Teaching Teamwork in Information Systems

Abstract

Teamwork is very important in information systems development. Therefore, most courses in systems analysis and design and many programming courses require students to work on group projects. However, a project group is not the same thing as a team. Furthermore, for a group to become a team, there are several important characteristics that must be developed. These characteristics do not always develop automatically. This chapter discusses the requirements for effectively forming, building, managing, and evaluating teams in information systems courses. Students should be taught these concepts in addition to the regular course content. This chapter also addresses two special issues that deal with team development and team management: managing cultural diversity and managing “virtual” teams, where the team members are geographically separated.