Mitigating challenges of collaborative science through team ethnography
Journal of Organizational Ethnography
ISSN: 2046-6749
Article publication date: 18 May 2023
Issue publication date: 24 July 2023
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to expand the use of ethnography to advance research on team science by revealing the barriers to teamwork as manifesting at institutional, cultural, and interpersonal contextual scales. The analysis suggests strategies to enhance team science's collaborative potential.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper considers some of the practical and analytical challenges of team science through the use of ethnographic methods. The authors formed a three-person subteam within a larger multisited, federally-funded, interdisciplinary scientific team. The authors conducted six months of participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and a focus group, using iterative deductive and inductive analyses to investigate the larger team's roles, relationships, dynamics, and tensions.
Findings
Integrating ethnography into the study of team science can uncover and mitigate barriers faced by teams at three primary levels: (1) academic culture, (2) institutional structures, and (3) interpersonal dynamics. The authors found that these three contextual factors are often taken for granted and hidden in the team science process as well as that they are interactive and influence teams at multiple scales of analysis. These outcomes are closely related to how team science is funded and implemented in academic and institutional settings.
Originality/value
As US federal funding initiatives continue to require scientific collaboration via inter-, multi-, and transdisciplinary research, there is little work done on how teams grapple with the practical tensions of scientific teamwork. This paper identifies and addresses many practical tensions and contextual factors across institutional and organizational structures that affect and challenge the conduct of collaborative scientific teamwork. The authors also argue that ethnography can be a method to challenge myths, understand contextual factors, and improve the goals of team science.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Dr. Mark Luborsky and Dr. Richard Smith, who provided valuable feedback on this manuscript. These discussions were significant in shaping the arguments about team science and the use of ethnographic methods to explore complex team dynamics. We would also like to thank the research participants/team for their continued support, engagement, and feedback throughout the entirety of this study. Additionally, the editors and the generosity of the reviewers for providing constructive and critical feedback on the final draft of this article.
Citation
Piqueiras, E., Stanley, E. and Laskey, A. (2023), "Mitigating challenges of collaborative science through team ethnography", Journal of Organizational Ethnography, Vol. 12 No. 2, pp. 162-180. https://doi.org/10.1108/JOE-06-2022-0017
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2023, Emerald Publishing Limited