An examination of supervisors’ perspectives of teamwork in a federal agency: promising practices and challenges using a gap analysis framework

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Content Running head: SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 1
Copyright 2016 Kealalokahi C. Losch

AN EXAMINATION OF SUPERVISORS’ PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK IN A
FEDERAL AGENCY: PROMISING PRACTICES AND CHALLENGES USING A GAP
ANALYSIS FRAMEWORK

by

Kealalōkahi Losch

A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ROSSIER SCHOOL OF EDUCATION
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF EDUCATION

May 2016

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 2

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I extend my sincere gratitude to my committee members. To Dr. Melora Sundt, mahalo
for not just the professional guidance but also for hosting me during my stint in the field
gathering data. To Dr. Kenneth Yates, mahalo for making me think a little harder and stretching
me that much more. It was worth it. Finally, to Dr. Kathy Hanson, mahalo for the opportunity to
do my research with your organization. It made the learning so much more relevant to see the
theory being applied in a real-world context.
Completing a work like this is only possible with a solid support network, and mine was
fantastic. First, my aloha and mahalo goes to my wife, Tracie, for her tolerance, patience, and
perseverance in taking over nearly every aspect of running our household and caring for our
children, on top of providing me with encouragement and love throughout this process. Second, I
want to thank the people who kept pushing me to get back on the doctoral horse after my first
attempt did not work out. To my best friend, Esben Borsting, and my sister, Kulamanu Goodhue
mahalo for convincing me to go with you to the EdD orientation. Most of all, to my mom, Naomi
Losch, mahalo for always believing in my potential and pushing me to excel.
I also need to mahalo the colleagues who also helped along the way. To my 2013 Hawaiʻi
Cohort, you put up with my constant questioning in class and my really bad jokes for two years.
You all deserve a medal. Of course, the dissertation itself would have been impossible and
impassable without my dissertation thematic group, C-Jo and the Cedar Trees. We laughed,
cried, and raged together and we made it through to the end together! Also, a big mahalo to my
colleagues at Kapiʻolani Community College, who helped in so many various ways, big and
small. I especially want to recognize my fellow EdD Trojans, Dr. Shannon Sakamoto and Dr.
Laure Burke, for keeping me sane with good advice and wonderful stories of their own struggles.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 3

Mahalo to my Vice Chancellor Louise Pagotto for volunteering to help with the editing of this
work.
I also offer a big mahalo to the ʻImi Naʻauao, Liko Aʻe, and the Judith Manning Grayson
Endowed Memorial Scholarship programs for their generous financial support, which was vital
to me being able to do this program.
Finally, I want to dedicate this dissertation to my two wonderful children, Kalaʻi and
Kaʻiwa. I hope that the time I spent away from them will be remembered as a story of never
giving up and serve as an inspiration for them to reach even higher for their own goals someday.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 4

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgements 2
List of Tables 7
List of Figures 9
Abstract 10
Chapter One: Introduction 11
Problem Statement 13
Project Design 14
Study Questions 15
Importance of the Study 16
Organization of the Study Proposal 16
Chapter Two: Literature Review 18
Historical Overview of Factors Influencing Employee Job Satisfaction 18
Classical School 19
Human Relations School 19
Cognitive Growth (Hierarchy of Needs) School 20
Expectancy Theory 21
Goal Setting 21
Action-Planning Research 22
Factors Influencing Effective Teamwork 23
What is Teamwork? 23
Factors impacting effective Teamwork 24
Impact of effective Teamwork on Employee Satisfaction 28
Influences on Teamwork from the Social Science Perspective 29
Knowledge 30
Motivation 31
Organizational Requirements 33
Summary of Factors 34
Chapter Three: Methodology 35
Purpose of the Study and Study Questions 35
Methodological Framework 35
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 5

Organizational Goal-setting 37
Assumed Performance Issues and Assets 37
The EVS 38
Summary of Assumed Issues and Assets for the EVS and Professional and Gap Analysis
Literature 44
Validation Procedures for Performance Issues and Assets 44
Validation Process for Performance Assets and Issues: Knowledge 45
Validation Process for Performance Assets: Motivation 46
Validation Process for Performance Issues: Organizational Culture and Context 47
Summary 48
Participating Stakeholders 49
Data Collection 49
Focus Group Observations 50
Interviews 51
Document Analysis 51
Instruments 52
Trustworthiness of Data 52
Data Analysis 52
Chapter Four: Results and Findings 54
Validation Scheme 57
Knowledge Results 58
Factual Knowledge 58
Procedural Knowledge 59
Conceptual Knowledge 60
Metacognitive Knowledge 62
Motivation Results 63
Active Choice 63
Persistence 67
Mental Effort 68
Organizational Results 71
Validated Asset: “Supervisor communicates to and from management with team.” 71
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 6

Suggested and Not Validated Organizational Behaviors 72
Synthesis of Findings 74
Summary 75
Chapter Five: Solutions, Implementation, and Evaluation 76
Validated Assets and Issues 79
Implementation Plan 84
Evaluation Plan 86
Reactions and Motivation 86
Learning and Performance 87
Transfer of Behavior 87
Results and Impact 87
Limitations and Delimitations 88
Limitations 88
Delimitations 89
Recommendations for Further Inquiry 89
Not Validated and Suggested Behaviors 89
Broader Questions on Supervisors and Employee Satisfaction 93
Conclusion 94
References 96
Appendices 105
Appendix A: Factors Contributing To Employee Satisfaction 105
Appendix B: Summary Of Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork From A Knowledge,
Motivation, And Organizational Culture Framework 108
Appendix C: Summary Of Assumed Causes And Assets For Knowledge, Motivation, And
Organizational Issues 111
Appendix D: Summary Of Assumed Issues And Assets And Validating Methods For
Knowledge, Motivation, And Organizational Assets And Issues. 114
Appendix E: Interview Protocol 117
Appendix F: Sources Supporting Theme Validation, Theme Suggestion, Or Lack Of Theme
Validation 119

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 7

LIST OF TABLES
Table 1. Design of the Larger Project 14
Table 2. Factors Impacting Effective Teamwork in Business Literature 25
Table 3. Supervisor Knowledge Behaviors Impacting Teamwork by Knowledge
Sub-area
31
Table 4. Supervisor Motivation Behaviors Impacting Teamwork by Motivation
Sub-area
32
Table 5. Supervisor Organizational Culture Behaviors Impacting Teamwork 34
Table 6. Summary of Supervisor Knowledge Behaviors and Corresponding EVS
Items by Sub-areas
41
Table 7. Summary of Supervisor Motivation Behaviors and Corresponding EVS
Items by Sub-areas
42
Table 8. Summary of Supervisor Organizational Culture Behaviors and
Corresponding EVS Items
43
Table 9. Summary of Assumed Knowledge Assets and Issues Validation 45
Table 10. Summary of Assumed Motivation Assets and Issues Validation 46
Table 11. Summary of Assumed Organizational/Culture/Context Assets and Issues
Validation
47
Table 12.! Summary of Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork from a
Knowledge, Motivation, and Organizational Culture (KMO) Framework
55
Table 13. Summary of Validated, Suggested, and Not Validated Assumed
Knowledge Behaviors by Knowledge Sub-areas
62
Table 14. Summary of Validated, Suggested, and Not Validated Assumed Motivation
Behaviors by Sub-area
70
Table 15. Summary of Validated, Suggested, and Not Validated Assumed
Organizational Behaviors
74
Table 16. Summary of Validation Status of Supervisor Behaviors 77
Table 17. Summary of Validated Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Effective
Teamwork from a Knowledge, Motivation, and Organizational Culture
(KMO) Framework
79
Table 18. Summary of Recommendations for Practice for Validated Supervisor
Motivation Behaviors
83
Table 19. Timeline and Implementation Plan for Recommendations for Practice for
Performance Assets and Issues
85
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 8

Table 20. Summary of Suggested Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork from a
Knowledge, Motivation, and Organizational Culture (KMO) Framework
92
Table 21. Summary of Supervisor Behaviors Not Validated as Impacting Teamwork
from a Knowledge, Motivation, and Organizational Culture (KMO)
Framework, including KMO sub-areas
93
Table A1. Factors Contributing to Employee Satisfaction 105
Table B1. Summary of Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork from a
Knowledge, Motivation, and Organizational Culture Framework
108
Table C1. Summary of Assumed Causes and Assets for Knowledge, Motivation, and
Organizational Issues
111
Table D1. Summary of assumed issues and assets and validating methods for
knowledge, motivation, and organizational assets issues
114
Table F1. Sources Supporting Theme Validation, Theme Suggestion, or Lack of
Theme Validation by KMO and Sub-factors
119

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 9

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1. Heuristic of the critical considerations of teamwork. 24
Figure 2. Modified gap analysis process 36

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 10

ABSTRACT
This study utilized a version of the gap analysis model created by Clark and Estes (2008) to
understand the impact that supervisor support has on teamwork as a contributor to employee
satisfaction. The purpose of this study was to examine the barriers to, and facilitators of,
supervisor support for effective teamwork at the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research
(CDER), a sub-unit of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. This study also sought to identify
the promising practices that supervisors throughout other organizations could adopt to improve
teamwork and the ways that such recommendations could be evaluated for their effectiveness.
Results from the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (EVS) and from a literature review were
used to identify assumed causes of barriers and facilitators to effective teamwork. Focus group
observations, interviews with supervisors, and document analysis were utilized to validate the
assumed causes and analyzed for the related knowledge, motivation, and organizational factors.
Of 24 supervisor behaviors that influence effective teamwork, as identified in the literature, only
four behaviors were validated, three as facilitators of and one as a barrier to effective teamwork.
The validated facilitators included supervisor knowledge of the organizational mission,
providing recognition and feedback for team members’ work, and providing effective
communication between supervisors’ teams and management. The validated barrier was related
to supervisors not taking punitive or corrective action for poor performance. All other behaviors
did not have sufficient evidence to be validated. The lack of evidence for the other behaviors
suggested fostering teamwork among their subordinates is not prominent in the minds of
CDER’s supervisors. The lack of evidence also indirectly demonstrated the limits to using the
current EVS to understand the relationship of supervisors to teamwork as a contributor to
employee satisfaction in federal agencies.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 11

CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Employees constitute the most significant asset of an organization. Often described as
human capital, employees are the primary vehicles that carry an organization to its goals (Harter,
Schmidt, Killham, & Asplund, 2012). Human capital is the largest financial investment an
organization has, as well (Požega & Crnković, 2008). Bukowitz, Williams, and MacTas (2004)
also noted that human capital is the source of competitive advantage for knowledge-intensive
organizations.
Managing, optimizing and retaining human capital is critical in successful organizations
(Harter et al., 2012; Požega & Crnković, 2008). Productivity, morale, organizational culture, and
the ability to recruit new people all impact an organization’s performance. For example, when
employees leave, either voluntarily or involuntarily, the loss of that human capital impacts the
organization in multiple ways (e.g. drop in productivity until a replacement is up and running,
cost of training a replacement, etc.) (Bukowitz et al., 2004). Harter et al. (2012) determined that a
business unit that can effectively engage and retain its employees can “nearly triple their chances
for above-average success” (p. 32) compared to other units across industry.
One measure of the organization’s performance in optimizing human capital is employee
satisfaction. Locke defined employee satisfaction as:
The pleasurable emotional state resulting from the perception of one’s job as fulfilling or
allowing the fulfillment of one’s important job values, providing these values are
compatible with one’s needs. (Values refer to what one considers beneficial, whereas
needs are the conditions actually required for one’s well-being.) (1976, p. 1342)
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 12

Organizations can prevent/reduce the loss of human capital by fostering and facilitating
employee satisfaction.
Employee satisfaction is achieved by addressing multiple factors in the workplace
relating to an individual’s job values and personal needs (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Griffeth,
Hom, & Gaertner, 2000; Harter et al., 2012; Locke, 1976; Yuan, 1997). Researchers (Blonski &
Jefmanski, 2013; Harter et al., 2012; Herzberg, Mausner, Peterson, & Capwell, 1957; Locke,
1976; Yuan, 1997; Zhu, 2013) have studied factors such as organizational culture, supervision,
communication, the work environment, economic benefits, autonomy, relationships, and
teamwork. Since individuals comprise an organization, teamwork among employees is one of the
essential elements necessary for organizational performance (Campion, Medsker, & Higgs,
1993; Manzoor, Ullah, Hussain, & Ahmad, 2011; Salas, Burke, & Cannon‐Bowers, 2000; Salas,
Sims, & Burke, 2005).
Organizations that foster and facilitate teamwork have higher levels of employee
satisfaction. Team and teamwork studies (Campion et al., 1993; Salas et al., 2005) have
described multiple factors that contribute to effective teams and team performance. These factors
included common understandings, information exchange protocols, motivational drivers,
behavioral mechanisms, conflict resolution procedures, appropriate team demographics, and
leadership activities (Campion et al., 1993; Salas et al., 2005).
Supervisors within an organization, in particular, play a critical role in both facilitating
and impeding teamwork and thus influence employee job satisfaction. Researchers (Griffin,
Patterson, & West, 2001; D. I. Jung & Sosik, 2002; Manz & Sims, 1987; Rousseau, Aubé, &
Tremblay, 2013; Taggar & Seijts, 2003) have determined that leadership activities, a factor unto
themselves, also guided and shaped many of the other factors.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 13

Problem Statement
The United States Federal Government is the largest public employer across the country.
In 2014, the Federal Government employed over four million people (United States Office of
Personnel Management, 2015). These employees were in all three branches of the Federal
Government: Legislative, Judicial, and Executive, including uniformed military personnel.
As an organization, the Federal Government values the satisfaction levels of its
employees. To measure employee satisfaction within its various departments and agencies, the
Federal Government utilizes the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (EVS). Administered
every year by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the EVS is designed to provide
participating departments and agencies with data on “areas which drive employee satisfaction,
commitment, engagement, and ultimately retention in the workforce” (United States Office of
Personnel Management Planning and Policy Analysis, 2014, p. 1). A more detailed explanation
of the EVS is included in Chapter Three: Methodology.
Although there was a wide range of employee satisfaction scores among federal
departments and agencies, the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), a sub-unit of
the Food and Drug Administration, had employee satisfaction scores on the EVS above the
median for federal agencies, especially in the area of teamwork. CDER sought to continue to
improve and wanted to identify the promising practices that led to its current score as well as
examine its performance gaps to lift the scores even higher. While acknowledging that the
CDER employees were the greatest contributors to building effective teams, examining CDER
supervisors’ perspectives of their roles in teamwork facilitation or hindrance provided
opportunities to document additional factors that may be addressed to promote team building and
thus employee satisfaction in other federal agencies.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 14

Project Design
Six education doctoral students (hereafter referred to collectively as the “Team”) from
the University of Southern California collaborated on this project to collect data from six unit
offices within CDER. The population involved in the project was drawn from CDER. The
sample and participants were drawn from the employees and supervisors from six offices within
CDER. The Team used a gap analysis framework to explore the perspectives of supervisors and
employees on job satisfaction. Gap analysis is a methodological framework designed to identify,
diagnose, validate, and solve human performance problems and to identify promising practices,
in this case high and low employee satisfaction (Clark & Estes, 2008). Table 1 describes the
project’s six studies, each taking a specific stakeholder perspective (supervisors or employees),
looking at barriers or facilitators or both, and focusing on practices related to either supervision
or teamwork.
Table 1
Design of the Larger Project
Teamwork Supervision
Perspective Facilitators Barriers Facilitators Barriers
Supervisor Study 4 Study 2
Employee Study 1 Study 5 Study 6 Study 3

This paper describes Study 4, with a focus on barriers and facilitators of effective
teamwork from the perspective of supervisors.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 15

Study Questions
The questions for this researcher’s study were:
1. From the perspective of supervisors, what knowledge, motivation, and organizational
factors influence teamwork and diminish or contribute to employee satisfaction within
CDER?
2. What are the recommended promising practices or solutions that supervisors within other
units of CDER could adopt to improve teamwork and employee satisfaction?
3. How could these recommendations be evaluated for effectiveness?
The data this researcher collected to answer the study questions consisted of results of
observations from focus groups, data from follow-up interviews with individuals, and the results
of document analysis from focus group close-out sessions. The focus groups were drawn the
supervisors from six offices within CDER. This study centered on the supervisors as a
stakeholder group and their experiences and perspectives on teamwork among their subordinates.
Participants in focus groups responded to prompts related to their office’s high and low scoring
items on the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (EVS). Volunteers for follow-up interviews
were solicited from each of the focus groups. This researcher collected these data by jointly
developing observation and interview protocols in collaboration with the Team, conducting
observations and interviews using these protocols, and procuring related documents.
The gap analysis framework, developed by Clark and Estes (2008), is designed to
identify and validate assumed causes of performance gaps in organizations prior to addressing
potential solutions. In this study, the gap analysis methodology was adapted to also identify and
validate assumed causes of promising practices that have led to smaller gaps in employee
satisfaction than those found in other federal agencies. In this study, this researcher analyzed
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 16

these data using the a priori categories of knowledge, motivation, and organization factors that
influence teamwork, in addition to employing open coding to find unexpected, emergent themes.
Importance of the Study
The implications for the wider domain and populations that may be interested in this
researcher’s study are greater productivity and improved workplace environments through
improvements in teamwork for federal agencies. Increased teamwork leads to greater efficiency
and effectiveness for federal agencies (Gallie, Zhou, Felstead, & Green, 2012), which, in turn,
provides a better return on investment for tax dollars paid by citizens. For supervisors in other
agencies, being able to identify and understand how to implement practices that have been
validated through prior implementation in CDER will provide useful beyond just being able to
identify performance gaps and their causes.
Organization of the Study Proposal
This study is organized into five chapters. Chapter One of the study delineates the context
of the problem, states the problem, defines the study purpose and research questions, and
discusses the importance of the study. Chapter Two reviews the academic literature for
information on employee satisfaction, teamwork’s relationship to employee satisfaction, and
supervisors’ impact on employee satisfaction through their interactions with their subordinate
teams. Chapter Three presents the methodology that was used for the study. The third chapter
also includes definitions of the study population studied, the framework utilized, and the
procedures implemented to complete the study. The study findings are assessed and analyzed for
performance gaps and promising practices in Chapter Four. Finally, Chapter Five presents
research-based recommendations for practice, including an implementation and evaluation plan
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 17

to further the promising practices and address the performance gaps. Chapter Five also reflects
on the study limitations and provides recommendations for further inquiry.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 18

CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Historical Overview of Factors Influencing Employee Job Satisfaction
The topic of employee satisfaction has been studied extensively over the last century
(Adams & Jacobsen, 1964; Clifton, Hollingsworth, & Hall, 1952; Gilbreth, 1912; Hackman &
Porter, 1968; Harter et al., 2012; Herzberg, 1959; Hoppock & National Occupational
Conference, 1935; Lawler III & Suttle, 1973; Locke, 1976; Mayo, 1933; McKenna & Beech,
2014; Taylor & Tucker, 1911; Uhrbrock, 1934; Vroom & Yetton, 1973). As successive scholars
engaged the topic, the focus of study on employee satisfaction changed. Scholars (Blonski &
Jefmanski, 2013, pp. 158-159; Locke, 1976, p. 1342; McKenna & Beech, 2014) now describe six
major eras, or schools of thought, relating to employee satisfaction. While the trends have been
roughly chronological in development, each continues to have its adherents and the lines
between them sometimes blur as researchers attempt to fully understand the factors that make
and keep employees satisfied. In order of development, the schools are:
• Classical (Physical-Economic/Economic Man) School
• Human Relations School
• Cognitive Growth (Hierarchy of Needs) School
• Expectancy Theory
• Goal Setting
• Equity Theory
Each of these schools is discussed below in turn.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 19

Classical School
The focus of the Classical School, also known as the Physical-Economic School (Locke,
1976) or Economic Man Theory (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013), was on maximizing the economic
benefit of an organization through more efficient uses of labor (Gilbreth, 1912; Taylor & Tucker,
1911). Taylor and Tucker’s (1911) “Scientific Management” approach, later known as
“Taylorism,” posited that if workers’ needs for rest were addressed, then they would ultimately
work faster and more efficiently for a net production gain. Expanding on Taylor’s work, Gilbreth
(1912) took a slightly different approach. Whereas Taylor’s primary concern was efficient use of
time to reduce fatigue, Gilbreth’s focus was on the reduction of employee’s physical motion to
reduce fatigue. Gilbreth proposed that redesigning work spaces and workflows to minimize
employee motion would lessen fatigue and lead to greater production efficiency. In general, by
acknowledging that the satisfaction of the employee would provide direct economic benefit to
the employer, the Classical school introduced the notion that the interests of employees and
employers were not necessarily antagonistic.
Human Relations School
When the Classical School’s attention to worker fatigue issues ultimately failed to truly
improve employee satisfaction, subsequent researchers examined more social and relational
factors giving rise to the Human Relations School in the 1930s (Hoppock & National
Occupational Conference, 1935; Mayo, 1930, 1933; Uhrbrock, 1934). Mayo (1933) pioneered
the Human Relations approach via the Hawthorne studies in the late 1920s. Although Mayo
originally intended to study fatigue mitigation, his research soon shifted to focus on employee
attitudes. Broader than just job satisfaction, Mayo’s work studied employee views of
management, their own economic context, and their views about being studied (Mayo, 1933).
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 20

Mayo was the first to key in on the role of the small work group and supervisory practices as
contributing factors to employee satisfaction.
Another scholar in the Human Relations School was Richard Uhrbrock (1934). Similar to
Mayo, Uhrbrock described employee satisfaction in terms of attitudes, noting that dissatisfaction
stemmed from a lack of knowledge (poor communication) on the part of the employee and the
organization itself, particularly the role of management. Uhrbrock also conducted early work on
the use of employee satisfaction surveys as instruments for gathering data.
It was during the era of the Human Relations School that the first intensive study
specifically about job satisfaction occurred (Hoppock & National Occupational Conference,
1935). Hoppock’s work differed from the work of his peers in that it focused more on presenting
an approach that allowed for multiple factors or philosophies for job satisfaction, but still
centered on the importance of the supervisor and the work group to job satisfaction.
Cognitive Growth (Hierarchy of Needs) School
While the Human Relations School broadened perspectives on employee satisfaction, the
next era of researchers (Clifton et al., 1952; G. Gallup & Hill, 1960; Gallup International
Research Institutes & Charles F. Kettering Foundation, 1977; Herzberg, 1959, 1966; Herzberg et
al., 1957) suspected that the work itself might have been key to employee satisfaction. The
Cognitive Growth School examined if key aspects of the work environment were critical to
employee dissatisfaction and if eliminating those factors would lessen dissatisfaction and
employee turnover, even if employees were still less than completely satisfied.
Abraham Maslow’s (1954) “Hierarchy of Needs” posited that people seek self-
actualization, growing into their fully realized selves. In the work environment, self-actualization
meant that employees needed to be given the space to grow and explore for themselves
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 21

professionally. Frederick Herzberg (1959) proposed a two-factor theory consisting of motivators
and hygiene factors. The latter concept defined those aspects of a job that will demotivate an
employee if they are missing, but would not motivate them additionally when present.
Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory was a direct application of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to job
satisfaction. Employee improvement in skill, efficacy, and responsibility is fostered through
mentally challenging work.
Expectancy Theory
Expectancy theory models, in all their forms (Hackman & Porter, 1968; Lawler III &
Suttle, 1973; Vroom & Yetton, 1973), operated on the assumption that employees make choices
based on the potential for the choice to meet their needs while tipping the balance of effort
versus outcome in the employee’s favor. The model was built around three components: (a)
expectancy, (b) instrumentality, and (c) Valence (Vroom & Yetton, 1973). Expectancy was the
belief that investing effort would yield a desired outcome. Instrumentality was the belief that
successful performance would yield a reward. Finally, valence was the value the individual
placed on the outcomes. The expectancy school noted that the perceptions of the employee were
just as valid as the reality that the employer had created in the work environment.
Goal Setting
Edwin Locke (1969, 1976) challenged previous notions that the answer to employee
satisfaction would be found in the employee or in the workplace. Instead, Locke (1976) proposed
an alternative understanding that emphasized employee perception or appraisal of the work
environment that created an emotional attitude toward job satisfaction. He defined the work
environment as a combination of events or conditions and agents. The events or conditions
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 22

included the work, rewards, and context of the job. The agents were the co-workers, supervisor,
and senior management.
Action-Planning Research
Today, researchers (Harter et al., 2012; Yuan, 1997) have utilized meta-analyses of many
previous studies and resultant theories to derive models that can incorporate and explain the
various behaviors and environments that have been studied. Based largely on employee survey
data, these meta-analyses have become focused on those factors that can be acted upon by
individuals, teams, and supervisors to effect positive change in organizations. The perspective of
the individual employee became an important factor in relation to nearly every other factor
studied previously. Some scholars (Zhu, 2013) have also noted that, initially, most theories of job
satisfaction were built around affective measures. However, since the 1980s, the impact of both
affective and cognitive determinants have been acknowledged and utilized to explain
satisfaction.
George Gallup began his research into human satisfaction in the early 20
th
century
(Harter et al., 2012). Over time, his focus shifted to look specifically at workplace satisfaction
(G. Gallup & Hill, 1960; G. H. Gallup, 1976; Gallup International Research Institutes & Charles
F. Kettering Foundation, 1977). Recently, the Gallup organization was able to utilize its access to
a multitude of employee satisfaction survey data to develop a model set of 12 questions (Harter
et al., 2012) to measure factors contributing to employee satisfaction. The report noted that the
factors do not have equal impact on employee turnover decision-making. However, the questions
were framed and explained in such a way that managers or supervisors who use the questions
would have actionable points to guide any action plans in response.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 23

In sum, historically, the focal shifts in employee satisfaction research resulted from
hypotheses testing in the workplace. As hypothetical factors failed to account for employee
dissatisfaction or improve levels of satisfaction, new factors were identified and hypotheses of
causation and correlation proposed. Looking across the various studies and meta-analyses,
grouping like factors resulted in nine major categories of factors that researchers found to
contribute to employee satisfaction. The factors proposed to contribute to employee satisfaction
and their citations are included in Table A1 in the appendices. A tenth category,
“Demographics/Age,” was included in some studies but not consistently examined as a
contributing factor but more often as a context or control. Two areas of interest have been
consistently studied, supervision and teamwork (Herzberg, 1959; Hoppock & National
Occupational Conference, 1935; Locke, 1976; Mayo, 1933).
Factors Influencing Effective Teamwork
What is Teamwork?
One of the major areas from which employees derive satisfaction or dissatisfaction is
their relationships with their co-workers. When these processes are formalized into team-based
approaches, employee satisfaction rises (Salas, Cooke, & Rosen, 2008). Teams consist of “a
distinguishable set of two or more people who interact, dynamically, interdependently, and
adaptively toward a common and valued goal/objective/mission” (Salas, Dickinson, Converse, &
Tannenbaum, 1992, p. 4 cited in Salas et al., 2014, p. 2). Meta-analyses of teamwork studies
defined teamwork as “an adaptive, dynamic, and episodic process that encompasses the thoughts,
feelings, and behaviors among team members while they interact toward a common goal” (Salas
et al., 2014, p. 2). The statement, in defining teamwork,

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 24

also alluded to the challenges faced in trying to study, analyze, and promote such a broad
concept across varying work environments.
Factors impacting effective Teamwork
Researchers (Salas, Lazzara, Benishek, & King, 2013; Salas et al., 2014) have created a
framework to describe the factors that interact to contribute to effective teams and effective team
performance, i.e. teamwork (see Figure 1). The framework consists of six “Core Processes and
Emergent States” and three “Influencing Conditions” (Salas et al., 2014, pp. 4-5). To derive the
framework, the researchers reviewed over 15 years of research on team effectiveness, including
previous meta-analyses. A summary of the literature supporting the core processes, emergent
states and influencing conditions is provided in Table 2.
4 HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
Human Resource Management DOI: 10.1002/hrm
These factors should
not be considered
in isolation from
one another, but
rather that they
must be holistically
considered in trying
to determine how to
establish effective
teamwork practices.
these considerations. In other words, one consid-
eration is not necessarily more or less important
than any other consideration. Instead, organi-
zations should attend to each of these consider-
ations and determine, based upon their unique
team situations, if any are more or less influen-
tial for the given team environment. Finally, we
propose this as an initial set of considerations and
associated practical implications, with the under-
standing that as research advances our knowledge
regarding teamwork, there may be a need for con-
tinued refinement. In sum, this heuristic serves to
be a living, parsimonious, organizing set of con-
siderations that individuals, teams, and organiza-
tions can utilize to develop and sustain effective
teamwork.
So what do organizational leaders and team
members need to know to enact effective team-
work? To answer this, we turn to the literature
to derive a set of nine critical considerations for
teamwork aimed at creating a more parsimoni-
ous path to effective practices in organizations
(see Table II). Each of these critical considerations
has been selected due to (1) its prevalence in the
theoretical team literature and (2) the empirical
evidence indicating its impact on team outcomes,
resulting in a need for organizations to pay close
attention to its influences in real-world settings. It
should be noted that these considerations are also
selected for their ability to provide a memorable
framework. The use of nine “C” words to encom-
pass teamwork may appear to be superficial, but
summarizing these reviews and their contribu-
tions to the teamwork literature. Although these
reviews provide key points in terms of important
factors that affect teamwork, they do not neces-
sarily provide practitioner-friendly insight regard-
ing what really matters to teamwork. That is,
the numerous attempts to define
and consolidate teamwork research
oftentimes results in more questions
than answers and does not necessar-
ily serve to guide organizations and
collaborators in addressing team-
work challenges in the real world
(Salas, Cooke, & Rosen, 2008).
A few assumptions must be
presented prior to further discus-
sion regarding each of these con-
siderations. First, we do not identify
directional paths among these con-
siderations within our heuristic (see
Figure 1). This is intentional, as the
literature suggests that these factors
may influence one another under
a range of circumstances. Indeed,
the potential interactions among
these factors are one of the driving
reasons behind their selection as a set. Thus, we
are arguing that these factors should not be con-
sidered in isolation from one another, but rather
that they must be holistically considered in trying
to determine how to establish effective teamwork
practices. Second, there is no hierarchy among
FIGURE 1. Heuristic of the Critical Considerations of Teamwork
INFLUENCING CONDITIONS
CORE PROCESSES & EMERGENT STATES
COGNITION CONFLICT
COACHING COORDINATION
COOPERATION COMMUNICATION TEAMWORK
CONTEXT CULTURE COMPOSITION
Figure 2. Heuristic of the Critical Considerations of Teamwork. Taken from Salas, Shuffler,
Thayer, Bedwell, and Lazzara (2014, p. 4)
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 25

Table 2
Factors Impacting Effective Teamwork in Business Literature
Factors Selected Citations
Core Processes & Emergent States! !
Cognition (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Campion et al., 1993; Salas et
al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014; Salas et al., 2005)
Communication (Salas et al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014)
Coordination (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Campion et al., 1993; Salas,
Grossman, Hughes, & Coultas, 2015; Salas et al., 2013;
Salas et al., 2014; Salas et al., 2005)
Cooperation (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Campion et al., 1993; Salas et
al., 2015; Salas et al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014; Salas et al.,
2005)
Coaching (Campion et al., 1993; Salas et al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014;
Salas et al., 2005)
Conflict (Campion et al., 1993; Salas et al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014;
Salas et al., 2005)
Influencing Conditions
Context (Campion et al., 1993; Salas et al., 2014)
Composition (Campion et al., 1993; Salas et al., 2014)
Culture (Salas et al., 2014)

Core processes and emergent states. The two components of the framework, core
processes and emergent states, refer to the team activities that facilitate the accomplishment of
tasks and goals and to the dynamic collective characteristics that result from teamwork,
respectively (Salas et al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014).
Cognition. The core process of cognition is “a shared understanding among team
members that is developed as a result of team member interactions including knowledge of roles
and responsibilities; team mission objectives and norms; and familiarity with teammate
knowledge, skills and abilities” (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5). Cognition encompasses all of the
information team members need about themselves, each other, and their organization. Other
researchers have referred to this core process as “shared mental models” (Salas et al., 2005). The
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 26

factor includes concepts like goal interdependence, task significance, and task identity (Campion
et al., 1993).
Communication. For the purposes of the framework, communication is “a reciprocal
process of team members’ sending and receiving information that forms and re-forms a team’s
attitudes, behaviors, and cognitions” (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5). Previously, Salas et al. (2005)
specified that the communication had to be “closed-loop” in nature to ensure that information
was flowing back and forth, not just one way. The communication also needs to flow not just
within the teams but also up to supervisors and potentially out to other teams within the
organization, when appropriate (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013).
Coordination. The goal of coordination is to enact “behavioral and cognitive mechanisms
necessary to perform a task and transform team resources into outcomes” (Salas et al., 2014, p.
5). The notion of coordination encompasses many of the knowledge processes within groups
including providing social support, remaining flexible, understanding task interdependency, and
self-managing (group autonomy) (Campion et al., 1993). Salas et al. (2005) discussed this factor
as mutual performance monitoring, back-up behavior, and adaptability.
Cooperation. “In essence, this is the attitudes, beliefs, and feelings of the team that drive
behavioral action” (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5). Cooperation is a major factor as it includes concepts
such as team orientation and mutual trust (Salas et al., 2005), a desire to help team members
(Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013), and team cohesion, collective and self-efficacy, psychological
safety, and empowerment (Salas et al., 2013).
Coaching. Coaching is “the enactment of leadership behaviors to establish goals and set
direction that leads to the successful accomplishment of these goals” (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5).
The leadership discussed here may come from both an informal team leader or from a formal
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 27

supervisor or manager. Locke’s (1976, p. 1328) description of leaders as “agents in the
workplace who help the employee to attain job values such as interesting work, pay, and
promotions, whose basic values are similar to his own, and who minimize role conflict and
ambiguity” captured the notion early on. The coaching component facilitates the preceding and
following factors (Salas et al., 2013).
Conflict. “The perceived incompatibilities in the interests, beliefs, or views held by one
or more team members” is defined as conflict (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5). Potential conflicts could
be based on tasks, processes or relationships. Effective teams will have resolution strategies in
place to mitigate against conflicts (Salas et al., 2013).
Influencing conditions. Employees and the teams they belong to do not exist in
isolation. Salas et al.’s model (2014) accounted for the wider organizational circumstances
impacting teams through three Influencing Conditions: Composition, Context, and Culture (pp.
12-16).
Composition. Team composition is shaped by “the individual factors relevant to team
performance; what constitutes a good team member; what is the best configuration of team
member knowledge, skills, and attitudes (KSAs); and what role diversity plays in team
effectiveness” (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5). Teams need to have particular KSAs to be effective.
Composition considers the team as a whole to understand whether or not the combination of
members includes all of the necessary elements to complete the task. Other scholars have
referred to this influencing condition alternatively as group design (Hackman, 1990) or team
characteristics (Tannenbaum, Beard, & Salas, 1992). Specific sub-factors considered here
include heterogeneity of skills and experience, diversity (gender, age, values, culture, ethnicity,
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 28

etc.), relative size of the group, and team orientation (Campion et al., 1993; Hackman, 1990;
Salas et al., 2014; Tannenbaum et al., 1992).
Context. “Situational characteristics or events that influence the occurrence and meaning
of behavior, as well as the manner and degree to which various factors impact team outcomes,”
define the physical, social, and organizational contexts within which the team operates (Salas et
al., 2014, p. 5). From the Taylorist (Taylor & Tucker, 1911) concerns over physical work
conditions to the availability of training, support, and other resources (Campion et al., 1993;
Health Quality Council of Alberta [HealthQltyCouncilAB]), context factors can limit or facilitate
teamwork. Current communication technologies have now widened the working context for
teams into virtual spaces as well (Salas et al., 2014).
Culture. The “assumptions about humans’ relationships with each other and their
environment that are shared among an identifiable group of people (e.g., team, organization,
nation) and manifest in individuals’ values, beliefs, norms for social behavior, and artifacts”
define culture in this framework (Salas et al., 2014, p. 5). Cultural factors may come from the
organization or the individual, or be formed within the team itself. When status hierarchies are
part of the culture, communication can be impacted as higher status team members may
dominate conversations and low status members may remain silent or disengage altogether. A
major cultural dichotomy that can influence teamwork is the Individualist-Collectivist split. If
teams do not take cultural concerns into account, then conflicts may arise (Salas et al., 2014).
Impact of effective Teamwork on Employee Satisfaction
Most of the factors that contribute to effective teamwork (see Table 2) are also integral to
employee satisfaction (see Table A1). Throughout the 20
th
century, increasing numbers of
employers have turned to teamwork as a method to improve their organizational efficiency
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 29

