Team Formation Research Articles

Incident response: A structured model from detection to containment and recovery

As cyber-attacks evolve in sophistication; organizations are under constant threat. This necessitates a cohesive approach to prioritize incident response (IR) capabilities and mitigate potential damages. This research paper explores integrating Information Security Management (ISM) and Incident Response (IR) functions; underlining the need for a unified strategy that leverages organizational learning theory. The study comprehensively analyzes the Incident Response Lifecycle; outlining the critical phases of preparation; detection and analysis; containment; eradication; recovery; and post-incident activities. It also investigates the crucial role and structure of Incident Response Teams (IRTs); advocating for tailored team formations that adapt to the dynamic nature of cyber incidents. By fostering collaboration between ISM and IR functions and focusing on technical and socio-technical factors; organizations can enhance their resilience against cyber threats and improve their overall security posture.

Bringing Calm to Antibiotic Stewardship: Customizing and Automating Antibiogram Creation at a Multi-Hospital Institution

Abstract We sought to automate antibiogram creation at our multi-hospital institution with custom features including transparency into data filtering, expanding the granularity to include multi-resistant organisms, and additional conditional formatting based on sensitivity percentages. We automated creation of the antibiogram using a python framework with embedded SQL scripts. The sensitivity data for isolates from the prior year was retrieved from our lab information system. It was filtered to include only inpatient, emergency department, and observation patients across all seven hospitals in our system. Additionally, the data was filtered to only include the first organism per patient per year. Finally, organisms meeting specific sensitivity criteria (i.e. methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus) were included as separate rows beneath the parent organism. This data was inserted into an excel workbook with customized formatting to include the institutional logo, coloring based on sensitivity percentages, and customizable comments. Each of these steps are easily editable year-to-year to allow for changing requirements. At each step of filtering, the integrity of the data was extensively validated to make sure it was performing as intended. The antibiograms are generated within a few minutes in a fully automated manner (Figure 1). These will be distributed systemwide after review by the Medical Microbiology directors and Antimicrobial Stewardship Committee in January of each year. The code was made in an easily editable, modular way such that requests for additional separation of organisms by sensitivity, removing drugs not pertinent to our formulary, and editing what organisms appear is easily managed by the informatics team on a year-to-year basis.

Collaborative Surgical Team Formation: A Proposed Theoretical Framework Using Genetic Algorithm

The imbalance in surgical team composition has a significant impact on the increment of surgical failure and error. The crucial factors influencing the optimal surgical team members are experience, skills, trust, and leadership. Hence, this study aims to maximize surgical team formation effectiveness with a systematic and data-driven approach to team composition for minimizing human error, maximizing safety, and promoting active communication and reliability among team members that can result in successful surgeries. A theoretical framework has been proposed for optimizing surgical team formation using a Genetic Algorithm (GA). This proposed framework is predicted to assemble an effective collaborative surgical team that can perform a successful surgery based on the multi-objective function: the performance indicators and social-based ratings.

Team-based learning in health professions education: an umbrella review

BackgroundTeam-Based Learning (TBL) has garnered considerable attention in education research. To consolidate the existing evidence, we conducted an umbrella review with four objectives: (a) to identify TBL review characteristics, (b) to synthesize findings from previous reviews regarding TBL effectiveness and outcomes, (c) to determine which student groups benefit most, and (d) to identify the most and least researched elements.MethodsThe Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) methodology was followed: [1] Search strategy and literature search [2] Screening and Study Selection [3] Assessment of methodological quality [4] Data collection, and [5] Data summary. We utilized Endnote, Excel, and MAXQDA for efficient project management and analyzing data.ResultsAnalyzing twenty-three reviews spanning from 2013 to 2024, we found a peak in TBL research in 2022 including more than 312 unique primary studies involving more than 63,987 participants. Notably, the United States and China accounted for over 61% of the total primary articles focused on students from medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and dentistry. Evidence supports the superiority of TBL in enhancing cognitive outcomes. However, findings related to retention are mixed. Insufficient evidence exists to draw robust conclusions when comparing TBL with other active learning methods. TBL demonstrates favorable outcomes in terms of clinical performance and engagement. Non-technical skills show mixed results. Notably, TBL positively impacts self-study, learning ability, decision-making, and emotional intelligence. Faculty experiences reveal an initial increase in workload, but generally hold positive attitude. Faculty development remain limited in duration and scope. Freshmen, academically weaker students, undergraduates, Chinese female students, and nursing students appear to benefit most from TBL. Team formation and size are the most frequently studied elements.ConclusionTBL holds promise for improving learning outcomes, but ongoing investigation is essential to maximize its impact in diverse educational contexts. This umbrella review underscores the need for further research in specific areas i.e. effective pre-class learning methods and faculty workload.

