This stage is when the team begins to come together. The team begins to identify each member’s strengths and build on those strengths while working on the assignment. The team typically enters a comfort zone in this stage in preparation for the big push to get work done in the next stage, performing. Similar to the storming phase, you can initiate a status meeting with each team. In many instances, I use a status meeting when I feel each team is in either the storming or norming phase, and act accordingly.
One tool that works in conjunction with the status meeting is the ‘Evaluation of Progress Toward Effective Team Functioning’*, a document adapted from Jack McGourty and Kenneth De Meuse’s The Team Developer: An Assessment and Skill Building Program.
Ask each student on the team to complete this instrument before the status meeting. NOTE: this should be completed anonymously. This tool can then be used to help troubleshoot potential issues a team is having. For example, if 4 of the 5 team members answer ‘Usually’ to the question “Issues never get resolved, only put on the back burner until next time”, you can begin troubleshooting the issue right away in the status meeting. Without using some sort of tool like this, it might take the entire meeting trying to identify the specific problems the team is having. Or worse, the problem might not surface so therefore it won’t be addressed.
In addition to the status update meeting, I sometimes use a pitch presentation at this point in a large team project. The team needs to sell both myself and the rest of the class on their idea, how they will accomplish their prototype, and finally what makes it unique. When teams are in the norming stage the presentations typically are very smooth because the entire team is now unified around a specific goal. Teams that are still in the storming stage tend to present very ill-defined ideas, often illustrating a lack of direction and clarity. At this point, I might schedule a meeting with the team during office hours, to follow-up and make sure the team is making progress and moving into the norming stage.
* Oakley, B., Felder, R., Brent, R., Elhajj, I. (2004). Turning student groups into effective teams. Journal of Student Centered Learning. Vol. 2, No. 1, 8-33.