(Campion et al., 1993; Hackman, 1990; Locke, 1976; Salas et al., 2014; Yuan, 1997). Within
government organizations, this approach has been particularly true (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013;
Chang, Chiu, & Chen, 2010; Yuan, 1997). Therefore, effective teamwork may be thought of as a
vehicle to deliver the factors that contribute to employee satisfaction.
Influences on Teamwork from the Social Science Perspective
This study was based on the gap analysis framework developed by Clark and Estes
(2008) and subsequently adapted for educational contexts by Rueda (2011). The gap analysis
model identifies three critical dimensions that need to be addressed when problem solving:
knowledge and skills, motivation, and organizational culture factors. Anderson et al. (2001)
elaborated on and expanded Bloom’s Taxonomy (Bloom, 1956) to define four types of
knowledge and skills: factual, procedural, conceptual, and metacognitive. The Anderson et al.
(2001) framework provided a means of further analyzing and understanding the knowledge
dimension Clark and Estes (2008) and Rueda (2011) included in the gap analysis model. The
three motivational indices described by Clark and Estes (2008) and Rueda (2011)—active
choice, persistence, and mental effort—guided the analysis of motivational issues and factors. To
address the organizational factors in the gap analysis, Clark and Estes (2008) drew upon various
studies that examined the broader organizational factors that exist in work settings contributing
to performance gaps among employees, including types of support necessary for effective
organizational change processes and the need to match types of performance support to types of
organizations (Dixon, Arnold, Heineke, Kim, & Mulligan, 1994; Druckman, Singer, Van Cott, &
ebrary, 1997; Schweiger & DeNisi, 1991).
Different stakeholders in an organization have different roles and responsibilities that
determine the knowledge, skills, and attitudes that are necessary to execute their jobs efficiently
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 30

and effectively. This study focused on the supervisors of CDER as the stakeholder group to
examine what supervisors did to facilitate or impede effective teamwork and thus employee
satisfaction (Yuan, 1997). In terms of the Salas et al (2014) model, researchers (Durham, Knight,
& Locke, 1997; Griffin et al., 2001; Rousseau et al., 2013) have identified that coaching
behaviors from supervisors were most effective in affecting the knowledge, motivation, and
organizational issues faced by employees. However, from the supervisors’ perspective, their
coaching behavior encompassed the facilitation or support of the other core processes mentioned
in the model. Thus, this study of supervisor impacts on effective teams sought to examine how
the coaching behavior of a supervisor did or did not effectively address the core processes and
influencing conditions of their subordinates’ experience.
Knowledge
One of the three areas of potential performance gaps or promising practices was in the
area of knowledge. To what extent did the supervisors have the necessary knowledge and skills
to accomplish their and their team’s goals and was there an effective process in place to acquire
additional information when needed? Anderson et al. (2001) delineated four types of knowledge.
Factual knowledge referred to individual elements of information, such as the what, when or
how. Conceptual knowledge was more complex and addressed concepts, processes, and
principles. Procedural knowledge provided the information about how to do something or make
decisions. Metacognitive knowledge related to the awareness of one’s own cognitive processes
and the ability to reflect on that knowledge.
The knowledge needs for supervisors about teamwork were factual, procedural, and
conceptual in nature. None of the identified supervisor behaviors was categorized as an indicator
of metacognitive knowledge. Supervisors needed to know the chain of factors that lead from
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 31

their own attitudes and behaviors to their employees’ satisfaction as a member of the team.
Effective supervisors also utilized coaching to “direct interaction with a team intended to help
members make coordinated and task-appropriate use of their collective resources in
accomplishing the team’s work” (Rousseau et al., 2013, p. 345) Table 3 lists the supervisor
knowledge behaviors impacting teamwork by knowledge sub-area derived from the relevant
literature.
Table 3
Supervisor Knowledge Behaviors Impacting Teamwork by Knowledge Sub-area
Knowledge
Sub-Areas
Supervisor Knowledge Behaviors
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization
Supervisors oversee training of new team members
Procedural

Supervisors know how to apply the organization’s policy and procedures to
subordinate teams
Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback

Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure information to
team members

Supervisors understand how to promote job autonomy (i.e. skill flexibility, team
member responsibility, and work variety) in team members
Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than demotivate
Conceptual

Supervisors understand the value of participatory decision-making for team-level
goal-setting

Supervisors understand principles and value of transformational leadership (e.g.
charismatic role-modeling, articulating an appealing or evocative vision,
promoting creativity and innovation, and coaching and mentoring)

Motivation
Clark and Estes (2008) described three indices that contribute to motivation: active
choice, moving from intention to action on a goal; persistence, persevering or continuing with
the choice in the face of adversity or distractions; and mental effort, investing the time and
energy to develop new information and approaches as needed to resolve unanticipated obstacles
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 32

to a goal. Whether a goal is externally or internally set, active choice occurred when a person or
group of people were actively pursuing the goal, rather than forestalling action through
avoidance, procrastination, argument, or other delaying tactics. Once under way, persistence was
indicated when a particular goal remained the central focus of activity, especially in the face of
competing goals or priorities. Finally, mental effort was required when new or unanticipated
challenges, in either number or magnitude, emerged in the pursuit of a goal. Clark and Estes
(2008) noted that mental effort is determined by the confidence level of the person or group.
Over or under confidence in one’s abilities often leads to a reduction in mental effort.
Supervisors also foster motivation in their employees through coaching behaviors. Manz
and Sims (1987) reported that “encouraging” particular employee behaviors raised employee
collective efficacy, which led to increased satisfaction. Transformational leadership, also referred
to as charismatic leadership (Northouse, 2013), seeks to foster intrinsic motivation and develop
the follower’s capacity to remain motivated and succeed in the face of adversity. In particular, D.
I. Jung and Sosik (2002) determined that transformational leaders, as opposed to transactional
leaders, promote empowerment, cohesiveness, and collective efficacy in their employees, which,
in turn, helps to facilitate employee satisfaction in teams. Table 4 lists the supervisor motivation
behaviors impacting teamwork by motivation sub-area derived from the relevant literature.
Table 4
Supervisor Motivation Behaviors Impacting Teamwork by Motivation Sub-area
Motivation
Sub-Areas
Supervisor Motivation Behaviors
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic and motivate team members
Supervisors set and communicate clear expectations
Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’ work
Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor performance

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 33

Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s collective efficacy
Supervisors empower team members through participatory decision-making

Supervisors provide feedback about team members’ roles and tasks to increase
team member autonomy
Mental Effort

Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement, self-observation, and self-evaluation in
team members
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather than solve problems for their teams
Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-team communication

Organizational Requirements
Finally, Clark and Estes (2008) described the importance of making sure that an
organization’s policy, practice, and cultural frameworks are aligned with the organization’s goals
and mission and are adequately supported with material and human resources. While policies and
practices may be modified relatively easily, depending on the organization, the cultural
framework is established over time through the “core values, goals, beliefs, emotions, and
processes learned” by the employees and leaders (Clark & Estes, 2008, p. 108).
Employees often interpret their supervisor’s behaviors to be representative of the
organization, its processes, and its culture (Griffin et al., 2001). Supervisors, then, play a key role
in modeling teamwork and setting the ground rules for team members to engage in team
processes. The supervisor also fosters teamwork by structuring the work environment
appropriately and providing critical information and constructive feedback to employees in a
timely manner (Griffin et al., 2001). Durham et al. (1997) found that teams that are supported to
participate in decision-making by setting team goals beyond the organizational goals yield higher
success. Table 5 lists the supervisor organizational culture behaviors impacting teamwork
derived from the relevant literature.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 34

Table 5
Supervisor Organizational Culture Behaviors Impacting Teamwork
Supervisor Organizational Culture Behaviors
Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see in the teams
Supervisors practice participatory decision-making
Supervisors support the creation of team-generated goals in addition to organizational goals
Supervisors provide the material support needed by their team
Supervisors communicate to and from management with team

Summary of Factors
The 24 behaviors listed in the knowledge, motivation, and organizational culture
categories above (Tables 3-5) provided a concrete set of measurable actions grounded in the
social sciences literature, which supervisors can undertake to support teamwork among their
subordinates. Table B1 in the appendices expands on the behaviors listed above by providing a
summary of the intersection of the teamwork factors, their supporting professional literature, and
the social science literature relating to knowledge, motivation, and organizational culture.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 35

CHAPTER THREE
METHODOLOGY
Purpose of the Study and Study Questions
The purpose of this study was to examine the barriers to, and facilitators of, supervisor
support for effective teamwork in a federal agency. The analysis focused on the causes of both
promising practices and performance gaps in the areas of knowledge and skill, motivation, and
organizational issues. This study examined the following questions:
1. From the perspective of supervisors, what knowledge, motivation, and organizational
factors influenced teamwork and diminished or contributed to employee satisfaction
within the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER)?
2. What are the recommended promising practices or solutions that supervisors within other
units of the federal agency could adopt to improve teamwork and employee satisfaction?
3. How could these recommendations be evaluated for effectiveness?
Methodological Framework
The gap analysis framework developed by Clark and Estes (2008) is designed to identify
and validate assumed causes of performance gaps prior to addressing potential solutions. In this
study, the methodology was adapted to also identify and validate assumed causes of smaller
performance gaps, which indicated promising practices that should be continued to keep the gap
small, if not to reduce the gap even more. The seven stages of the modified gap analysis include:
1. Goal-setting.
2. Measuring current achievement for performance gaps and promising practices.
3. Identifying assumed contributing factors as knowledge, motivation, or organizational
causes.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 36

4. Validating the assumed knowledge, motivation, and organizational causes.
5. Devising appropriate solutions to the validated causes.
6. Implementing the solutions.
7. Evaluating the effectiveness of the solutions.
The final evaluation step feeds back around to revisiting the goals, thereby beginning a new
cycle of analysis. The modified gap analysis framework is depicted in Figure 2.

Figure 2. Modified Gap Analysis Process. Adapted from Clark and Estes (2008)
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 37

Organizational Goal-setting
The aspirational goal, or ideal, for employee satisfaction in an organization is 100%
satisfied employees. However, the reality of employee satisfaction for many organizations,
including CDER, is lower. That said, when the performance gap, the difference between the goal
and the reality, is relatively small compared to similar organizations, the practices employed by
the subject organization are considered promising practices, which are an asset to the
organization. However, larger gaps in areas relating to employee satisfaction may be considered
barriers to the attainment of the aspirational goal and areas to be examined for causes and
appropriate measures taken to improve the performance of the organization.
Assumed Performance Issues and Assets
In their works on utilizing gap analysis to address performance gaps, Clark and Estes
(2008) and Rueda (2011) cautioned against problem solving without first identifying and
verifying the underlying causes of the performance gap. Rueda (2011) noted that too often,
individuals or organizations assume that they already know what has caused a performance gap.
Working from their unconfirmed causes, they either proceed directly to a solution, which may or
may not be appropriate or effective, or they are overwhelmed by the enormity of the assumed
problem and become paralyzed into inactivity. Similar pitfalls exist when considering promising
practices. It is possible to assume that one knows what is going right without having actually
assessed what is causing the positive conditions specifically. Then, one might replicate a practice
or apply a policy that is assumed to be promising and have nothing happen, or worse, cause a
performance gap instead.
Information to determine the assumed or possible causes of performance gaps and
promising practices relating to employee satisfaction in CDER was gathered from multiple
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 38

sources including (a) the results of a government employee satisfaction survey, (b) learning,
motivation, and organization theory, and (c) review of the literature on teamwork and employee
satisfaction (referred to hereafter as “related literature”). The related literature was discussed in
Chapter Two and is summarized in the tables in this Chapter Three.
The EVS
What is the EVS? To measure the employee satisfaction within its various departments
and agencies, the Federal Government utilizes the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (FEVS
or EVS). Administered every year by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the EVS is
designed to provide participating departments and agencies with data on “areas which drive
employee satisfaction, commitment, engagement, and ultimately retention in the workforce”
(United States Office of Personnel Management Planning and Policy Analysis, 2014, p. 1). The
EVS has 98 items covering eight topic areas, (a) personal work experiences, (b) work unit, (c)
agency, (d) supervisor, (e) leadership, (f) satisfaction, (g) work/life, and (h) demographics. The
items are also grouped into four broader indices: Employee Engagement Index, Global
Satisfaction Index, The New IQ Index, and HCAAF indices. EVS results are used by the
respective agencies to assist with strategic planning and improvement and to identify
government-wide trends (United States Office of Personnel Management Planning and Policy
Analysis, 2014). Based on the Global Satisfaction Index, CDER employees’ satisfaction was
measured at 72%, as compared to 64% and 59% across the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services and the entire U.S. Government, respectively (United States Office of Personnel
Management, 2014).
Results of the EVS. As a survey instrument, 71 EVS question items in topic areas one
through five provided a surface level assessment of employee satisfaction. The research team
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 39

categorized the 71 items into one of three domains, (a) knowledge, (b) motivation, or (c)
organizational culture (KMO) based on which domain would be most appropriate in addressing
performance gaps for the item. The team determined that four items related to knowledge, ten to
motivation, and the remaining 57 to organizational issues.
CDER’s mean scores across the items for the entire organization was 70%, with the
median at 72.9%. The ten items with the highest positive scores were mostly in the motivation
and organizational areas. None of the indices used to group EVS items were strongly
represented, however. The ten scores with the highest negative scores were all organizational
issues. Half of the highest negative scores came from the Results-Oriented Performance Culture
Index of the Human Capital Assessment and Accountability Framework (HCAAF). Concerns
centered on pay, promotion and recognition, and performance accountability.
Of the 71 items on the EVS, 28 items directly or indirectly assessed elements
contributing to one or more of the 24 supervisor behaviors identified in the literature reviewed in
chapter two. When the research team categorized the 71 EVS items, we considered them from
the point-of-view of the employee as that is how the survey was intended to be used. However,
because this study was examining supervisor behaviors relating to teamwork, this researcher
reviewed and reevaluated the 71 items to determine which ones related to teamwork based on the
24 identified supervisor behaviors. Twenty-nine of the EVS items related to the behaviors. To
further draw out the difference in stakeholder roles related to teamwork, this researcher
reevaluated the KMO categorization from the supervisor’s perspective. Many of the shifts were a
result of the fact that supervisors’ behaviors are actually representative of the organization itself
(Griffin et al., 2001). Thus, what may have seemed like an organizational culture issue to an
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 40

employee may have been a knowledge or motivation issue for the supervisor, who helped set the
organizational culture as an active agent of the organization.
Using the re-categorization, nine of the items related to knowledge, 15 related to
motivation, and nine related to organizational factors. Four items had implications for multiple
factors and were listed in all of the relevant areas. Eight of the supervisor behaviors did not have
any EVS items that directly or indirectly assessed the behaviors. Each of the EVS items is
discussed in turn below based on its supervisor KMO categorization.
Knowledge and skills. Nine of the EVS items related to teamwork included knowledge
elements. None of the leading knowledge items related to the supervisor behaviors were among
the top ten items for CDER. Only one item was over 85% positive, item #50: “In the last six
months, my supervisor has talked with me about my performance,” which ranked as 11th
highest. Of the nine knowledge-related items, the lowest rated was #32, “Creativity and
innovation are rewarded” (50.4% positive, 20.8% negative). Four of the supervisor knowledge
behaviors did not have any correlating EVS items:
• Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization
• Supervisors oversee training of new team members
• Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure information to team
members
• Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than demotivate
Because 40% of the supervisor behaviors did not have correlating questions in the EVS,
the utility of the instrument in providing a preliminary look at the research question was
extremely limited. Most of the items that did relate to knowledge and skills did not highlight any
particular strengths or weaknesses. Further investigation through other approaches became all the
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 41

more important given the unremarkable results of the EVS items. Table 6 provides a summary of
the supervisor knowledge behaviors and their corresponding EVS items by KMO areas and sub-
areas.
Table 6
Summary of Supervisor Knowledge Behaviors and Corresponding EVS Items by Sub-areas
Supervisor Behaviors in Knowledge Sub-Areas
EVS Item
Item # Item % +(-)
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization No EVS Correlate
Supervisors oversee training of new team members No EVS Correlate

Procedural
Supervisors know how to apply the organization’s policy and
procedures to subordinate teams
38 75.8 (7.9)
Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback 44
46
50
69.9 (13.1)
68.9 (18.7)
85.9 (6.9)
Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure
information to team members
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors understand how to promote job autonomy (i.e. skill
flexibility, team member responsibility, and work variety) in team
members
30
43
60.7 (16.8)
73.4 (11.8)
Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than
demotivate
No EVS Correlate
! ! !
Conceptual
Supervisors understand the value of participatory decision-making for
team-level goal-setting
30
63
60.7 (16.8)
63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors understand principles and value of transformational
leadership
32
34
50.4 (20.8)
67.9 (8.6)

Motivation. The significant motivation results on the EVS, both high and low, were
concentrated in the sub-area of Active Choice. Item 7, “When I am needed I am willing to put in
the extra effort to get a job done,” was the highest ranked (98.1% positive) of the 71 items on the
EVS. The score spoke to the high value that the employees placed on their work, which, in turn,
provided high motivation for success. At the same time, employees also noted in item #42 that
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 42

