Analyzing Team-Building Skills and Social Media in Online Courses

This report examines the development of team-building skills in an online undergraduate Business Technology Management course, focusing on the impact of social media and various course activities. The study investigates how students perceive the contribution of assignments, the website project, and other resources to the development of communication, work coordination, and team cooperation skills. It explores the extent to which students utilize social media tools, such as email, GLearningCampus, texting, and Facebook, to enhance their online learning experience and compensate for the lack of face-to-face interaction. The research questions address the relative contribution of course activities, the specific social media tools employed, and the impact of social media choices on perceived team-building skill development. The findings reveal that the website project and assignments contribute the most to team-building skill acquisition, while practice quizzes contribute the least. Students demonstrate a strong understanding of team-building components, and they extensively use social media to support their learning. The study highlights the importance of fostering a sense of community in online courses and suggests that even in a virtual environment, students actively seek to develop team-building skills.

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TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS, SOCIAL MEDIA AND ONLINE COURSE DELIVERY
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TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS, SOCIAL MEDIA AND
ONLINE COURSE DELIVERY
Jennifer D.E. Thomas, Pace University
Danielle Morin, Concordia University
Dennis Kira, Concordia University
ABSTRACT
With the increasing use of social media in society, as well as in the classroom, this study
sought to examine the contribution that various resources and activities, as well as social media
tools used by students, in an online undergraduate Business Technology Management course,
may make to the development of various components of team-building skills. Online courses do
not generally foster team-building, however, from our past research, there is indication that
students seek to overcome this, as well as the missing human factor, by engaging social media.
The results found indicate that certain social media tools are used extensively by a large
number of students, namely, email messaging, GLearningCampus, Texting, and Facebook, in
addition to face-to-face communication. Interestingly, texting and face-to-face communications
were almost tied, and phone calls were less used than most other media. These results suggest
t h a te v e ni n a c o m p l e t e l yv i r t u a le n v i r o n m e n t ,s t u d e n t ss e e mt o s e e kcommunity, though
seemingly not by traditional phone communication.
Keywords: team-building skills, social media, online delivery
INTRODUCTION
Mention the words social media and most everyone has an immediate conception of what
that means. In academia attempts are made for more precision resulting in multiple definitions of
the meaning of social media and social media tools (Tess, 2013). These attempts were distilled
by Dabbagh and Kitsantas 2011, p. 1, to suggest the term is used to, “define a variety of
networked tools or technologies that emphasize the social aspects of the Internet as a channel for
communication, collaboration, and creative expression, and is often interchangeable with the
terms Web 2.0 and social software.”, with examples of tools such as, Delicious, WordPress, and
Twitter, PBworks, Flick, YouTube, Facebook, Linkedin, Google Apps. To this list of tools,
Kaplan & Kaenlein, 2010, p. 61, add Wikipedia, Second Life, Blogs, World of Warcraft, and
d e f i n ei t a s , “ a g r o u po f I n t e r n e tb a s e da p p l i c a t i o n st h a tb u i l do n t h e i d e o l o g i c a la n d
t e c h n o l o g i c a lf o u n d a t i o n so f W e b2 . 0 ,a n dt h a ta l l o wt h ec r e a t i o na n de x c h a n g eo f u s e r
generated content”. Social media use is suggested by Correa, et al., 2010, p. 247, as “the
p a r t i c u l a rc o n s u m p t i o no f d i g i t a lm e d i ao r I n t e r n e tt h a th a s l i t t l et o d o w i t ht r a d i t i o n a l
informational use.”
Bass 2012, p.1, proposed applying “disruptive innovation” to the problem of learning in
higher education. Based on the definitions in the paragraph above, it is simple to see how social
media could be considered one such disruptive innovation in education, if one accepts the
definition Bass provides from Clayton Christensen, “a product or service takes root initially by
s i m p l ea p p l i c a t i o n sa t t h eb o t t o mo f a m a r k e ta n dt h e nr e l e n t l e s s l ym o v e s‘ u pm a r k e t ’ ,
eventually displacing established competitors.” It’s not hard to see this playing out with the
increased use of social media in the educational context. Research by Educause Center for
Global Journal of Business Pedagogy Volume 1, Number 1, 2017
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Applied Research (ECAR), 2012, as reported in Gikas and Grant, 2013, found 67% of students
report that mobile devices (which facilitate social media use) is important for their learning and
one study found social media use has increased from 2007 to 2010 and that the age gap between
u s e r si s shrinking. In t h e i ro w ns t u d y ,G i k a sa n dG r a n t ,2 0 1 3 ,p . 2 1 ,f o u n dt h a ts t u d e n t s
described the use of social media to assist learning as, “(a) accessing information quickly, (b)
communication and content collaboration, (c) variety of ways to learn, (d) situational learning”.
