Enhancing Communication in Multidisciplinary Teams

Most of my academic career was dedicated to working on interdisciplinary research projects. In the early days, I found there was little consideration for the inherent challenges of this type of work, particularly in managing power dynamics across the STEM/social science disciplinary divide. While there is a lot to be gained from interdisciplinary research, it can be a hard road to walk. It’s so refreshing to see interdisciplinary research gaining more prominence from funders, and critically, a more intentional approach to creating supportive spaces for people to communicate across disciplinary divides. Here are some key lessons I learnt along the (sometimes rocky) journey: 🔹Language Matters: Ensure everyone on the team understands the key terms used to articulate the research. For instance, on an antimicrobial resistance project I was working on, the term ‘driver’ meant different things to different academics. Spending time interrogating this helped the team to have a shared understanding of the objectives of the project. 🔹 Regular Knowledge-Sharing Sessions: Building an understanding of what each team member is doing to contribute to the project can help to foster a positive working environment. Facilitated sessions, where each team member presents their work, can help to foster a shared understanding. For me, learning about how microbiological sampling techniques worked was helpful when developing my own ethnographic study. 🔹 Foster a Culture of Mutual Respect: Post-docs and project administration staff, often the hardest working, sometimes see their contributions rendered invisible. I cannot stress enough how vital it is to create an environment where all disciplines and team members are valued equally. Avoid empty platitudes; good leadership comes with actively listening to each other and recognising that the project wouldn’t happen without every member of the team. 🔹 Utilise Facilitation Techniques: Don’t assume that a group will naturally come together; intentional facilitation, such as round-robin discussions, ensures everyone has a chance to contribute. This can also help to manage power dynamics and give voice to quieter members. 🔹Create a Psychologically safe space: When people do not feel safe to share their ideas, they will not take risks and experiment. Safe spaces for learning are essential; public criticism and shaming can deter people from sharing. Encourage team members to explore ideas outside their comfort zones in a way that is supportive. Creating safe spaces is the only way people will experiment together. Interdisciplinary research can indeed be a hard road to walk, but the journey is enriched with diverse perspectives and the potential for groundbreaking discoveries. It's about managing the complexities with care and ensuring every voice is heard and respected. Let's continue to push the boundaries of knowledge, together. #interdisciplinaryresearch #academicresearch #power #facilitation

When promoting certain practices, we often emphasize their technical advantages, but their true value frequently lies in the improvement of inter and intra-team communication and the quality of shared information. Test-Driven Development (TDD), for example, helps teams tackle complex problems granularly, in a divide-and-conquer fashion. With no code to discuss initially, we are encouraged to talk about our expectations and decide on the tests we want to perform. This fosters a shared understanding of what each small part of the system should do. We communicate our goals one step at a time, which may lead to involving more people to ensure everyone is on the same page. It’s not just that TDD is suitable for pairing or mobbing; rather, pairing and mobbing are well-suited for TDD. Trunk-Based Development/Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery allows for fast experimentation and feedback. Quick feedback leads to more frequent communication with stakeholders, product teams, customers, and other engineers. The quality of shared information is high because it is driven by real-world data. As a result, we engage in more meaningful and informed discussions. Measure the effectiveness of your inter and intra-team communication by tracking the number of catch-up/sync-up meetings needed over a couple of weeks, how often your teams deliver to production, and how quickly they can prototype and experiment. These metrics often indicate whether teams are adopting certain technical practices and benefiting from the communication patterns and the quality of information these practices encourage. Don't adopt TDD, TBD, CD just because of their technical advantages; do it because of the better communication and higher quality of information they lead to. And remember: it's always an information-supply problem 😊 #trunkbasedevelopment #tdd #continuousintegration #continuousdelivery #softwaredevelopment #softwareengineering

