4. What Trainees Learned from AIMS Team Science
Team science allowed the cohort to develop psychological safety, which
ultimately enabled effective team functionality within the larger AIMS
project. Psychological safety is the shared belief that the team is a
safe space for risk taking and exchanging new scientific ideas
(Edmondson 1999). This is especially important for trainees and early
career researchers, who often face underdeveloped confidence and general
inexperience, making it more difficult to participate in large projects
with unfamiliar collaborators. Developing psychological safety early on
allowed AIMS trainees to freely share ideas by establishing trust among
team members. Our Team Science class provided a safe space to gain
confidence, get to know each other, and receive feedback from peers.
This resulted in increased feelings of being supported by, connected to,
and included in the project team (Figure 2). Additionally, the
incorporated DEI training [provided by the ADVANCEGeo Network]
educated and empowered team members in building inclusive workspaces.
Ultimately, a focus on fostering psychological safety and trust among
trainees fostered collaboration across the AIMS project.
Onboarding via the Team Science class enabled AIMS trainees to
understand how a big project operates and adjust to new expectations.
The practical operation of a big, interdisciplinary project poses
challenges for trainees to navigate due to differences in disciplinary
jargon, best practices, and acknowledged goals. Furthermore, the
challenges of managing personal interactions, competing agendas, and
demands on time increase as a function of team size. To address these
challenges, the Team Science class discussed the AIMS project’s
logistics and policies (e.g., Supplemental Info 3-5), thereby building a
common vocabulary and understanding of project-wide goals. Further, this
allowed trainees to advance their knowledge base beyond specific
sub-disciplines. This course introduced trainees to each other despite
disciplinary and institutional barriers, facilitating effective
communication and building a sense of community. Discussions of project
expectations were provided to the group at the same time and in the same
format, leaving less room for misinterpretation or miscommunication.
The course launched early and open conversations about authorship, data
sharing, and workload distribution. Notably, AIMS trainees valued
discussing the authorship policy (Supplemental Info 4-5; modeled on
policy described in Cheruvelil et al. 2014), as it gave a clear outline
of what was expected from project members as co-authors on papers and
talks. AIMS’ internally posted authorship memos (Supplemental Info 5)
allowed other collaborators to express interest in co-authorship and
determine non-advisors’ roles on our papers. Thirty-seven authorship
memos have been written so far to further a variety of products and
manuscripts, both within and across the regions and institutions in AIMS
(Figure 1). Examples include Mountain West and Southeast regions’
microbial ecologists working with Great Plains hydrologists to describe
microbial diversity in the Konza Prairie (Figure 1). Hydrology
collaborators across all regions are building a R package for processing
flow intermittence sensor data (Figure 1). A subset of biogeochemists
across all regions are focused on stream metabolism (Figure 1). By
demystifying the authorship process early on, trainees were empowered to
lead 68% of all products so far, allowing us to share our findings and
build strong networks early in our careers. Additionally, the AIMS
Mentorship Agreement (Supplemental Info 3) provided similar guidance
across labs and institutions by facilitating discussions between faculty
mentors and trainees of mutual expectations. These discussions led to
clarity and transparency in trainees’ relationships with advisors and
other project mentors, while also providing a foundation for continuing
the conversations after the class was over. Overall, setting these
expectations early allowed us to understand our role more clearly on a
big project with many competing demands.
Collaboration requires building skills in effective group communication
including integrating layers of feedback, building awareness of
disciplinary jargon, and navigating misunderstandings before they become
conflicts. To practice these skills, trainees received in-class feedback
on our conceptual models from AIMS peers, thereby building confidence
before presenting to more experienced researchers. By the time trainees
reached the high-stakes environment of a full-project meeting, the ideas
had been vetted by our peers, mentors, supervisor, and course
instructor. Iterative feedback improved trainee’s individual conceptual
models (Panel 1) and gave us the opportunity to collaborate across
disciplines, allowing us to begin our thesis and dissertation work with
many levels of interdisciplinary feedback within our first semester.
Additionally, it is inevitable that conflicts will arise when many
distinct disciplines and personalities are represented on big projects;
however, Team Science provided a scaffolding to navigate points of
friction. This ensured that conflicts did not turn into outright
disputes, but instead led to greater understanding between
collaborators. For AIMS, a focus on building group communication and
conflict management skills allowed us to more confidently navigate the
challenges inherent in working with an interdisciplinary team.