It seems a natural progression to link social media with team-building. The term team-
building itself also has many definitions or components. As used by the authors of this paper in
previous research, team-building skills are defined as, “Coordinating Work – bringing together
work from multiple sources and team members; Team Cooperation/Collaboration – interpersonal
skills, resolution of differences; Communication skills – conveying ideas effectively, both orally
and written” (Thomas, 2001, Thomas and Morin, 2007), constructs supported by McKendall,
2000, Fapohunda, 2013, Ben-Zvi, 2007 and Roseth et al., 2008. The collaborative aspect of
team-building is defined by Hermsen, et al., 2010, as translated by Voorn and Koomers, 2011, as
“active listening, receiving and giving feedback, honouring one’s commitments, contributing to
fair division of tasks, being assertive, the co-creation of a good collaborative atmosphere and
taking responsibility”. The acquisition of these skills would seem to be naturally supported by
the use of social media. While a still new area for research, some studies already suggest that
social media can have an impact on learning even on the development of team-building skills.
(Tess, 2013;Voorn & Kommers, 2011; Cochran & Bateman, 2010; Liaw, Hatala & Huang,
2010).
In an online course, the impression is one of isolation in which students most likely work
independently, without reference to their fellow students, apart from some possible discussion
board e x c h a n g e s .D e v e l o p i n gteam-building s k i l l ss e e m sa d i s t a n tpossibility. ( B e n s o n&
Samarawickrema, 2009; Mandernach, 2006; MacKnight, 2000). While students appreciate the
convenience of online course delivery, the need for the human component is still vital and they
tend to seek it out. This expectation has been observed in our own past research. (Thomas, et al.,
2016; Morin, et al., 2015). The popularity of social media interaction suggests that students are
likely to employ these means of communication to enhance their online learning experience, with
or without instructor intervention.
The above assertions are the focus of this current research, expanding on previous work
which examined solely communication skills (Thomas, e t a l .2 0 1 6 a ) .I n t h i spaper work
coordination and team cooperation were additionally examined. These three components were
investigated in a previous study and were found to be the main three legs of team-building skills
(Thomas, et al. 2016b). In particular, the current study examined students’ perceptions of the
development of the three identified components of team-building skills from the resources and
activities used in an online, undergraduate Business Technology Management course. Secondly,
it also examined whether, for the purposes of the course, students seek alternate means of
communication amongst themselves, to compensate for the lack of the face-to-face component of
the course.
THE STUDY
In this paper, students’ perceptions of their acquisition of the three components of Team-
Building from t h ev a r i o u sa c t i v i t i e sand resources u s e di n a virtual Business T e c h n o l o g y
Management course, and the social media tools they employ for the purposes of the course, were
explored. The research questions were:
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1. What is the relative contribution of the activities and resources of the course to the
perceived acquisition of the three components of Team-Building skills?
2. Did students enlist social media tools to assist in the course? What were they?
3. Did the choice of social media have an impact on the perceived contribution of activities
and resources to the development of the three components of Team-Building skills?
Based on Thomas, 2001, and building on prior research (Thomas, et al., 2016b); Thomas
and Morin, 2012, 2010, 2006), the three components of Team-Building skills are identified as
Communication, Work Coordination and Team Cooperation and are defined as follows:
 Communication: conveying ideas effectively, both orally and written
 Work Coordination: bringing together work from multiple sources and team members
 Team Cooperation: interpersonal skills, resolution of differences
Several activities and resources were offered in the course to assist in the development of
these skills. Students were also given a list of social media tools and asked about their use. These
are:
Table 1
ACTIVITIES, RESOURCES AND REPORTED SOCIAL MEDIA USED
IN THE COURSE
Activities Resources Social Media Tools
Assignments
Discussion Board
Discussion Cases
Practice Quizzes
Website Project
Textbook
PowerPoint Notes
Overall Platform
Email, Facebook, Phone Calls,
Text Messaging, Blogging,
Face-to-Face,
GLearning Campus, Other.
