In his address he identified human factors as one of nine “growth areas for psychological science” in the 21 century.

Other interesting points include:

• Psychological science makes life-changing contributions to our society, but psychologists often are not recognized for these contributions. (p. 355)
• As our consulting and applied psychologists know, psychologists do much more than provide mental health services. Helping business and industry cope with the uncertainty caused by global changes in the world economy and helping them maintain psychologically healthy workplaces and workforces present extraordinary opportunities for our profession. (p. 360)
• Although there are many types of psychologists, our common core includes our methods and scientific rigor. Our methods and scientific rigor are a double-edged sword, however, as many of our methods (e.g., measurement models and assessments) are strong on internal validity issues while ignoring external validity and application to the solving of social problems. (p. 363)
• Human factors psychologists have already made major advances through research in aviation safety and training, human–machine computer interfaces (e.g., Google), and traffic safety. An exciting and promising development is the application of safety research conducted in aviation to the health care arena to improve patient safety during medical procedures. Both human factors and I/O methods in team building and functioning are improving medical outcomes through increased patient safety. (p. 364)
• Utilizing the strengths of psychological methods and theories can enhance the work of many basic sciences, as there is almost always a human and psychological component in applying new scientific and technological advances. (p. 365)
• We need more psychologists employed by or as consultants to agencies that are tackling global problems such as environmental change, war, displacement, manmade and natural disasters, and famine. We can spend billions of dollars to develop new technologies, but in the end, if people do not use them correctly they will be underutilized, will not work, or will contribute to further problems (cf. Han et al., 2005). This is another area of research in which psychologists can play important roles. (p. 366)
• We need to change the way we train our students and, most likely, the places in which we train them. These types of changes necessitate that we collaborate with professions outside of psychology while maintaining our unique identity as psychologists. For science, we need to collaborate more with economists, engineers, neuroscientists, and computer scientists and to set up joint training programs to take advantage of each discipline’s unique strengths. (p. 367)
• In summary, our profession can make a difference that makes a difference, and we can create a future in which our nation benefits from the application of our rich and varied science to the grand challenges of our society and the individuals we serve. (p. 367)

Discoveries

1. Shared cognition matters in team performance.
2. Shared cognition can be measured.
3. Team training promotes teamwork and enhances team performance.
4. Synthetic task environments (STEs) provide context for research.
5. Team performance can be modeled.
6. Factors that influence team performance have been identified.
7. Well-designed technology can improve team performance.
8. The field belongs to many disciplines.

Challenges

1. We need better measurement.
2. We need to study teams “in the wild.”
3. We need a better understanding of dynamic assembly of adaptive teams.
4. We need an increase emphasis on team cognition.
5. We need a better understanding of teams in a multicultural context.

The authors close the article by making the following comments:

In sum, there is a science of team performance that has met much of the demand from organizations for guidance on the formation and management of teams. But the work is not done; there are discoveries and developments yet to come. The field must continue to keep pace with new demands from a continuously changing workplace. To achieve advances in our abilities to understand, predict, control, and design for team performance in the coming decades, we must forge functional partnerships between researchers and practitioners across scientific disciplines and domains of application. (p. 545)

References

Salas, E., Cooke, N.J., & Rosen, M.A. (2008).  On teams, teamwork, and team performance: Discoveries and developments.  Human Factors, 50, 540-547. (104 KB, .pdf)

• Encourage people to question traditional methods and look for innovative new approaches that will be more effective.
• Articulate an inspiring vision to gain support for innovative changes from members of the organization.
• Encourage and facilitate the acquisition of skills needed for collective learning by individuals and teams.
• Strengthen values consistent with learning from experience and openness to new knowledge, thereby helping to create a learning culture in the organization.
• Help people develop shared mental models about cause-effect relationships and the determinants of performance for the team or organization.
• Encourage social networks that will facilitate knowledge sharing, collaborative development of creative ideas, and the acquisition of political support for innovations.
• Help people recognize when important learning has occurred and to understand the implications for the team or organization.
• Gain external support and financing for major initiatives involving the acquisition or application of new knowledge (e.g., acquisitions or joint ventures).
• Encourage experiments to gain more knowledge about the likely effects of changes before implementing them on a large scale in a way that cannot easily be aborted.
• Encourage teams to conduct after-activity reviews to identify effective and ineffective processes.
• Develop measures of collective learning and knowledge diffusion to assess how well it is accomplished and identify ways to improve it (learning how to learn).
• Encourage people to acknowledge when a new initiative is failing and should be aborted rather than continuing to waste resources on it.
• Create decentralized subunits with considerable authority to pursue learning and entrepreneurial activities in a responsible way.
• Develop, implement, and support programs and systems that will encourage and reward the discovery of new knowledge and its diffusion and application in the organization.