Organizational resilience and its implications for healthcare workers in the COVID-19 pandemic: A literature review.

Organizational resilience is crucial in supporting the well-being of healthcare workers and ensuring the quality of healthcare services during crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aims to comprehensively review organizational resilience of healthcare facilities in terms of its conception, measurement, and impacts on healthcare workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. A search was conducted in four databases (PubMed, ScienceDirect, PsycINFO, and Web of Science) for empirical articles considering organizational resilience among healthcare facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic from 2019 to 2024. Several keywords from three categories ("COVID-19", "organizational resilience," and "healthcare facilities") were used, and RAYYAN was used to manage references. Four empirical articles from 172 studies were included, which encompassed a total sample of 6,606 healthcare workers from Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Türkiye. Organizational resilience could influence the individual resilience of healthcare practitioners, enhance crisis management and ensure safety performance. The strategies of enhancing organizational resilience at healthcare worker level included staff training, crisis management protocols, collaboration promotion, and stress management approaches. The ones at health facility level included government intervention, funds for hospital preparedness, competency-based crisis management, and mental health programs for healthcare workers. Our review also suggests a lack of empirical studies, no commonly used measurement instruments, and the heterogeneity of study contexts in the research of organizational resilience in public health. This review highlights effective strategies to enhance the organizational resilience of healthcare workers and examines their impact during the COVID-19 pandemic. Immediate government action, funding to support hospital preparedness, and the formation of flexible healthcare teams are essential to strengthen organizational resilience among healthcare workers for future crises.

Using Scrum in Solving Business Reality Cases

Objective: This teaching innovation proposal aims to dynamise and bring the teaching of the subject Business Management and Organisation, taken in the fourth semester of the bachelor’s degree in Business Administration and Management (GAD), closer to the business world. Theoretical Framework: It is necessary to bring the university closer to business in order to reduce the gap in the skills training demanded by companies and to achieve better employability of graduates. Method: To do this, we propose the resolution of a production case by workshops, through the formation of agile teams, using Scrum and Kanban, using the Trello application for the latter, the iterative and incremental approach of this methodology will allow the student to learn in a simple and practical way concepts that grow in complexity, as it evolves in the resolution of the same. Results and Discussion: This teaching methodology allows the student to simultaneously acquire the specific competences of the subject and the so-called soft competences demanded by the working environment. Research Implications: This type of innovation is necessary in university institutions in order to include in their curricula the competences demanded by recruiters, and can also be used in other disciplines and careers. Originality/Value: The originality of the research lies in the practice of a learning process that makes it possible to include the training required by companies in curricula.

Latent personality profiles of analog astronauts: An unsupervised clustering method analysis

The selection of astronauts for space missions is an important process that involves the assessment of multiple factors, including personality traits. Previous studies have corroborated that these traits exert a significant influence on the performance and adaptation of the crew during the execution of space missions. In this study, International Personality Item Pool - NEO – 120 (IPIP-120) was used to assess the personality of participants in a sample of 43 analog astronauts who took part in 9 different analog missions between 2022 and 2023. The objective was to identify specific personality profiles among the analog astronauts using the unsupervised k-means clustering method. The centroids of each cluster were analyzed to describe distinctive personality profiles. The results revealed the existence of two distinct personality clusters among the analog astronauts. The first cluster showed a greater propensity toward adventure, intellect, goal striving, extroversion, and cooperation. In contrast, the second cluster exhibited lower scores on these traits. The identification of these two differentiated personality profiles reinforces the importance of personality assessment as a valuable tool in the astronaut selection process. Furthermore, the application of the k-means method demonstrates its utility as an effective technique for identifying underlying patterns in complex datasets. These findings may inform future astronaut selection strategies, contributing to the formation of more effective and cohesive teams for space missions.

