rule) 10. Be considerate and respectful of other team members. 11. Be open and nonjudgmental when communicating. Use constructive criticism

Collaborate, and help each other out as needed. Share your thoughts and opinions with the team when helpful. Listen to what others have to say and give them a chance to speak without interruption. Consider ideas different from one's own and discuss relative merits.

12. Communication is vital, thus team members must constantly check email/phone messages and electronic collaboration spaces.

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13. Communicate any issues one might have, whether it is with the lab itself or issues with another team member, advisor or teaching assistant.

14. Be respectful and understanding of the abilities of other team members. Keep discussion focused on relevant topics.

15. Openly communicate any issues and complaints she/he may have about any lab issues, communication issues, task delegation issues, or other issues associated with instructor, advisor, or another team member.

16. Openly share thoughts and helpful feedbacks during team meetings, brainstorming, and lab planning.

17. Be honest and non-‐judgmental. 18. Collaborate to increase team efficiency and communicate often via email and Dropbox to

make sure task are completed before the specified date for editing, discussion, and proofreading purposes.

19. Actively listen to others opinions and allow everyone the chance to share thoughts without interruption.

20. Be understanding of the abilities, strengths, and weaknesses of other team members and help each other to improve.

Example #3: Effective Team Communication and Collaboration Proper Teamwork Behavior 1. Be prepared for the experiments. Read the necessary reading before meetings and

labs. 2. Arrive on time to all meetings and labs. If there are ever cases when you are unable

to do so, notify the team at least 24 hours beforehand. 3. Be open and nonjudgmental. Treat others with respect, understanding, and

courtesy. 4. Collaborate and help each other. 5. Be comfortable with compromising. 6. Include all members in conversations and share ideas. Do not refute ideas without

proper discussion. Use constructive criticism. 7. Keep focused to the topic at hand. 8. Communicate with team members the lab information and any special

circumstances that may arise. 9. Each team member must devote a fair share of time to the development of the

project. 10. Share data and information to the team in a prompt manner. 11. Share both works in progress and finished works with the team. 12. Team members should maintain a high level of respect amongst each other.

Weekly Meetings: These are the general practices that should be used at all meetings including team, faculty and industry consultant. Example #1: Meetings: These are general things that should take place at team meetings but do not necessarily apply to all meetings.

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1. Use as record of tasks that need to be completed and topics we’ve already discussed to avoid being redundant 2. Meetings will be scheduled at: see Team Meetings 3. Two hours a week must be set aside and kept free of obligations for team meetings. These times are: _______________(flexible, meetings may be added if needed) 4. A faculty meeting will be held weekly on: 5. Team meetings and faculty meetings will be held at the same time and place each week

a. Faculty meeting: time _________; place ________ b. Team meeting: time _________; place ________

6. In general, meetings should be efficient and last less than 1 hour and 15 minutes, unless circumstances arise. Time of meeting will be changed by unanimous vote only. 7. Team Leader is the facilitator at team and faculty meetings. 8. Faculty advisors will follow the team’s ground rules for meetings. Read agenda before attending meeting. 9. Teaching Assistant will follow the Team’s ground rules for meetings. Read agenda before attending meeting. 10. Members check in with each other at beginning of meetings. Interruptions during work/meeting time kept at a minimum. 11. If any person attending meetings attempts to monopolize the meeting, the Team leader has the responsibility to redirect the discussion. 12. Inform of schedule changes in advance 13. Members are expected to maintain a formal atmosphere and to minimize distractions at team/faculty meetings. 14. Members will be prepared for discussion prior to the meeting. 15. The Team Leader will end each meeting with a summary of what has been covered and what still needs to be done/ assigned. 16. Distractions will be kept to a minimum at team meetings. For example, no cell phone calls during meetings, unless it pertains to the project. However food and drinks are allowed, unless the meeting is taking place in the lab. 17. Everyone will listen to each other and not interrupt the person speaking. 18. Each member will have the opportunity to speak. 19. Everyone's opinions are equal weight. 20. Team Leader will summarize key points at the end of each topic of discussion to make sure we are in agreement 21. Speak effectively -‐ don't waste time in meetings by repeating what is already been said or is irrelevant. 22. Only one minute tangents allowed. Lateness and Absence: These rules outline the consequences of being late to or missing a meeting, without notification. 1. Being a few minutes late will be tolerated, but if one member is significantly late (without prior notification), he/she will buy the other members a tasty beverage.

a. If 10 minutes late to meeting, owe 1 scoop of ice cream to other

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members. b. If 15 minutes or later to meeting, owes 2 scoops of ice cream to other members. Ice cream can be substitute for another sugary craving.

2. Attend all meetings and be on time. 3. Be willing to add more meetings to schedule when necessary. 4. If a member misses a scheduled meeting and does not notify the group at least 24 hours in advance, that person will take orders for food and bring refreshments for the next team meeting.

a. Team members who are going to be late will call or e-‐mail other team members or faculty advisor. b. Minutes will be taken for the late team member and given to them upon arrival.

5. Lateness is tolerated on occasion but chronic lateness will not be tolerated. a. Valid Excuses for missing an assignment or a meeting are Job interviews,

Graduate School Interviews, and Confirmed Illness. b. Missing a meeting must be communicated to all involved in advance. c. Other excuses are at the discretion of team members or all involved.

6. Chronic lateness will be reported to the team coordinator. Agendas: These rules set the formula for how the agenda will be written, presented at meetings, and distributed. 1. For all team and faculty meetings, the Team Leader will write an agenda 24 hours in advance and send to all participants and the Team Coordinator. 2. The agenda will be flexibly followed. General ideas will be covered without constraining interactions. 3. All team members will contribute to the agendas. Stay on topic and follow agenda. Minutes: These rules set the formula for how the minutes will be used by the team. 1. The recorder will record all pertinent information from the meetings and send minutes to other members within 48 hrs. 2. If a team member is going to be late the recorder will take minutes and give these minutes to the late member upon arrival. 3. The Recorder will only take minutes when a team member is missing from a team meeting or a faculty meeting. These minutes will be sent to all team members within 24 hours by the recorder Example #2: General: These are general guidelines that should be used at all meetings including team, faculty, and industry consultant. 1. Team meetings will be held weekly

a. Time_________; Place_____________ 2. A faculty meeting will be held weekly

a. Time_________; Place_____________

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3. In general, meetings will last no longer than 1 hour, unless special circumstances arise. 4. Team leader facilitates the discussion at team and faculty meetings. Tardiness and Absence to Meetings: These are guidelines that outline the consequences of being late or absent. 1. If one is significantly late, he/she must send notification at least a day in advance unless it is an

emergency. 2. Valid excused absence includes: sudden or chronic illness, job interviews, and graduate school

interviews. 3. The first time a member is significantly late for a meeting, the group will warn that person. If the

same member misses more than 2 times and does not heed the team’s warning, the problem will be reported to the team coordinator.

4. Being a few minutes late will be tolerated, but is one is significantly late (without notification in advance), he/she must buy the team tasty beverages based the team’s preferences.

5. If a member misses a meeting without prior notification, he/she must order refreshments for the next group meeting.

6. Minutes will be taken for the late member and given to him/her upon arrival. In case of absences, minutes will be distributed out within 24 hours after the meeting.