References

Yukl, G. (2009).  Leading organizational learning: Reflections on theory and research.  The Leadership Quarterly, 20, 49-53.

But, what are the best ways to create and support teams?  One method of answering this question is to identify best practices from the scientific literature.

Below are seven reviews that provide an overview to the breadth and complexity of research on teams.

• Ilgen, D. R., Hollenbeck, J. R., Johnson, M., & Jundt, D. (2005). Teams in organizations: From input-process-output models to IMOI models. Annual Review of Psychology, 56, 517–543. (256 KB, .pdf)
• Kozlowski, S. W. J., & Bell, B. S. (2003). Work groups and teams in organizations. In W. C. Borman, D. R. Ilgen, & R. Klimoski (Eds.), Handbook of psychology: Industrial and organizational psychology: Vol. 12 (pp. 333-375). London: Wiley.
• Kozlowski, S. W. J., & Ilgen, D. R. (2006). Enhancing the effectiveness of work groups and teams. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 7, 77–124. (456 KB, .pdf)
• Mathieu, J., Maynard, M.T., Rapp, T., & Gilson, L. (2008).  Team effectiveness 1997-2007: A review of recent advancements and a glimpse into the future.  Journal of Management, 34, 410-476.
• McGrath, J.E., Arrow, H., & Berdahl, J.L. (2000).  The study of groups: Past, present, and future.  Personality and Social Psychology Review, 4, 95-105. (60 KB, .pdf)
• Salas, E., Stagl, K. C., & Burke, C. S. (2004). 25 years of team effectiveness in organizations: Research themes and emerging needs.  In C. L. Cooper & I.T. Robertson (Eds.), International review of industrial organizational psychology: Vol. 19 (pp. 47-92).  New York: John Wiley & Sons.
• Salas, E., Stagl, K. C., Burke, C. S., & Goodwin, G. F. (2007). Fostering team effectiveness in organizations: Toward an integrative theoretical framework of team performance. In R. A. Dienstbier, J. W. Shuart, W. Spaulding, & J. Poland (Eds.), Modeling complex systems: Motivation, cognition and social processes: Nebraska Symposium on Motivation: Vol 51 (pp. 185–243). Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

Kozlowski, Gully, Nason, and Smith (1999)

• Tasks
• Goals
• Roles
• Process Emphasis
• Performance Demands

Sundstrom, McIntyre, Halfhill, and Richards (2000)

• Production
• Service
• Management
• Project
• Action and Performing
• Advisory

Devine (2002)

• Executive
• Command
• Negotiation
• Commission
• Design
• Advisory
• Service
• Production
• Performance
• Medical
• Response
• Military
• Transportation
• Sports

Hackman and Wageman (2005)

• “Surgical” teams
• Coaching Groups
• Face-to-Face Teams
• Virtual Teams
• “Sand Dune” Teams

References

Devine, D.J. (2002). A review and integration of classification systems relevant to teams in organizations. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 6, 291-310.

Hackman, J.R., & Wageman, R. (2005). When and how team leaders matter. Research in Organizational Behavior, 26, 37-74.

Kozlowski, S. W. J., Gully, S. M., Nason, E. R., & Smith, E. M. (1999). Developing adaptive teams: A theory of compilation and performance across levels and time. In D. R. Ilgen & E. D. Pulakos (Eds.), The changing nature of work performance: Implications for staffing, personnel actions, and development (pp. 240–292). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Sundstrom, E., McIntyre, M., Halfhill, T., & Richards, H. (2000). Work groups: From the Hawthorne studies to work teams of the 1990s and beyond. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 4, 44-67.

“…are composed of two or more individuals who (a) exist to perform organizationally relevant tasks, (b) share one or more common goals, (c) interact socially, (d) exhibit task interdependencies (i.e., work flow, goals, outcomes), (e) maintain and manage boundaries, and (f ) are embedded in an organizational context that sets boundaries, constrains the team, and influences exchanges with other units in the broader entity.” (Kozlowski & Bell, 2003, p. 334).