Construct an instructional approach based on collaborative learning and reflective learning for enhance students’ analytical thinking and critical thinking skills

In the context of rapid globalization and digitalization, the development of students' critical and analytical thinking skills is increasingly prioritized in education. This study aims to address the gap in instructional models by designing an eight-step instructional model that integrates collaborative and reflective learning strategies to enhance these essential skills. Drawing on social constructivist theories and Dewey's reflective thinking framework, the research develops a comprehensive model that includes phases such as goal setting, team formation, exploration, collaborative practice, reflection, integration, and feedback. The findings suggest that this model significantly improves students' analytical and critical thinking abilities by promoting structured collaboration and intentional reflection. Through diverse group interactions and continuous self-assessment, students achieve a deeper understanding and critical analysis. The model's iterative feedback mechanisms also contribute to sustained improvements in student learning outcomes. This study introduces an original instructional model that theoretically supports the enhancement of analytical and critical thinking skills through a systematic integration of collaborative and reflective learning, offering practical implications for educators seeking to foster these higher-order thinking skills in students.

Factors influencing the formation of creative student teams

Factors influencing the formation of creative student teams

Centering Belonging for NIRSA: Leaders in Collegiate Recreation

Volunteer leaders and staff in NIRSA: Leaders in Collegiate Recreation (NIRSA) aimed to establish shared norms for belonging, guided by recommendations from the Association's climate study conducted by 122 Consulting Group. The climate study precipitated the formation of an implementation team for justice, diversity, equity, and inclusion (JDEI). This case study explored stakeholders’ perspectives about shared norms (diversity, equity, inclusion, justice, and respect) for belonging, using multiple data points (historical context, JDEI trends, association reports, and focus groups) to ignite action. Analysis of these perspectives at in-person and virtual NIRSA educational sessions identified three themes: positive reception, action/accountability, and integration/ongoing engagement. The study provides valuable insights for association leaders to shape belonging initiatives by using shared expectations, thus effectively guiding actions based on the findings of a climate study. This study is essential for associations, and its findings can also empower members to drive similar initiatives on their respective campuses.

The Impact of Diagnosis-Specific Plan Templates on Admission Note Writing Time: A Quality Improvement Initiative.

Background There are limited objective studies regarding the effectiveness of strategies to alleviate the documentation burden on resident physicians. Objective To develop and implement diagnosis-specific templates for the plan of care section of inpatient admission notes, aiming to reduce documentation time. Methods Twelve templates for the plan of care section of admission notes were written by the study authors, reviewed by attending physicians, and shared with the residents through the electronic health record (EHR) on September 23, 2022. EHR audit log data were collected to examine admission note writing times, supplemented by resident feedback on acceptability via an anonymous survey. Feasibility measures included time investment, experience with the EHR, and resident training. Results Between July 1, 2021 and June 30, 2023, 62 pediatric residents contributed 9840 admission notes. The templates were used in 557 admission notes. The mean total time spent on an admission note decreased from 97.9 minutes pre-intervention to 71.0 minutes post-intervention with the use of a template; an adjusted reduction of 23% (95% CI 16%-30%; P<.001). The mean attending time spent editing an admission note was unchanged. The survey results underscored wide acceptability of the templates among the residents. Feasibility data showed that the project required minimal time investment from the health care informatics team and minimal resident training. Conclusions Using templates in the care plan section of admission notes reduces the time residents spend writing admission notes.

Longitudinal Interprofessional Education in Undergraduate Health Profession Education: A Scoping Review Protocol

Interprofessional education (IPE) is essentially applied in the medical professions curriculum to produce graduates ready for collaborative practice. Globally, competency frameworks and guidelines have been developed to guide the integration and implementation of IPE into formal curriculum. Developing student competencies to become collaborative-ready health professionals takes a long time. This is also influenced by the formation and development of an interprofessional team’s maturity, which is a time-consuming process. Therefore, repetitive exposure to interprofessional learning throughout the curriculum (longitudinal education) should be implemented, since undergraduate level. This scoping review aims to explore the breadth of the longitudinal literature related to IPE. This article explores the global literature to identify, characterise, and summarise evidence from the published literature on longitudinal IPE. This scoping review considers the longitudinal activities of IPE in various contexts. The papers included report on the learning experiences of two or more types of students in a healthcare profession programme. This scoping review was conducted in accordance with the scoping review guidelines of the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI). The PubMed, Scopus, ProQuest, EBSCOhost, and ScienceDirect databases were searched. The results were limited to papers published in the English language from 2016 to the present. Two independent reviewers screened the titles and abstracts, and extracted data from the full-text articles. The results are presented descriptively in diagrams, tables, or other relevant formats, followed by narrative summaries.