7. Chronic lateness will be reported to the team coordinator. 8. Members will be prepared for discussion prior to the meeting. 9. The Team Leader will end each meeting with a summary of what has been covered and what still needs to be done/ assigned. 10. Distractions will be kept to a minimum at team meetings. For example, no cell phone calls during meetings, unless it pertains to the project. However food and drinks are allowed, unless the meeting is taking place in the lab. 11. No interrupting. 12. Each member will have the opportunity to speak. 13. Everyone's opinions are equal weight. 14. Team Leader will summarize key points at the end of each topic of discussion to make sure we are in agreement 15. Speak effectively -‐ don't waste time in meetings by repeating what is already been said or is irrelevant. 16. Only one minute tangents allowed. Agendas: These rules formulate how the agenda will be written, shared, and presented at meetings. 1. The team leader will email agendas out 24 hours before a faculty meeting to all

participants and the Team coordinator. 2. During team meeting, all team members will contribute to the formulation of agenda for

the next faculty meeting. 3. Teaching Assistant will follow the Team’s ground rules for meetings. 4. Each team member should read and understand the agenda before faculty meeting. 5. During meetings, the team should stay focused and flexibly follow the agenda.

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Minutes: These rules formulate how minute will be kept, distributed to, and used by team members. 1. The team recorder will record relevant information during faculty meetings and email out minutes

to other team member within 48 hours. 2. In case a team member is absent, the team recorder will email out minute within 24 minutes after

the meeting. Team Meetings: These are guidelines that should be considered during only team meetings 1. Weekly meetings will be held on ____________; Place__________. 2. We will meet for one hour to discuss any problems we are having in the laboratory. The

team will also discuss the weekly activities created by the team leader and agree on which activities to pursue. The team will discuss main issues and questions to bring up to the faculty advisor. This will be reflected through the team leader’s agenda for the faculty meeting.

3. Team members must be punctual to team meetings. 4. If a member is going to be absent, that member must inform other team members a day

before the meeting. Faculty Advisor Meetings: These are guidelines that should be considered during only Faculty Advisor meetings 1. Weekly meetings with the faculty advisor will be held _______; Place________. 2. Items on the agenda will be discussed at the meeting. 3. The team leader facilitates meeting. 4. The items are those pre-‐selected from the team meetings. 5. The faculty in this meeting will give as much input as necessary and will not take over

the meeting. 6. Team members must be punctual to faculty meetings. 7. If a member is going to be absent, that member must inform other team members a day

before the meeting. CI Meetings:

1. Time __________; and Place_____________ to be determined with CI Instructor. 2. Team members must be punctual to meetings. 3. If a member is going to be absent, that member must inform other team members a

day before the meeting. 4. Oral presenter facilitates meetings when it is their rotation.

Final Note: The ground rules as stated serve only to help facilitate group work. If the team collectively decides to deviate from the ground rules, that is fine. Written Reports These are rules to help in the delegation and completion of written reports in a timely fashion and to the standards that the team has set down Example #1: General

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1. The team will clearly delegate writing responsibilities. Each team member contributes towards writing delegated sections of papers, and reads over the final draft (revised by Final Editor) to ensure that all components are completed.

2. All team members should clearly understand the sections that they are to write, their mutual responsibilities, and the entire process by which the report will be prepared.

3. The team will draw up a writing plan and will meet to discuss content and establish timelines.

4. Written work should be finished at least 24 hours before the deadline, to provide time for editing and proofreading.

5. The final check of the report is critical and the editor will insure that terminology is consistent, tone is even, and the report is consistent and logical.

Proposal The proposal is written individually, but specific meetings will be held by the team to collaborate on content. All content will be agreed upon by the team and will be the same in the individual papers.

Weekly Memorandum 1. The weekly memorandums will be written by the recorder and sent to all team

members for review. Other team members will contribute to the content of the report.

2. The report will be sent out weekly no later than the day before the faculty meeting. It should be emailed to the team email address.

Final Report The final report will be compiled by the team leader and submitted 24 hours before the faculty meeting.

Laboratory Notebooks 1. The recorder is responsible for neatly recording data in the lab notebook. 2. Keep only one notebook in active use at a time. 3. Keep detailed records of experiments by noting down all necessary information (i.e.

problem statement, sketches or flow diagrams, objectives, observations, operating details, calculations, etc.)

Team Leader Transition Report: The team leader will write this report at the end of first and second rotation. It will include key concepts such as team life cycles, TKI, the application of ground rules, and suggestions for new team leader.

Completion Report: Written by the team leader and turned in the evening before the team’s Exit Conference. The report will summarize team accomplishments, effectives tools used, and feedbacks.

Example #2: General 1. Documents written by the team will be discussed and the basic content finalized will

be discussed prior to writing at team meetings. 2. All major documents including the mid-‐term progress report and final report will

have dedicated meetings for content and writing discussion.

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3. The team will draw up a plan. The team will meet well in advance of the deadline to delegate responsibilities and set a timeline. The team will stick to the timeline.

4. The team will clearly delegate writing responsibilities. 5. All team members should clearly understand the sections that they are to write,

their mutual responsibilities, and the entire process by which the report will be prepared.

6. The team will all be final editors. 7. The final check of the report is critical and the editor will insure that terminology is

consistent, tone is even, and the report is consistent and logical.106 8. d. Major documents will be written collaboratively by assigning specific sections of

the documents to individual team members to write by a specific internal due date. 9. The entire team will be responsible for final compilation and editing of the

document prior to submission no less than 48 hours before the project document due date.

10. Finish written work 24 hours early to give time to edit and proofread 11. Rough drafts for reports presented to group three days in advance of due date so all

team members can review the work. 12. Writing will be divided into sections. 13. Be honest while recording and analyzing data. 14. After team members have written their individually assigned sections for the team

paper, one team member, selected by the team, will complete the final edit of all sections and send to other team members for approval.

15. Valid Excuses for missing an assignment are Job interviews, Graduate School Interviews, and Confirmed Illness. Missing an assignment must be communicated to all involved in advance with an alternative plan to make up the assignment.

Proposal The proposal is written individually but specific meetings will be held by the team to collaborate on content and all content will be agreed upon by the team and will be the same in the individual papers.

Weekly Memorandum 1. Weekly Memorandum will be written with the idea in mind that all team members

in their individual and team reports will utilize the content. 2. Weekly Memorandum will be written by the recorder(s) and then forwarded to the

rest of the team for editing and commentary. 3. Weekly Memorandum will start in the third week of the course. 4. The report will be sent out weekly no later than the day before the meeting with

your faculty advisor; it should be e-‐mailed as an attachment to the team email address. The report is due even if the meeting is canceled for any reason. Although the recorder is responsible for writing the report, all members of the team should contribute to the content.

Final Report 1. The final report will be compiled by the team leader and submitted no less than 24

hours before the faculty meeting. 2. Every member produces their own bibliography (in correctly cited format)

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Team Leader Transition Report: The team leader will write this report at the end of first and second rotation. It will include key concepts such as team life cycles, TKI, the application of ground rules, and suggestions for new team leader. Completion Report: Written by the team leader and turned in the evening before the team’s Exit Conference. The report will summarize team accomplishments, effectives tools used, and feedbacks. Laboratory Notebooks 1. The recorder is responsible for neatly recording data in the lab notebook. 2. Keep only one notebook in active use at a time. 3. Keep detailed records of experiments by noting down all necessary information (i.e.


