Edgar Cardenas – Integration and Implementation Insights

Four tips for developing norms for collaboration agreements

October 28, 2025

By Edgar Cardenas.

edgar-cardenas_2025 — Edgar Cardenas (biography)

Norms are the foundational building blocks for collaboration agreements. Hence, we must consider what’s an effective way for teams to develop the norms underpinning a collaboration agreement? How can teams build on experience and avoid getting bogged down when negotiating norms?

In helping teams to develop norms that enable productive collaborations, I use Richard Hackman’s definition of norms as “shared agreements among members about what behaviors are valued in the group, and what behaviors are not. They refer only to behavior, including things members say, not to unexpressed private thoughts and feelings” (Hackman, 2011, p.103).

In other words, norms that help you collaborate better must be grounded by clearly identifiable behaviors and team members must agree to abide by these norms. When developing a norm, the team then has to ask: “Is the behavior clear enough that team members have a shared understanding of the specific behavior?” and “Do we agree to using this norm?”

Establishing, discussing, and sustaining accountability in your team: Seven strategies

October 27, 2025September 24, 2024

By L. Michelle Bennett, Michael O’Rourke, and Edgar Cardenas

authors_l-michelle-bennett_michael-orourke_edgar-cardenas — 1. L. Michelle Bennett (biography)
2. Michael O’Rourke (biography
3. Edgar Cardenas (biography)

How can I hold my teammates accountable?

Being willing and able to hold yourself and others accountable depends heavily on the collaborative culture created by the team (see previous i2Insights contribution by L. Michelle Bennett on Mindset matters for interdisciplinary teams: Choose a collaborative one).

Collaborative cultures characterized by psychological safety, transparency, and an ability to engage in productive conflict provide the strongest foundation for accountability.

Team science is an integral competency for the U.S. National Science Foundation’s Convergence Accelerator Program

October 1, 2024September 10, 2024

By L. Michelle Bennett, Edgar Cardenas and Michael O’Rourke

authors_l-michelle-bennett_edgar-cardenas_michael-orourke — 1. L. Michelle Bennett (biography)
2. Edgar Cardenas (biography)
3. Michael O’Rourke (biography)

What roles do research and development agencies have in actively preparing research teams to engage productively in collaborative research? Is it enough to require that teams engaging in funded research prepare themselves to collaborate effectively?

The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Convergence Accelerator Program was launched in 2019 to fast track the development of ideas into real-world applications and solutions intended to have substantive societal and economic impact. Building upon basic research and discovery and using a convergent approach, the program accelerates use-inspired research toward impact by funding multidisciplinary teams from a wide range of disciplines and sectors to solve complex societal and economic challenges.

Writing confidentiality and anonymity into collaboration agreements

October 27, 2025November 21, 2023

By Edgar Cardenas, L. Michelle Bennett, and Michael O’Rourke

authors_edgar-cardenas_l-michelle-bennett_michael-orourke — 1. Edgar Cardenas (biography)
2. L. Michelle Bennett (biography)
3. Michael O’Rourke (biography)

How might teams create norms to scaffold the use of confidentiality and anonymity in team settings? How could a team integrate language about confidentiality and anonymity into their collaboration agreement? How can teams use these approaches and simultaneously build psychological safety and trust?

In an earlier i2Insights contribution, we provided a collaboration agreement template to help teams improve their chances of collaboration success by facilitating dialogue about shared values, norms, and processes of collaboration. This template is designed around three central dimensions of collaborative research: team management, team dynamics, and team communication.

Confidentiality and anonymity in teams

November 21, 2023

By Edgar Cardenas, L. Michelle Bennett, and Michael O’Rourke

Do confidentiality and anonymity have a place in teamwork? What are the risks and how might they be mitigated? Can teams move past the need for confidentiality and anonymity?

It takes time and intentional effort to create an environment within a team that is safe for interpersonal risk-taking (ie., a psychologically safe environment). As a team works to develop a psychologically safe environment, teammates will likely be more and more willing to speak openly about challenges. As part of this work, and in an effort to make certain all team members are comfortable sharing issues and challenges, teams may suggest adopting confidential and/or anonymous communication channels; however, there are significant risks associated with their use in teams. Here we detail some of the common risks and provide a set of design elements for dealing with them.

Confidentiality

Teammates who have concerns and are uncomfortable sharing them openly with the full team might choose to communicate confidentially with another person, who may be on the team or outside of the team.

Collaboration agreement template

November 4, 2025July 19, 2022

By L. Michelle Bennett, Edgar Cardenas and Michael O’Rourke

1. L. Michelle Bennett (biography)
2. Edgar Cardenas (biography)
2. Michael O’Rourke (biography)

As scientific research continues to move towards collaborative knowledge production, scientists must become more adept at working in teams. How can teams improve their chances of collaboration success? What is a good way to facilitate dialogue about shared values, norms and processes of collaboration? Are there ways of anticipating, identifying, and addressing obstacles as they arise?

We have designed a collaboration agreement template to assist teams in:

Making explicit and therefore transparent important aspects of their approach to collaboration
Ensuring they have a shared vision for their work together
Recognizing that their working relationships are dynamic, individually and as a team, and will require flexibility and a willingness to adapt over time
Establishing expectations for working together, including what they do and say
Preparing for disagreements and even conflicts, especially in the early stages and along the way when there are changes in team composition.

Using the arts and design to build student creative collaboration capacity

September 12, 2024May 15, 2018

By Edgar Cardenas

How can undergraduate and graduate students be helped to build their interdisciplinary collaboration capacity? In particular, how do they build capacity between the arts and other disciplines?

In 2018, I co-facilitated the annual, 3-day Emerging Creatives Student Summit, an event for approximately 100 undergraduate and graduate students from 26 universities organized by the Alliance for the Arts in Research Universities. Students’ majors ranged from the sciences, engineering, music, arts, and design.