Team formation in large organizations: A deep reinforcement learning approach

Efficient team formation is critical to human resource management, particularly as large enterprise organizations continue to flatten and are increasingly driven by projects. Efficiently scheduling internal departments and reducing employee scheduling costs are essential objectives. This paper addresses the challenge of extracting employees from the existing network who possess the necessary skills to meet project requirements while minimizing the disruption to the original department network. To tackle this problem, we model the organization as a graph, where each employee is a node, and edges represent communication between them. We formulate team formation as a combinatorial optimization problem on the graph. We first innovatively design the employee replacement and organizational measures for changing structures on the graph. To overcome the complexity of team formation under vast organizational structures and resource constraints, we propose the Graph Combinatorial Optimization DQN framework. This novel approach combines reinforcement learning and graph neural networks. By leveraging graph neural networks, we learn employee representations based on their basic information, skills, and communication patterns with other employees. Furthermore, during testing, we enable the agent to continuously improve its solutions through learning and avoid the pitfall of optimizing early decisions that may hinder the modification of later decisions. This is achieved by incrementally building subsets of solutions. We demonstrate the superiority of the GCO-DQN framework using both the real-world enterprise dataset and a synthetic dataset by comparing GCO-DQN with five state-of-the-art methods.

Enhancing supply chain resilience through risk mitigation strategies: Evidence from smallholder red chili supply chains in East Java Indonesia

The cultivation of red chili in East Java, Indonesia, has significant economic and social impacts, necessitating proactive supply chain measures. This research aimed to identify priority risk agents, develop effective risk mitigation, and enhance supply chain resilience using the SCOR model, House of Risk, Interpretative Structural Modelling (ISM), and synthesis analysis. Examining 238 respondents—including farmers, collectors, wholesalers, retailers, home-agroindustries, and experts—the findings highlight farmers’ critical role in supply chain resilience despite risks from crop failures, weather fluctuations, and pest infestations. Simultaneous planting led to market oversupply and price drops, but accurate pricing information facilitated quick market adaptation. Wholesalers influenced pricing dynamics and income levels, impacting farmers directly. To improve resilience, three main strategies were developed through ten key elements: proactive strategies (real-time SCM tracking, Weather Early Warning Systems, risk management team formation, and training), resistance strategies (partnerships, chili stock reserves, storage and drying technologies, GAP implementation, post-harvest management, agricultural insurance, and Fair Profit Sharing Agreements), and recovery and growth strategies (flexible distribution channels and customizable distribution centers). Furthermore, the study delves into the mediating and moderating effects between variables within the model. This research not only addresses a knowledge gap but also provides stakeholders with evidence to consider new strategies to enhance red chili supply resilience.

Political Polarization and Finance

We review an empirical literature that studies how political polarization affects financial decisions. We first discuss the degree of partisan segregation in finance and corporate America, the mechanisms through which partisanship may influence financial decisions, and the available data sources used to infer individuals’ partisan leanings. We then describe and discuss the empirical evidence. Our review suggests an economically large and often growing partisan gap in the financial decisions of households, corporate executives, and financial intermediaries. Partisan alignment between individuals explains team and financial relationship formation, with initial evidence suggesting that high levels of partisan homogeneity may be associated with economic costs. We conclude by proposing several promising directions for future research.

Teamwork in Contests

Abstract We study self-organized teams in dynamic contests. Using data from Kaggle, we document that teams outperform solo players, but few players choose to form teams. Every new team alters the composition of players, discouraging less productive solo players to make submissions. We estimate the structural parameters of a dynamic contest model, including the team formation and submission costs. We find that team formation incentives diminish with the number of teams, as do the incentives to make submissions. We empirically evaluate the productivity-discouragement tradeoff caused by teamwork and discuss implications for contest design, including facilitating teamwork and hosting open competitions.

What if we consider research teams as teams?