The Discussion Cases refer to the activity where students discuss a case online and the
Website Project consists in the activity where students design a website. The Website Project
was an activity in which students could do the work as a team or individually. Most students
choose to form a team to complete the project. If done as a group, students were asked to
evaluate and comment on each other’s performance. Comments were generally positive. The
Overall Platform used for the course is the eConcordia Course Management System and the
GLearning Campus is the communication system part of the online platform.
An online survey was sent to all students registered in the course. The instrument was
made up of three parts:
a) students’ demographics and their level of understanding of the definitions provided of
the three components of team-building skills,
b) students’ perceptions of the contribution of various activities and resources towards
the three components of team-building skills,
c) students’ choice of social media tools to communicate amongst themselves.
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RESULTS
Demographics
There were 376 students who participated in the survey, of which 54% were male and
46% were female. Most had moderate to extensive computer experience with 53.5% having
moderate and 42.6% having extensive experience. Most students (60%) were between 20 and 22
years of age, and most students had taken at least one online course, the average being 2.3.
Understanding of Definition
Students were asked to rate their understanding of the definition of the three components
of Team-Building on a scale from 0 (No understanding at all) to 10 (Very High understanding).
As seen in Table 2, the average understanding score for each skill was Communication: 8.31,
Coordination: 8.36 and Cooperation: 8.53 out of 10. Of these, 84.8% indicated they had an
extensive understanding of the definition of Communication, 85.9% of Coordination, and 87.5%
o f C o o p e r a t i o n .T h ed e f i n i t i o no f C o o p e r a t i o ni s t h em o s tunderstood. Therefore w e a r e
confident that the respondents clearly understand the definitions used in this research.
Students’ Perceptions of Team-Building Skills Acquisition
Research Question 1:
What is the relative contribution of the activities and resources of the course to
the perceived acquisition of the three components of Team-Building skills?
Table 3 presents the contribution of course components (activities and resources) to the
development of each of the components of Team-Building skills. It can be seen that on average,
students perceived that the Assignments and the Website Project contributed the most to each of
the components of Team-Building. In particular, the Website Project gave the highest perceived
contribution w i t h9 3 . 0 7 %f o r C o m m u n i c a t i o n ,9 4 . 1 3 %f o r C o o r d i n a t i o na n d 9 2 . 7 8 %f o r
C o o p e r a t i o nc o m b i n i n g``Moderately`` and ` ` A l o t ` ` ,r e s p o n s e s .I n s e c o n dp l a c e ,t h e
Assignments also have strong perceived positive contributions, with 87.67% for Communication,
8 9 . 8 1 %f o r C o o r d i n a t i o na n d 8 7 . 1 0 %f o r C o o p e r a t i o n .T h e a c t i v i t yt h a ti s p e r c e i v e dt o
Table 2
LEVEL OF UNDERSTANDING OF DEFINITIONS
Students were asked to rate their level of understanding of the definitions from 0 (No understanding at all)
to 5 (Average) to 10 (Very High understanding)
Communication (n=376) Coordination (n=375) Cooperation (n=375)
Extensive (7 to 10) 84.8% 85.9% 87.5%
Moderate (4 to 6) 13.9% 12.0% 10.6%
Minimum (0 to 3) 1.3% 2.1% 1.9%
Average
(Standard Deviation)
8.31
(1.71)
8.36
(1.78)
8.53
(1.76)
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contribute the least to all the components of the Team-Building is the Practice Quizzes, with
positive contribution perceived contribution between 39 and 43%. It is encouraging that most
students tackled the practice quizzes individually rather than seeking to make it a team activity.
Among the resources offered in the course, the PowerPoint Notes contributed the most to
Communication a nd Coordination s ki l lswhile the overall Pl a t for mc ont r i but e dthe most to
Cooperation. The textbook contributed the least to all the components of Team-Building which
makes sense as reading the textbook is essentially an individual endeavour. The surprise is that it
was almost 50-50. It would be interesting to know from those who did perceive the contribution
how the textbook helped to achieve these skills.
