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Teamwork: Reciprocal helping relationships

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“The essence of teamwork is the development and maintenance of reciprocal helping relationships among all the members”*

In my third post on the topic of helping, I consider teamwork as a helping relationship (see here for my first and second posts). Below are  some notes/quotes/ideas on teamwork from Chapter 7 of Schein’s book ““Helping: How to offer, give and receive help”.

Teamwork as perpetual reciprocal helping (title of Chapter 7)

Early on in his book, Schein refers to teamwork as ‘perpetual reciprocal helping’ and the phrase stuck with me because it offered an interesting perspective on this word and concept. Traditional definitions of teamwork, such as the one found at Merriam-Webster online, go something like this: “work done by several associates with each doing a part but all subordinating personal prominence to the efficiency of the whole.” Unlike this definition, Schein’s emphasizes trust and exchange, which I believe are important.

https://flic.kr/p/ozLoE

About subordination, Schein notes that teams work best when the higher status person exhibits some humility, and “acknowledges that others are crucial to good outcomes”. Thus, for effective team functioning, the higher status team member should create space for other members to develop identities and roles that feel equitable within the context of that group.  One way of doing this is by taking on the process consultant role and helping members figure out responses to the following issues:

  1. Who am I to be? What is my role in this group?
  2. How much control/influence will I have in this group?
  3. Will my goals/need be met in this group?
  4. What will be the level of intimacy in this group? (p.109)

He rightly notes that members should not strive for equal status and rank within the group. Rather, teammates should strive to be comfortable with the status that corresponds with their role.  The goal is mutual acceptance because that is essential to the development of the trust, which is needed to sustain group performance. “Effective teams do not have to be love-ins, but members must know each other well enough as fellow team members to be able to trust them to play their roles in the accomplishment of the group’s task.” (Schein, 2009, p.111).

The previous quote resonated with me because I used to think that even workload distribution was an essential feature of good teamwork. However, as I think back to my experiences of teamwork and collaboration, clarity of role expectations has been a much more important factor. Effective teamwork happens when people understand, agree upon, and stick to, their roles.  

Clearly, good teamwork needs more than clarity around role expectation; however, this is a piece I plan to pay more attention to  in future collaborations.

*(Schein, 2009, p.107)

Reference: Schein, E. (2009). Helping: How to offer, give and receive help.  San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

Photo credit: “Teamwork” by Kim S. Creative Commons Licensed.

Helper roles: Process consultant, expert, doctor

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Help

This is a continuation of my thoughts and notes on “helping” in the context of educational development (see here for my first blog post on this topic). I have been reading Schein’s “Helping: How to offer, give and receive help” and am finding it very relevant to my work (and beyond).

 In Chapter 3, Schein describes three helper roles that we can potentially adopt:

  • Expert resource who provides information or services
  • Doctor who diagnoses and prescribes (extension and enlargement of above)
  • Process consultant who focuses on building an equitable relationship and clarifies what kind of help is needed.

Though we often go between all three roles, we should begin any helping relationship in the role of process consultant. By engaging in humble inquiry, the process consultant establishes trust between the client (the word Schein uses for any individual who is receiving help) and herself; this minimizes the imbalance between the two individuals.

Adopting the process consultant role does the following:

  1. Reduces the ignorance inherent in the situation
  2. Minimizes the initial status differential
  3. Identifies what other role(s) may be most suitable for the identified problem.

Fundamental to the process consultant role “is the assumption that clients must be encouraged to remain proactive, in the sense of retaining both the diagnostic and remedial initiative because only they own the problem identified, only they know the true complexity of their situation, and only they know what will work for them in the culture in which they live” (Schein, 2009, p.62)

The above has prompted me to think about the role(s) I adopt in my educational development work. Though I strive to be/stay curious and ask questions, I wonder if I do so to the extent that is necessary to be truly helpful, especially when I am first approached for help.  I will pay more attention to this and to how I switch between roles.

 

Reference: Schein, E. (2009). Helping: How to offer, give and receive help.  San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

 

Photo credit: Eva the Weaver “Help” (Creative Commons Licensed)

Helping: What it means in educational development

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IMG_1841

This table is taken from Schein, 2009 (p.7).

Educational development: “The profession dedicated to helping colleges and universities function effectively as teaching and learning communities” (from Felten, Kalish, Pingree, & Plank, 2007, p.93)

As an educational developer, helping is important.  Whether I am program planning, consulting, or facilitating, my ultimate aim is to help (to enhance teaching and learning in some way). Schein (2009) notes that there is helpful help and unhelpful help. I know I have done both.

In order to better understand what it means to help, I am reading Schein’s book  “Helping: How to offer, give and receive help”.  Below are some sense-making notes I have taken and quotes I find particularly useful from the first three chapters (future blog posts will explore the other chapters).

Schein begins by describing two cultural principles that are fundamental to understanding the helping relationship:

  • “….all communication between two parties is a reciprocal process that must be, or at least must seem to be, fair and equitable” (p.11)
  • “… all relationships in human cultures are to a large degree based on scripted roles that we learn to play early in life and which become so automatic that we are often not even conscious of them” (p.11-12)

He applies the notions of “social theatrics” and “social economics”  to describe communication within a cultural context.

According to Schein, “every helping relationship is in a state of imbalance” in the beginning (p.35). That imbalance exists largely because of the unequal power dynamics; the client (the term he uses for anyone seeking or being offered help) is “down” and the helper is “up”. “Being thrust into the role of help is immediately a gain in status and power…” (p.33),  Schein notes. The helping process is often impeded because the people involved fail to recognize the initial imbalance. Consequently, neither the helper or client initially knows what to expect and what to give the relationship.  So that our help may be helpful, we must address and deal with the imbalance.

