Bridging Team Interdependence Research and Team Project Design To Enhance Student Interactions: A Roundtable Discussion and Resource Exchange

While many management classes incorporate team projects to provide opportunities for students to build teamwork skills, students repeatedly choose to “divide and conquer” these projects. Resultantly, students build fewer teaming and interpersonal skills than intended. We propose that management educators can improve this scenario by bridging the gap between team interdependence insights and team assignment design. In this roundtable session, we will highlight research on task, goal and outcome interdependence; share our experiences applying each type of interdependence to team project design; and facilitate roundtable discussions intended to generate new team project design ideas for all participants.