What makes a good team player? Personality and team effectiveness

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258 DRISKELL, GOODWIN, SALAS, AND O’SHEATable 1Teamwork Dimensions (Adapted from Cannon-Bowers et al., 1995)Dimension Definition SubskillsAdaptabilityTeam members use information from the taskenvironment to adjust strategies through the use offlexibility, compensatory behavior, and reallocationof resources.FlexibilityCompensatory or back-up behaviorProviding assistanceShared situationalawarenessPerformancemonitoring andfeedbackTeam managementInterpersonal relationsCoordinationTeam members develop shared knowledge of theteam’s internal and external environment.Team members give, seek, and receive task-clarifyingfeedback.Team members direct and coordinate task activities,assign tasks, plan and organize, and motivate otherteam members.Team members optimize interpersonal interactions byresolving conflicts, use of cooperation, andbuilding morale.Team members organize team resources, activities,and responses to ensure complete and timelycompletion of tasks.Shared orientationTeam awarenessPerformance monitoringProviding feedbackError correctionResource managementMotivationPlanning and goal settingConflict resolutionCooperationMorale buildingTask organizationResponse coordinationTiming and activity pacingCommunication Team members exchange information efficiently. Seeking or requesting informationProviding informationAcknowledgement andconfirmationDecision makingTeam members integrate or pool information, identifyalternatives, select solutions, and evaluateconsequences.AssessmentEvaluationProblem solvingwhich is compensatory behavior to supportother team members who are overloaded orexperiencing difficulty. Hackman and Morris(1978) have noted that one of the few universallyeffective group strategies is adaptability.Shared Situational AwarenessTeam members must develop a shared situationalawareness, also referred to as mutualknowledge (Cramton, 2001; Thompson & Coovert,2003) or common ground (Clark & Brennan,1991). Team members possess contextualtask and team information that must be communicatedto and understood by other team members.Cramton (2001) noted that mutual knowledgemay suffer when team members fail tocommunicate unique information that they possess,fail to distribute information evenly amongteam members, or fail to correct misunderstandings.Some research has shown that the accuracyand similarity of shared mental modelsamong team members predicts the quality ofteam processes and performance (Marks, Zaccaro,& Mathieu, 2000; Mathieu, Heffner,Goodwin, Salas, & Cannon-Bowers, 2000;Thompson & Coovert, 2003).Performance Monitoring and FeedbackPerformance monitoring and feedback behaviorsinclude monitoring other team member’scontributions as well as monitoring teamprogress, identifying errors, providing constructivefeedback, and offering advice for performanceimprovement. Members of effectiveteams must be familiar with each other’s rolesand accept responsibility for providing and acceptingfeedback (McIntyre & Salas, 1995).
PERSONALITY AND TEAM EFFECTIVENESS259Team ManagementTeam management behaviors include directingand coordinating the task activities of otherteam members, assigning tasks, and motivatingother team members. These are primarily taskbehaviors oriented toward instrumental goals.One critical management task, planning, is oftenoverlooked in teams (Hackman & Morris,1978), although research has clearly demonstratedthe value of planning (Janicik & Bartel,2003; Weingart, 1992) and pretask briefings(Marks et al., 2000) to team performance.Interpersonal RelationsTeam members optimize interpersonal relationsby resolving conflicts, encouraging cooperativebehavior, and building team morale.These are primarily socioemotional behaviorsoriented toward smooth interpersonal relations.McIntyre and Salas (1995) noted that positive orsupporting team behaviors are not always apparentin team interactions—tasks demandsmay require terse, formal communications attimes—but that a positive team environmentsupports these task activities. Moreover, researchhas shown that cohesive groups tend toagree more readily (Lott & Lott, 1961), reportgreater satisfaction with the group (Curtis &Miller, 1986), and in general outperform lesscohesive groups (Mullen & Copper, 1994).CoordinationIn one of the earliest studies of group performance,Shaw (1932) attributed the effectivenessof groups to the capability of group members toexchange and coordinate information. Janicikand Bartel (2003) noted that effective coordination,knowing who is going to do what, when,and with whom, is critical to team performance.Behaviors that support effective coordinationinclude matching team member resources totask requirements, regulating the pace of teamactivities, and coordinating the response andsequencing of team member activities (Fleishman& Zaccaro, 1992).CommunicationCommunication is the primary vehiclethrough which task groups accomplish theirgoals (Marks et al., 2000). Team members mustexchange ideas and information in a clear andtimely manner. Research suggests that effectiveteam performance is related to the quantity andquality of communications—effective teamscommunicate more and better than less effectiveteams (Foushee, 1982; Kanki, Lozito, &Foushee, 1989; Marks et al., 2000). Effectivecommunication behaviors include exchanginginformation in a timely manner, acknowledgmentof information, double-checking that theintent of messages was received (closed-loopcommunication), clarifying ambiguity, and theappropriate use of verbal and nonverbal cues(Kanki & Smith, 2001; Stout, Salas, & Fowlkes,1997).Decision MakingTeam decision making involves problemidentification and assessment, information exchange,generation and evaluation of solutions,implementation, and evaluation of consequences(Forsyth, 1990; Hirokawa, 1980). Barriersto effective team decision making mayinclude failure to adequately assess problems(Moreland & Levine, 1992), failure to considerothers’ input (Driskell & Salas, 1992), failure todisclose uniquely held information (Stasser &Titus, 1995), and undue influence from a singleteam member (Foushee & Helmreich, 1988).PredictionsThe preceding classification of core teamworkdimensions allows us to take the next stepin linking team member personality and teamrequirements. In the following, we predict theeffects of the specific personality facets definedin Figure 1 on specific core teamwork dimensions.These predictions are summarized in Table2. Note that when we are able to make astrong positive or negative prediction based oneither existing research or on a logical extensionof existing research, these predictions aremarked as “” or “–” respectively. In othercases, we feel that the relationship between aparticular team member facet and a specificteamwork dimension is weaker or unsupported,and thus we note these predictions as intermediateand indicated as “”.
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What makes a good team player? Personality and team effectiveness

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