Team Processes

Abstract

Team processes refer to the actions team members take to combine their individual resources, knowledge, and skill to resolve their task demands and achieve collective goals. These are distinct from team emergent states which refer to characteristic levels of feelings or thoughts among team members. The distinguishing feature between team processes and emergent states is that team processes represent actions team members take, whereas emergent states represent team member attitudes, values, cognitions, and motivations. Both team processes and emergent states are conceptually dynamic and can vary as a function of the other. Conceptual clarity regarding the nature of team processes has developed only in the prior two decades. Prior to that time team processes were broadly and ill-defined. Team processes have occupied the mediating role in traditional input-process-outcome (IPO) models. However, these models have evolved to position team processes within a larger category of mediating mechanisms in organizing frameworks of overlapping domains capturing team structural features, team compositional features, and mediating mechanisms, all embedded within organizational structure and culture. Team processes are increasingly recognized as having taskwork and teamwork dimensions, with taskwork being represented as creative behavior, decision-making, and boundary spanning; and teamwork being represented by transition, action, and interpersonal processes. The subject of team processes has been represented in nearly all general reviews of small groups and teams, in many primary studies that examine both general and specific team processes, and in several meta-analyses. The fundamental conclusion of this body of research is that teams can learn how to have more effective processes, and teams with more effective processes exhibit higher performance.