In order to assess whether the different activities and resources offered in the course have
a significant different level of impact on each component of Team-Building skill, an analysis of
variance was conducted. It was found that the mean perceived contribution of activities and
r e s o u r c e sw e r es i g n i f i c a n t l yd i f f e r e n tw i t hp - v a l u e su n d e r10-140 f o r e a c ho f t h e three
components. Also several additional analyses of variance were performed to assess if each
activity and each resource contributes to the three components significantly differently. The sign
S+ means that the corresponding p-value < 0.01, S means 0.01< p-value < 0.05 and N means no
significant difference at 5%. The average perceived contributions of the Website Project to the
three components of Team-Building skills are not significantly different. The same is true for the
Overall Platform. All other activities and resources contribute differently to each skill.
Table 3
STUDENTS’ PERCEIVED CONTRIBUTION OF ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES TO THE
THREE COMPONENTS OF TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS
Communication Coordination Cooperation Anova
Per Act&R
n Mean (St. dev)
+ impact %
Mean (St. dev)
+ impact %
Mean (St. dev)
+ impact %
Significance
p-value
Activities
Assignments 373 2.32(0.68)
87.67%
2.49(0.67)
89.81%
2.50(0.71)
87.10% S+
Discussion Board 375 1.88(0.73)
66.40%
1.75(0.76)
55.88%
1.69(0.76)
50.93%
S+
Discussion Cases 375 2.05(0.74)
75.34%
1.84(0.72)
64.80%
1.58(0.70)
46.13%
S+
Practice Quizzes 373 1.50(0.63)
42.25%
1.54(0.66)
44.65%
1.42(0.61)
39.29% S
Website Project 375 2.57(0.62)
93.07%
2.63(0.59)
94.13%
2.64(0.61)
92.78% N
Resources
Textbook 375 1.54(0.61)
48.13%
1.74(0.73)
56.53%
1.61(0.69)
48.53% S+
PowerPoint Notes 374 1.81(0.73)
62.03%
1.86(0.74)
64.71%
1.70(0.69)
56.53% S+
Overall Platform 375 1.77(0.72
60.48%
1.80(0.72)
61.87%
1.74(0.72)
58.24% N
Anova per skill (p-value) S+ S+ S+
Legend:
*The mean and standard deviation are calculated by assigning 3 to “A lot”, 2 to “Moderate” and 1 to “Not at all”.
**The Positive Impact corresponds to the combined percentage of “A lot” and “Moderate”
S+: Significance < 0.01; S: 0.01< Significance < 0.05, N: Not significant
Global Journal of Business Pedagogy Volume 1, Number 1, 2017
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We can also observe, highlighted in bold, towards what component, each activity and
resource contributes the most. We can see that the Assignments and the Website Project are
perceived to contribute the most to the development of Cooperation skill, while the Discussion
B o a r da n dD i s c u s s i o nC a s e sc o n t r i b u t et h em o s tt o C o m m u n i c a t i o nskill. T h eperceived
contributions of the Practice Quizzes to each of the components of Team-Building skills are the
lowest of all activities and resources. It is even significantly lower for Team Cooperation. It is
comprehensible since this activity is meant as a tool for students to deepen their understanding of
concepts and practice their applications. As for the resources, they all contribute the most to the
development of Coordination skill.
Social Media Used
Research Question 2:
Did students enlist social media tools to assist in the course? What were they?
Table 4 indicates that students used on average 3.18 different social media tools to
communicate with their fellow students, with 1% of them using no social media tools at all, and
more than 60% using at least 3 social media tools (18%+22%+16%+5%+0.5%). Table 4 also
shows that Email is the most popular media of communication, being used by 80% of students,
followed by G Learning Campus at 65%, and Facebook at 57%. It can be observed also that a
high percentage of students, 47%, still used Face-to-Face communication even if this course is
offered online. Only 19% used phone calls, 5% used Skype, and 1% used Blogging. Only three
percent indicated they used other means of communication, such as Whatsapp and Googledocs.
One percent used no communication at all. Also, we observe that 99% of students reported using
at least one social media (including Face-to-Face) to communicate with their fellow students.