“My supervisor supports my need to balance work and other life issues,” which was 86.6%
positive and ranked #8 of the 71 EVS items.
At the opposite end, four of the lowest ten EVS items related to motivation. All of the
items related to how performance, especially poor performance, was handled. Item 24, “In my
work unit, differences in performance are recognized in a meaningful way,” had both the lowest
positive (42.0%) as well as the highest negative (29.5%) scores of the correlating EVS items.
Scores relating to Persistence either had no correlates with the supervisor behaviors or
were unremarkable, with positive scores in the middle of the range between 60-70, and the sub-
area of Mental Effort had no correlating EVS items at all. Table 7 provides a summary of the
supervisor motivation behaviors and their corresponding EVS items by sub-areas.
Table 7
Summary of Supervisor Motivation Behaviors and Corresponding EVS Items by Sub-areas
Supervisor Behaviors in Motivation Sub-Areas
EVS Item
Item # Item % +(-)
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic and motivate team members 7
42
98.1(0.7)
86.6 (4.8)
Supervisors set and communicates clear expectations 6
19
56
83.0 (11.0)
70.5 (15.4)
73.9 (8.9)
Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’
work
15
22
24
25
31
65
72.5 (12.6)
50.0 (25.2)
42.0 (29.5)
49.1 (23.9)
60.5 (17.4)
57.9 (18.7)
Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor performance 23
24
40.6 (27.9)
42 (29.5)

Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s collective efficacy No EVS Correlate
Supervisors empower team members through participatory decision-
making
30
63
60.7 (16.8)
63.4 (15.5)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 43

Supervisors provide feedback about team members’ roles and tasks to
increase team member autonomy
3
46
68.6 (15.2)
68.9 (12.3)

Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement, self-observation, and self-
evaluation in team members
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather than solve problems for
their teams
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-team communication No EVS Correlate

Organization. Based on the EVS scores, the teamwork performance issues in CDER
were largely organizational in origin. Of the nine items identified as organizational, only one
item was above 85% positive item #49, “My supervisor treats me with respect.” Item #64, “How
satisfied are you with the information you receive from management on what’s going on in your
organization?” was among the lowest ten positive EVS item scores (59.3%). The other items in
this group were mid-range among the 71 EVS items. Table 8 provides a summary of the
supervisor organizational culture behaviors and their corresponding EVS items.
Table 8
Summary of Supervisor Organizational Culture Behaviors and Corresponding EVS Items
Supervisor Behaviors
EVS Item
Item # Item % +(-)
Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see in the teams 45
49
75.9 (5.5)
86.3 (5.9)
Supervisors practice participatory decision-making 63 63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors support the creation of team-generated goals in addition to
organizational goals
63 63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors provide the material support needed by their team 9
14
59.8 (24.2)
71.2 (14.2)
Supervisors communicate to and from management with team 56
58
59
64
73.9 (8.9)
68.0 (13.0)
73.7 (8.8)
59.3 (18.8)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 44

Summary of Assumed Issues and Assets for the EVS and Professional and Gap Analysis
Literature
The relationship of supervisor behaviors to EVS items under the KMO rubric was based
on both professional as well as gap analysis literature. Appendix C presents the relationship of
these four areas. The table in Appendix C is an expansion of the table in Appendix B, mentioned
at the end of the literature review in Chapter Two.
Validation Procedures for Performance Issues and Assets
The remaining sections of Chapter Three describe how the assumed causes were
validated in order to determine which required solutions and which turned out to be assets and
therefore required no solutions. Chapter Four presents the results of the validation assessment.
Similarly, those areas that were assumed assets were also validated in order to determine which
could be recommended or replicated for implementation in other federal agencies. Three types of
data were collected in this study, (a) focus group observations, (b) private interviews, and (c)
document analysis. As a first step in validating a supervisor behavior, a type of evidence was
considered validated if there were two or more specific sources of evidence to indicate that the
evidence from the type of data was not an outlier or lone case, e.g. at least two interview subjects
or focus groups mentioned the behavior. In the second step, supervisor behaviors were
considered validated, as either an issue or an asset, if at least two of the three types of data
collected were validated. If a behavior was addressed in only one of the types or by only one
source, then it was considered “suggested” but not validated. In those cases where the behavior
was not addressed at all by any data type or source, the assumed performance issues and assets
were considered not validated.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 45

Validation Process for Performance Assets and Issues: Knowledge
Of the four dimensions of knowledge described by Anderson et al. (2001), only two of
the dimensions, procedural and conceptual, were represented in the items on the EVS relating to
supervisor behaviors and teamwork.
Procedural knowledge assets and issues validation process. Validation of procedural
knowledge issues was assessed through focus group observations, individual confidential
interviews, and document analysis. In each instance, this researcher collected and examined the
evidence of how, how often, and to what end supervisors understand and apply organizational
policies and procedures in support of their teams.
Conceptual knowledge assets and issues validation. The supervisors’ reflective
comments in focus group observations and individual confidential interviews indicated the
degree of conceptual knowledge they possessed. Within the context of this study, conceptual
knowledge indicated the value supervisors placed on specific practices and behaviors they were
performing to support and strengthen their teams.
A summary of the knowledge validation approaches is included in Table 9.
Table 9
Summary of Assumed Knowledge Assets and Issues Validation
Assumed Knowledge
Assets and Issues
How Was It Validated?
(Assets/Issues)
Procedural
In the last six
months, my
supervisor has
talked with me
about my
performance.
Observations: Examples of how the supervisors are providing
performance feedback to their employees; How frequently? To what
end?
Interviews: Interview Protocol Questions: 3, 4, 7, & 9; Providing
performance feedback mentioned as a means to foster teamwork.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 46

Conceptual
Creativity and
innovation are
rewarded.
Observations: Comments made about how rewards or incentives for
employ creativity and innovation are not needed or valued.
Interviews: Interview Protocol Questions: 3, 4, 7, & 9; Supervisors
discuss creativity and innovation as optional components that do not
have real value.

Validation Process for Performance Assets: Motivation
Of the psychological factors underlying motivation (Clark, Howard, & Early, 2006) at
CDER, task value was assumed to underlie the assets and issues identified by three EVS items. A
summary of the motivation validation approaches is included in Table 10.
Values validation. The value component of supervisors’ motivation was validated
through focus group observations, individual confidential interviews, and document analysis.
Statements and reflections of supervisors’ experiences in motivating subordinates to persist in
the face of difficulty or time-consuming tasks indicated that the task had value to the supervisor.
Similarly, statements relating to the importance or necessity of allowing employees the
flexibility to take care of personal issues to ensure team success validated the value of supporting
work/life balance.
Table 10.
Summary of Assumed Motivation Assets and Issues Validation
Motivational Asset
or Issue
Type of
Indicator
Possible Underlying
Cause
How Was It Validated?
Employees are
willing to put in
extra effort to
finish the job.
Active Choice Supervisors are able to
convey the value of the
work to their employees
and believe that they can
complete the work (L,
T)
Observations: Discussion of
lengths to which people have
gone to complete tasks and the
role the supervisor had in
fostering the behavior.
Interviews: Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 5, & 6.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 47

My supervisor
supports my need
to balance work
and other life
issues.
Active Choice Supervisors realize that
an employee distracted
by personal concerns or
issues will not be as
effective. (L, T)
Observations: Discussion of
supervisor actions to support
employees’ work/life balance.
Interviews: Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 5, & 6.
In my work unit,
differences in
performance are
recognized in a
meaningful way.
Active choice

Supervisors do not
appreciate the value of
performance recognition
to enhancing teamwork
(L, T).
Observations: Discussions of
supervisor performance
recognition as pro forma or
extraneous or irrelevant to
team success and satisfaction.
Interviews: Interviews:
Interview Protocol Questions:
3, 4, 5, & 6; Statements of not
valuing the need to recognize
employees for their various
degrees of effort or skill.
* Related Literature (L) or Theories related to culture/context (T)

Validation Process for Performance Issues: Organizational Culture and Context
The organizational culture at CDER valued supervisor respect for subordinates as a major
asset, but vertical communication between senior managers and employees was an issue. To
validate the asset and issue, focus groups were observed and individual confidential interviews
conducted to validate the assumed causes of the asset and issue. Document analysis of the focus
group close-out sessions was also conducted to triangulate and validate the findings. A summary
of the organizational culture validation approaches is included in Table 11.
Table 11.
Summary of Assumed Organizational/Culture/Context Assets and Issues Validation.

Organizational Asset
or Issue
Possible Organizational Cause(s) How Was It Validated?
My supervisor treats
me with respect
• Supervisors were once
employees (T)
• Supervisors are trained well (L)
• Supervisors listen to their
employees (E)
• Leadership aware of
employee’s capabilities. (E)

• Observations: Comments
indicating supervisor respect
for subordinates
• Interviews: Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 8, & 9;
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 48

• Supervisors provide training
and advancement opportunities
to employees (E)
How satisfied are you
with the information
you receive from
management on
what’s going on in
your organization?
• Lack of established
communication systems (L)
• Lack of transparency from
administration (T)
• Lack of understanding of
relationship between job and
agency’s goals and priorities
(E)
• Managers do not communicate
the goals and priorities of the
organization (E)
• Observations: Comments from
supervisors on the lack of
information that flows through
them from the senior
management; comments that
indicate that they do not pass
on to employees all of the
information they receive from
senior managers.
• Interviews: Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 8, & 9;
* EVS (E) or Related Literature (L) or Theories related to culture/context (T)

Summary
Validation of the performance assets and issues was conducted through the use of both
qualitative and quantitative data in each of the knowledge, motivation and organizational
domains of the gap analysis framework. Each of the specific dimensions of the KMO domains
was also validated utilizing the same approach.
For the knowledge domain, the assets were related to effective performance feedback
between the supervisor and employees. Knowledge issues related to a lack of recognition or
support for creativity and innovation. In the area of motivation, the supervisor assets related to
high task value leading to effective active choice. However, issues existed around the perception
that supervisors do not appropriately differentiate between employees who are good performers
and those who are not. The level of respect supervisors gave to their employees was a major
organizational asset. The organizational culture issues were related to a lack of vertical
communication within CDER. These issues are summarized in Appendix D in Table D1 along
with the supporting literature sources from the literature review (Chapter Two).

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 49

Participating Stakeholders
The study’s subject population came from the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research
(CDER), a 4
th
Level Sub-agency of the United States Government in Silver Spring, Maryland. In
2014, 1739 CDER employees, representing approximately 52.5% of over 3300 CDER
employees, completed the EVS (United States Office of Personnel Management, 2014). CDER
selected six offices, out of 13, to be included in this study based on the high or low EVS scores
that were reported in the 2014 results. The stakeholders for this study were primarily the
“Supervisors” of the six selected CDER offices. These employees were tasked with formal
supervisory authority as opposed to the peer-leading “Team Leaders” or the “Manager” at the
next leadership level above the “Supervisor” (United States Office of Personnel Management,
2014). Of the total 1739 CDER employees who participated in the 2014 EVS, 363 respondents
were supervisors (n=145) or team leads (n=218). 80 supervisors and team leads from the six
offices participated in the study through focus groups and follow-up interviews. No data were
collected to determine if the study participants had also submitted responses to the 2014 EVS.
While the literature reviewed in Chapter Two clearly delineated formal supervisors’ and
informal team leads’ leadership roles in relationship to employee teams and satisfaction, some
offices utilized team leads for leadership more than others. Therefore, Team Leads who
participated in the supervisor focus groups, described below, were also included in the
stakeholder group.
Data Collection
Permission to conduct this study was obtained from the University of Southern
California’s Institutional Review Board (IRB). The on-line Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey
(EVS), on-site focus group observations; 30-minute individual, confidential follow-up
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 50

interviews; and a document review from the focus groups were used to validate and triangulate
knowledge, motivation, and organizational assumed causes and assets. Personally identifiable
data were not collected at any time. Each of the data collection methods is elaborated on below.
Focus Group Observations
Observations were made of facilitated focus groups from each of the stakeholder groups
of each of the offices selected by CDER. Members of CDER’s organizational development
office and a consulting firm contracted by CDER facilitated the sessions. USC professors and
doctoral students (the Team) only observed the focus groups. An observation protocol, described
above, was developed by the Team to guide data collection. The focus group observations varied
from approximately 90 to 150 minutes for supervisors and employees, respectively. The focus
group observations were conducted with the six CDER offices over the course of three months,
with one day of focus groups dedicated to each office. Information on participant completion of
the 2014 EVS was not collected, so this researcher could not ascertain how many or if any
participants had actually done the survey themselves.
Focus group sessions were segregated by role: employees in the morning and supervisors
in the afternoon. Attendance rates were inconsistent among the offices for both stakeholder
groups. Overall, a total of 235 people participated in the focus group process with 155 people at
the employee sessions and 80 people at the supervisor sessions. In some offices, the team leads
attended the employee session. In other offices, the team leads attended the supervisor session.
Those team leaders who participated in the supervisor sessions are included with the supervisors
for the purpose of the findings analysis. Other team leads who were at the employee sessions
were not included.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 51

Interviews
At the end of each focus group, participants were invited to volunteer for a private,
follow-up phone interview with one of the research team (“Team”) graduate students. The Team
developed nine questions to elicit responses from the participants relating to the two larger
project domains of teamwork and supervision as determinants of employee satisfaction. The
interview protocol is provided in Appendix E. A total of 23 participants filled out a contact card,
and 11 interviews were completed, ranging in length from 15 to 45 minutes. Only one of the 11
interviews was conducted with a supervisor. Two of the interviews were with team leads that had
attended supervisor sessions. The other eight interviews were with employees. In many cases, the
interviewees consented to having the interviews recorded.
Document Analysis
Document analysis consisted of analyzing the close out notes aggregated from employee
and supervisor focus groups from each of the six CDER offices that participated. During the
focus group sessions, staff from the CDER Division of Learning and Organizational
Development (DLOD), along with Team members, presented and described the top ten and
bottom ten EVS items for that particular office. During each focus group session, participants
were asked to discuss two questions, (a) “What about these [EVS] items are important and
why?” and (b) “What do you think causes or contributes to these results?” The answers they
provided were shared out at the end of the session. DLOD staff created a series of slides to
present back to the entire office at the end of the day. The information presented from the slides
was used to triangulate with the data acquired from the EVS and from the individual follow-up
interviews.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 52

Instruments
The Research Team collaborated to develop the instruments used for the focus group
observations and interviews. Utilizing a collaborative approach ensured data collection
consistency across all Team members. While specific formatting of the notes varied, each
member of the Team gathered general demographic information about the focus group
participants, which EVS items they highlighted and why, and any additional observations by the
Team members.
As with the focus group observations, the interview instrument was created
collaboratively to ensure that data collection was consistent. The interviews consisted of nine
questions and were semi-structured. The interview questions covered both of the project topics,
supervision and teamwork, and tied them back to the knowledge, motivation, and organizational
domains in each study of the project.
Trustworthiness of Data
Trustworthiness of the study data was ensured through multiple processes. First, initial
data from the EVS was cross-verified with data collected from the observations and with
additional data from the interviews. Second, the EVS instrument was an established and reliable
survey that had been used repeatedly and consistently over time. Third, the anonymity and
confidentiality of the participants was maintained in the survey and interview data collection,
respectively. Finally, member checks were conducted on the survey and focus group data.
Data Analysis
Data analysis was conducted on the researchers’ and facilitators’ notes from the focus
group observations as well as the researchers’ notes from the individual interviews. The focus
group close-out notes constituted a third source of notes for analysis. The Team collaborated to
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 53

develop a coding scheme that was used to code the notes. The coding scheme was based on the
knowledge, motivation, and organizational categories and their respective sub-categories as
defined in the gap analysis literature (Clark & Estes, 2008; Rueda, 2011). However, the Team
also maintained an awareness of data not fitting the coding and used an emerging theme method
based on Grounded Theory (Corbin & Strauss, 2008) to address additional, unexpected themes.
Both intended and unexpected themes were documented, compared for consistent interpretation,
and analyzed for categorization into the gap analysis framework, i.e. knowledge, motivation, and
organizational issues. Additionally, notes were coded for information relevant to teamwork
based on the professional literature in Chapter Two (Durham et al., 1997; Griffin et al., 2001; D.
I. Jung & Sosik, 2002; Manz & Sims, 1987; Rousseau et al., 2013; Salas et al., 2014; Scott &
Baran, 2010; Taggar & Seijts, 2003). The findings produced by the methodology described in
this chapter are presented in the next chapter, Chapter Four.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 54

CHAPTER FOUR
RESULTS AND FINDINGS
The U.S. Federal Government utilizes the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (EVS) to
measure employee satisfaction within its various agencies and departments. The Center for Drug
Evaluation and Research (CDER), a sub-unit under the Food and Drug Administration (FDA),
scored above the median for federal agencies. The EVS scores relating to teamwork were among
the very highly rated areas as presented in Chapter Three. The purpose of this study was to
examine what role supervisors believe they have in teamwork facilitation or hindrance as
understood through the gap analysis factors of knowledge, motivation, and organizational
culture.
In Chapter Two, the relationship between teamwork and employee satisfaction was
described. In Chapter Three, this researcher presented the assumed knowledge, motivational and
organizational causes of promising practices and performance gaps relating to supervisor impacts
on effective teamwork. This study sought to address the following questions:
1. From the perspective of supervisors, what knowledge, motivation, and organizational
factors influence teamwork and diminish or contribute to employee satisfaction within
CDER?
2. What are the recommended promising practices or solutions that supervisors within other
units of the federal agency could adopt to improve teamwork and employee satisfaction?
3. How could these recommendations be evaluated for effectiveness?
In this chapter, this researcher analyzed the findings from the data collected to address the first of
the three questions. The remaining two questions of the study are addressed in Chapter Five.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 55

To further explore the knowledge, motivation, and organizational factors, this researcher
divided the first research question into three sub-questions:
1. What do supervisors know and do to influence teamwork?
2. How do supervisors sustain their own and their team’s persistence and mental effort in
problem-solving?
3. How does what the supervisors do to create and implement the culture of the organization
create barriers or facilitators to teamwork among their employees?
Table 12 lists the specific knowledge, motivation, and organizational behaviors that the
literature in Chapter Two cited as being indicative of supervisors’ having a positive impact on
teamwork. The data validating or not validating these behaviors are discussed below by their
respective KMO categories.
Table 12
Summary of Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork from a Knowledge, Motivation, and
Organizational Culture (KMO) Framework

KMO by
Sub-Areas
Supervisor Behaviors
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization
Supervisors oversee training of new team members

Procedural

Supervisors know how to apply the organization’s policy and procedures to
subordinate teams
Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback

Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure information to
team members

Supervisors understand how to promote job autonomy (i.e. skill flexibility, team
member responsibility, and work variety) in team members
Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than demotivate