Research teams are an important means by which knowledge is generated in Health Professions Education (HPE). Although funding agencies encourage the formation of interdisciplinary and interprofessional research teams, we know little about how our interdisciplinary and interprofessional research teams are functioning, nor how best to ensure their success. Indeed, while HPE Scholarship Units and research environments have been the object of study, little work has been focused on research teams themselves. In this article, the authors propose that research teams should be studied as unique instantiations of teams where several individuals work together towards a common goal. Considering research teams as a team can encourage attention to how effective teams are built, supported, and celebrated, it can acknowledge that competent individuals may form incompetent teams, and it opens important avenues for future research. Turning our attention to better understanding how and when research teams thrive should support the development of more effective teams; resulting in reduced waste and redundancy, better mobilization of team members' time and skills, and enhanced knowledge generation. Considering research teams as teams, encourages an understanding that these teams require care, commitment, and effort to sustain them, and it acknowledges that pursuing research in a team context is both a collaborative and a social endeavour.

The Reality of Innovation Management in Higher Education Institutions from Innovative Students’ Point of View

Innovation management plays a crucial role in harnessing innovations for economic development. Higher education institutions are considered one of the fundamental stages for embracing and supporting student innovations, especially in the early stages of ideation, selection and experimentation. Within this context, the current study aimed to understand the reality of innovation management in Omani higher education institutions at the pre-innovation stage. The study employed a descriptive methodology using a qualitative phenomenological research design. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with a sample of 30 participants from two government universities and three private universities. The study utilised thematic analysis for data interpretation. In its findings, the study discusses the current reality of the management of the pre-innovation stage in Omani higher education institutions through five themes: announcing competitions, team formation, supervisory role, exploration of innovative ideas, and policies and regulations. The findings revealed that, despite efforts made by universities, there is a lack of planning or a defined roadmap for the innovation process. The study recommends implementing supportive policies and regulations for innovation, placing more emphasis on planning in the pre-innovation stage and adjusting supervision for students according to their innovative areas. KEYWORDS Innovation management, higher education, pre-innovation stage, innovation stage, innovation policies, Sultanate of Oman.

Exploring team creativity: The nexus between freshness and experience

Scientific collaborations are widely acknowledged as a key factor in advancing contemporary science. Using the absence of prior collaboration relationships among all team members of a focal paper to assess team freshness, previous studies demonstrated strong associations between team freshness and the ability to generate original and multidisciplinary papers. However, the intricate interplay between team freshness and the experiences of new members remains less explored. For example, individuals can be classified based on their experiences or ages, distinguishing between newcomers with limited experience and incumbents with a track record of publications. Using the existing definition of team freshness, we focus on categorizing fresh teams into two distinct types: those consisting of fresh incumbents and those with fresh newcomers. Utilizing a comprehensive dataset comprising over 5 million articles, we systematically investigate the relationship between team freshness, the freshness of incumbents, and the freshness of newcomers on various creativity measurements. Our analysis yields several key findings. Firstly, both team freshness and the freshness of newcomers display a declining trend over time, whereas the freshness of incumbents remains stable. Secondly, we observe strong positive associations between team freshness, the freshness of incumbents, and the freshness of newcomers with regard to various creativity indicators. Strikingly, we emphasize substantial promotional powers of the freshness of incumbents on creativity, even after adjusting for overall team freshness. Our results have important policy implications related to the formation of creative teams.

Multi-task oriented team formation in online collaborative learning

Rational and personalized team formation can greatly enhance the efficiency of online collaborative learning. However, in the process of forming learning teams and completing learning tasks, online synchronous communication among team members is often overlooked, and the abilities of team members may change during task execution, which may have an effect on the completion of team tasks. To address these problems, this paper comprehensively considers the impact of learners’ online time and skill levels on team formation. We quantify the potential development space of learners’ skills and design optimization objectives accordingly based on the Zone of Proximal Development theory. Additionally, we propose a Near-Informer deep learning model to predict learners’ future online states, aiming to measure communication efficiency. Then, we propose a multi-task oriented multi-objective optimization team formation problem, and transform it into a single-objective one by using weighted aggregation of all objectives. After that, we present a Three-dimensional Monte Carlo Tree Search algorithm (TDMCTS). The experiments are conducted based on two real datasets. Compared with the baselines, our Near-informer model achieved the highest number of optimal predictions, with 22 out of 32. Besides, TDMCTS algorithm achieved more comprehensive team formation results, with average skill satisfaction degrees of 99.8% and 98.9% on two task sets, respectively, while satisfying the task requirements.