Springer Nature
A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research
14 October 2026
BY SCOTT M. GRAFFIUS | ScottGraffius.com
Recommended Citation
Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
About This Article
Source information and links for materials cited are provided in the References section.
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation," published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature), examines a cross-disciplinary team formed during the COVID-19 pandemic to develop a grant proposal. Based on that experience, the authors identify five themes they recommend teams address: Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow. Spoiler: The paper has many issues.
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" features Scott M. Graffius' research. However, its description of Graffius' work is inaccurate, and the citation is invalid. For those and other reasons, and to proactively clarify any potential misunderstandings, Graffius provides the following objective, evidence-based assessment of the paper, and he does not endorse the paper.
1. Problems With References and the Reference List
References should direct readers to identifiable sources that support the claims for which they are cited. The paper falls short on both counts. Select examples illustrate the problem.
The paper cites a RAND Corporation report, "On Distributed Communications: Summary Overview" (attributed to Baran, 2018), to support a claim that team members expanded their collaborations beyond the project. The RAND report concerns distributed communications and the development of resilient communication networks. It does not document expanded collaboration among the team members or substantiate the paper’s claims about team science and grant-writing networks.
The paper cites Tuckman and Jensen’s 1977 work on group development in connection with the proposition that scientific alignment develops through the divergence and convergence of ideas. The paper does not explain how the cited work supports this specific proposition. Without that connection, the reference does not establish the claim for which it is offered.
The reference attributed to Graffius is incorrect. The error is delineated in point 10.
2. The Evidence Is Limited and Non-Comparative
The quantitative evidence consists of four surveys of team members, with 21–36 respondents per survey, analyzed using what the paper calls univariate descriptive statistics, alongside a small network analysis.
The study reports no comparison team, no independent baseline against which to assess the intervention, no inferential statistical analysis, and no reported effect sizes or confidence intervals. The respondents were members of the team whose process was being evaluated. Some had also helped design or implement that process.
Those data can describe participants' reported experiences. They cannot, on their own, establish that the framework caused improvements, that it outperforms other approaches, or that the findings generalize to other teams.
The paper presents the five themes (Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow) as essential targets for teams. A single case can generate useful hypotheses and practical lessons, but it does not provide a sound basis for declaring a set of themes necessary or effective across settings.
The study’s descriptive evidence is not equivalent to validation. The paper does not demonstrate that its framework improves team performance.
3. The Central Constructs Were Not Adequately Measured
The paper places psychological safety, mutual trust, and respect near the center of its argument. It asserts that aligning contributions and expectations through these conditions helps teams achieve their goals.
Yet the paper does not report adequate validated measures of these central constructs. Instead, it relies on selected agreement items and network diagrams, then interprets some observed behaviors as evidence of psychological safety.
That's a substantial gap between the measurement and the claim. A network diagram may show who reported learning from whom or who was identified as a leader. It does not, by itself, establish that participants felt psychologically safe, trusted one another, or experienced mutual respect.
The paper's limitations section acknowledges that antecedent conditions were not measured directly. Its abstract and conclusion nevertheless use language that presents relationships involving these conditions as findings of the study.
The authors need to distinguish between concepts that inform their interpretation and variables their study actually measured. The paper does not make this distinction consistently, leaving insufficient empirical evidence to establish that its conclusions about key constructs are supported by the measurements.
4. Causal Claims Without a Causal Design
The paper suggests that its approaches produced positive outcomes. The design does not establish that conclusion.
Consider the reported growth in connections among team members. People brought together to work on the same grant proposal have an obvious reason to develop new working relationships: they are collaborating on a shared objective. That change could occur without the particular framework or interventions described in the paper.
The paper's conclusion states that the team significantly extended its networks, yet the paper does not report a statistical significance test supporting that claim. An increase in a reported count does not, by itself, establish statistical significance. If the authors intended "significantly" in its statistical sense, the paper does not provide the reported analysis needed to substantiate that interpretation.
The authors may reasonably report that participants described new connections or that the network diagrams contain more reported ties after team formation. Those are descriptive observations. They do not establish that the intervention caused the change.
Causal claims require evidence capable of distinguishing the proposed explanation from plausible alternatives. The study does not do that.
