Social: Social Cognition and Teamwork - Foundations for Designing User-Centered Systems - page 221

understanding of how the context in which the technological system is used sig-
nificantly affects how it is used. Workplace systems are socio-technical systems
(see Chap. 2 ); that is, technical systems that are designed for and shaped by people
operating in social contexts. This means it is important to consider the interactions
and interdependencies between the social and technical aspects of any system that
is being developed or modified: How is it being used? How does it affect (trans-
form, facilitate, impede) social processes?
Social psychology and other disciplines draw a distinction between individuals
acting alone, dyads (two people interacting), groups, teams, and communities. In
the context of work tasks, dyads, groups, and teams tend to share more clearly
defined goals. Here we use the term team to refer to a particular, formally defined
and workplace oriented type of group. Whilst what applies to groups generally
applies to teams, what applies to teams does not always apply to groups.
A team comprises two or more individuals who have to carry out work (a set of
related tasks) in pursuit of some common (specified) goal. Team performance, like
individual performance, is still based on the notion of particular people doing
particular tasks in a particular context. It is, however, complicated by the need to
communicate and co-ordinate actions and decision making, and by having to con-
sider the effects of the way that the team may be distributed in both space and time.
When thinking about teams, it is important to remember that what counts as a
team depends on where you draw the boundaries when conducting your analysis
(Hollnagel 2007 ). In aviation, for example, if you draw your boundary at the
aircraft cockpit level you might consider the pilots to be a team. If, however, you
extend the boundary to cover the whole of the (interior of the) aircraft, then the
team would include the flight attendants. You can keep extending the boundary
outwards, which would bring more people into the team: ground crew; air traffic
control; and so on.
Social processes related to and mediated by technology also occur in other large
systems of systems such as medicine, entertainment, defense, and increasingly in
education. For example, in air transportation, many people—passengers, pilots,
ground crew, and so on—come together (see Fig. 8.1 ). Where a number of social
groups come together, as in this case, a large socio-technical system—a system of
systems—is formed smaller socio-technical systems each of which has their own
social rules and regulations, and often includes different technical systems. People
frequently end up as the points at which these systems overlap. For example, think
about the check-in agent at an airport who has to work with baggage handling
systems to ensure your luggage gets on to the right plane. Here, the agent who
prints and attaches the tag to your bag is the boundary point between the check-in
system and the baggage handling system, and the tag determines how the bag
moves into the baggage handling system.
Working as a team can bring problems of co-ordination and communication.
The aviation industry recognized this and developed the concept of cockpit
resource management (Wiener et al. 1993 ) as a way of dealing with the issues on