Shark attack: a teamwork challenge - an exercise in blue ocean rescue

Hi, everybody, and welcome to Shark Attack, which is a simulation to look at your teamwork, preferences and roles, and it's an exercise in rescuing a person who has been attacked by a shark. I'm Dr. Stephanie Jones, I'm associate professor of organizational behavior at Maastricht School of Management in the Netherlands and while I was visiting New Zealand, I came across this story. I thought this would be a very good demonstration of understanding teamwork.

Now we see this happen in New Zealand, and this is a place that I visit very frequently. I'd like you to imagine that you visited New Zealand, you are a conservationist, a biologist. You're working as a member of a team of five with the New Zealand Department of Conservation and you are based in this very remote and a very far south location called Campbell Island. This is 600 kilometers south of Stewart Island, off the southern coast of South Island, in New Zealand. You came by helicopter from Stewart Island with your supplies, and you'll be there based on Campbell Island for a number of months, and you're studying penguin breeding habits, and you're a conservationist.

Let's think about what are typical approaches to teamwork, because probably you will have one of these or more of these approaches and these will come out in the way that you play this simulation. Now first of all, you could be the ideas person, good at creative problem-solving. You can be resourceful number two at an effective at making contacts, getting things fixed, making things happen, and number three, you may be focused on coordinating the efforts of others, pushing people to overcome their barriers, getting things done. Being a coordinator or shaper in your approach. Number four, you could be very good at careful decision-making, understanding worst case scenarios, seeing what might go wrong. Number five, you might be focused on making sure everybody is happy and comfortable and living in harmony, and this is a very important preference that some people have as a team player. Number six, you could be very hardworking getting things done, very reliable, diligent and doing the job quickly and on time and effectively. Now number seven, it could be that you are an expert in a specialist area and that's your contribution to the team. It could be something like you're a medical expert, you know a lot about different fish and animals and birds and things like this, but you have a strong area of expertise and that's your contribution.