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 56

Conceptual

Supervisors understand the value of participatory decision-making for team-level
goal-setting
Supervisors understand principles and value of transformational leadership

Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic and motivate team members
Supervisors set and communicate clear expectations
Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’ work
Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor performance

Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s collective efficacy
Supervisors empower team members through participatory decision-making

Supervisors provide feedback about team members’ roles and tasks to increase
team member autonomy

Mental Effort

Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement, self-observation, and self-evaluation in
team members
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather than solve problems for their teams
Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-team communication

Organizational culture
Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see in the teams
Supervisors practice participatory decision-making

Supervisors support the creation of team-generated goals in addition to
organizational goals
Supervisors provide the material support needed by their team
Supervisors communicate to and from management with team

Participating Stakeholders
The participating stakeholders in this study were supervisors and team leaders from six
offices within the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), a sub-unit of the U.S. Food
and Drug Administration (FDA). A breakdown of the demographics of the participating
stakeholders was covered in Chapter Three.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 57

Validation Scheme
For each of the supervisor behaviors listed in Table 12, above, the behavior was
considered validated if two or more types of data, i.e. focus group observations, interviews, or
document analysis, indicated the presence of the supervisor behavior from two distinct sources
within the type. For example, there needed to be at least two comments from two different
interviews as well as two focus group comments from two different sessions to validate a
behavior. Given the small sample from each category, it was possible that the comments in an
interview came from the same person who commented in a focus group. Therefore, this
researcher wanted to ensure a second source of data corroborated the first. Four behaviors met
the validation standard, three promising practices or assets and one performance gap or issue.
Those behaviors that had a single instance in two or more types or had two or more
sources in a single type were labeled as “suggested.” As some “suggested” behaviors had
oppositional evidence, i.e. one asset comment and one issue comment, “suggested” behaviors
were not labeled as assets or issues. Across the KMO areas, 16 of the behaviors were
“suggested.”
Those behaviors that did not meet the validated or suggested thresholds were labeled as
“not validated.” Four of the behaviors were “not validated” due to a lack of evidence. A
summary of the sources supporting the designation of validated, suggested, or not validated
themes is in Table F1 in Appendix F.
EVS items were matched to relevant behaviors but were not considered a corroborating
data type for two reasons. First, the EVS questions were constructed from the perspective of an
employee, not a supervisor, so it was not possible to determine if the participant was considering
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 58

their subordinates when they responded. Second, it was not possible to parse out supervisor and
team lead responses to individual EVS items from other organizational roles.
Knowledge Results
Factual Knowledge
This study sought to validate two factual knowledge behaviors:
• “Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization.”
• “Supervisors oversee training of new team members.”
Validated Asset: “Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization.” One of
the stronger, yet least explicit, behaviors in both focus groups and interviews was a commitment
to the mission. As an example of factual knowledge, discussion of the importance of and
commitment to the mission corresponded with being one of the highest scoring items on the
EVS, as well. One of the team leads simply stated, “It’s very clear how you are impacting public
health.” A supervisor elaborated further:
Public service itself is a very big responsibility and is satisfying. To see that many
dedicated people in different disciplines and how when we meet as a team with so many
different disciplines trying to dissect the application to really put out all the toxicities, all
the safety, all the risks, and then just make a decision to go or not to go, it’s really a
fantastic teamwork and all in the name of public service and the American health for the
general public.
That said, it was not clear whether everyone was knowledgeable of, and referencing the
FDA or CDER mission specifics, or if they just had a general commitment to the public good as
they perceive their own and others’ roles.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 59

Procedural Knowledge
This study sought to validate five procedural knowledge behaviors:
• “Supervisors know how to apply the organization’s policy and procedures to subordinate
teams.”
• “Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback.”
• “Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure information to team
members.”
• “Supervisors understand how to promote job autonomy in team members.”
• “Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than demotivate.”
Of the five behaviors identified by the research literature on procedural knowledge,
supervisors talked most about how they promote job autonomy amongst their subordinate teams.
Job autonomy, a type of procedural knowledge, was indicated when employees have skill
flexibility, when team members are take responsibility, and employees have work variety.
Relating to skill flexibility and work variety, one supervisor explained:
I want them to do other things because to be honest, if you do the same thing over and
over it gets boring and I don’t want people to get bored and then they’re going to do look
some other job. I do want them to expand their horizon and let them do other things but I
said, you need to balance, you need to have a balance.
The same supervisor also noted that she requires her team members to take responsibility
even when working from home:
I have told my people that I need to know, if you’re, let’s say, whatever you’re doing that
you’re not available when you’re working from home, I need that stated on their
calendar. Everybody has access to everybody’s calendar electronically in Outlook. If I
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 60

need, before I call someone, call them, let’s say they’re working from home, before I call
them I need to make sure they’re not in a meeting or they’re not on a telecom and they’re
available so I just look at their calendar and go from there.
Part of the supervisor’s ability to create job autonomy was dependent on their knowledge
of the FDA’s and CDER’s various policies and procedures and their applicability to the
employee. Effective supervisors were able to both implement and educate their employees on the
policies and procedures including flex-time and the technological tools that were available to
assign tasks and monitor productivity. A supervisor noted, “If you want to follow people up what
they’re doing, believe it or not, we have pretty good ways.” The same supervisor went on to say
that the ability to inform employees had “improved quite a bit” from the time that she had started
with CDER.
Two procedural knowledge behaviors went unaddressed and therefore were not validated:
(a) knowing how to provide constructive feedback and (b) knowing how to set goals that
motivate employees. The possible explanations and implications of the unaddressed procedural
knowledge behaviors are addressed in the section on metacognitive knowledge below.
Conceptual Knowledge
This study sought to validate two conceptual knowledge behaviors:
• “Supervisors understand the value of participatory decision-making for team-level goal-
setting.”
• “Supervisors understand principles and value of transformational leadership.”
Though none of the supervisors mentioned them by name, a few noted the principles and
value of a transformational leadership approach, particularly coaching and mentoring and
charismatic role-modeling. One team lead noted:
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 61

It’s part of our job to make sure everybody is okay and they feel cared about. I think
when you do make that trip into the office that makes it a little, it makes it easier to do
that because you feel like you’re going to get something out of being there in person.
The team lead was referring to the fact that many of the employees participate in a telework
option that does not require them to come into the office daily. Coaching and mentoring can
become more difficult under such circumstances.
Another supervisor focused on a different aspect of transformational leadership,
charismatic role-modeling. The supervisor mentioned that she believes in a healthy work-life
balance. To that end, she mentioned the following:
I actually refused to have a Blackberry. So many times they wanted me to have a
Blackberry because as a manager you’re allowed to have a Blackberry, I refused to have
a Blackberry because that means they’re going to reach me at any time of the day and it’s
with me. … I don’t think it’s a good idea. I know the American society is very much into
working all the time. I don’t think we expect people to do that and to be honest, I think as
a Federal Government and the FDA, I think people can finish their job easily in nine
hours. … but to work and be more like 14 hours a day, that’s absurd and that’s not
healthy and I don’t think it’s productive.
Left out of the discussion by both subjects was the third prong of transformational leadership,
articulating an appealing or evocative vision. As mentioned in the preceding section on factual
knowledge, the focus was mostly on the mission without any real consideration for a future
vision.
One conceptual knowledge behavior went unaddressed and therefore was not validated:
understanding the value of participatory decision-making for team-level goal-setting. The
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 62

possible explanations and implications of the unaddressed conceptual knowledge behavior are
addressed in the section on Metacognitive Knowledge below.
Metacognitive Knowledge
Although the literature did not delineate supervisor behaviors relating to metacognitive
knowledge, the methodology of this study did require the participating supervisors to reflect on
their behaviors. However, the degree of metacognitive reflection was inconclusive due to the
general dearth of comments on the topic. One possible explanation was that behaviors are not
occurring, so there was nothing for the supervisors to report. However, it may have also been
that the supervisors did not realize or understand how their own actions impacted their teams.
The lack of data on one procedural behavior, “supervisors know how to set goals that motivate
rather than demotivate,” was a prime example. Were there no data because it was not being done
or were there no data because supervisors did not recognize the behavior’s contribution to
effective teamwork and therefore did not think to discuss it?
A summary of the validated, suggested and not validated assumed knowledge assets by
sub-areas is presented in Table 13.
Table 13
Summary of Validated, Suggested, and Not Validated Assumed Knowledge Behaviors by
Knowledge Sub-areas.

Supervisor Behaviors Source(s) of Evidence
Validated,
Suggested, or
Not Validated
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of the
organization
Focus Group Observation
Interviews
Document Analysis
Validated Asset
Supervisors oversee training of new team
members
Interview
Document Analysis
Suggested

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 63

Procedural
Supervisors know how to apply the
organization’s policy and procedures to
subordinate teams
Interviews Suggested
Supervisors know how to provide constructive
feedback
Document Analysis Suggested
Supervisors know how to provide appropriate
policy and procedure information to team
members
Interview Suggested
Supervisors understand how to promote job
autonomy in team members
Focus Group Observation
Interview
Document Analysis
Suggested
Supervisors know how to set goals that
motivate rather than demotivate
Not validated
Conceptual
Supervisors understand the value of
participatory decision-making for team-level
goal-setting
Not validated
Supervisors understand principles and value
of transformational leadership
Interviews Suggested

Motivation Results
Active Choice
This study sought to validate four active choice behaviors:
• “Supervisors set goals that are realistic and motivate team members.”
• “Supervisors set and communicate clear expectations.”
• “Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’ work.”
• “Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor performance.”
Behaviors influencing the active choice of team members—their willingness to choose to
engage in the work—were one of the few areas where data indicated both promising practices
and a performance gap.
Validated Asset: “Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’
work.” Supervisors frequently mentioned that they took steps to provide recognition and
feedback for their employees’ work. The recognition and feedback were seen as useful in
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 64

supporting employee motivation. One supervisor noted, “I think we need to do more of that. I
think we need to recognize people for what they do.” However, the same supervisor also
cautioned that, “unless somebody really deserve [sic] something and did a really good job, we
should not be just giving these awards, not in a meaningful fashion, but we do need to recognize
people.”
The specific forms of recognition and feedback varied from one-time awards to
promotion opportunities. A team lead gave such an example and then described the downside to
not providing such opportunities:
In our division we are also trying to reorganize so that we have additional supervisory
spots for team leaders and above because we recognize that people, if you can’t move up
some times you move out. We feel we might lose really talented people because there
isn’t a promotion opportunity. We are trying to fix that by creating four additional team
leader positions so we can have additional upward mobility. … Everyone who’s been a
team leader or above has been promoted from within the division.
Thus, supervisors realized that their teams functioned better when they were motivated by
incentives.
Less frequently, and therefore only a suggested behavior, supervisors described what they
did to set realistic goals and motivate their teams, which was closely related to an additional
behavior about their setting and communicating their expectations to their teams. As mentioned
previously, in relation to role-modeling, a supervisor explained:
To work and be more like 14 hours a day, that’s absurd and that’s not healthy and I don’t
think it’s productive. … I can tell you, there are some divisions that are really, really
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 65

overworked and there is a lot of work and they do need the extra time but to be doing this
all the time I’m not in favor of that and I don’t think it’s necessary.
However, having the expectation without communicating it was not enough. The supervisor
described how she conveyed her expectation to the employee:
In fact, I have this particular person. I have called him in to my office. He’s just a
workaholic and I called him to my office and I said listen. I said, first of all, I know
you’re not trying to impress me before your evaluation. I don’t get impressed with this.
You need to have a life with your family. You have a family, you have children, you have
your wife. I know this because my people, we do talk about their social life and family
life. I said, this is not acceptable to me.
In a focus group, one supervisor set clear expectations of teamwork with his employees
right up front, “I tell new hires and in interviews, ‘you will be working in a team and you must
ask questions and be willing to learn.’” In the same group, another supervisor described the
routines she established with her subordinates:
[Performance evaluations are] once a year but we meet twice a year and I meet with them
way more than twice a year. I have an open door policy, they come whenever they want
to talk about something as long as I know about it and we’re not going to talk about two
hours.
Whether being proactive by briefing employees up front or calling them in when potential issues
arise or simply keeping an open-door policy, supervisors kept the communication lines open.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 66

Validated Issue: “Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor
performance.” Across many of the offices, supervisors admitted that they did not take punitive
or corrective action when employees did not perform well. As a team lead who did not have the
power to take action, one team lead noted:
I think the poor performers can be an issue ... Most often times if you're not their
supervisor or if you're not in that person's skin I can completely understand you're only
seeing one component of your interpretation of what that might look like and the real
story is probably much more complicated. … I know Performance Improvement Plans
were put in place. It's necessary but I'm not privy to that. Again, all I see is the constant
behavior itself and the expectation of behavior change and, quite frankly, lack of
consequences for not changing behavior. That's the most frustrating is kind of going
through the same thing over and over and over and not seeing any behavior change.
Getting a sense that people feel like they don't need to change because there's no
consequence.
However, even for the supervisor who did have the authority to take action, larger structures and
policies were seen as hampering efforts to do so. In a focus group one supervisor explained:
HR makes it hard to deal with poor performers. Even when you are trying to do
something, you can’t tell the rest of the staff what you doing because of confidentiality.
Hope poor performers get another job or accept a detail elsewhere.
Thus, many supervisors appeared to feel unable to properly address poor performance issues due
to larger organizational concerns. Organizational assets and issues are addressed in a subsequent
section.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 67

Persistence
This study sought to validate three persistence behaviors:
• “Supervisors believe in the team’s collective efficacy.”
• “Supervisors empower team members through participatory decision-making.”
• “Supervisors provide feedback about team members’ roles and tasks to increase team
member autonomy.”
The behaviors contributing to the supervisors’ persistence—their perseverance with a
choice in the face of adversity or distractions—were suggested but not validated. Supervisors had
confidence in the collective efficacy of their employee teams. They believed in the skills of their
people and trusted them to get the job done. A supervisor gave her thoughts in an interview, “I
personally have very reliable, responsible, dedicated people that I never had any problem in
terms of efficiency and productivity of the reviewers.” She followed up with her overall
philosophy, which centered on the need to trust her employees. The degree of trust that this
supervisor demonstrated was a prerequisite to another behavior that can influence persistence,
participatory decision-making.
Supervisors empowered their employees through participatory decision-making on a
limited scale. While higher-level management determined the project work assigned to a team or
office, one team lead described how individual assignments on the projects were made, “I think
every project is now no one is selected or no one is selected without being asked. There is more
opportunity more than there used to be to get involved in something.” Giving the opportunity to
choose to participate in a new project empowered the employee by giving him/her some control
over his/her workload and workflow.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 68

Another area of participatory decision-making occurred in the hiring process. The same
team lead described how the staff was included in the hiring process:
We do rely heavily on the thoughts of the staff and we rely on them to conduct half of the
interview. Half of it’s with team leaders, half with staff and staff take the candidates out
we want them to get to know the person. So I think that really helps with our hiring too
we have at least seven different people interacting with his person and can get their
opinion so then you feel more confident hiring.
Through the participation of the potential hire’s future team members it was more likely that a
candidate would be a better fit with the existing team, thereby leading to a shorter and smoother
initial adjustment period.
One persistence behavior was not validated, “Supervisors provide feedback about team
members’ roles and tasks to increase team member autonomy.” The lack of data on this behavior
was seemingly incongruous with the procedural knowledge finding that the supervisors foster job
autonomy. However, this difference was most likely in the degree of feedback and
communication supervisors had with their teams about explaining their decisions related to the
work they did to foster autonomy.
Mental Effort
This study sought to validate three mental effort behaviors:
• “Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement, self-observation, and self-evaluation in team
members.”
• “Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather than solve problems for their teams.”
• “Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-team communication.”
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 69

As with the persistence behaviors, the mental effort behaviors, which described the
supervisors’ investment of time and energy to develop new information and approaches as
needed to resolve unanticipated obstacles to a goal, were either only suggested or not validated.
It was very clear that supervisors encouraged and facilitated intra-team communication. The
support for intra-team communication also aligned with the supervisors’ tendencies to create
strong communication pathways between themselves and their teams. In a focus group, one of
the supervisors summed it up, “You must communicate and work together to get the job done.”
In individual interviews, two team leads described the specific approaches that were
taken in their respective teams. The first team lead said, “For our team we've get (sic) every other
team check in. We do have monthly division meetings. We do try to do some cross team
meetings, cross division meetings where will have one rep go from each group.”
The other team lead described a similar structure:
We have a weekly meeting for an hour and which we called a “CSO meeting” CSO is
just a title that everybody has that’s for a safety officer. Everybody sits around a big table
in the conference room and folks from home call in and everybody brings their
challenges questions from the week whether it something that they can’t answer on their
own or maybe it’s really interesting and they won’t share their result or what they found.
We all do that. It’s a really nice collaborative environment when you’re relying on all
your colleagues and peers to help you with something and you’re sitting there hoping that
you have some knowledge to share.
Finally, a supervisor described her approach to keep everyone up to speed with each
other and have a chance to learn from each other as well:
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 70

Everyone has like about five minutes because it’s only an hour meeting, five minutes of
selling to the group what was an interesting or unusual or unique application that they
may have had that month or a toxicity of a class of drugs or whatever so everybody
knows what’s going on with the other reviewer.
The strategies undertaken by the supervisors to enhance communication within their teams as
well as between themselves and their teams provided an impetus for the employees to apply
themselves to their tasks. Maintaining their efforts, once initiated, required persistence, the final
motivation component.
Only one of the mental effort behaviors was not remarked upon and therefore remained
not validated. None of the supervisors referenced trying to stimulate problem-solving in their
teams versus solving the team’s problems directly themselves. As with the not validated
knowledge behaviors, it was not possible to tell if the supervisors were simply not mentioning
what they actually did or if they did not do anything in this area. A summary of the validated,
suggested and not validated assumed motivation behaviors by sub-areas is presented in Table 14.
Table 14
Summary of Validated, Suggested, and Not Validated Assumed Motivation Behaviors by Sub-
area

Supervisor Behaviors Source of Evidence
Validated,
Suggested, or
Not Validated
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic and
motivate team members
Interview
Document Analysis
Suggested
Supervisors set and communicate clear
expectations
Focus Group Observation
Interview
Document Analysis
Suggested
Supervisors provide recognition and feedback
for team members’ work
Interviews
Document Analysis
Validated Asset