Example #3: General 1. Documents written by the team will be discussed and the basic content will be

discussed prior to writing at team meetings. 2. All major documents including the mid-‐term progress report and final report will

have dedicated meetings for content, timeline, and writing discussion. 3. The team will assign a Final Editor, who will ensure that terminology is consistent,

tone is even, and the report is consistent and logical. The editor should receive all parts within 5 days before the deadline.

4. The team should plan to have a near-‐final draft within 2 days of the deadline. After that, only superficial edits should be done.

5. Writing will be divided into sections. 6. Be honest while recording and analyzing data. 7. The team will follow firm deadlines to ensure that all weight is born equally. Proposal: 1. All scientific content will be agreed upon by the team and will be the same in the

individual papers. 2. The content of the proposal will be discussed at the team meeting on ______. 3. The proposal must be written and emailed to all team members by __________. 4. The proposals will then be discussed prior to submission. 5. Team members must approve of your proposal before being submitted.

Weekly Memorandum 1. Recorder writes the Weekly Memorandum and will send to the rest of the team

for editing and commentary. 2. Sent 24 hours before meeting with faculty advisor. The report is due even if the

meeting is canceled for any reason. Final Report: 1. A Draft final report will be written 2. The final report will be compiled by the team leader and submitted no less than 24

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hours before the faculty meeting. 3. Once the report has been edited, all team members must read the report and give

feedback. B and C should be done at least twice. 4. The Final report should be completed at least three days before it is due. Laboratory Notebooks 1. The recorder is responsible for neatly recording data in the lab notebook. 2. Keep only one notebook in active use at a time. 3. Keep detailed records of experiments by noting down all necessary information (i.e.


Team Leader Transition Report: The team leader will write this report at the end of first and second rotation. It will include key concepts such as team life cycles, TKI, the application of ground rules, and suggestions for new team leader. Completion Report: Written by the team leader and turned in the evening before the team’s Exit Conference. The report will summarize team accomplishments, effectives tools used, and feedbacks. Example #4: General: 1. Each written report will have meeting for discussion of content, task delegation, and

timeline for compilation and editing. 2. The team will set up meeting times and draw up a plan. The team should meet at least a

week before the deadline to delegate tasks and create an internal timeline. 3. The team will delegate tasks and responsibilities. All team members must clearly

understand the part they are writing and stick to the internal timeline. 4. The team will assign a final editor. 5. The team leader will read through the final report and give his/her proof of the report

before submission. 6. A final editor will be selected based on writing strengths and weaknesses. 7. Everyone must finish his/her share of work 3 days in advance for compilation and editing

purposes. 8. The final report should be ready for submission at least 12 hours in advance. The team will

avoid furiously trying to finish the work the night before it is due. 9. Unethical and inappropriate manipulation of data will not be allowed. Proposal: 1. The proposal will be written as individuals; however, meeting will be held for discussion of

content and data analysis. 2. The team will agree on the results and the same data/result will be used in individual

papers. Weekly Memorandum: 1. The team recorder will be in charge of writing the weekly memorandum. 2. The weekly memorandum will be uploaded onto Dropbox 2 days in advance of the faculty

meeting for group editing and commentary.

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3. The weekly memorandum will be sent out to the team address no later than 24 hours before the faculty meeting. Even if the meeting is canceled, it should still be sent out nevertheless.

4. During team rotation, the previous recorder will write the first weekly memorandum. Final Report: Final Report will be compiled by the team leader at least 3 days in advance, and turned in no less than 24 hours in advance. Progress Report: Collaboratively written and compiled by the team leader at least 3 days in advance, and turned in no less than 24 hours in advance. Team Leader Transition Report: The team leader will write this report at the end of first and second rotation. It will include key concepts such as team life cycles, TKI, the application of ground rules, and suggestions for new team leader. Completion Report: Written by the team leader and turned in the evening before the team’s Exit Conference. The report will summarize team accomplishments, effectives tools used, and feedbacks. Laboratory Notebooks

• The recorder is responsible for neatly recording data in the lab notebook. • Keep only one notebook in active use at a time. • Keep detailed records of experiments by noting down all necessary information

(i.e. problem statement, sketches or flow diagrams, objectives, observations, operating details, calculations, etc.)

Example #5: Written Reports

• Documents written by the team will be discussed and the basic content finalized will be discussed prior to writing at team meetings.

• Timelines (and deadlines) will be made and followed • Work will be evenly distributed after discussion by all team members • Editing will be evenly distributed • Team Leader will be in charge of final check-‐up and reminder if something

has not been properly completed/ if work is sub-‐par and delegate responsibilities accordingly

• Compilation and editing of document should be completed prior to the deadline

Ground Rules regarding submitting proposal • Agree on the potential experimental paths and procedures to achieve team’s

goals. • Share useful literature (graphs, reaction pathways, process diagrams) for

effective presentation Ground Rules regarding weekly memorandum

• The recorder will be in charge of submitting weekly memorandum, and team members should contribute to the content.

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• All team members should check the weekly memorandum before the recorder sends it to the faculty advisor.

Ground Rules regarding submitting final report • The team leader will be in charge of compiling and submitting no less than 24

hours before the faculty meeting. • Each team member is expected to contribute equally to write both draft and

final reports. • Start preparing for final reports as early as possible for adequate discussion

and revision. • Extracurricular activities, UROP commitment and other course work should

not be the excuses for not contributing equally. Ground Rules regarding keeping laboratory notebooks

• The Recorder will be in charge of updating the notebook for each laboratory session and follow specific rules to keep neat, complete and clear notebook. (Rules from Appendix B, manual

Ground Rules regarding Team Leader Transition Report: • The team leader will write this report at the end of first and second rotation. It will

include key concepts such as team life cycles, TKI, the application of ground rules, and suggestions for new team leader.

Ground Rules Regarding Completion Report: • Written by the team leader and turned in the evening before the team’s Exit

Conference. The report will summarize team accomplishments, effectives tools used, and feedbacks.

Conflict Management System These are basic guidelines on how to deal manage conflict and disagreements ethically within the team. Example #1: 1. If conflicts were to arise, team members should first try to listen and understand each

other and settle the conflict. 2. Be aware of team members’ conflict styles and your own during disagreements. 3. If conflict were to persist, the team should go to the team coordinator for further

mediation and negotiation. 4. Conflict with faculty advisor and teaching assistant should be discussed as a team and the

team coordinator. 5. Respect each other’s opinions and criticisms. 6. The team leader should mediate any disagreement and heated discussions. 7. Each team member should be willing to compromise. 8. Conflict brought to the attention of the team coordinator should be kept confidential. 9. Be aware of team members’ conflict styles and your own during disagreements. 10. Only voice concerns relevant to the project. 11. Try to understand each other's motives before getting confrontational.