The therapist who thinks they know best?  Doesn't. The future of ABA is collaboration, not control. I've watched the field evolve over years. The old model? Behavior analyst prescribes. Family complies. That model is crumbling. And it should. Research shows what actually works: multidisciplinary, & family-centered models. Not isolated behavior programs run by single experts. Here's what isolated ABA gets wrong: ⨯ It prioritizes science over family knowledge. ⨯ Treats caregivers as intervention implementers, not partners. ⨯ Ignores what speech therapists, OTs, educators already know. ⨯ Creates conflicting strategies across different environments. ⨯ Measures compliance instead of meaningful progress. Here's what collaboration-based ABA gets right: ↝ Families co-create goals, not just receive them ↝ Speech therapists integrate communication into behavior plans ↝ OTs address sensory needs affecting behavior ↝ Educators share classroom strategies that work ↝ Everyone aligns interventions across all settings One study found something critical: Children receiving coordinated multidisciplinary care achieved greater gains. In communication. In social skills. In real outcomes. Compared to isolated single-therapy approaches. The difference? Teams talked. Plans integrated. Families participated. Another study highlighted four collaboration tenets: ↝ Facilitating genuine two-way communication. ↝ Establishing co-constructed values with families. ↝ Defining clear roles without hierarchy. ↝ Committing to teamwork over territorial expertise. Notice what's missing? Control. The future isn't about BCBAs knowing best. It's about BCBAs facilitating partnerships. Family-centered doesn't mean "nice to have." It's evidence-based practice. Parents know their child's routines, dynamics, preferences. That knowledge is critical for intervention adherence. For sustaining behavior change long-term. Without family context, interventions fail to generalize. What collaboration requires: ↝ Shared decision-making from day one ↝ Clear communication without jargon barriers ↝ Respect for diverse professional expertise ↝ Integration of family priorities into goals ↝ Regular cross-disciplinary coordination meetings This isn't softer ABA. It's smarter ABA. More ethical. More effective. More sustainable. The field's ethical code already emphasizes client-centered care. Collaboration is how we actually deliver it. Control keeps behavior analysts isolated. Collaboration makes us part of something bigger. The future doesn't belong to lone experts. It belongs to connected teams. 💙 Are you experiencing collaborative ABA? Or isolated control? If you're ready to rebuild programs that families trust and staff believe in, let's talk. Message me to explore what's possible. Repost to Reshape ABA ♻️ ✨ Follow Dr. Cécile Heinze ✨

Are We Speaking the Same Language? 💡 Insights on Interdisciplinary Science Communication A few years ago, I was asked to help scientists communicate with… each other. This surprised me a bit because I usually train researchers to engage with the public, high school students etc. But why help scientists communicate among themselves? The answer lies in the rise of interdisciplinary research: Today’s complex problems require knowledge from many different research fields, making effective communication within interdisciplinary research projects crucial. Despite limited literature on this, I took on the challenge and have since conducted numerous rewarding workshops. This autumn I moderated a workshop for Carlsberg Foundation Semper Ardens Accelerate grant holders and in later summer we had a productive ITEASc workshop in Middelfart, where PhD and master’s students developed and pitched interdisciplinary research projects. Here are some key takeaways for successful interdisciplinary research and scicomm from the workshops: 📣 Have a clear aim: Well-motivated research questions are essential. 📣 Start a dialogue, not a monologue: Listen to your audience (in this case: your peers). 📣 Be transparent: Share your uncertainties. 📣 Train in a safe environment: Positive feedback culture is important. 📣 Be playful and reflective - but hold on to your core scientific skills and projects. 📣 Have patience: Developing a common language takes time. As we learned from ITEASc keynote speaker Andreas Roepstorff, interdisciplinary work might even slow down publication rates. But we need better papers, not more papers. We need to listen more and talk/write less! So… how do we train this in a workshop? 1) We start with fun and safe activities to spark conversation. It might look chaotic in photos, but it’s well thought out :-) 2) We aim for clear end products, like poster presentations. 3) Everyone literally writes down their core scientific skills on a piece of paper and presents it to the others. Three trivial points? Yes, perhaps. But highly efficient! AND it’s fun. What more could you ask for? Here what participants said when evaluating the workshops: “The workshop was really enlightening. It provided a toolbox that I will for sure use in the future to establish collaborations and submit multidisciplinary proposals with colleagues with different backgrounds!” “It was a friendly and validating environment.” “The ice breaker gave me the feeling that this was well organised, this was something new, and this was going to be fun. It did wonders for networking throughout the day.” “Amazing ideas in 3h. I can only imagine what could we do with months!” “It significantly shaped me to a better science communicator :)”   What are your experiences – good or bad – with Interdisciplinary Science Communication?  