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 71

Supervisors take punitive or corrective action
for poor performance
Focus Group Observation
Interview
Document Analysis
Validated Gap

Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s collective
efficacy
Interview Suggested
Supervisors empower team members through
participatory decision-making
Interview Suggested
Supervisors provide feedback about team
members’ roles and tasks to increase team
member autonomy
Document Analysis Suggested
Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement,
self-observation, and self-evaluation in team
members
Interview Suggested
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather
than solve problems for their teams
Not validated
Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-
team communication
Focus Group Observation
Interviews
Document Analysis
Suggested

Organizational Results
This study sought to validate five organizational behaviors:
• “Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see in the teams.”
• “Supervisors practice participatory decision-making.”
• “Supervisors support the creation of team-generated goals in addition to organizational
goals.”
• “Supervisors provide the material support needed by their team.”
• “Supervisors communicate to and from management with team.”
Validated Asset: “Supervisor communicates to and from management with team.”
One organizational behavior was validated in the findings, supervisor communication
between team and management. This result was consistent with similarly themed validated assets
in the knowledge and motivation areas mentioned previously. Just as supervisors highlighted the
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 72

importance of fostering communication within their own teams, this finding demonstrated that
supervisors were also aware of the need to communicate vertically between the levels of the
organization. One team leader said, “So just having the team leaders, we really try to support
from upper leadership, our deputy and deputy director, to get out of the office and walk around,
go talk to people.” In effect, the team leads were managing up to their own supervisors to get
them to interact more with the line employees.
Another team lead also described a more formal process to facilitate communication,
“We do have monthly division meetings. We do try to do some cross team meetings, cross
division meetings where will have one rep go from each group.” The same team lead noted,
however, that the process was not without its challenges:
How they [managers] work together and then how each manager is involved with what
their staff is doing. Being integrated into that sort of as an advisor but also
communicating across other departments. I think communication can break down there
sometimes. That makes it difficult for the staff to then work effectively together.
Based on the dual nature of the latter team lead’s comments, it appeared that without the formal
communication processes and opportunities, communication between sub-units tended to be
inconsistent or ineffective.
Suggested and Not Validated Organizational Behaviors
Three other areas were suggested, but not validated, by the data, (a) supervisors’
modeling the behavior they wished to see in their teams, (b) practicing participatory decision-
making, and (c) providing material support to teams. When supervisors modeled the behavior
they wished to see in their employees, they were creating expectations as a part of the
organizational culture. While a conceptual understanding of the importance of charismatic role
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 73

modeling was a knowledge issue, it was also indicative of the organization’s expectations when
executed by a supervisor. In a focus group, one supervisor summed it up, “Teamwork means that
you set the tone for the division.” Another supervisor supported the thought by declaring, “Our
culture supports teamwork.”
Relating to participatory decision-making, the comment was specific to the hiring process
and mirrors a similar behavior to empower teams through participatory decision-making
discussed in the persistence section under motivation. Here, the same team leader, quoted earlier
in the motivation finding, stated:
It’s not just the division director or whoever meeting one on one than feeling a lot of
pressure to make or break the decision. It’s a whole group behind the decision if it
doesn’t work out than well yep a whole group of people thought that it was going to be a
good fit and they were wrong which I think that really helped and helpful to hire new
people, and some really great people and some really tough people.
Beyond the hiring process, however, there was no evidence to suggest that team members were
included in the decision-making processes as a normal part of the organizational culture.
The final organizational behavior with only one reference in the interviews and focus
groups was that supervisors provide the material support needed by their team. In this case, a
supervisor in one of the focus groups stated, “I believe we always have sufficient resources. How
do we prioritize or utilize resources matters. It’s about best use versus inefficiency.” The
supervisor’s comment, if representative of his peers, was problematic. It did not demonstrate that
the supervisor had a true understanding of the needs of his team, but rather definitely reflected an
organizational perspective regarding the requisition and utilization of resources. The supervisor’s
assumption that sufficient resources “always” exist suggested that either infinite resources were
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 74

available to meet a changing workload or that workloads were generated based only on the
availability of resources.
None of the supervisors mentioned supporting team-generated goals in addition to
organizational goals. Potential causes for the lack of data include an organizational culture that
does not value team-level goal setting, an organizational structure that does not empower
supervisors and their teams to have additional team-based goals, and a workflow that is very
linear and regimented that would make additional goals irrelevant. A summary of the validated,
suggested, and not validated assumed organizational behaviors is presented in Table 15.
Table 15
Summary of Validated, Suggested, and Not Validated Assumed Organizational Behaviors
Supervisor Behaviors Source of Evidence
Validated,
Suggested, or
Not Validated
Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see
in the teams
Focus Group Observation
Interviews
Document Analysis
Suggested
Supervisors practice participatory decision-
making
Interview Suggested
Supervisors support the creation of team-
generated goals in addition to organizational
goals
Not Validated
Supervisors provide the material support needed
by their team
Focus Group Observation
Document Analysis
Suggested
Supervisors communicate to and from
management with team
Focus Group Observation
Interviews
Document Analysis
Validated Asset

Synthesis of Findings
The supervisor comments relating to teamwork were a relatively small component of the
total amount of data gathered in the study. Only three interviews out of a total of 11 interviews
were with supervisory personnel, one formal supervisor and two team leads. Of the six
supervisor focus groups, only one provided multiple points relating to teamwork. Two other
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 75

focus groups yielded one comment each. The close-out documents were similarly sparse and did
not yield many comments from the supervisors.
Merriam (2009) noted that the relevance of case studies lies in the perception of the
reader, rather than the power of the data. When the reader is able to identify with the problem
being addressed, he/she will find his/her own meaning. In this case, perhaps the reader will relate
to how the relative lack of data suggested that supervisors’ influence on their teams was not high
in their own consciousness.
Summary
The findings from this study provided some insight into what knowledge, motivation, and
organizational factors influenced teamwork and diminished or contributed to employee
satisfaction within CDER. However, many of the behaviors suggested by the relevant literature
were either minimally addressed or not addressed at all in the interviews and focus group
observations. The data collected in this study validated only four of the 24 supervisor behaviors
that contributed to fostering teamwork, as taken from the relevant literature. Three of the
validated behaviors were assets for CDER. One of the behaviors was a validated performance
gap, which needs to be solved. It is unknown whether the silence on the remaining behaviors was
due to an absence of the behaviors at CDER or if the supervisors were not aware that the
behaviors were relevant factors to effective teamwork. Suggestions for a way forward to address
these questions are presented in the following chapter.
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 76

CHAPTER FIVE
SOLUTIONS, IMPLEMENTATION, AND EVALUATION
The purpose of this study was to examine the barriers to and facilitators of supervisor
support for effective teamwork in a federal agency. This study examined the following questions:
1. From the perspective of supervisors, what knowledge, motivation, and organizational
factors influenced teamwork and diminished or contributed to employee satisfaction
within the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER)?
2. What are the recommended promising practices or solutions that supervisors within other
units of the federal agency could adopt to improve teamwork and employee satisfaction?
3. How could these recommendations be evaluated for effectiveness?
The findings presented in Chapter Four focused on question one to explore the causes of both
promising practices and performance gaps in the areas of knowledge and skill, motivation, and
organizational issues relating to supervisor influences on teamwork. Questions two and three are
addressed in this chapter through recommendations for practice, an implementation plan for the
recommendations, and a plan to evaluate implemented recommendations. The chapter closes
with an assessment of this study’s limitations and delimitations and then delineates areas for
further inquiry into the topic.
As described in Chapter Three, focus group observations, private phone interviews, and
document analysis were triangulated as sources of evidence for an issue and asset analysis of
supervisors’ influences on effective teamwork as a contributor to employee satisfaction. The
subsequent findings, presented in Chapter Four and summarized again in Table 16 below,
revealed that only four of the 24 indicative supervisor behaviors were validated as either a
performance gap or promising practice among CDER supervisors. Four behaviors were not
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 77

validated by any evidence. The remaining 16 behaviors were only “suggested” as the supporting
evidence was limited in scope or quantity and did not meet the criteria for validation as
operationalized for this study.
Table 16
Summary of Validation Status of Supervisor Behaviors
Supervisor Behaviors by Areas and Sub-Areas
Validated,
Suggested or Not
Validated
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization Validated Asset
Supervisors oversee training of new team members Suggested

Procedural
Supervisors know how to apply the organization’s policy and procedures
to subordinate teams
Suggested
Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback Suggested
Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure
information to team members
Suggested
Supervisors understand how to promote job autonomy in team members Suggested
Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than demotivate Not Validated

Conceptual
Supervisors understand the value of participatory decision-making for
team-level goal-setting
Not Validated
Supervisors understand principles and value of transformational
leadership
Suggested

Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic and motivate team members Suggested
Supervisors set and communicate clear expectations Suggested
Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’ work Validated Asset
Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor performance Validated Issue

Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s collective efficacy Suggested
Supervisors empower team members through participatory decision-
making
Suggested
Supervisors provide feedback about team members’ roles and tasks to
increase team member autonomy
Suggested
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 78

Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement, self-observation, and self-
evaluation in team members
Suggested
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather than solve problems for
their teams
Not Validated
Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-team communication Suggested

Organizational culture
Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see in the teams Suggested
Supervisors practice participatory decision-making Suggested
Supervisors support the creation of team-generated goals in addition to
organizational goals
Not Validated
Supervisors provide the material support needed by their team Suggested
Supervisors communicate to and from management with team Validated Asset

The validated behaviors indicated that supervisors knew the mission of the organization,
provided recognition and feedback for their team members’ work, and maintained a strong
communication pipeline between their teams and management within CDER. However, just as
clear was a performance issue when taking necessary punitive or corrective action due to poor
subordinate employee performance. Each of these areas is addressed, in turn, in the following
section, with recommendations to strengthen or propagate positive assets or to institute changes
to address performance issues.
As presented in Chapter Three, Clark and Estes (2008) and Rueda (2011) stated that the
assumed causes of assets and issues in an organization must be validated before appropriate
measures can be identified or implemented to either strengthen or solve the assets or issues,
respectively. Taken together, behaviors that were not validated or only suggested in the study are
addressed together as areas that need further data generation and collection under the
“Recommendations for Further Inquiry” section at the end of this Chapter. Potential causes of
the data gap are presented in the Limitations section of this chapter.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 79

Recommendations for Practice
The following recommendations for practice focus on the behaviors validated as assets
and issues. Drawing upon related theories of learning from social science and professional
literature, strategies to institutionalize or replicate promising behaviors or address and solve
performance issues are presented. The wider applicability of each recommendation beyond
CDER is discussed with each behavior, in turn.
Validated Assets and Issues
The data collected in this study validated only four of the 24 supervisor behaviors that
contribute to fostering effective teamwork, as taken from the relevant literature. Three of the
validated behaviors were assets for CDER. One of the behaviors was a validated performance
issue, which needs to be solved. These behaviors are summarized in Table 17.
Table 17
Summary of Validated Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Effective Teamwork from a Knowledge,
Motivation, and Organizational Culture (KMO) Framework

Validated Supervisor Behaviors, by KMO sub-areas (Performance Issue in Italics)
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization

Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’ work
Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor performance

Organizational Culture
Supervisors communicate to and from management with team

Factual knowledge asset: “Supervisors know the goal/mission of the organization.”
Perhaps the strongest behavior that was evident in this study was that CDER supervisors knew
and deeply believed in their organizational mission to protect the public. As many of the
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 80

supervisors had extensive backgrounds in the medical and medical-related science fields, this
finding was not surprising. Clark and Estes (2008) noted that factual knowledge, the knowledge
sub-area to which the behavior belongs, is readily transferrable between similar contexts. Other
studies (Chun & Rainey, 2005; C. S. Jung, 2014) have shown that the less staff members
understand and relate to the organizational goals and mission, the less likely they are to be
satisfied. Given that a large percentage of the staff positions at CDER require medical and
pharmaceutical-related backgrounds and experience, their previous education and experience
were easily transferrable, making mission-orientation almost a given. That said, the CDER
leadership might still want to provide simple reminders to its staff to continue to promote and
reinforce the specific mission and context of the organization. Circulation and promotion of the
mission statement through signage or occasional correspondence would help to reinforce the
mission in the daily routines of the staff. For supervisors in other organizations, especially those
that have a health and human services-related mission, it might be helpful to provide occasional
reminders of the impacts of the mission and work. The reminders can be given often and through
various venues including posters and signage in the common workspaces, articles in staff
newsletters about the mission and its impacts, and by regularly including mission references or
discussion in team meetings. Such reminders of the factual realities of the job might then
translate into an increase in motivation (Eccles, 2006), discussed next.
Motivation. The validated motivation behaviors were related to the recognition of and
ramifications for employee performance, both positive and negative. Supervisors noted that they
engaged in providing recognition for exemplary performance but were often reluctant to hold
poor performers accountable. From a social science perspective, both behaviors were categorized
under the “Active Choice” motivation sub-area and can be explained by Expectancy Value
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 81

Motivational Theory (Eccles, 2006), which asks two fundamental questions, (a) “Can I do the
task?” and (b) Do I want to do the task?” The answer to each of these questions determines
whether or not the supervisor will make the choice to engage in the behavior.
Active choice asset: “Supervisors provide recognition and feedback for team members’
work.” Although there were limited opportunities within the official organizational frameworks
to reward employees for exemplary performance, some supervisors still strived to find less
official, yet still rewarding ways to recognize their employees’ accomplishments. They felt that
doing so was necessary to the overall welfare of their subordinate teams. These supervisors
further expressed that they felt they could find ways to provide recognition without resorting to
monetary awards. However, other supervisors were frustrated because they did not believe that
their employees would appreciate any recognition without a monetary award accompanying it.
Studies (Abdullah & Wan, 2013; Kuvaas, 2011) have shown that non-monetary awards
are effective in promoting job satisfaction. Therefore, it would be useful to try to institutionalize
the behaviors that were already being undertaken by the supervisors or to solicit from them the
ideas they had that they feel had value but were unable to implement at the time. If supervisors
would identify the strategies they have already implemented and resulted in improved teamwork
and satisfaction, then it would give the CDER management the data and rationale to
institutionalize those strategies. Identifying the barriers to implementation and working to
remove them also reinforces the value that the supervisors have placed on rewarding exemplary
behavior and encourages them to continue and encourage other supervisors, who might have
been more reluctant previously or did not realize the value of non-monetary rewards, to start.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 82

Active choice issue: “Supervisors take punitive or corrective action for poor
performance.” On the other hand, when it came to holding employees accountable for their poor
job performance, supervisors were much less likely to choose to act. For the most part, they cited
the human resources (HR) policy and procedures as being too difficult to navigate and not worth
the effort. They were not confident that they could actually hold a poor performer accountable
and therefore did not even try to do so.
To address the reluctance of supervisors to engaging in holding poor performers
accountable, supervisors need to be given opportunities to realize the value and attainability of
holding the relevant employees accountable. The supervisors cited the federal HR structures as
the cause of their reluctance. However, such a rationale was still ambiguous. Additional
questions about the cause of the supervisors’ reluctance need to be asked to ascertain whether the
reluctance is due to (a) a knowledge issue, e.g. a lack of knowledge or understanding of the HR
policies and procedures and/or how to execute them; (b) a motivation issue, e.g. supervisors do
not believe that their own interventions will be effective in resolving the employee’s
performance issues; or (c) an organizational issue, e.g. a belief that the HR policies and processes
relating to poor performers are flawed on an broader organizational level. Each of these root
causes would require different types of interventions.
In general, research (Daley, 2008) has shown that supervisors need to have opportunities
to practice going through the process and know that their superiors at CDER and their colleagues
in the HR office support them. Meetings with senior leaders and HR staff members to explore
the causes of the reluctance are advised. Such meetings should also include data from HR,
without any identifiers, about the efficacy of the disciplinary process. Those supervisors who
have attempted to follow the HR process successfully and unsuccessfully need to identify what
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 83

worked and what did not, respectively, to provide additional data to HR staff members and
senior leaders that will inform additional strategies to address holding poor performers
accountable. A summary of the validated behaviors, an underlying learning principle related to
the behavior, and the type of enhancement recommended to institutionalize the relevant principle
are provided in Table 18.
Table 18
Summary of Recommendations for Practice for Validated Supervisor Motivation Behaviors
Validated Supervisor Motivation Behaviors
(Validated Issues in Italics)
Enhancement
Principle
Recommended Action
Active Choice
Supervisors provide recognition and
feedback for team members’ work
Increasing and
Maintaining
Expectancy
Value
Institutionalize supervisor
behaviors and create other
recognition strategies based on
supervisor feedback
Supervisors take punitive or corrective
action for poor performance
Increasing
Expectancy
Value
Provide opportunities to have
supervisors work with managers
and HR staff to realize value
and attainability in following
processes.