5. The Team Counts and Survey Denominators Need Reconciliation
The paper describes a final team of 25 members and reports 39 members at one point in the project. Its ethics statement separately refers to an original early-phase team of 44 people. The paper does not clearly reconcile these different team-size figures. The four reported survey denominators were 39, 33, 25, and 27.
There may be reasonable explanations for these different figures. Membership may have changed over time, and not every survey need have been administered to the same group. The paper should nevertheless provide a clear account of who was on the team at each stage, who received each survey, and how many people responded.
As presented, the figures do not form a readily reconciled account of team membership and participation.
Attrition also deserves more attention. The paper reports that some individuals who left the team early felt they had gained or strengthened team and people skills. However, it does not clearly explain how former team members were included in, or excluded from, the final survey, or how their experiences were accounted for in the findings.
A change from an original 44-person team to a final team of 25 is not a trivial detail in a study of intentional team formation. The paper identifies several reasons for departures or reduced engagement, including competing commitments, personal circumstances, pandemic fatigue, and perceived lack of fit as the project evolved. However, it does not clearly reconcile the different team-size figures or sufficiently explain how membership changes affected the study's assessments and findings.
The conclusions should account for that uncertainty. Findings drawn largely from those who remained may not represent the experiences of the entire group.
6. The Qualitative Analysis Is Not Sufficiently Documented
The paper states that the five themes emerged when the core author team coded the qualitative data. It provides too little information for readers to evaluate that process. The paper does not adequately explain the coding procedure, identify the number of coders, describe the codebook, explain how disagreements were handled, or specify the volume of qualitative material analyzed. The underlying qualitative data are not available for readers to inspect.
The paper also says that some recommendations draw on facilitators’ experience. That experience may be useful, but it raises a question the authors should address: how much did the five themes emerge from participants' data, and how much reflected frameworks or assumptions the facilitators brought to the project?
The themes overlap with established work on team science and team management. The paper should explain more clearly what is novel about them and how the data support that contribution.
Qualitative analysis can produce valuable findings without following a single prescribed procedure. It still requires sufficient transparency for readers to understand how researchers moved from source material to codes, from codes to themes, and from themes to recommendations. The paper provides only a limited account of that analytical process, making it difficult for readers to assess how the reported themes were derived from the underlying data.
7. The Authors Evaluated a Process in Which They Participated
The paper's evaluation raises questions about independence. All authors were members of the team or contracted team-science facilitators, and some also served on the proposal's leadership team. The team-science professionals hired to support the project participated in the process under evaluation, and some co-authored the paper. The paper declares no competing interests, while several cited works were also co-authored by members of the author team. These circumstances do not automatically invalidate the study. They do, however, heighten the importance of explaining how the evaluation was conducted, how potential bias was managed, and what evidence would have counted as an unsuccessful outcome.
The grant proposal was not funded. The authors acknowledge that outcome but emphasize multiple metrics of success and maintain that the process was nevertheless successful. There is nothing inherently wrong with identifying benefits beyond a grant award. Teams may develop skills, strengthen relationships, and generate useful ideas even when a proposal is unsuccessful. The concern is whether those additional benefits provide sufficient evidence to validate the process, particularly without clearly specified criteria for success, a systematic evaluation, or adequate safeguards against self-assessment bias.
When the people who designed and implemented a framework also determine that it worked, the assessment needs safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper does not adequately demonstrate such safeguards. Consequently, the authors' favorable interpretation is difficult to distinguish from their own assessment of the work, particularly because the paper does not sufficiently establish how potential bias was managed or how the reported evidence was used to evaluate success.
The ethics disclosure also deserves attention. The authors report that participant recruitment, consent, and data collection preceded the institutional review board (IRB) determination. They explain that the activities were initially conducted as a team assessment rather than as research, and that the decision to publish arose later. Written permission to use de-identified survey data for manuscript development was subsequently sought from participants. These circumstances warrant consideration alongside the study’s methods, consent arrangements, and the authors’ account of why prospective IRB review was not required.
8. The Recommendations Go Beyond What Was Tested
The paper's section on cross-disciplinary team applications describes the five themes as "particularly valuable" for five types of teams, including teams forming in virtual environments, large multi-institutional consortia, and teams in high-stakes or high-uncertainty contexts.
