Focus: Week 1 introduces core team-building concepts, key theories, and why teams matter for organizational performance. Students examine team interdependence, distinguish taskwork from teamwork, and use Tuckman’s model to identify a team’s likely development stage.

Required Readings

1. Fundamental Stages of Development through the Relevance of Team Building
2. Are Team Building Interventions Still Relevant
3. Team Building and Teamwork in Organizations: Implications for Managers and Employees in Workplaces
4. Effectiveness of Team Building Training Improving The Cohesiveness of The Working Group

Focus: Week 2 explores Tuckman’s stages of team development and connects team progression to Kolb’s Experiential Learning Cycle. Students practice diagnosing team-stage evidence and designing stage-appropriate actions that improve collaboration and performance.

Required Readings

1. The Impact of Group Work Stages on Team Collaboration: Analyzing Tuckman’s Model
2. Team Development and Experiential Learning
3. Examining Team Collaboration: A Study Utilizing Tuckman’s Framework for Analysis
4. A Study of the Relationship of Factors in the Tuckman Model

Focus: Week 3 focuses on communication processes that strengthen teamwork, reduce misunderstandings, and improve conflict outcomes. Students practice active listening and apply evidence-based communication moves to common team breakdowns.

Required Readings

1. Active Listening
2. Active Listening: A Model of Empathetic Communication in the Helping Professions
3. Active Listening as A Basic Skill of Efficient Communication Between Teachers and Parents: An Empirical Study
4. Communication Strategies and Our Learners
5. Expanding the Scope of Strategic Communication Towards a Holistic Understanding of Organizational Complexity

Focus: Week 5 addresses trust building, cohesion, engagement, shared leadership, and knowledge sharing in remote teams. Students connect research evidence to anti hierarchy insights from Margaret Heffernan’s talk to design practical strategies that reduce isolation and improve collaboration.

Required Readings

1. Correlation Between Remote Management Cohesion of Working Teams and Personnel Engagement
2. Team Barriers to Tacit Knowledge Sharing in Software Development Project Teams
3. Making Shared Leadership Work: The Importance of Trust in Project-Based Organizations
   Required Media Margaret Heffernan TED Talk: Why it is Time to Forget the Pecking Order at Work

Focus: Week 6 examines how inclusive team environments are intentionally designed to foster psychological safety, respect for uniqueness, and shared purpose. Students apply PERMA and belonging concepts to diagnose team climate and design practical leadership actions that strengthen sustainable inclusion.

Required Readings

1. PERMA and the Building Blocks of Well Being
2. Belonging: A Review of Conceptual Issues, an Integrative Framework, and Directions for Future Research
3. About and Beyond Leading Uniqueness and Belongingness: A Systematic Review of Inclusive Leadership Research
   Required Media Martin Seligman video Flourishing: A New Understanding of Well-Being

Focus: Week 7 focuses on sustaining performance over time through feedback routines, measurement systems, team learning, and shared understanding. Students connect research on feedback and high-performance teams to practical operating rhythms that sustain growth and adaptability.

Required Readings

1. Developing and Sustaining High-Performance Work Teams
2. The Future of Feedback: Motivating Performance Improvement Through Future-Focused Feedback
3. Enhancing the Effectiveness of Work Groups and Teams