Doing so, however, can be difficult because the helper and client may fall into traps.

Traps the helper may fall into Traps the client may fall into
  • dispensing wisdom prematurely
  • meeting defensiveness with more pressure
  • accepting the problem and over-reacting to the dependence
  • initial mistrust
  • relief
  • looking for attention, reassurance and/or validation instead of help

A successful helping relationship requires that the helper intervene in ways that “build up the client’s status” (p.47). By addressing the imbalance of power, the helping relationship may further develop and become productive.

Reference: Schein, E. (2009). Helping: How to offer, give and receive help.  San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

Instructional objectives and learning outcomes: There is a difference

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Until recently, I have used the terms “instructional objectives” and “learning outcomes” interchangeably.  Though I was aware that some educators thought there was a difference between the two, I chose to side with those who said there was none. I could not, however, have backed up my choice with anything other than a vague “I’ve read there is no difference”.

Different Kinds of Outcomes

A few weeks ago, my colleague Cindy Underhill (@cindyu) recommended an article titled “Learning outcomes in higher education” by Joanna Allan.  This paper has had a profound effect on my thinking: I no longer think of instructional objectives and learning outcomes as synonymous.  That is because, in her article, Allan describes the ‘why’ behind these terms – -meaning, she explains the motivation given theorists (whose work is associated with a term) had when proposing a particular term. Her well-written historical account of terms such as instructional objectives, behavioural objectives, expressive objectives and learning outcomes distinguishes between the purpose of–and philosophical orientation behind– the various terms. The strength of this paper is that it helped me understand the rationale connected to the use of the different words that I previously thought of as synonymous.

Below are some key ideas that I now link to two terms which, until recently, I used interchangeably:

“Instructional Objectives” The word “instructional”  emphasises that the achievement of prespecified objectives are a direct consequence of instruction that the student receives. (linked to the work of Mager)

  • Mager proposes that educators not use words such as: understand, know, appreciate as these are “too slippery” (not measurable).
    • he suggests that instructional objectives should specify condition, criterion, and that word choice is very important
    • he recommends that complex tasks be broken into highly discrete and defined elements to create instructional objectives
    • brings the learner to forefront
  • Emphasis here is on what can be measured quantitatively
  • (reflected the view of people trained in psychology)

“Learning Outcomes” (linked largely to the work of Eisner, 1979): “are essentially what one ends up with, intended or not, after some form of engagement” (Eisner, 1979, p. 103, Cited in Allan, 1996).

  • What the student achieves, as opposed to what the instructor plans to teach
  • Broad overarching consequences of learning (as opposed to a preconceived specific goal).
  • May be:
    • Subject specific outcomes. Similar to instructional objectives in that they relate to, or result from, the content that is taught. However, they are not expressed in the form of [discreet/reductionist] instructional objective; they do not specify condition or performance in the way that instructional objectives do.
    • Generic academic outcomes: encompass learning that occurs in an individual independent of direct teacher/student interaction, and learning that is not directly related to the pre-specified subject-specific outcomes (Allan, 1996). Individualized and not fully predictable. Transferable. Transcend discrete subjects. (related to Eisner’s notion of “personal outcomes”…but somewhat different).
      • Include: interpersonal skills, critical self-reflection, working independently, being information literate, synthesizing ideas etc

 

Reference:

Allan, J. (1996). Learning outcomes in higher education. Studies in Higher Education 21.1: 93-108.

Next on my list to read:

Harden, R. M. (2002). Learning outcomes and instructional objectives: is there a difference?. Medical teacher, 24(2), 151-155.

 

Photo credit: Julian Kücklich (Flickr, Creative Commons Licensed cc by-nc-nd 2.0

 

Applying a backward-design approach to an educational development program

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Aligning Screwed-Up Planets Of The Universe

We promote a backwards design approach among our instructors…but—ironically—I am only now starting to use it in my own educational development planning and assessment work. Though the task of applying backward design to our entire Centre offerings is too daunting, the application of this concept to a sub-set of our offerings is appealing and makes good sense.

Carol Hurney’s (@hurneyca) session titled “Applying backwards design to your center” (see here for her POD Conference 2015 resources) has prompted me to think further about the application of backward design to the Formative Peer Review of Teaching, one of the programs I oversee.

At this time, the program consists of:

  • Peer review of teaching workshops
  • Online resources
  • A formative peer review of teaching team

And, I have been considering the addition of:

  • Open classroom week
  • A flipped peer review of teaching workshop

Taking a backward design approach to this program would mean that I:

1) Identify desired results: What do I want the learners to understand and know and be able to do? What are the learning goals and objectives for the formative peer review program? What essential questions will learners explore? What knowledge & skill will learners acquire? Confession: I have done this only for the Workshop, but not for the program as a whole.

2) Determine acceptable evidence: How do I know that the learners (those who participate in the Formative Peer Review of Teaching program) know what I want them to know?   Confession: I have this vaguely charted out in my head, but have nothing written down.

3) Plan the learning experiences. What do I need to do in the program to prepare the learners for the above assessment?   Status: Naturally, I have this covered!

Where things are at and next steps: Clearly, I have a lot of work to do when it comes to applying a backward design to the Formative Peer Review of Teaching Program. This is one of my planned follow-ups from the excellent POD conference. I’ll keep you posted.

 

Photo credit: Ian Sane, “Aligning Screwed-Up Planets Of The Universe”. Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)