As Chief Program Officer at the Dubai Autism Center, I don’t just supervise our education/clinic department. I also oversee our Occupational Therapy, Psychology, and Speech-Language departments. When I stepped into the role, I understood the initial hesitation about a Behavior Analyst overseeing other disciplines. Honestly, I’d likely feel the same if the situation were reversed. Over time, our teams have seen that I genuinely value an interdisciplinary approach and respect each department’s perspective on treatment. Collaboration isn’t only about being “easy to work with” (though soft skills matter). It also requires a shared foundation and sufficient understanding of each other’s disciplines to communicate clearly, interpret recommendations accurately, and provide meaningful feedback. That’s why I really enjoyed the paper “Interdisciplinary Collaboration Training: An Example of a Preservice Training Series.” What stood out most is its practical approach to building interdisciplinary fluency inside an organization. It doesn’t focus on teaching “collaboration skills,” but it also emphasizes learning key aspects of one another’s disciplines, enabling teams to develop a shared frame of reference. That kind of cross-disciplinary understanding helps us better appreciate each discipline’s values and decision-making and communicate in ways that reduce friction and build trust. It also (in my opinion) provides stronger, more informed input on intervention plans, which ultimately deliver more cohesive support for families. This paper is packed with a lot of good ideas, and I’m planning to start rolling some of them out soon. Worth the read! #Autism #Dubai #DubaiAutismCenter #InterdisciplinaryCare #InterprofessionalCollaboration #TeamBasedCare #ABA #BCBA #OccupationalTherapy #SpeechTherapy #SLP #Psychology #ClinicalLeadership #EvidenceBasedPractice #ProfessionalDevelopment

#ThrivingToGetWorkDone Post 6 of 9: Fostering Collaboration and Teamwork: Breaking Down Silos Fostering collaboration and teamwork is essential in a complex environment like a hospital, where departments must work together seamlessly to provide the best patient care. Here are two short use cases on how to activate this skill in routine work within the hospital industry: Use Case 1: Collaborating Across Departments for a Multidisciplinary Care Plan You’re involved in creating a multidisciplinary care plan for patients with chronic illnesses. This requires input from various departments, including Cardiology, Nutrition, and Physical Therapy. To foster collaboration, you suggest, “Let’s schedule regular multidisciplinary team meetings where each department can share their insights and updates on patient progress. We’ll use these sessions to ensure that our care plans are fully integrated and that we’re all working towards the same patient outcomes.” By bringing everyone together, you break down silos and ensure that each department’s expertise is utilized, leading to better patient care. Use Case 2: Enhancing Collaboration in a Quality Improvement Project In another scenario, you’re working on a quality improvement project aimed at reducing hospital readmission rates. You notice that different departments, such as Discharge Planning, Pharmacy, and Home Health, are working in isolation. You propose a more collaborative approach: “Let’s form a cross-departmental task force to tackle this issue. We’ll meet bi-weekly to share data, discuss challenges, and develop integrated strategies to reduce readmissions. By working together, we can identify gaps in our processes and ensure a smoother transition for patients after discharge.” This approach not only fosters teamwork but also leads to more comprehensive solutions. #My2Cents: Collaboration is the cornerstone of success in any complex organization. By fostering teamwork and breaking down silos, we can leverage the full spectrum of our collective expertise, leading to better outcomes for our patients and our hospital. These posts aim to invoke a better overall environment by sharing practical ways to enhance workplace collaboration and productivity. What strategies have you used to foster collaboration in your workplace? Share your experiences in the comments! #Leadership #Teamwork #WorkplaceCulture #Collaboration #HealthcareLeadership #ThrivingAtWork #HospitalAdministration #PatientCare