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Example #2: 1. Communicate with everyone whenever you are uncomfortable or unhappy with a

certain task. 2. Be aware of team members’ conflict styles and your own during disagreements. 3. Respect each other's opinions/criticisms. 4. Summarize agreements and disagreements and then make decisions 5. Team members should discuss problems with each other before going to faculty

advisor. 6. Defer to judgment of team leader if conflict cannot be resolved 7. If outside conflicts become too cumbersome, discuss with TA then faculty advisor,

then team coordinator (everything will be kept confidential). 8. Conflicts with TA or faculty advisor should be discussed as a team with the team

coordinator. Example #3: 1. Be aware of team members’ conflict styles and your own during disagreements. 2. Summarize agreements and disagreements and then make decisions 3. Team members should discuss problems with each other before going to faculty

advisor. 4. Be open to constructive criticism. Respect each other’s opinions and criticism. Be

willing to make compromises. 5. If a heated discussion occurs, Team Leader will mediate, after all team members

having taken a step back to cool down before continuing discussions. 6. Be willing to make compromises. Compromises are not sufficient. We will instead

strive for collaboration. 7. Only challenge each other in meaningful ways. 8. Respect each team member. 9. Understand each other's motives before getting confrontational 10. Conflicts with TA or faculty advisor should be discussed as a team with the team

coordinator. 11. Conflict within the team that cannot be settled by the team leader should be

brought to the team coordinator. 12. Disagreements amongst team members should be brought to team coordinator for

settlement. 13. Disagreements amongst team members brought to the team coordinator’s attention

will be confidential. 14. Refer to Mission Statement and Team Expectations Example #4: 1. Communicate with all team members when you are uncomfortable or unhappy with

a specific task 2. Be aware of team members’ conflict styles and your own during disagreements. 3. Summarize agreements and disagreements, then form a decision together 4. Do not just let a disagreement go unresolved

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5. Be willing to make compromises 6. Team members should discuss/work out problems with each other before going to

faculty advisor 7. If conflict cannot be resolved between team members: If unresolved conflict arises

between two team members, third team member should help settle it (majority rules)

8. If unresolved conflict arises among all three team members, discuss (together, as a team) with TA or faculty advisor

9. If still irresolvable, discuss together with team coordinator

Lab/ Outside Work: Lab Sessions: These rules are guidelines for how to prepare for and utilize a lab session. Work and Work Distribution: These are guidelines for how create an equitable division of work between the team members while making sure that each team member works on and learns every aspect of the project. These also outline how to go about actually performing your individual work. Example #1: 1. The group must agree on work distribution, assigned tasks, and set deadlines. All tasks will be distributed fairly; everyone will do assigned tasks on time. Work as a team to meet all deadlines 2. Rotate positions, so that all can develop necessary lab skills 3. Arrive on time to the lab or communicate conflicts in advance. 4. Hand assignments in on time. 5. Delegate equal task distribution over the entire term rather than weekly and make the distribution dependent upon each team member’s outside work commitments. 6. Prior commitments and the team’s priorities will be the over ridding criteria for equal work distribution. 7. Perform duties of role to best of ability. If you don’t understand to do something, check with team members or advisors before you start. 8. If a team member forgets his/her task, the others will remind him/her. If the same member continuously forgets, a tasty beverage/fancy dessert will be in order. 9. Start work early so assigned tasks are completed by meeting time. 10. Keep in mind that the primary focus of the team is work. 11. If 2 of 3 members decide they need to stay late or come in another time and the third member can make this time, all three must show up if necessary. 12. Background reading that is assigned at team meeting for upcoming week and all members are expected to read this. 13. Remain in agreement about what needs to be done before leaving lab. 14. Activity Lists will be formulated utilizing strengths and weaknesses and individual expectations of team members and will be created on a weekly basis by the Team Leader and updated by the Recorder and attached to the Weekly

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Memorandum for everyone’s perusal. Example #2: 1. The group must agree on work distribution, assigned tasks, and set deadlines. All tasks will be distributed evenly; everyone will do assigned tasks on time. Work as a team to meet all deadlines 2. Arrive on time to the lab. 3. Delegate equal task distribution over the entire term rather than weekly and make the distribution dependent upon each team member’s outside work commitments. 4. Team members will submit schedules of outside prior commitments for the term

at the first team meeting and it will be updated as changes occur. Prior commitments and the team’s priorities will be the overriding criteria for equal work distribution. 5. If a team member forgets his/her task, the others will remind him/her. If the same member continuously forgets, the others will take up the issue with the Team Coordinator. 6. Plan experiments in advance of lab time. Perform data analysis outside of lab. 7. Accomplish tasks with no more than the necessary number of man-‐hours. 8. Background reading will be assigned each week at team meeting for the upcoming week, and all members are expected to read this. 9. Remain in agreement about what needs to be done before leaving lab. 10. Activity Lists will be formulated utilizing strengths and weaknesses and individual expectations of team members and will be created on a weekly basis by the Team Leader and updated by the Recorder and attached to the Weekly Progress Report for everyone’s perusal. Example #3: 1. The team must be focused on the long-‐term goal and short-‐term goal of the lab

project. 2. The team roles are rotated once a while to help each individual gain the necessary

skills of a leader, a recorder, and an oral presenter. 3. Each team member should hand assignment in on time and follow the team

calendar accurately. 4. Work should be distributed fairly and reasonable. Accommodations can be made for

unexpected/special situations. 5. Each member should arrive to the lab on time and go through the Activity List for

that day. 6. If change of schedule occurs, team members should contact the team leader

immediately. 7. If a team member forgets his/her task, others will remind him/her. However, if the

same member continuously forgets, he/she should be read to order refreshments for the group at the next team meeting.

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8. If the majority of the team believes that it is necessary to come in for an additional lab session and remaining team member can make to the time, all team member must show up for the lab session.

9. Tasks should be delegated according to the strengths and weakness of each team member.

10. Deviations from the planned activities must be agreed on by all team members. 11. Set up should not take more than 30 minutes and clean up will take place 30

minutes before the end of lab. 12. If it is necessary to stay later than 5 pm two of the three members must stay to

conduct experiments. Staying after 5 pm will be voluntary and will be agreed up by all team members. I

13. t is expected that team members will volunteer to pick up extra assignments/tasks if their schedule allows and if they are willing.

14. Activity lists will also be created keeping individuals strengths and weaknesses and whether team members would like to develop their weaknesses.

15. The team must be focused on the long-‐term goal and short-‐term goal of the lab project.

16. Each team member should hand assignment in on time and follow the team calendar accurately.

17. Work should be distributed fairly and reasonable. Accommodations can be made for unexpected/special situations.

18. If change of schedule occurs, team members should contact the team leader immediately.

19. If a team member forgets his/her task, others will remind him/her. However, if the same member continuously forgets, he/she should be read to order refreshments for the group at the next team meeting.

Example #4: 1. The group must agree on work distribution, assigned tasks, and set deadlines. All

tasks will be distributed evenly; everyone will do assigned tasks on time. Work as a team to meet all deadlines

2. Attempt to distribute work fairly. Even distribution of work over the course of the term.

3. Rotate positions, so that all can develop necessary lab skills 4. Arrive on time to the lab or communicate conflicts in advance. 5. Hand assignments in on time. 6. Delegate equal task distribution over the entire term rather than weekly and make

the distribution dependent upon each team member’s outside work commitments. 7. Team members will submit schedules of outside prior commitments for the term at

the first team meeting and it will be updated as changes occur. Prior commitments and the team’s priorities will be the over ridding criteria for equal work distribution.

