Product Development and Learning in Project Teams: The Challenges are the Benefits

The value of teams in new product development (NPD) is undeniable. Both the interdisciplinary nature of the work and industry trends necessitate that professionals from different functions work together on development projects to create the highest quality product in the shortest time. Understanding the conditions that facilitate teamwork has been a pursuit of researchers for nearly a half-century. We review existing literature on teams and team learning in organizational behavior and technology and innovation to offer insights for research on new product development teams. Building on prior work, we summarize the organizational benefits of NPD teams, and identify five attributes of these teams that hinder attainment of their potential: (1) project complexity, (2) cross-functionality, (3) temporary membership, (4) fluid team boundaries and (5) embeddedness in organizational structures. We argue that effective management of these five attributes allows not only organization-level benefits, but also team-level benefits in the form of new capabilities and team member resilience. We then highlight the critical roles of leadership and of communication and conflict management training as strategies for overcoming the challenges to team effectiveness in NPD, as well as for realizing five team benefits: (1) project management skills, (2) broad perspective, (3) teaming skills, (4) expanded social network, and (5) boundary spanning skills. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of our ideas for conducting future team research.