Presentation 1
1 - A Framework for Developing Team Science Expertise Using a Reflective-Reflexive Design Method (R2DM)
Presented by: Gaetano Lotrecchiano
Authored by: L. Michelle Bennett, Roger Schwarz and Associates
Gaetano Lotrecchiano, George Washington University
Yianna Vovides, Georgetown University

Effective integration and implementation of knowledge in research are dependent on team science expertise grounded in collaboration principles and techniques that advance individual and group scientific agendas. The Science of Team Science (SciTS) provides evidence-based research and best practices that strive to develop scientists’ collaborative skills so that they can work across disciplinary boundaries while developing strong and diverse teaming relationships. Identifying the motivations of those involved in collaborative teaming can contribute to maximizing team effectiveness and applying the knowledge emerging from understanding team members’ motivations has the potential to shape teams’ adaptation of a shared mutual learning mindset as a core tenet of scientific teamwork. In addition, surfacing motivations has the potential of helping team members examine their own needs about their scientific and career goals. 

In this paper we draw from the domains of the Motivation Assessment for Team, Integration, and Collaboration (MATRICx) framework, Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs motivational theory, and The Team Effectiveness Model for Science (TEMS) to develop an integrative reflective-reflexive design that focuses on the development of intrapersonal attributes within the context of a team. Approaching expertise development from this integrative design invites individual reflection in the context of group reflexivity to serve as the cornerstone of deep team science competency. We used a design thinking approach to identify a framework that merges individual reflection with group reflexivity. The core questions we asked are: (i) What constitutes expertise to participate and succeed in science teams? And (ii) How might we approach the design of learning engagements that enable the development of the needed expertise?

Presentation 2
3 - Applying the UX-Informed Community of Practice Learning Model in Transdisciplinary Research
Presented by: Peng Warweg, George Mason University
Authored by: Brenda Bannan, George Mason University
Dawn Hathaway, George Mason University
Peng Warweg, George Mason University

Transdisciplinary research transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries to address societal problems through knowledge integration and co-production (Cockburn & Cundill, 2018). Research institutions have been exploring effective ways to structure and stimulate transdisciplinary practice, many of which focus on team dynamics, scientific culture, and policy (Hall et al., 2019). Recently, there is a growing interest in applying learning frameworks to facilitate transdisciplinary research. Nembhard pointed out (2010) that deliberate learning activities foster interdisciplinary collaboration. Keen et al. (2005) argued for a focus on adult learning in groups for sustainability science. 
One of the learning frameworks is Community of Practice (CoP) (Lave & Wenger, 1991), which refers to informal and collaborative learning occurring inside a group of practitioners who share the same practice, interest and concerns. As an organizational learning model, CoP encompasses many key features intrinsic to transdisciplinary practice, a community of research practitioners, engagements, collaborations, and knowledge co-production. Researchers conclude that CoP holds many advantages in promoting member participation, collaboration, and knowledge co-production (e.g., Cundill et al., 2015, Degn et al., 2018, Zhao et al., 2018). 

This paper highlights our experience of applying the CoP framework to initiate and expand transdisciplinary practice at a newly established research center in a R1 university. Applications at the center were informed by prior studies on research CoPs (e.g., Cundill et al., 2015, Degn et al., 2018, Zhao et al., 2018). The center readily facilitates member participation and responds to common CoP challenges, and is more methodological in its approaches, including from a human-centered, user-experience (UX) perspective. Hartson and Pyla (2018) defined UX as the totality of the effects felt by the user before, during, and after interaction with a product or system in an ecology. We find a UX-inspired research CoP model helps enhance understandings of member participation, instigate meaningful collaborations and drive sustainable productivity. More specifically,

• Previous studies find CoPs combat traditional departmental silos and provide a platform for researchers to intersect across different disciplines. We find researchers who join our research CoP already self-identify as transdisciplinary. While our CoP does not dissolve departmental boundaries, it does provide a safe space where these researchers reimagine both self and group identities. 
• Prior studies indicate that researchers are motivated to join a CoP which is marked by the bottom-up approach, and equal power distribution. While our experience concurs with these findings, we also recognize individual professional goals significantly impact the level of participation. 
• Prior studies also applaud CoPs’ informal and fluid nature for mobilizing members to shift roles according to research needs and encouraging new member integration. While purposefully keeping our membership informal and inclusive, we constantly juggle between maintaining a relatively focused group identity and growing new members of diverse backgrounds.

We find an explicit and shared vision of building a research CoP among the leadership and members early on can greatly promote members participation and mitigate common challenges. We also find it especially beneficial to adopt UX-informed design thinking in developing intentional facilitations to really engage members and catalyze research.
 