8. Perform duties of role to best of ability. 9. If a team member forgets his/her task, the others will remind him/her. If the same

member continuously forgets, a tasty beverage/fancy dessert will be in order.

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10. Start work early so assigned tasks are completed by meeting time 11. Keep in mind that the primary focus of the team is work. 12. If 2 of 3 members decide they need to stay late or come in another time and the

third member can make this time, all three must show up then. 13. Background reading will be assigned each week at team meeting for upcoming week

and all members are expected to read this. 14. Remain in agreement about what needs to be done before leaving lab. 15. Activity Lists will be formulated utilizing strengths and weaknesses and individual expectations of team members and will be created on a weekly basis by the Team Leader and updated by the Recorder and attached to the Weekly Progress Report for everyone’s perusal. Safety: These are rules to codify how the team will follow through on safety in the laboratory in compliance with MIT regulations. 1. Check team members before going into lab for meeting Safety Requirements (long

pants, closed shoes). 2. All team members must complete and understand the new policies on

environmental safety before beginning their project. 3. All Team members will adhere to the following Overall Safety Rules in all laboratory work:

a. Eye protection is required at all times in the laboratory and where chemicals are stored and handled. b. Horseplay, pranks, or other acts of mischief are especially dangerous and are absolutely prohibited.

c. Work only with materials when you know their flammability, reactivity, corrosiveness, and toxicity.

d. Laboratory areas should not be used as eating or drinking places. e. Unauthorized experiments are prohibited. f. Confine long hair and loose clothing when in the laboratory. Men should remove

neckties. g. Mouth suction should never be used to fill pipettes, to start siphons, or for any other purpose. h. Never perform experimental work in the laboratory alone. i. A TA or a staff must be around when students are in the lab. Know how to shut

down your experiment if the alarm sounds. j. A complete copy of the safety regulations will be referred to whenever any

question about safety in regard to our project is questioned by a team member or anyone else associated with our project.

XI. Cleanup and Checkout The team will do laboratory Cleanup and Checkout on the last day of class. When the

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cleanup is complete, Steve Wetzel will inspect, approve, and sign the team out. The team will consider the following during the cleanup: 1. Glassware should be cleaned and dried and returned to the proper storage area. 2. Tools and equipment should be returned to the location they came from. 3. If you borrowed anything from another lab, please return it. 4. If you have equipment that needs attention, please notify Steve Wetzel, or a TA. 5. Discard all items that are not likely to be reused. 6. Use CAUTION when disposing of chemicals. Be sure that every container is clearly identified with its contents, full names only, no abbreviations or formulas. 7. We have special tags and forms that need to be filled out for the disposal of chemicals. Please ask if you have any questions about mixing, compatibility, or proper disposal method. Check the MSDS for chemicals used. 8. Dispose of sharps only in proper containers. 9. Clean the top of your bench. Remember that you started with a clean bench, and you should leave it clean. Example #2: Safety: The following guidelines give code for safety. Follow the Overall Safety Rules in all laboratory work that are outlined in the Course Manual:

1. Goggles must be worn at all time in the lab. 2. No pranks and jokes during lab hours 3. Make sure to check material’s characteristics before using. 4. No food or drink allowed. 5. Wear loose clothing all the time

Each team member will clean up lab area during cleanup: 1. Tools should be returned to proper location. 2. Dispose sharps to proper container. 3. Be cautious when disposing chemical in the container. Make sure the container has

correct labeling.

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Appendix Two

Templates

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Team Rotation Schedule Template: (In Team Booklet) Choosing of roles that can be rotated or remain static, i.e. Team Leader, Recorder, Oral Presenter. If there are more than three people in your team, choose to have two leaders and two recorder and two oral presenters for each rotation. Name of Team Members: Team # Rotation #1 Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Rotation #2 Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Rotation #3 Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________ Role______________________ Name of Team Member ______________________

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Strengths and Weakness Template: (In Team Booklet) List your strengths in the following areas: Name: Team # Technical Strengths: Technical Weaknesses: What do you want to develop in this area during the term? Interpersonal Strengths: Interpersonal Weaknesses: What do you want to develop in this area during the term? Writing and Editing Strengths: Writing and Editing Weaknesses: What do you want to develop in this area during the term? Presentation Strengths: Presentation Weaknesses: What do you want to develop in this area during the term?

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Agenda Document Template #1: This is an example of an Agenda Document that can be used as a template 1. Subject line of e-‐mail: E-‐MAIL SUBJECT LINE: Last Name of Team Leader -‐Team# -‐ Agenda – Date

a. If a download subject line of file: Last Name -‐Team# -‐ Agenda – Date

2. Send to Team email address (1026-‐[email protected])

AGENDA for either Team or Faculty Meeting

LOGISTICS

Team # Last Name of Team Leader: Time, Date, and Place of Meeting: Who should attend: TOPICS TO BE DISCUSSED:

1. It is helpful to socialize for a few minutes before the formal meeting begins.

2. List the overall areas to be covered in the meeting.

3. Within each area, list the topics to be discussed.

4. Identify specific problems and issues that need to be resolved

5. Include as attachments any necessary material not previously disseminated

6. Last topics should include

7. Summary of decisions and plans

8. Any issues related to functioning of the team

9. Estimate the approximate time expected to be devoted to each topic

10. Summarize the meeting.

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Send out agendas 24 hours before the meeting to allow time for comments on the topics included in the agenda. Advance knowledge allows time for feedback from all the participants concerning items to add and allows team members time to think about issues to be discussed.

Agenda Template #2

This is an example of an Agenda that can be used as a template 1. Subject line of e-‐mail: E-‐MAIL SUBJECT LINE: Last Name of Team Leader -‐Team# -‐ Agenda – Date

a. If a download subject line of file: Last Name -‐Team# -‐ Agenda – Date

2. Send to Team Members, TA, Faculty Advisor and Team Coordinator

3. Sends out agendas 24 hours to allow time for comments on the topics included in the agenda before the meetings. Advance knowledge allows time for feedback from all the participants because comments and additions are always appreciated especially comments on any solutions to problems stated on agenda.