Organizational culture asset: “Supervisors communicate to and from management
with team.” Supervisors validated their role as an effective conduit for communication between
their teams and management. Both formal and informal communication strategies were
mentioned as approaches to keeping communication flowing vertically within CDER. The
formal strategy was to have monthly division and cross-team meetings. An effective informal
strategy was to have leaders, from supervisors to deputy directors, leaving their offices to
circulate through the hallways of their units, becoming more accessible and approachable while
getting a better sense of their unit’s atmosphere at any given moment. While the strategies were
very effective, they were not institutionalized across all CDER sub-units. As leadership sets the
tone for the organization culture, consistent behavior and participation on the part of supervisors
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 84

across all CDER offices is vital to creating a shift in the organizational culture (Clark & Estes,
2008). To promote the informal strategy, CDER managers should identify, discuss, and
encourage such behavior when conducting the formal monthly meetings. Highlighting and
reinforcing the behaviors of supervisors who demonstrate the successful informal strategy
normalize such behavior as part of the institutional culture and create an expectation that others
will conform.
Implementation Plan
The implementation plan takes the recommendations for practice given above and
proposes a methodology to normalize the practices within the organizational environment.
Kirkpatrick and Kirkpatrick (2006, p. 3) provided a template for an implementation plan in ten
steps:
1. Determining Needs
2. Setting Objectives
3. Determining Subject Content
4. Selecting Participants
5. Determining the Best Schedule
6. Selecting the Appropriate Facilities
7. Selecting Appropriate Instructors
8. Selecting and Preparing Audio-Visual Aids
9. Coordinating the Program
10. Evaluating the Program
The validated assets and issue and subsequent recommendations for practice constitute
step one in the process. Step two follows on the original employee satisfaction goals determined
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 85

by the CDER leadership, namely to raise the level of employee satisfaction to 100%. The
determination of the subject content for step three and a timetable for implementation is provided
below in Table 19.
Table 19.
Timeline and Implementation Plan for Recommendations for Practice for Performance Assets
and Issues

Behavior to be addressed
(Issue in italics)
Proposed action
Type of
Intervention
Suggested
Implementation
Timeframe.
Supervisors know the goal/
mission of the organization
Create reinforcing documents
and signage
Information 1-3 months
Supervisors provide
recognition and feedback
for team members’ work
Inventory and disseminate to
all supervisors existing
effective informal practices
Information
Systematizing
2-4 months
Supervisors take punitive or
corrective action for poor
performance
• Provide opportunities for
supervisors to meet with
human resources staff and
senior leaders to identify
and validate additional
specific causes of
reluctance to holding
poor performers
accountable.
• Devise appropriate
knowledge, motivation,
and organizational
solutions and strategies as
needed based on the
additional data collected.
Education 2-4 months
Supervisors communicate to
and from management with
team
Inventory and encourage
effective informal behaviors
among supervisors
Information
Systematizing
1-3 months

For step four, an appropriate selection of participants from CDER offices, i.e. only titled
supervisors and not team leads, would help to further differentiate between the roles, an issue
discussed more in “Recommendations for Further Inquiry” at the end of this chapter. The
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 86

supervisors should be drawn from all ten of the CDER offices not just those sampled for this
project.
The Division of Learning and Organizational Development (DLOD) within CDER’s
Office of Executive Programs (OEP) will determine the details of steps five through nine. An
evaluation of the implementation plan, step ten, is discussed in the next section on the Evaluation
Plan.
Evaluation Plan
Clark and Estes (2008) noted that closing the loop on program improvement through
evaluation is absolutely vital for successful change. For this study, the performance evaluation
tool created by Kirkpatrick and Kirkpatrick (2006) is suggested. The model has four stages:
1. Reaction
2. Learning
3. Behavior
4. Results
Reactions and Motivation
The first stage of the model is used to gauge the reaction of the participants to the
implementation action in terms of their motivation (Clark & Estes, 2008; Rueda, 2011).
Supervisors will be asked to complete a brief survey online, consisting of Likert scale and open-
ended questions, to solicit their assessment of the actions in the implementation plan. The survey
questions will address supervisor perspectives on the impact of the signage on their
understanding of the CDER mission statement as well as their ability to work with their
subordinate teams. The supervisors will also be asked if they contributed or utilized any of the
strategies gathered to address positive feedback for their subordinates as well as communication
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 87

strategies with their own managers and peers. Finally, a survey will assess the efficacy of the
human resource education program in making the supervisor feel better supported and able to
deal with poor performers.
Learning and Performance
The learning and performance stage of the process is to assess how the changes are
progressing and if the assets are being developed or expanded and if the issues are being
addressed. Kirkpatrick and Kirkpatrick (2006) noted that self-reporting is not as effective for
assessing motivational and organizational changes in this stage. Instead, direct observation is
preferred. Managers, DLOD staff, and HR staff may be used to gather observational data on the
supervisors with regard to handling the supervisors’ subordinate performance as well as the
vertical communication between management and the teams.
Transfer of Behavior
The third stage of the model checks to see if the supervisors are still utilizing the
introduced changes after the initial intervention has been completed (Kirkpatrick & Kirkpatrick,
2006). Members of DLOD will survey supervisors six months after the interventions were
introduced to assess whether or not supervisors have improved their ability to work with their
teams and are still utilizing the specific strategies.
Results and Impact
Finally, stage four measures “the bottom line” (Clark & Estes, 2008, p. 137). What
difference did this study and its companions within the larger project make on employee
satisfaction at CDER? The 2016 EVS would certainly be a major instrument to use as a post-
intervention survey. Additionally, a decrease in employee turnover would also provide a data
point for analysis. Clark and Estes (2008) suggested that a triangulation of impact source data is
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 88

ideal. Therefore, as a final point, a focus group in 2017 utilizing a smaller sampling of
supervisors could provide an opportunity to get more robust details and close the loop on the
initial cycle of assessment and change.
Limitations and Delimitations
Limitations
The study was constrained by several limitations related to the EVS as the initial
instrument for the study and issues related to the sampling process and sample size. The initial
EVS data came from an instrument that was not constructed by the researchers. The wording of
particular items in the instrument was ambiguous when attempting to code for knowledge,
motivation, or organizational (KMO) signifiers. Additionally, the survey instrument was not
geared to measure the impact of teamwork on employee satisfaction, the central concern of the
study. The EVS also asked the subject stakeholder group, CDER supervisors, to complete the
instrument from the perspective of being an employee, not as a supervisor. Given that the survey
data were self-reported by the supervisors, additional issues may have impacted the data,
including honesty of responses, attribution of cause, interpretation of degrees of certainty or
quality, and a potential for social desirability bias, given the publication of the data by the U.S.
government.
Limitations relating to sampling included issues around research team access to
participants, small sample size, and inconsistent definition and inclusion of participants for the
target stakeholder group. Additional limitations to this study included limited access of the
research team to the supervisors. The sample size for this study was extremely small as a result.
However, the size of the sample alone may not be as important if the findings and
recommendations resonate with the reader and parallels can be drawn to other scenarios or
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 89

organizations. As noted by Merriam (2009), it is up to the reader to decide if the description of
the data was sufficient to be applicable to another context.
Delimitations
Several delimitations will constrain the generalizability of this study. The study was built
on the gap analysis framework. In the organization studied, the overall education level of
employees was high compared to most government units due to the professional scientific and
medical requirements of the majority of the organization’s job series. Education level as a skew
to the data was also not investigated to determine if it would delimit the transferability of the
results and recommendations to another unit of the Federal Government.
Also, the stakeholder group chosen for this study was the supervisors, not the team
leaders. The literature on a leader’s interaction with and impact on teamwork differentiated
between the two statuses. However, in CDER, team leads and supervisors were not utilized
consistently between offices. This difference was not accounted for in this study. The
applicability of the study’s results to another federal agency would vary depending on how it
considers and utilizes the team leads compared to the supervisors.
Finally, it is important to note that this study, as well as the larger project, was conducted
on a limited number of offices within a single sub-level of a single federal agency. While all of
the agencies participate in the EVS, not all of them had the same degree of participation within
their units and sub-units.
Recommendations for Further Inquiry
Not Validated and Suggested Behaviors
The vast majority of the supervisor behaviors in this study were not validated or only
suggested by limited evidence. Given this overall lack of validation, additional data are required
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 90

before any reliable recommendations for practice can be suggested. The overlap of some of the
behaviors between the knowledge, motivation, and organizational categories also seemed to
suggest an interrelationship between the behaviors and their impact on teamwork. However, as
determining any such relationship was outside the scope of this study it would be useful for a
future study to examine if such an interrelationship exists or was merely shallow coincidence.
By examining the data that were collected as well as this study’s methodology,
suggestions follow to delineate areas that were unaddressed in this study and how data might be
collected in the future. The methodology presented in Chapter Three is used as the template for
further data collection including (a) a survey instrument, (b) focus group observations, (c)
follow-up interviews, and (d) document analysis.
Survey instrument. Although the limitations of the EVS in this study were discussed in
the Limitations section, it should also be noted that an additional survey would be necessary to
obtain quantifiable data on supervisor perspectives about their role in facilitating and promoting
effective teamwork as that was not the focus of the EVS. Effective survey questions would
attempt to elicit responses from supervisors that provoke or demonstrate a degree of reflection or
metacognition of their contributions to teamwork through their behaviors. The survey should be
administered to as many CDER supervisors as possible.
Focus group observations. The key to the focus group observations in a subsequent
study is to first clarify the role of team leads in the CDER organizational culture. Given the
differing authority levels between the team leads and the supervisors, as well as the supervisory
relationship of the supervisor over the team lead, it would be most appropriate to limit the focus
groups to those in formal supervisory positions. The focus groups would cover the new survey
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 91

instrument described above in the same way that the previous focus groups looked at the EVS
results.
Follow-up interviews. As with this study, it is recommended that follow-up interviews
be solicited on a volunteer basis and be conducted by a third party not directly employed by
CDER. Other researchers on this larger project noted that phone interviewees demonstrated a
willingness to share information with a more open attitude than was evident in the focus group
observations. The interview questions should also be more narrowly focused on teamwork
among subordinates rather than among peers, i.e. other supervisors.
Document analysis. As the document analysis used in this study was of limited utility
compared to the other data sources, this researcher recommends that a different approach to
document analysis be utilized. Supervisors should be invited to share, in writing, a summary or
outline of the informal processes they have devised or would devise to foster teamwork in their
respective units. These documents could either be crafted individually beforehand or generated
collectively as an activity during the focus group sessions.
The recommendations presented above are necessary to provide enough data to determine
where the supervisors’ promising practices and performance gaps exist in relation to effective
teamwork. The 20 supervisor behaviors that were only suggested or not validated are listed in
Tables 20 and 21, respectively.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 92

Table 20
Summary of Suggested Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork from a Knowledge,
Motivation, and Organizational Culture (KMO) Framework

Suggested Supervisor Behaviors, by KMO sub-areas
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors oversee training of new team members

Procedural
Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback
Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure information to team
members
Supervisors know how to provide constructive feedback
Supervisors know how to provide appropriate policy and procedure information to team
members
Conceptual
Supervisors understand principles and value of transformational leadership

Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic and motivate team members
Supervisors set and communicate clear expectations

Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s collective efficacy
Supervisors empower team members through participatory decision-making
Supervisors provide feedback about team members’ roles and tasks to increase team
member autonomy

Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-reinforcement, self-observation, and self-evaluation in team
members
Supervisors encourage and facilitate intra-team communication

Organizational Culture
Supervisors model the behavior they wish to see in the teams
Supervisors practice participatory decision-making
Supervisors provide the material support needed by their team

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 93

Table 21
Summary of Supervisor Behaviors Not Validated as Impacting Teamwork from a Knowledge,
Motivation, and Organizational Culture (KMO) Framework, including KMO sub-areas

Supervisor Behaviors Not Validated, by KMO sub-areas
Knowledge
Procedural
Supervisors know how to set goals that motivate rather than demotivate
Conceptual
Supervisors understand the value of participatory decision-making for team-level goal-
setting

Motivation
Mental Effort
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving rather than solve problems for their teams
Organizational Culture
Supervisors support the creation of team-generated goals in addition to organizational goals

Broader Questions on Supervisors and Employee Satisfaction
Through the course of this study, many questions occurred to this researcher that were
beyond the scope of the present study. A few of the questions came from an interest in how this
study intersected with other studies in the project such as, “How does the literature on
supervision and teamwork reinforce or contradict each other from the supervisors’ stakeholder
perspective?” Other questions related to the overall context of the agency that was the focus of
this project, including:
• given the high percentage of highly educated employees within CDER, what correlations,
if any, exist between education level and satisfaction?
• CDER’s mission is extremely critical to the overall public health of the United States.
Does the seriousness of that mission impact the satisfaction of its employees compared to
other federal units that do not have missions tied to such high stakes?
• if supervisors do not participate in the implementation plan laid out in this study, why
not?
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 94

Other areas of potential inquiry are methodological in nature. For example, this study did
not seek to identify or examine the team lead role. What are some of the greatest factors
contributing to their job satisfaction with regard to teamwork and supervision? Also, this project
relied on the EVS as a survey instrument. How would CDER’s employee satisfaction scores look
if another set of questions like those in the Gallup Study (Harter et al., 2012) were used instead?
Conclusion
This study explored the barriers to and facilitators of supervisor support for effective
teamwork in a sub-unit of the Food and Drug Administration, the Center for Drug Evaluation
and Research (CDER). The study utilized the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey to identify
CDER as a unit with higher than average employee satisfaction scores among other federal
agencies. Clark and Estes’ (2008) gap analysis model, which analyzes performance through the
domains of knowledge, motivation, and organizational culture, was used to try to validate 24
supervisor behaviors that relevant professional literature identified as impacting employee
teamwork. Focus group observations, private interviews, and document analysis were utilized as
sources of evidence and analyzed for their knowledge, motivation, and organizational culture
correlations to the identified behaviors. Only four of the 24 supervisor behaviors were validated,
mostly due to relatively few supervisors relating to teamwork from all sources. While the initial
intent of the study was to be able to provide recommendations for practice and an
implementation plan based on the assets and issues of the validated supervisor behaviors, the
lack of validation was so severe that the most prudent course of action would be to go back to the
supervisors to get additional data to try to achieve a higher degree of validation.
The inconclusive results of this study and the subsequent recommendation to gather more
data hinted at the possibility that fostering teamwork among their subordinates was not
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 95

prominent in the minds of CDER’s supervisors. Rather than being taken as a shortcoming of this
study or the larger project, this researcher saw this gap as further evidence of the points made in
the literature that suggested many supervisors in organizations tended to be transactional leaders
rather than transformational leaders (D. I. Jung & Sosik, 2002). As employees perceived their
supervisors as the most immediate representation of the organizations at which they work
(Griffin et al., 2001), the leadership style of the supervisor is key to fostering teamwork and
thereby job satisfaction.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 96

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SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 105

APPENDIX A
FACTORS CONTRIBUTING TO EMPLOYEE SATISFACTION
Table A1
Factors Contributing to Employee Satisfaction
Factor Selected Citations
Organizational Culture
Stress/emotional exhaustion (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013)
Development encouraged (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Harter et
al., 2012)
Promotional Opportunity/Opportunity for
Advancement
(Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Herzberg,
1959; Herzberg et al., 1957; Locke,
1976)
Mission/Purpose makes my job important (Harter et al., 2012; Mayo, 1933;
Uhrbrock, 1934)
Opportunity to do my best daily (Gilbreth, 1912; Harter et al., 2012;
Locke, 1976)
Commitment (Locke, 1976; Yuan, 1997)
Values (Locke, 1969)
Family friendly policies (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013)
Corporate Culture (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013)
Organization as a whole (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013)
Supervision
Supervision/Supervisor (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Gilbreth,
1912; Herzberg, 1959; Herzberg et al.,
1957; Hoppock & National
Occupational Conference, 1935; Locke,
1976)
Leadership/Management (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Mayo,
1933)
Received Feedback/Progress Report in last 6 mos. (Gilbreth, 1912; Harter et al., 2012;
Locke, 1976)
Skill Identity (Locke, 1976)
Work Itself
Work itself (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Herzberg,
1959; Herzberg et al., 1957; Locke,
1969)
Fatigue/physicality of the work (Gilbreth, 1912; Hoppock & National
Occupational Conference, 1935; Locke,
1976; Taylor & Tucker, 1911)
Workload (Gilbreth, 1912; Locke, 1976)
Meaningful work (Herzberg, 1959; Locke, 1976)
Mental Challenge (Locke, 1976)
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 106

Skill Variety/Job enlargement (Gilbreth, 1912; Hoppock & National
Occupational Conference, 1935; Locke,
1976)
Communication
Communication (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Herzberg
et al., 1957; Locke, 1969; Mayo, 1933;
Yuan, 1997)
Opinions count (Harter et al., 2012)
Recognition/praise for my good work (Harter et al., 2012; Hoppock &
National Occupational Conference,
1935; Locke, 1976)
Role conflict (Locke, 1976)
Expectations understood vs. Role ambiguity (Gilbreth, 1912; Harter et al., 2012;
Locke, 1969, 1976; Uhrbrock, 1934;
Yuan, 1997)
Work Environment
Working conditions (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Herzberg,
1959; Herzberg et al., 1957; Hoppock
& National Occupational Conference,
1935; Locke, 1969, 1976; Taylor &
Tucker, 1911; Uhrbrock, 1934)
Possess Proper Materials & Equipment (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Gilbreth,
1912; Harter et al., 2012; Locke, 1969,
1976)
Economic Benefits (Direct & Indirect)
Pay/wages/salary (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Gilbreth,
1912; Herzberg, 1959; Herzberg et al.,
1957; Locke, 1976; Taylor & Tucker,
1911; Uhrbrock, 1934; Yuan, 1997)
Benefits (Vacation, Retirement, medical, etc.) (Herzberg et al., 1957)
Job security (Herzberg et al., 1957)
Teamwork
Teamwork/cooperation (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Herzberg
et al., 1957; Mayo, 1933)
Collaboration (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013)
Associates committed to quality (Gilbreth, 1912; Harter et al., 2012;
Herzberg et al., 1957)
Co-worker relations (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Gilbreth,
1912; Herzberg et al., 1957; Locke,
1969, 1976; Mayo, 1933; Uhrbrock,
1934)
Autonomy
Autonomy/Empowerment (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Locke,
1976)
Creativity (Locke, 1976)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 107

Opportunities at work to learn and grow (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Gilbreth,
1912; Harter et al., 2012; Locke, 1976)
Self-esteem (Gilbreth, 1912; Locke, 1976)
Work Relationships
Social Relationships (Herzberg et al., 1957; Locke, 1976;
Yuan, 1997)
I have a best friend at work (Harter et al., 2012)
Cared about as a person by supervisor/co-worker (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Harter et
al., 2012; Herzberg et al., 1957)
Demographics/Age (Blonski & Jefmanski, 2013; Yuan,
1997)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 108

APPENDIX B
SUMMARY OF SUPERVISOR BEHAVIORS IMPACTING TEAMWORK FROM A
KNOWLEDGE, MOTIVATION, AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE FRAMEWORK
Table B1
Summary of Supervisor Behaviors Impacting Teamwork from a Knowledge, Motivation, and
Organizational Culture Framework

