Diverse feedback mechanisms focus multi-disciplinary team improvement

The skills to operate in effective teams do not just happen but must be encouraged and fostered so that entrenched stereotypes will be broken down and appropriate communication methods developed. Reports into engineering and other professional disciplines dating back over 20 years, have highlighted the lack of core competencies of new graduates. However, the most recent of such reports indicate little if any improvement. Apparently there has been little change in either the content or the pedagogical methods used in most university courses over that time.

In the last decade, many companies have adopted a concurrent engineering philosophy which is focused on using project teams made up of engineering, design, marketing, finance and accounting personnel, from the start of the new product development process. To achieve success in such teams in industry, students are expected to benefit by gaining experience in such multidisciplinary groups before graduation.

Since the mid 1990s, third and fourth year engineering, business and design students at Monash University, have participated in project based learning teams, acting as consultants to selected companies on new product development projects.

However, no course is ever perfect and as the needs of students, graduates and prospective employers change, effective courses must change also. The purpose of this paper is to examine four means by which the above project utilises feedback to lead to on-going improvement. The paper will discuss the use of reflective reports completed by students at the end of the project, feedback from the companies for whom they consult, research findings from independent observers who have studied team dynamics and factors determining their effectiveness and from graduates. As a result, changes in student briefing, company and project selection and team and peer assessment have been and are being implemented.

Specific findings include the importance of the group forming process in the initial weeks to predicting the likely success of the group, the need to ensure that the companies' briefs are neither too broad not too limiting, the selection of companies of an appropriate size and the need for students to make clear recommendations based on hard factual data and reasoned argument.

On a number of issues the course objectives were strongly endorsed but their implementation was seen as leaving substantial room for improvement. An area which has seem substantial changes in implementation without changing objectives is the implementation of peer assessment. This has changed from being based on a 16 item questionnaire with 360 degree diagrammatic feedback, to 4 item bar graph feedback, with the benefits of being much less time consuming to do and simpler to understand, with little loss of information.

Issues such as team leadership, dividing the brief into evenly balanced areas of responsibility and using peer feedback as a formative tool are focuses of ongoing development. While many courses benefit from student evaluation, the diverse approach used to establish and enhance this multi-disciplinary team learning, can provide a model with potential across the spectrum of tertiary education.