References

Kozlowski, S. W. J., & Bell, B. S. (2003). Work groups and teams in organizations. In W. C. Borman, D. R. Ilgen, & R. Klimoski (Eds.), Handbook of psychology: Industrial and organizational psychology: Vol. 12 (pp. 333-375). London: Wiley.

The article discusses findings from a 2008 survey commissioned by the BYP, the young professional advisory committee that will be working with Boise Mayor David H. Bieter, and “The Starfish Initiative” which was conceptualized by Bob Lokken and Nancy Napier.

• Hooked on Gadgets, and Paying a Mental Price
• An Ugly Toll of Technology: Impatience and Forgetfulness
• More American Sense a Downside to an Always Plugged-In Existence
• The Risks of Parenting While Plugged In

The articles follow on the heels of recently publish book, “The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains” by Nicholas Carr, which expresses the authors concerns that the Internet is causing irreparable harm to the way we interact with and process information.  I’m currently reading the book and will post a review next week.

Don Norman at IIT Design Research Conference 2010 from IIT Institute of Design on Vimeo.

• The Economist published “In Praise of Boise,” which lauded local startup Balihoo.
• No. 16 on Forbes list of “America’s Most Innovative Cities.”
• No. 8 on Life’s list of “Most Underrated Cities in the West.”

It’s great to see those outside the region recognizing what locals have known for years – Boise is a great place to live and start a business.

The hour-long panel was moderated by Mark Rivers (CEO of Brix & Company) and included Bob Lokken (CEO of WhiteCloud Analytics), John Sosoka (CEO of Pulse-Robotics), and Michael Boerner (CEO of Unity Media Group and Unity Medical) as panelists.

An illustrative example of the discipline’s comprehensiveness is to review the table of contents for the Handbook of Human Factors and Ergonomics (3rd), which was edited by Gavriel Salvendy. Below are the 61 chapter titles:

1. The Discipline of Ergonomics and Human Factors
2. Human Factors Engineering and Systems Design
3. Sensation and Perception
4. Selection and Control of Action
5. Information Processing
6. Communication and Human Factors
7. Cultural Ergonomics
8. Decision-Making Models and Decision Support
9. Mental Workload and Situation Awareness
10. Social and Organizational Foundations of Ergonomics
11. Human Factors and Ergonomic Methods
12. Anthropometry
13. Basic Biomechanics and Workstation Design
14. Task Analysis: Why, What, and How
15. Task Design and Motivation
16. Job and Team Design
17. Personnel Selection
18. Design, Delivery, and Evaluation of Training Systems
19. Human Factors in Organizational Design and Management
20. Situation Awareness
21. Affective and Pleasurable Design
22. Workplace Design
23. Vibration and Motion
24. Sound and Noise
25. Illumination
26. Occupational Health and Safety Management
27. Human Error
28. Ergonomics of Work Systems
29. Psychosocial Approach to Occupational Health
30. Manual Materials Handling
31. Work-Related Upper Extremity Musculoskeletal Disorders
32. Warnings and Hazard Communications
33. Use of Personal Protective Equipment in the Workplace
34. Human Space Flight
35. Chemical, Dust, Biological, and Electromagnetic Radiation Hazards
36. Modeling Human Performance in Complex Systems
37. Mathematical Models in Engineering Psychology: Optimizing Performance
38. Supervisory Control
39. Digital Human Modeling for CAE Applications
40. Virtual Environments
41. Accident and Incident Investigation
42. Human Factors and Ergonomics Audits
43. Cost–Benefit Analysis of Human Systems Investments
44. Methods of Evaluating Outcomes
45. Visual Displays
46. Information Visualization
47. Online Communities
48. Human Factors and Information Security
49. Usability Testing
50. Web Site Design and Evaluation
51. Design of E-Business Web Sites
52. Augmented Cognition in Human–System Interaction
53. Design for People with Functional Limitations
54. Design for Aging
55. Design for Children
56. Design for All: Computer-Assisted Design of User Interface Adaptation
57. Human Factors and Ergonomics Standards
58. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Medicine
59. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Motor Vehicle Transportation
60. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Automation Design
61. Human Factors and Ergonomics in Manufacturing and Process Control

Quite amazing isn’t it?  I count the Handbook of Human Factors and Ergonomics (3rd) as one of the primary “go to” books in my professional library – as does Don Norman.

Here are links to .pdfs of the table of contents, index, preface, and Chapter 1: The Discipline of Ergonomics and Human Factors.

References

Salvendy, G. (Ed.). (2006). Handbook of human factors and ergonomics (3rd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.