Supervisor Behaviors by Gap Analysis
Areas and Sub-Areas
Professional Literature Social Science
Literature Equivalents
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors know the goal/mission of
the organization
Salas, Shuffler, Thayer,
Bedwell, Lazzara, 2014;
Jung & Sosik, 2002;
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors oversee training of new
team members
Manz & Sims, 1987 (Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Procedural
Supervisors oversee training of new
team members
Manz & Sims, 1987 (Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors know how to apply the
organization’s policy and procedures
to subordinate teams
Jung & Sosik, 2002; (Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors know how to provide
constructive feedback
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau, Aube, &
Tremblay, 2013; Manz
& Sims, 1987
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors know how to provide
appropriate policy and procedure
information to team members
Salas et al., 2014; Jung
& Sosik, 2002;
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors understand how to
promote job autonomy (i.e. skill
flexibility, team member
responsibility, and work variety) in
team members
Salas et al., 2014;
Griffin, Patterson, &
West, 2001;
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors know how to set goals that
motivate rather than demotivate
Durham, Knight, &
Locke, 1997;
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 109

Conceptual
Supervisors understand the value of
participatory decision-making for
team-level goal-setting
Durham et al., 1997;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Supervisors understand principles and
value of transformational leadership
Baran & Scott, 2010;
Manz & Sims, 1987;
Jung & Sosik, 2002;
(Anderson et al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are realistic
and motivate team members
Salas et al., 2014;
Durham et al., 1997;
Rousseau et al, 2013;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors sets and communicates
clear expectations
Rousseau et al, 2013;
Jung & Sosik, 2002;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors provide recognition and
feedback for team members’ work
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau et al, 2013;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors takes punitive or
corrective action for poor
performance
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau et al, 2013;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Persistence
Supervisors believe in the team’s
collective efficacy
Jung & Sosik, 2002;
Taggar & Seijts, 2003
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors empower team members
through participatory decision-
making
Durham et al., 1997;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors provide feedback about
team members’ roles and tasks to
increase team member autonomy
Griffin et al., 2001;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-
reinforcement, self-observation, and
self-evaluation in team members
Jung & Sosik, 2002;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors stimulate problem-solving
rather than solve problems for their
teams
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau et al, 2013;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)
Supervisors encourage and facilitate
intra-team communication
Salas et al., 2014;
Durham et al., 1997;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991; Locke
& Latham, 1990, 2002)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 110

Organizational culture
Supervisors model the behavior they
wish to see in the teams
Jung & Sosik, 2002;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Neuman, Edwards, &
Raju, 1989)
Supervisors practice participatory
decision-making
Durham et al., 1997;
Rousseau et al, 2013;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Neuman et al., 1989)
Supervisors support the creation of
team-generated goals in addition to
organizational goals
Durham et al., 1997;
Manz & Sims, 1987
(Neuman et al., 1989)
Supervisors provide the material
support needed by their team
Manz & Sims, 1987 (Neuman et al., 1989)
Supervisor communicates to and from
management with team
Manz & Sims, 1987 (Neuman et al., 1989)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 111

APPENDIX C
SUMMARY OF ASSUMED CAUSES AND ASSETS FOR KNOWLEDGE, MOTIVATION,
AND ORGANIZATIONAL ISSUES
Table C1
Summary of Assumed Causes and Assets for Knowledge, Motivation, and Organizational Issues
Supervisor Behaviors in Gap
Analysis Areas and Sub-Areas
Professional
Literature
Social Science
Literature
Equivalents
EVS Item
Item
#
Item % +(-)
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors know the
goal/mission of the
organization
Salas, Shuffler,
Thayer, Bedwell,
Lazzara, 2014;
Jung & Sosik,
2002;
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors oversee training of
new team members
Manz & Sims,
1987
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
No EVS Correlate
Procedural
Supervisors know how to apply
the organization’s policy and
procedures to subordinate
teams
Jung & Sosik,
2002;
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
38 75.8 (7.9)
Supervisors know how to
provide constructive feedback
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau, Aube,
& Tremblay, 2013;
Manz & Sims,
1987
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
44
46
50
69.9 (13.1)
68.9 (18.7)
85.9 (6.9)
Supervisors know how to
provide appropriate policy
and procedure information to
team members
Salas et al., 2014;
Jung & Sosik,
2002;
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors understand how to
promote job autonomy (i.e.
skill flexibility, team member
responsibility, and work
variety) in team members
Salas et al., 2014;
Griffin, Patterson,
& West, 2001;
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
30
43
60.7 (16.8)
73.4 (11.8)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 112

Supervisors know how to set
goals that motivate rather than
demotivate
Durham, Knight,
& Locke, 1997;
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
No EVS Correlate
Conceptual
Supervisors understand the
value of participatory
decision-making for team-
level goal-setting
Durham et al.,
1997; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
30
63
60.7 (16.8)
63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors understand
principles and value of
transformational leadership
Baran & Scott,
2010; Manz &
Sims, 1987; Jung
& Sosik, 2002;
(Anderson et al.,
2001; Bloom,
1956; Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
32
34
50.4 (20.8)
67.9 (8.6)
Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are
realistic and motivate team
members
Salas et al., 2014;
Durham et al.,
1997; Rousseau et
al, 2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
7
42
98.1(0.7)
86.6 (4.8)
Supervisors sets and
communicates clear
expectations
Rousseau et al,
2013; Jung &
Sosik, 2002; Manz
& Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
6
19
56
83.0 (11.0)
70.5 (15.4)
73.9 (8.9)
Supervisors provide recognition
and feedback for team
members’ work
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau et al,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
15
22
24
25
31
65
72.5 (12.6)
50.0 (25.2)
42.0 (29.5)
49.1 (23.9)
60.5 (17.4)
57.9 (18.7)
Supervisors takes punitive or
corrective action for poor
performance
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau et al,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
23
24
40.6 (27.9)
42 (29.5)
Persistence
Supervisors believe in the
team’s collective efficacy
Jung & Sosik,
2002; Taggar &
Seijts, 2003
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors empower team
members through
participatory decision-making
Durham et al.,
1997; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
30
63
60.7 (16.8)
63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors provide feedback
about team members’ roles
and tasks to increase team
member autonomy
Griffin et al.,
2001; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
3
46
68.6 (15.2)
68.9 (12.3)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 113

Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-
reinforcement, self-
observation, and self-
evaluation in team members
Jung & Sosik,
2002; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors stimulate problem-
solving rather than solve
problems for their teams
Salas et al., 2014;
Rousseau et al,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
No EVS Correlate
Supervisors encourage and
facilitate intra-team
communication
Salas et al., 2014;
Durham et al.,
1997; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura, 1991;
Locke & Latham,
1990, 2002)
No EVS Correlate
Organizational culture
Supervisors model the behavior
they wish to see in the teams
Jung & Sosik,
2002; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
45
49
75.9 (5.5)
86.3 (5.9)
Supervisors practice
participatory decision-making
Durham et al.,
1997; Rousseau et
al, 2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
63 63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors support the creation
of team-generated goals in
addition to organizational
goals
Durham et al.,
1997; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
63 63.4 (15.5)
Supervisors provide the material
support needed by their team
Manz & Sims,
1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
9
14
59.8 (24.2)
71.2 (14.2)
Supervisor communicates to
and from management with
team
Manz & Sims,
1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
56
58
59
64
73.9 (8.9)
68.0 (13.0)
73.7 (8.8)
59.3 (18.8)

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 114

APPENDIX D
SUMMARY OF ASSUMED ISSUES AND ASSETS AND VALIDATING METHODS FOR KNOWLEDGE, MOTIVATION, AND
ORGANIZATIONAL ASSETS AND ISSUES.
Table D1
Summary of assumed issues and assets and validating methods for knowledge, motivation, and organizational assets issues

Supervisor
Behavior by Gap
Analysis Area
Assumed Causes and Assets
Sources
EVS
Item #
Validating Methods
Teamwork
Business
Sources
Gap Analysis
Literature
Equivalents
Focus Groups Interview Document Analysis
Knowledge
Procedural
Supervisors
know how to
provide
constructive
feedback
Salas et al.,
2014;
Rousseau,
Aube, &
Tremblay,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Anderson et
al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956;
Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
44
46
50
Examples of how the
supervisors are
providing
performance
feedback to their
employees; How
frequently? To what
end?
Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 7, &
9; Providing perfor-
mance feedback
mentioned as a means
to foster teamwork.

Conceptual
Supervisors
understand
principles and
value of
transformational
leadership
Baran & Scott,
2010; Manz &
Sims, 1987;
Jung & Sosik,
2002;
(Anderson et
al., 2001;
Bloom, 1956;
Wood &
Bandura, 1989)
32
34
Comments made
about how rewards
or incentives for
employ creativity and
innovation are not
needed or valued.
Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 7, &
9; Supervisors discuss
creativity and
innovation as optional
components that do
not have real value.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 115

Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set
goals that are
realistic and
motivate team
members
Salas et al.,
2014; Durham
et al., 1997;
Rousseau et al,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura,
1991; Locke &
Latham, 1990,
2002)
7
42
Discussion of lengths
to which people have
gone to complete
tasks and and the role
the supervisor had in
fostering the
behavior.
Discussion of
supervisor actions to
support employees’
work/life balance.
Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 5, &
6;

Supervisors
provide
recognition and
feedback for
team members’
work
Salas et al.,
2014;
Rousseau et al,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura,
1991; Locke &
Latham, 1990,
2002)
15
22
24
25
31
65
Discussions of
supervisor
performance
recognition as pro
forma or extraneous
or irrelevant to team
success and
satisfaction.
Interviews: Interview
Protocol Questions: 3,
4, 5, & 6
Statements of not
valuing the need to
recognize employees
for their various
degrees of effort or
skill.
Supervisors
takes punitive or
corrective
action for poor
performance
Salas et al.,
2014;
Rousseau et al,
2013; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Bandura,
1991; Locke &
Latham, 1990,
2002)
23
24
Discussions of
supervisor
performance
recognition as pro
forma or extraneous
or irrelevant to team
success and
satisfaction.
Interviews: Interview
Protocol Questions: 3,
4, 5, & 6
Statements of not
valuing the need to
recognize employees
for their various
degrees of effort or
skill.

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 116

Organizational Culture
Supervisors
model the
behavior they
wish to see in
the teams
Jung & Sosik,
2002; Manz &
Sims, 1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
45
49
Comments indicating
supervisor respect for
subordinates
Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 8, &
9;

Supervisor
communi-cates
to and from
management
with team
Manz & Sims,
1987
(Neuman et al.,
1989)
56
58
59
64
Comments from
supervisors on the
lack of information
that flows through
them from the senior
management;
comments that
indicate that they do
not pass on to
employees all of the
information they
receive from senior
managers.
Interview Protocol
Questions: 3, 4, 8, &
9;

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 117

APPENDIX E
INTERVIEW PROTOCOL
Data Collection Method: Interview Protocol and Questions

Introduction
• Thank you for meeting with me. I’m a doctoral student at USC and I'm here to help
CDER understand more about its EVS findings. I’m interested in different
stakeholder perspectives (such as employees or supervisors) about how the quality of
supervision and teamwork experienced influence people’s satisfaction with their jobs.
• I’m interested from your experience in your office, and I hope to be able to use what I
learn from today to help CDER refine its action plan around employee satisfaction.
• Anything you tell me will remain anonymous. I will not attribute anything you say to
you either by name or job category.
• You may choose to skip any question and you may end this interview at any time.
• The total time should take no longer than 30 minutes.
• What questions do you have for me before we begin?”
Do you mind if I record our interview? I will destroy the recording once I’ve finished my report.
NO, DO NOT RECORD YES, OK TO RECORD

NOTE WHICH STAKEHOLDER GROUP THIS PERSON REPRESENTS:
SENIOR MGMT SUPERVISOR EMPLOYEE

Interview Questions
#1 It looks like the group from today came up some possible causes or issues related to
supervision that are contributing to employee satisfaction (LIST THEM) either
positively or negatively. How confident are you that the group has surfaced all the right
causes? Anything you would add or take off?
#2 IF NOT ALL THE RESEARCH-BASED CAUSES HAVE SURFACED, ASK THIS:
Some research suggests that an additional reason, related to supervision and job
satisfaction, could be (INSERT HERE). How does that apply if at all to your
experience here?
#3 Your group came up with some possible causes related to teamwork that might be
contributing to employee satisfaction (LIST THEM) either positively or negatively.
How confident are you that the group has surfaced all the right causes? Anything you
would add or take off?
SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 118

#4 IF NOT ALL THE RESEARCH-BASED CAUSES HAVE SURFACED, ASK THIS:
Some research suggests that an additional reason, related to teamwork and job
satisfaction, could be (INSERT HERE). How does that apply if at all to your
experience here?
#5 Your group also came up with some action items in response to the scores. How
confident are you that if you completed these plans, employee satisfaction would
improve? How confident are you that the group will successfully complete the plans?
#6 Thinking about these action plans, some common reasons why groups don’t follow
through are related to motivation – meaning they don’t think it’s important. To what
extent is this a concern, in your opinion?
#7 Sometimes groups don’t follow through because of skill – they don’t know what to do.
To what extent is this a concern, in your opinion?
#8 Sometimes groups don’t follow through because organizational barriers get in the way
– red tape. To what extent is this a concern, in your opinion?
#9 Generally, what would you say are the most important factors influencing employee
satisfaction, either positively or negatively, at CDER?

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 119

APPENDIX F
SOURCES SUPPORTING THEME VALIDATION, THEME SUGGESTION, OR LACK OF
THEME VALIDATION
Table F1.
Sources Supporting Theme Validation, Theme Suggestion, or Lack of Theme Validation by KMO
and Sub-factors

Behavior
Relevant
EVS
Items
Focus
Group
Interview Documents
Validated,
Suggested, or
Not Validated
Knowledge
Factual
Supervisors know the
goal/mission of the
organization
T
G
H
1
2
3
4
5
6
Validated
Asset
Supervisors oversee training
of new team members
F 2 Suggested
Procedural
Supervisors know how to
apply the organization’s
policy and procedures to
subordinate teams
38
F
H
Suggested
Supervisors know how to
provide constructive feedback
44
46
50
3 Suggested
Supervisors know how to
provide appropriate policy
and procedure information to
team members
H Suggested
Supervisors understand how
to promote job autonomy (i.e.
skill flexibility, team member
responsibility, and work
variety) in team members
43 T H
2
4
Suggested
Supervisors know how to set
goals that motivate rather than
demotivate
Not Validated

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 120

Conceptual
Supervisors understand the
value of participatory
decision-making for team-
level goal-setting
30
63
Not Validated
Supervisors understand
principles and value of
transformational leadership
32
34

G
H
Suggested
Motivation
Active Choice
Supervisors set goals that are
realistic and motivate team
members
7
42
H 2 Suggested
Supervisors sets and
communicates clear
expectations
6
19
56
T H 2 Suggested
Supervisors provide
recognition and feedback for
team members’ work
15
22
24
25
31
65

G
H
1
2
3
4
6
Validated
Asset
Supervisors takes punitive or
corrective action for poor
performance
23
24
R F
1
2
3
5
6
Validated
Issue
Persistence
Supervisors believe in the
team’s collective efficacy
H Suggested
Supervisors empower team
members through
participatory decision-making
63 G Suggested
Supervisors provide feedback
about team members’ roles
and tasks to increase team
member autonomy
3
46

2
4
Suggested

SUPERVISOR PERSPECTIVES OF TEAMWORK AT THE FDA 121

Mental Effort
Supervisors encourage self-
reinforcement, self-
observation, and self-
evaluation in team members
H Suggested
Supervisors stimulate
problem-solving rather than
solve problems for their teams
Not Validated
Supervisors encourage and
facilitate intra-team
communication
T
F
G
H
3 Suggested
Organizational Culture
Supervisors model the
behavior they wish to see in
the teams
45
49
T
F
H
2 Suggested
Supervisors practice
participatory decision-making
63 G Suggested
Supervisors support the
creation of team-generated
goals in addition to
organizational goals
63 Not validated
Supervisors provide the
material support needed by
their team
9
14
X 5 Suggested
Supervisor communicates to
and from management with
team
56
58
59
64
T
F
G
H
1
2
3
5
Validated
Asset

Asset Metadata

Creator Losch, Kealalōkahi C. (author)

Core Title An examination of supervisors’ perspectives of teamwork in a federal agency: promising practices and challenges using a gap analysis framework

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Education (Leadership)

Publication Date 04/15/2016

Defense Date 12/20/2015

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag employee satisfaction,federal agency,gap analysis,leadership,OAI-PMH Harvest,performance gaps,promising practices,supervisors,teamwork

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Advisor Sundt, Melora (committee chair), Hanson, Katherine (committee member), Yates, Kenneth A. (committee member)

Creator Email klosch@usc.edu,losch@hawaii.rr.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c40-227587

Unique identifier UC11278564

Identifier etd-LoschKeala-4250.pdf (filename),usctheses-c40-227587 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-LoschKeala-4250.pdf

Dmrecord 227587

Document Type Dissertation

Format application/pdf (imt)

Rights Losch, Kealalōkahi C.; Losch, Kealalokahi C.

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA

Abstract (if available)

Abstract This study utilized a version of the gap analysis model created by Clark and Estes (2008) to understand the impact that supervisor support has on teamwork as a contributor to employee satisfaction. The purpose of this study was to examine the barriers to, and facilitators of, supervisor support for effective teamwork at the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research (CDER), a sub-unit of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. This study also sought to identify the promising practices that supervisors throughout other organizations could adopt to improve teamwork and the ways that such recommendations could be evaluated for their effectiveness. Results from the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey (EVS) and from a literature review were used to identify assumed causes of barriers and facilitators to effective teamwork. Focus group observations, interviews with supervisors, and document analysis were utilized to validate the assumed causes and analyzed for the related knowledge, motivation, and organizational factors. Of 24 supervisor behaviors that influence effective teamwork, as identified in the literature, only four behaviors were validated, three as facilitators of and one as a barrier to effective teamwork. The validated facilitators included supervisor knowledge of the organizational mission, providing recognition and feedback for team members’ work, and providing effective communication between supervisors’ teams and management. The validated barrier was related to supervisors not taking punitive or corrective action for poor performance. All other behaviors did not have sufficient evidence to be validated. The lack of evidence for the other behaviors suggested fostering teamwork among their subordinates is not prominent in the minds of CDER’s supervisors. The lack of evidence also indirectly demonstrated the limits to using the current EVS to understand the relationship of supervisors to teamwork as a contributor to employee satisfaction in federal agencies.