Agenda for either Team or Faculty Meeting

Team# Agenda Team Leader: Date and Time: April 14, 2-‐2:45 PM, Place: Room 56-‐469 Attendees: Team Members In Attendance: Faculty Advisor: In Attendance: Teaching Assistant: In Attendance: Length of Meeting: Key Topic: Priority

Due Date:

1. Socialize Time to Accomplish 2. Agenda Items Time to Accomplish 3. Discussion Time to Accomplish 4. Team Updates Time to Accomplish 5. Weekly Activity List Time to Accomplish 6. Goals for week Time to Accomplish 7. Discussion:

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a. Tasks and time required for each Time to Accomplish 8. Feedback Time to Accomplish 9. Meeting Summary by Team Leader Time to Accomplish

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Weekly Memorandum (Progress Report) Template:

Memorandum To: Faculty advisor From: [Your name] CC: Team No. _ [Your team number] Date: [Today’s date] Subject: Progress Report No. 1 [Number sequentially] for Week of [Sunday’s date for this week] Title: [Project Title] 1. Introduction Identify the overall scope of the project and any changes in the scope or direction since inception of the project. (Early in the term, you can use your mission statement if a more specific scope has not yet been developed.) This section should be one paragraph unless major changes in scope or direction are underway. 2. Work Carried Out Cover the period since the last progress report and include subsections that summarize the following: a. Meetings held Summarize substantive issues and problems discussed, ideas and strategy developed, and decisions reached. b. Tasks accomplished and milestones reached The tasks refer to what you did. The milestones refer to major points of achievement identified, for example, in your proposal or other documents. c. Data Summarize important laboratory data and any analysis from theory. Use figures or tables as appropriate. Identify any conclusions that can be drawn from your data and their significance. d. Problems Describe (1) resolution or status of previously reported problems, (2) new problems or issues to be resolved and your strategy for doing so, and (3) any problems you anticipate in the future. Will any of these require a change in scope or direction of your project? 3. Work to be Done Describe action plans for tasks that will be carried out in the next reporting period (usually one week). Relate these to problems or issues to be resolved or to tasks that are to be carried. 4. Team Describe any issues or problems related to functioning of your team that should be brought to the attention of the team coordinator and your faculty advisor. Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of your team and how you plan to rectify the weaknesses. Indicate any communication problems within your team or with 10.26 personnel. 5. Summary A summary is appropriate if there is considerable content in your report. Briefly summarize the status of the project; take a larger view in evaluating progress or lack thereof; and highlight problems and suggested changes.

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Minutes Template

Here is a Template that can be used for Minutes for Meetings. Minutes are optional. What to include in the Minutes: Subject Line: Last Name-‐Team#-‐Minutes for TPR #1-‐Date of Meeting Please submit any corrections Name of Recorder: Team # Minutes for Weekly Memorandum # Date and type (Faculty or Team) of Meeting: Time Meeting began and ended: Who Attended: Items handled in lab during the week: Tasks Accomplished since last meeting: Activity List -‐ Questions and Tasks to do for next week include what tasks are assigned to which team member, changes to activity lists. Questions to be discussed at next faculty meeting Brainstorming activities Team Interaction Discussions and Brainstorming Sessions List suggestions and formulated plans suggested by faculty advisor if faculty meeting

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Team Leader Transition Report Template: Team Leader Transition Report: Team Number: Team Members: Rotation Number: Current Leader: Future Leader: 1. How is the team doing?

a. Team Life Cycles

2. How are the team interactions? a. Effectiveness and Changes to Ground Rules b. How is team using TKI assessment?

3. How is the team accomplishing the task? 4. Strengths:

a. Team strengths b. Individual strengths

5. Weaknesses:

a. Team strengths b. Individual strengths

6. Improvements and Suggestions For New Team Leader: 7. Suggested changes in Milestones: 8. Suggested Changes in Weekly Task Activity Lists: SEE EXAMPLES FOR EACH ROTATION IN APPENDIX 3.

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Completion Report Template

Completion Report Template Team # Team Leader: Team Members: Project Name and Number: Faculty Advisor: A. Websites: Discuss how you used the website and any difficulties or improvements you wish to mention.

1. Stellar Website: 2. Collaboration Tool Box Website:

B. Oral Presentations: Discuss each rotation and how the plan and ground rules were improved over time. C. Writing Assignments: Discuss how you collaborated and how your team’s written plan and ground rules helped the team members write a successful paper.

1. Proposal 2. Progress Report 3. Final Report 4. Weekly Memorandum 5. Agendas

6. Team Leader Transition Report D. Completion of Task and Team Functions: Discuss the completion of the task and the team’s functioning for Rotation #3 building upon the prior Team Leader Transition Reports. E. Team Presentation: Discuss what your team learned and how you interacted with the other teams during the planning and executing of the presentation. F. Team Culture: 1. Metamorphosis of Individual Weaknesses into Strengths: 2. Did each team member meet their personal expectations that they listed at the beginning of the class? 3. How did the team utilize each member’s individual strengths to make the team more effective? 4. How did each individual team member use their knowledge of their TKI conflict styles to manage conflicts?

a. What styles did each member over or underuse? b. When you used the most effective style how did that help you manage

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the conflict? 5. Ability to meet faculty advisor's expectations. 6. Ability to meet team's milestones. 7. Ability of team to progress through team life cycles. 8. Ground Rules and Mission Statements 9. Time Management of the Team 10. Role Rotation 11. Weekly Faculty and Team Meetings G. Suggestions for improving the course

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Appendix Three Examples

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Examples Vision and Mission Statements: Sample Vision and Mission Statements: Microsoft Mission Statement -‐ Our Mission at Microsoft, we work to help people and businesses throughout the world realize their full potential. This is our mission. Everything we do reflects this mission and the values that make it possible. Our Values as a company, and as individuals, we value: 1. Integrity and honesty. 2. Passion for customers, for our partners, and for technology. 3. Openness and respectfulness. 4. Taking on big challenges and seeing them through. 5. Constructive self-‐criticism, self-‐improvement, and personal excellence. 6. Accountability to customers, shareholders, partners, and employees for

commitments, results, and quality. Microsoft's vision: "A personal computer in every home running Microsoft software." Coca Cola’s Mission Statement -‐ Everything we do is inspired by our enduring mission: To Refresh the World... in body, mind, and spirit. To Inspire Moments of Optimism... through our brands and our actions. To Create Value and Make a Difference... everywhere we engage. "COCA COLA’s VISION To achieve sustainable growth, we have established a vision with clear goals. Profit: Maximizing return to shareowners while being mindful of our overall responsibilities. People: Being a great place to work where people are inspired to be the best they can be. Portfolio: Bringing to the world a portfolio of beverage brands that anticipate and satisfy peoples; desires and needs. Partners: Nurturing a winning network of partners and building mutual loyalty. Planet: Being a responsible global citizen that makes a difference. Starbuck’s Mission Statement -‐ "Establish Starbucks as the premier purveyor of the finest coffee in the world while maintaining our uncompromising principles as we grow. The following six guiding principles will help us measure the appropriateness of our decisions: Provide a great work environment and treat each other with respect and dignity. Embrace diversity as an essential component in the way we do business. Apply the highest standards of excellence to the purchasing, roasting and fresh delivery of our coffee. Develop enthusiastically satisfied customers all of the time. Contribute positively to our communities and our environment. Recognize that profitability is essential to our future success. " Gehry Technologies Mission Statement -‐ Gehry Technologies ("GT") is a building industry technology company providing integrated, digitally driven construction tools and methodologies to companies and their projects. GT brings fifteen years experience applying advanced digital technologies to complex building projects undertaken by Gehry Partners and other leading architecture and engineering companies. Our clients are firms and building teams interested in moving beyond the limits of drafting and paper driven project

