Dream teams: a positive psychology of team working

This chapter proposes that by incorporating the principles of positive psychology into traditional models of team working, teams are able to produce exceptional collaborative outputs. There are many factors highlighted by positive psychology that can enable teams and their members to flourish. This chapter explores these and, in the process, offers the Positive Input-Process-Output (IPO) Model: a framework that we propose enables dream teams to become reality. The model identifies the key inputs (e.g., team diversity, team attachment, clear and evolving roles) and processes (e.g., optimism, potency, supportive leadership), which together can create and maintain work teams that not only perform their tasks most effectively but also satisfy the fundamental socio-emotional requirements of team-based work and human flourishing.