How to Adapt 1.7 times quicker, Reduce Absenteeism by 37%, and Reduce Operational Costs by 30% (Research Based) 👇 "Interprofessional collaboration transforms the delivery of care and fosters a culture of respect and shared responsibility." - J. Michael Bishop In today’s complex, fast-changing, and agile environment, interprofessional/interdisciplinary collaboration (IPC) is necessary for thriving. 💠 Benefits of IPC for your organization: ✔ Reduction in Cognitive Load: 👉 By distributing tasks and responsibilities, IPC reduces individual cognitive load, reduces the risk of burnout, and enhances mental health. ✔ Increased Efficiency: 👉 Streamlined communication and coordinated efforts to make better use of resources and time. ✔ Professional Growth: 👉 Learning from colleagues across disciplines enhances knowledge and skills. ✔ Better Problem-solving: 👉 Collective problem-solving leads to innovative solutions for complex challenges. ✔ Enhanced Resilience and Adaptability: 👉 IPC teams are more resilient and adaptable, responding quickly and effectively to unexpected challenges due to diverse perspectives. ✔ Cross-Disciplinary Innovation: 👉 IPC fosters innovation by merging diverse fields to create unique solutions and advancements. 💠 6 Challenges of IPC and Tips how to Overcome them: 1️⃣ Communication Barriers: 👉 Different terminologies and communication styles can lead to misunderstandings 🚀 Tips: Implement standardized communication tools and regular team meetings to foster clear and consistent communication. 2️⃣ Role Clarity and Conflicts: 👉 Unclear roles and overlapping responsibilities can cause confusion and conflict. 🚀 Tips: Clearly define roles and responsibilities and encourage open dialogue. 3️⃣ Cultural Differences: 👉 Diverse cultural backgrounds can lead to different expectations and practices. 🚀 Tips: Provide cultural competency training to enhance understanding and respect for diverse perspectives and practices. 4️⃣ Resistance to Change: 👉 Some team members may be resistant to adopting new collaborative practices. 🚀 Tips: Involve resistant members in the planning and implementation process and demonstrate the benefits of IPC through pilot programs and success stories. 5️⃣ Lack of Shared Goals: 👉 Different disciplines may have varying priorities, leading to misaligned goals. 🚀 Tips: Facilitate workshops and alignment meetings to develop a shared, customer-centered vision agreed upon by all team members. 6️⃣ Varying Levels of Buy-In: 👉 Not all team members may be equally committed to IPC. 🚀 Tips: Engage team members early, explain the need for IPC, and recognize their contributions to build commitment and enthusiasm. Embracing interprofessional collaboration isn't just a trend. It's a necessity for any organization aiming for high performance and resilience. How is your team fostering IPC? --- 🔔 Enjoy my posts? Follow me Eva Gysling, OLY #leadership #culture #coaching #interprofessionalwork

The Role of Occupational Therapists as Leaders in Multidisciplinary Teams Leading in multidisciplinary teams requires a strategic blend of skills and insights from Occupational Therapy. We excel at integrating our unique understanding of functional goals and client needs with the expertise of other healthcare professionals. This collaborative approach allows us to drive holistic care plans that address every aspect of a client’s well-being. By actively participating in team discussions and decision-making processes, we enhance our collective ability to deliver comprehensive and effective care. Our leadership helps bridge gaps, ensuring seamless coordination and improved patient outcomes. In our roles within multidisciplinary teams, OTs embody various leadership functions that drive effective collaboration and patient care. Here are some key ways we lead: 1. Facilitate Communication Among Team Members Ensure clear, consistent updates on client progress and needs. Bridge gaps between different professional perspectives and approaches. 2. Integrate Holistic Perspectives into Care Plans Combine insights from various disciplines to create comprehensive plans. Consider physical, emotional, and environmental factors in treatment strategies. 3. Lead Patient-Centered Care Discussions Advocate for the client's preferences and goals in treatment decisions. Ensure that care plans align with the client's values and needs. 4. Coordinate Multidisciplinary Assessments Organize joint evaluations with specialists to gather diverse insights. Streamline assessment processes for more efficient and effective care. 5. Educate Team Members on OT Approaches Share knowledge about OT techniques and their benefits for clients. Enhance understanding of how OT interventions complement other therapies. 6. Monitor and Adjust Treatment Goals Track client progress and adjust goals based on team feedback. Ensure that treatment objectives remain relevant and achievable. 7. Facilitate Collaborative Goal Setting Work with team members to set shared, achievable goals for clients. Align different therapeutic approaches towards common client outcomes. 8. Support Seamless Transitions Between Care Settings Coordinate client transitions from one care environment to another. Ensure continuity of care and minimize disruptions in treatment plans. Our role as leaders in multidisciplinary teams is pivotal for delivering holistic and effective client care. By embracing these leadership functions, we not only enhance the collaborative process but also ensure that each client receives comprehensive and personalized support. In doing so, we reaffirm our essential contribution to the success of the team and the well-being of those we serve. #OccupationalTherapy #OccupationalTherapist #WhyOT #OTMatters #OT #OTR #OTD #UnitedStatesOT