Table 4
SOCIAL MEDIA (Usage and Types) (N=376)
Number of Social
Media Tools Used
Frequency Type of Social
media
Frequency
0 1% Email 80%
1 13% G Learning Campus 65%
2 25% Facebook 57%
3 18% Face-to-Face 47%
4 22% Text messaging 46%
5 16% Phone calls 19%
6 5% Skype 5%
7 0.5% Others 3%
Average 3.18 Blogging 1%
No communication 1%
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Impact of Social Media Tools on Students’ Perceptions
Research Question 3:
Did the choice of social media have an impact on the perceived contribution of
activities and resources to the development of the components of Team-Building
skills?
Further analysis was performed to determine whether the usage of social media tools
affects the perception of the contribution of activities and resources towards the enhancement of
Team-Building components. In Table 5, it is observed that the use of social media seems to
impact some of the perceptions of the contribution that activities and resources make to the
d e v e l o p m e n to f Team-Building components. S i g n i f i c a n td i f f e r e n c e si n p e r c e p t i o n swere
observed according to use of certain social media. The following five social media tools were
studied in detail: Email, Facebook, Text Messaging, Face to Face and GLearning Campus. These
were selected as they were used by at least 45% of the sample. Each social media will be
analysed separately.
Significant differences at 10% were recorded in Table 5. We note that the usage of the social
m e d i at o o l ss h o w sn o s i g n i f i c a n ti m p a c to n t h ep e r c e p t i o no f t h ec o n t r i b u t i o nm a d eb y
D i s c u s s i o nB o a r d ,t h e T e x t b o o ka n d t h e O v e r a l lP l a t f o r mt o a n y o f t h e Team-Building
components. However the following observations can be made:
• Impact of Email
Students, actively using Email Messaging, found that the Assignments and the Power
Point notes contribute significantly differently to the development of Cooperation skill; in
fact students who do not use email identify more support than those who do. No other
significant difference has been identified.
• Impact of Facebook
None of the resources are impacted by the use of Facebook (FB). However significant
differences of t h e p e r c e i v e dc o n t r i b u t i o no f s e v e r a la c t i v i t i e st o Team-Building
components have been identified. We first note that the Assignments, the Discussion
c a s e sa n d t h e W e b s i t eP r o j e c tw e r ea l l p e r c e i v e dt o s u p p o r tt h e d e v e l o p m e n to f
Communication skills in a significantly different level. For example, students who use
Facebook, perceive that the Assignments and the Website project contribute more, while
the Discussion Cases contribute less to the skill. In addition, the Assignments contribute
differently to Coordination in fact, those who use Facebook, perceived a higher level of
contribution than those who do not.
• Impact Text Messaging
S t u d e n t s ,a c t i v e l yu s i n gT e x tM e s s a g i n g ,f o u n dt h a tt h e A s s i g n m e n t sc o n t r i b u t e
significantly differently to the development of the Communication skill, and the Website
project to the Coordination skill, in fact, those who use Text Messaging perceive a higher
contribution to those skills.
• Impact of Face-to-Face
Students, relying on Face-to-Face (FtoF), found that the Practice Quizzes contribute
significantly differently to the development of the Coordination skill, and the Power
Point Notes to the Cooperation skill, in fact, those who do not use Face-to-Face perceive
a higher contribution to those skills.
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• Impact of GLC
Students, actively using the GLearning Center (GLC), found that the Assignments, the
Discussion cases and the Power Point Notes contribute significantly differently to the
development of the Communication skill, and the Discussion cases, the Website Project
and the Power Point Notes to the Coordination skill, while the Website project also
contributes differently to the Cooperation skill. Those who do use the GLearning Center
perceive a higher contribution to those skills.
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Table 5
STUDENTS’ PERCEIVED CONTRIBUTION OF ACTIVITIES AND RESOURCES TO
TEAM-BUILDING SKILLS AND SOCIAL MEDIA
Communication Coordination Cooperation
Activities
No Yes No Yes No Yes
Assignments Email 2.623 2.468
FB 2.247 2.384 2.407 2.555
TEXT 2.267 2.392
FtoF
GLC 2.244 2.368
Discussion Board Email
FB
TEXT
FtoF
GLC
Discussion Cases Email
FB 2.132 1.986
TEXT
FtoF
GLC 1.930 2.110 1.725 1.900
Practice Quizzes Email
FB
TEXT
FtoF 1.596 1.483
GLC
Website Project Email
FB 2.509 2.623 2.577 2.697
TEXT 2.585 2.694
FtoF
GLC 2.519 2.700 2.542 2.700
Resources
Textbook Email
FB
TEXT
FtoF
GLC
PowerPoint Notes Email 1.831 1.664
FB
TEXT
FtoF 1.767 1.624
GLC 1.710 1.860 1.733 1.922
Overall Platform Email
FB
TEXT
FtoF
GLC
Legend:
*The mean and standard deviation are calculated by assigning 3 to “A lot”, 2 to “Moderate” and 1 to
“Not at all”.
