Expert Teams: Do Shared Mental Models of Team Members make a Difference?

摘要

The purpose of the present thesis was to investigate whether and how familiarityinfluences coordination, resilience, and efficiency in high performance teams in safetycriticalorganizations. Research has accumulated solid support for the general presumptionthat shared mental models are associated with team effectiveness (see overview, Kozlowski& Ilgen, 2006). Unfortunately, familiarity and shared mental models have seldom been thesubject of investigation. This is surprising since the importance of team members having ashared understanding is underlined in dynamic situations that require high levels offlexibility and adaptability in the team (Cannon-Bowers et al., 1993; Salas & Fiore, 2004).The first study investigated whether knowledge about individual team memberswould augment the effect of operational skills in predicting operational effectiveness intrained expert teams. The second study investigated the consequences of shared mentalmodels (SMM) of team members in teams that are forced to coordinate their activitiestowards a shared goal in a distributed team setting. The third study investigated whethershared mental models of team members would transfer across new tasks or situations and,through better coordination, result in improved efficiency and less physiological arousal.Study 1 included samples from 24 active duty officers who made up four submarineattack teams. Studies 2 and 3 included a total of 177 cadets from the Royal Norwegian NavalAcademy. The findings from these three studies indicate that familiar teams usedcoordination strategies that enhanced efficiency. The coordination strategies used by familiarteams are characterized by less overt communication (statements per minute) during highworkload (Study 1), a higher global anticipation rate (Study 2), and more adaptability andback-up statements during cross-training (Study 3). In addition, familiar teams showed moreovert communication (e.g., confirmation) when confronted with a novel situation (Studies 2and 3). Familiar teams outperformed unfamiliar teams, being more accurate, quicker andachieving greater mission success (i.e., more hits). Familiar teams were morephysiologically aroused (HR) during low workload (Study 2), and less during high workload(Study 1), recovery (Studies 2 and 3), and decreasingly so during training (Study 3).These three studies extend previous research by presenting new empirical data on thesignificance of shared mental models of team members. Study 1 demonstrated thatknowledge about team members (i.e., shared mental models of team members) adds toperformance over and above the contribution of operational skills (Aim 1). Studies 2confirmed Study 1 (within teams) and provide empirical evidence for the effect of sharedmental models of team members in distributed teams (Aim 2). The findings from Study 3suggest that shared mental models of team members are transferable across tasks andenhance the effects of cross-training (Aim 3). All studies extend previous research, butStudy 3 in particular indicates that shared mental models of team members are distinctlydifferent from transactive memory systems (Aim 3). Hence, a shared mental model of teammembers represents an independent, adaptive asset at team level that enhances teamperformance and efficiency.These studies are the first to provide empirical evidence in support of the notion thatshared mental models of team members are a mechanism that improves teams’ efficiency,resilience, and coordination. This thesis confirms shared mental models of team members asan important and independent construct with an added value in relation to team performanceand efficiency. It thus expands previous knowledge, where the focus has been onequipment, tasks, and team interaction. The findings are a contribution to and fill animportant gap in the literature on Shared Mental Models. Implications are discussed fortraining, staffing and safety issues in teams in safety-critical organizations.