Presentation 3
22 - Design Sprints: A Method for Making Informed Team Decisions Rapidly
Presented by: Maureen Brudzinski, University of Michigan
Authored by: Maureen Brudzinski, University of Michigan
Beth LaPensee, Michigan Institute for Clinical & Health Research

Design Sprints were developed at Google Ventures as a way to move rapidly from developing an idea to testing prototypes. The process uses human-centered design principles to allow a group to understand multiple perspectives on a given problem, create viable solution options, and move forward to evaluate a first prototype. At the Michigan Institute for Clinical & Health Research, we have used Design Sprints in different scenarios, including creating a COVID caregivers' toolkit and designing a medical deterioration alert system. These co-creation sessions have used various methods, including empathy interviews, assumptions mapping, crazy 8’s, solutions sketching, and storyboards to advance teams rapidly through the decision making process while simultaneosly making space for individual ideas and opinions to be shared. We find the Design Sprint process and corresponding tools and methods to be endlessly adaptable across disciplines and uniquely suited to bringing together diverse perspectives to solve problems. We posit that Design Sprint methods can have broad utility in the service of team science by fostering community building and team culture; ambitious ideation and risk-taking; solutions-focused mindsets; and productivity, among others. Additionally, they should be well-suited to both emergent and established teams as well as a multitude of desired goals and outcomes. In this session, the panelists will share their experience implementing Design Sprints, discuss how the myriad methods could be repurposed for other team-based efforts, and engage the audience in visioning how these methods can be further adapted for novel use in team-based scenarios.

Presentation 4
58 - Toward a Translational Team Science Hierarchy of Needs: Exploring the Information Management Challenges of Team Science
Presented by: Betsy Rolland, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Authored by: Jason Chladek, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Patrick Kelly, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Betsy Rolland, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Clinical and Translational Research (CTR) requires a team-based approach, with successful teams engaging in skilled management and use of information. To conduct high-quality, rigorous research and advance scientific knowledge, Translational Teams (TTs) engage in information behaviors, including seeking, using, creating, sharing, storing, and retrieving information, in ways specific to the translational context. Yet we know little about the ways these TTs engage with information across the lifecycle of CTR projects. This qualitative pilot study explored the sociotechnical challenges that information management imposes on the conduct of team-based CTR through interviews of 10 TT members at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

We found that TT members did not recognize the centrality of information or information behaviors to their scientific work. Furthermore, TT members did not receive support or guidance from their institution in managing information, leading to individualized choices that conflicted at the team level, causing confusion and increasing the potential for data and information loss. Furthermore, we found that TTs’ piecemeal and reactive approaches to information management created conflict within the team and slowed scientific progress. The lack of cohesive information management strategies made it more difficult for teams to develop strong team processes like communication, scientific coordination, and project management. While TTs’ research was hindered by the siloed university that provided little support or guidance, TTs who had developed shared approaches to information management that foregrounded transparency, accountability, and trust, described substantial benefits to their teamwork.

While more research is needed to develop approaches to mitigate to the challenges we identified, one lightweight solution is to implement a team-based intervention such as UW-ICTR’s Collaboration Planning. In delivering Collaboration Planning to more than 40 teams at UW and beyond, we have seen that teams benefit from the opportunity to discuss a team-wide strategy to information management.

Finally, we propose a new model for the SciTS field—a Translational Team Science Hierarchy of Needs. Based on Maslow’s famous Hierarchy of Needs, our model suggests new considerations for the design, development, and evaluation of interventions, with a focus on targeting the appropriate stage of team development. Such a focus has the potential for helping TTs create a strong base that supports team processes that to maximize a team’s scientific potential.

Presentation 5
61 - Using self-evaluation to build transdisciplinary capacity in team-based approaches to urban sustainability: student reflections on their own learning
Presented by: Mathieu Feagan, University of Waterloo
Authored by: Marta Berbes, University of Waterloo
Mercy Borbor Cordova, Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral (ESPOL)
Elizabeth Cook, Barnard College
Maria del Pilar Cornejo de Grunauer, ESPOL - Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral
Mathieu Feagan, University of Waterloo
Nancy Grimm, Arizona State University
Shruti Jadala, University of Florida
Addison Martin, Utah State University
Margot Mattson, San Diego State University
Isabella Pacenza, Barnard College
Carlos Romero, Columbia University
Chloé St. Amand, University of Waterloo

This project investigates the use of self-evaluation in building student capacity for transdisciplinary teams-based research in the context of an international collaboration in Latin America on urban sustainability, nature-based solutions, and informal settlements. After completing a two-month preparatory course, a team of US graduate and undergraduate students from different disciplines developed a shared rubric for evaluating their own success implementing a transdisciplinary project working closely with local university research partners, the municipality, and community leaders in the informal settlements. The student team revisited the rubric criteria at the beginning, middle, and end of their ten-week fieldwork experience, to reflect on the evolution of their criteria and finally score themselves. Students were then individually interviewed to help understand their perceptions of the value of self-evaluation in developing and implementing a transdisciplinary approach to their project. The results show that this experience of using self-evaluation and working in a transdisciplinary team was new for students, and it posed challenges that no prior academic training had quite prepared them for. Still, with strong on-the-ground support from local and international faculty, the student team developed communication and group process skills to integrate their different disciplinary expertise in a way that was highly valued by the communities and local research partners. The student team found that using the self-evaluation rubric helped build confidence in their ability to identify criteria and implement a project that in retrospect lived up to their own expectations of success. All five participants said they would continue engaging with transdisciplinary research approaches and that they saw self-evaluation as a critical tool for helping them navigate the process and enhance learning. Suggested modifications and insights from student experiences are now informing another iteration of the process of using self-evaluation to build student capacity for a transdisciplinary team-based approach with a new cohort of students.