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management and into 21st century, digitally enabled design and construction practices. Gehry Technologies promotes this transformation of building design and delivery practices through three inter-‐related Centers of effort: Software Products, Consulting and Services and Research and Education. Project teams working with GT's technologies and services can anticipate many benefits relating to improved quality and reduced costs, including: * Improved visibility by project leadership into information developed by the extended building team, * Integration of financial and other non-‐geometric data with project geometry, * Improved coordination of building systems to identify and address potential conflicts before construction, * Management of project data through version and revision tracking, * Integration between AE documentation and fabrication or construction activities, * Reduced project transaction costs (paper printing, rework, etc.). MetalSoft Mission Statement -‐ MetalSoft is dedicated to delivering the most advanced innovation and technology to the sheet metal fabrication industry. Our vision is to build a bridge between humans and machines through software technology. We believe that effective communication between humans and machines is the key to the future of the manufacturing industry. To implement this vision, MetalSoft has built a global research and development network that extends throughout the U.S., Japan, Italy, China, and India. True to our Engineering roots, MetalSoft maintains an innovation-‐centric corporate culture designed to promote and develop the creativity of each employee and maximize our ability to meet the needs of the fast-‐changing sheet metal fabrication industry. Apple Mission Statement -‐ Apple Computer "To produce high-‐quality, low cost, easy to use products that incorporate high technology for the individual. We are proving that high technology does not have to be intimidating for non-‐computer experts."

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Example #1 Agenda

Team# X Team Meeting Agenda Team Leader: Sam Date and Time: April 14, 2-‐2:45 PM, Place: Room 56-‐469 Attendees: Team Members In Attendance: Sam Susan Sarah Faculty Advisor: In Attendance: Teaching Assistant: In Attendance: Sung Length of Meeting: 45 Minutes Key Topic: Progress Report Presentation High Priority

Due Date:

1. Socialize (5 minutes) 2. Set up AV Equipment (5 minutes) 3. Lauren’s Presentation (15 minutes) 4. Discussion of Presentation (15 minutes)

a. Constructive Criticism 5. Team 11 Updates (5 minutes)

a. Presentation rehearsal with Writing Instructor b. Creation of Design 2 caffeine/lactose tablets

c. Dissolution test on Design 2 caffeine/lactose tablets 6. Weekly Activity List (15 minutes)

a. Draft Report Tasks b. Draft Presentation data analysis

7. Goals for week (5 minutes) 8. Discussion: Tasks and time required for each task (10 minutes) 9. Feedback (10 minutes) 10. Meeting Summary by Team Leader (5 Minutes)

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Example #2 Agenda Agenda for 10.26 Team # Week 14 Faculty Advisor Meeting Team Leader Name Aaron Date of Meeting: Monday, May 11, 2009 Time: 2:30 pm, for 85 minutes. Place : 66-‐480 Attendance : All team members will be in attendance. Key Objectives Primary Objective The primary objective of the meeting is to discuss the final report draft comments. Secondary Objectives • Discuss patent requirements and future work • Discuss final data analysis results • Keep the meeting short to allow time for presentation preparation work in lab Agenda 1. Brief hello and social time (5 min) 2. Discussion of draft final report comments (15 min) 3. Discuss data analysis results for final data (15 min) 4. Address patent requirements and set tentative summer dates (10 min) 5. Weekly Activity List (15 minutes)

A. Draft Report Tasks B. Draft Presentation data analysis

6. Goals for week 7. Discussion: Tasks and time required for each task (10 minutes) 8. Feedback (10 minutes) 9. Meeting Summary by Team Leader (5 minutes)

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Appendix Four

Team Leader Rotation Tasks

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Team Leader Responsibilities Rotation #1

Understand How to implement the Team Life Cycles STAGE 1. FORMATION

“Honeymoon “ period

Excitement, anticipation, and optimism Initial, tentative commitment to the team

Suspicion, fear and anxiety about ability to accomplish the task Skepticism about what role team member will play on team

Idealistic discussion of concepts and issues Impatient about having to discuss and analyze the process

Complaints about barriers to the task Resistance to building team, focus on task

Team members strengths and weaknesses are discussed but not accepted Ground Rules are discussed and written down

Maintenance Tasks during Formation Stage 1. Get to know each other through conversation and Structured Informational Sessions. 2. In the Formation Stage the Team Leader is responsible for initiating the structure of the team. As the leader, you are responsible for the following: 1. Organizing and Defining Relationships in the Team 2. Assigning Specific Tasks 3. Specifying Procedures to Follow 4. Scheduling Work 5. Clarifying Expectations of Team Members 3. The Team Leader is responsible for developing a written list of task (Activity Lists) to be delegated, showing the flow and time management of the tasks the team is performing. 4. The Recorder will be responsible for keeping team records, i.e. Weekly Progress Reports. 5. Gather information about the team members. Here are some areas that should be covered when making your assessment: Competencies (strength and weaknesses), Expectations , Intercultural Behavior, Time Management, and Conflict Styles 6. Create a format to run effective Meetings. 7. Create Concrete Goals for the project and plan a Systematic Approach to reaching your goal. Using the overall goals decide what pressures, outside support, or stresses will be affecting the team 8. Create a List of Milestones for the project. 9. Be Directive while leading in the Formation Stage because members are apt to be lofty and abstract in this stage or look at the Formation Stage as pointless and show

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impatience with the process. Team Members usually exhibit low competence at this stage and high commitment. 10. Create Ground Rules and refer to them to keep the team on purpose. Refer to them when describing the team’s activities in the Weekly Memorandum (Weekly Progress Report). 11. Have open discussions about complaints and use your Conflict Management System created in your ground rules to address these complaints. 12. Report all the above Formation Activities in the first weekly Progress Report. 13. The team leader should check how much time other team members actually spent on the task activities and whether the time estimates were correct for the task. If not, adjustments must be made to the time management plan. Discuss thoroughly what inside and outside influences affected the team's efficiency. After a milestone is reached, meet and examine how the team members used their time. In the beginning, there will probably be a discrepancy between the time the team expected to use for specific activities and the time actually required. These findings can be used to continually refine estimates of the time required to carry out specific tasks in your action plans.

14. When roles are rotates, the leader should fill out a Team Leader Transition Report for the next team leader. STAGE 2. CRITICISM

Ground rules are ignored

Near panic sets in over the realization of how much work lies ahead Resistance to the task

Sharp fluctuations in attitude about the team Skepticism about the project’s chances of success

Differences of opinion begin amongst team members although there is agreement on the real issues

Clarity of purpose increases; plenty of uncertainties persist Members are Competitive and Defensive Decisions do not come easily within the team Compromise is required to enable progress

Doubt over the competence of superiors who chose the project

Maintenance Tasks during Formation Stage 1. After assessing each team member, develop a profile describing how you think each member will tackle the project that lies ahead.

2. The team leader should be Supportive because there is usually some task competence, but low to medium commitment. 3. Review and adapt the ground rules to cover each situation that arises. Ground Rules are sometimes broken. Discuss them, and adapt them to the team culture. 4. If team members resist the task, utilize Active Listening Techniques to find out what the problems are and adjust plans accordingly.