* indicates significance below 0.05
* Yes indicates the use of that specific social media tool, and No that it was not used.
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CONCLUSION
T h e r e s u l t so f t h estudy p r e s e n t e dhere i n d i c a t ethat, by u s i n gv a r i o u sa c t i v i t i e s ,
resources, and tools in the course, it is possible to foster the development of team-building skills
in a completely online course, in particular skills related to communication, team cooperation
and work coordination.
It was found that different activities and resources contribute significantly differently to
the acquisition of the components of Team-Building skills examined. In particular, the Website
Project and the Assignments are the best activities to develop each of the three components of
Team-Building skills. Discussion Boards and Discussion Cases also contribute but at a lesser
level. Practice Quizzes, although very important for deepening the students’ understanding of a
concept and its applications, cannot be expected to develop the skills under study. In fact, their
perceived contributions to the three components are lower than those of the Textbook, the
P o w e r P o i n tN o t e sa n dt h eO v e r a l lP l a t f o r m.T h e s er e s u l t sa r ei mp o r t a n tf o ro n l i n ec o u r s e
developers seeking strategies to help students develop these skills.
Supporting the results found from the comprehensive literature review conducted in the
area by Tess 2013, our results also indicate that we can no longer ignore the usage of social
media in the learning process of students. This paper demonstrates that not only do students seek
community even in an online course, but that when students use a certain social media tool, their
perceived contribution of activities and resources to the development of the components of
Team-Building skills is impacted. What seemed to work better in the past does not always work
as well in the world of access to multiple media.
For example, students very active on social media may not appreciate the value of the
D i s c u s s i o nBoard as m u c ha s t h o s ew h oa r el e s sa c t i v e .I t i s u n d e r s t a n d a b l e ,s i n c et h e i r
communication needs are covered outside the pedagogy of the course. In the past discussion
boards were probably the only way for online students to communicate among themselves.
Frequently students now create a Facebook account to post questions and answers not monitored
by the professor or the teaching assistant, potentially obtaining the wrong answers, which is a
concern.
The expectations of students are also getting very high; many will expect to find course
support on YouTube and other social media outlets. Answers to students’ email, which according
to the results found in this study are their favoured means of communication, when addressed to
the instructor, are expected within a very short turnaround time. Instead of searching for an
answer themselves, students simply send an email to the professor or teaching assistant and
expect an immediate response. This new phenomenon could eventually have a possible impact
on students’ problem solving skills which could be the subject of another research study.
Many professors start to feel that this new teaching environment makes their work much
more difficult and demanding. In addition to the many demands, professors might have to think
about posting questions via social media outside of the confines of the course management
support system in order to engage students. For the instructors, it often means retooling and
retraining, specifically in how to effectively integrate the various technologies to enhance the
learning experience.
As was found in this research, in spite of the complete virtual environment of the course,
s t u d e n t sa r ed e v e l o p i n gthe t h r e ec o m p o n e n t so f t h e i rteam-building s k i l l s ,b u ti t i s n o t
completely certain if the social media tools are complementing the activities and resources of the
course or actually replacing some of them. In line with the recommendations coming out of the
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literature review conducted by Tess, 2013, this would need to be studied more deeply so as to be
a b l et o ma k es p e c i fi cr e c o mme n d a t i o n sfo r en h a n c i n gpedagogy. In a n o n l i n eco n t e x t ,the
h u m a n - t o - h u m a ni n t e r a c t i o nm i g h ts t i l lb e a s r e l e v a n ta s t h eh u m a n - c o m p u t e ri n t e r a c t i o n
experience, as evidenced by the high percentage who reported that they continue to make use of
face-to-face communication though not phone calls, in spite of the preponderance of smart phone
ownership among the student population.
All the above areas will be ripe for research for many years to come.
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