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5. Attempt to define what Conflict Management Styles members are using to deal with their resistance and feelings of being overwhelmed. Remember: conflict avoidance is overused during this stage of team development. 6. Many of the emotional issues in the Criticism Stage actually arise from differences in working styles or time management issues. These issues are covered over by defensive emotional reactions such as frustration, apathy about team structure, or anger regarding the organization of the course. 7. Motivation levels need to be considered when Delegating Tasks. Assess the motivation level of each team member and delegate task in the appropriate manner. 8. If members are feeling frustrated about the organization of the project, discuss the team’s feelings openly with your faculty advisor or instructor to move the process along. 9. After clearly stating the problems, make discussion and resolution of these items, part of the Agenda so they are not avoided or mishandled. 10. Review overall goals with the team: becoming as efficient and as high-‐ performing as possible to accomplish the task.

11. After a milestone is reached, summarize how the team used their time to understand how the time was really spent. 12. Facilitation of discussions during the Criticism Stage will be a large factor in determining how quickly your team reaches the Accomplishment Stage. 13. When roles are rotated, the team leader should make out a Team Leader Transition Report for the next team leader. Rotation #2 Team Leader Tasks

STAGE 3. SYNTHESIS

Team members learn to work together successfully

Respond to Teal Leader facilitating meetings and project Resistance fades

Roles and responsibilities are clear and accepted Collaborative efforts are initiated

Team members begin to give each other positive criticism Members begin to reestablish a harmonious team culture

Commitment to the task Realistic planning takes place

Conflict management is established and agreed upon The team’s mission is beginning to be realized

Team and personal goals are discussed and implemented Ground rules are implemented

Maintenance of team is established Discussion begins on how to form a consensus and maintain the team culture

Beliefs, assumptions, and values and working styles are acknowledged Progress on the task is significant

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May engage in fun and social events together Commitment and unity is strong

Maintenance Tasks for Synthesis Stage 1. Review the Strengths and Weaknesses and Expectations that each team member is working to develop individually. Use the Team Leader Transition Report as a reference. 2. For task allocation and brainstorming, use Coaching as a leadership style because the team has begun to trust one another and some (if not all) members are usually experiencing high competence with variable commitment. 3. Review the conflict situations of the past. Discuss the different Conflict Styles each of the members used to manage and negotiate the conflict. Don't forget that the avoidance conflict style is overused during the Criticism Stage in a team. Many may still cling to this conflict style in the hope that ignoring the problem will make it go away, or hoping that they can tough it out. 4. Go over your time management system, particularly your Milestones and Activity Lists. Make changes if necessary where time estimates are not accurate. The team now has some historical information about the time it takes a particular team member to do a particular task. Use this information to adjust the time. 5. Begin to plan ahead for the next stage of development. Look for differences in the perception of quality by the individual team members, and address the problem. 6. After a milestone is reached, summarize how the team used their time to understand how the time was really spent. 7. Revise the ground rules and adapt them to provide more clarity on difficult issues encountered. Many times a person commits to a ground rule because they wish to change their behavior to the ideal. A team member who is habitually late may agree to always be on time for meetings. Many times this commitment results in that person honestly thinking their behavior is congruent with their new commitment, while it is not. They can be unaware that they are behaving in a manner that is preventing them from accomplishing the commitment. The team member may no longer be a half hour late, but still show up ten minutes late. Although this may be frustrating to other team members, it could be a radical change in behavior for the first team member. 8. Bring up the incongruities in team members' behaviors in a nonjudgmental forum. 9. Review the mission statement and revise if it does not adequately describe the mission of the team. 10. Have each member write a synopsis of how they feel the team is behaving. Use this to determine the behaviors that are actually emerging in the team. (Journals can facilitate this but the team needs to discuss behaviors openly and honestly.) 11. Check recent Progress Reports against earlier progress reports to determine if there is evidence that effectiveness and efficiency has increased. 12. When rotating roles, the team leader should make out a Team Leader Transition Report for the next team leader.

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STAGE 4. ACCOMPLISHMENT

Members skillfully discuss their strengths and weaknesses Members use knowledge of strengths and weaknesses to accomplish task

Team is strategically aware of what they are doing and why Shared vision is established

Team members understand their roles on the team Conflict is managed skillfully

Team makes necessary changes to ground rules and scope Team members are satisfied with the team’s progress

Members are committed to the team’s goals Team as a unit can implement change

Members are effective at problem-‐solving and decision-‐making Dialogue amongst team members is established

Maintenance Tasks To Perform During Accomplishment Stage 1. Evaluate each team member’s Technical Skills and Strengths and Weaknesses and Expectations. Are the expectations being met and are you utilizing each team member’s strengths and supporting their weaknesses? 2. Promote communication amongst the members to be more skilful by facilitating discussions on adapting the systems for maintaining the team to comfort amongst the team members. Active Listening conversations are centered on teaching each other what has been learned collaboratively to comfortably and efficiently enhance the team's goals and objectives. 3. Manage Conflict efficiently by insuring that no team member ignores the other team member's open communications about how certain procedures or behaviors are not supporting the efficiency of the team 4. Review your Reporting Activities to ensure that they are organized so communication is efficient to others outside the team. Communication amongst team members reflects an attainment of a higher level of expertise on the project. 5. Team leader is now Delegating Tasks to other team members because there is high competence and high commitment to the team's performance and efficiency. Put on the Agenda a ten-‐minute discussion period to discuss how to manage the performance of the team. 6. Review each member's progress to decide if the members are experiencing satisfaction regarding the skills they needed to accomplish and if they are experiencing a sense of control over their project. Discuss changes by brainstorming and changing the Activity Lists. STAGE 5. COMPLETION

Team members assess if team reached their goals, both collectively and

personally Members emotionally accept situations where their expectations were not

met on the team Members acknowledge the personal goals they did not attain

Member acknowledge the personal goals they attained

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Team members discuss openly changes they would make the next time they are on a team

Members say goodbye to each other Archival materials are stored and given to proper authorities Communication systems used by the team are closed down

Maintenance Completion Tasks 1. The Team Leader makes sure all assignments have been completed and turned in properly. 2. The Team Leader sets up a meeting for an exit interview and a meeting with the course instructor to decide on how the team will adjourn. If a meeting with faculty is not required, the team leader schedules and facilitates this meeting using the Completion List. 3. Before the exit interview the Team Leader will have a team meeting to discuss the points that will be brought up during these exit meetings. Agendas are created and sent at least 72 hours in advance so appropriate feedback can be received from all members. 4. The team prepares a Team Self Assessment to include in the Completion Report. Part of the assessment should include whether the individual and collective goals of the team were reached. The Team leader usually reports the information to others. 5. An emotional assessment of team members' feelings about the team culture is included in their final report. This section of the presentation is confidential and only given to the course instructor. 6. Teams can plan a dinner or outing so the team can adjourn on a high note. Bibliography Langlois, Harold, (2010) Leadership Mindsets, Challenges of Leadership in Teams 2010 MIT Professional Education Nahavandi, A., 1997. The Art and Science of Leadership. London, UK: Prentice Hall International; Dubrin, A.J., 1995. LEADERSHIP Research Findings, Practice, and Skills. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.) Schmidt, Terry (2010) Emotionally Intelligent Project Management, Challenges of Leadership in Teams 2010 MIT Professional Education Tuckman, Bruce (1965). "Developmental sequence in small groups". Psychological Bulletin 63 (6): 384–99. doi:10.1037/h0022100