The authors attribute these broader recommendations in part to facilitators’ experience. Such experience can inform a proposal, but it does not establish that the framework has been tested or shown to work in all the settings listed.
The paper would be stronger if it identified these applications as hypotheses or practitioner recommendations for future evaluation. As written, the language sometimes presents extrapolations as established findings.
9. Editorial Errors
The paper has editorial problems. For example, the Figure 6 caption gives a response scale as "strongly disagree, disagree, neither agree nor agree, agree, or strongly disagree." The labels are internally inconsistent: the middle category is malformed, the "strongly disagree" endpoint is repeated, and “strongly agree” is absent.
Elsewhere, the paper refers to "a tenant of psychological safety" where "tenet" is intended.
10. The Citation of Graffius’ Work Is Incorrect as Presented
For context and clarity, information on Graffius' work is presented below. Issues with the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper follow it.
The "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper states: "Graffius (2024) updates Tuckman and Jensen’s (1977) framework, noting limited practical evidence and strategies specifically for the Forming stage." Immediately before this statement, the authors note, "… studies still flag the team formation stage as a critical but under-explored period." Immediately after the sentence about Graffius, they state, "… demonstrates unexplored dynamics in initial collaboration interaction." However, the paper's characterization of Graffius' work is incorrect. The Forming phase is neither unexplored nor under-explored.
The paper's reference list gives the following citation:
Graffius S (2024) Revisiting Tuckman: evidence-based strategies for the forming stage of team development. J Leadersh Organ Stud 31(1):5–16.
The citation is invalid:
As summarized above, Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" has been used and cited by publications and others worldwide. Based on context, the 2024 submission date of the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper, and its reference to Graffius' 2024 work, the correct citation would be:
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" documents one team's experience and proposes lessons for other teams. It may offer useful ideas, but it does not establish that its five themes are necessary, that the framework improves team performance, or that its broader recommendations are empirically validated. The study is a single, unreplicated case based largely on internal self-reports, without a comparison group or adequate measurement of several central constructs. Broader claims require clear operational definitions, appropriate measures, transparent analytical procedures, a reconciled account of team membership and survey participation, and research designs capable of testing outcomes.
The paper’s conclusions are further undermined by causal claims unsupported by the study design, network interpretations that exceed the reported analysis, inconsistent accounts of team membership, insufficiently transparent qualitative procedures, and other methodological and reporting issues. The authors also evaluate a process in which they participated and judge it successful despite the grant proposal’s failure to secure funding, without sufficiently establishing safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper mischaracterizes Scott M. Graffius' work and it provides an invalid citation.
Readers should treat the paper’s findings with caution. Graffius does not endorse the paper.
Brennan, A. N., Rollinson, C. R., Love, H., Schulz, A. N., Reidy, B., Grossman, J. J., Dickmann, E. M., Fisher, E. R., McCormack, L., Richardson, A. D., LaMontagne, J., Helmus, M. R., & Li, D. (2026, September 29). Five core themes of intentional team formation. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
Graffius, S. M. (2026, January 3). Scott M. Graffius' Phases of Team Development - Applied to Human Teams and Human-AI Teams: 2026 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.18184.89601
The authors of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and their affiliations, as listed in the paper, are:
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications is a peer-reviewed, fully open-access journal published by Springer Nature. Launched in 2015 as Palgrave Communications, it adopted its current name in June 2020. The journal publishes research across the humanities, social sciences, and behavioural sciences, including interdisciplinary scholarship using theoretical, qualitative, quantitative, and methodological approaches. Its stated editorial commitments include rigorous peer review, robust research, and high editorial and ethical standards. Articles are published online and made freely accessible to readers. The journal’s broad scope encompasses psychology, sociology, management, communication, education, and complex networks.
Springer Nature is a global research, educational, and professional publisher formed in 2015 through the combination of Nature Publishing Group, Macmillan Education, and Springer Science+Business Media. Its publishing portfolio includes scholarly journals, academic books, and research resources spanning science, technology, medicine, the humanities, and the social sciences. The company supports researchers, educators, students, and professionals through its publishing platforms and related services. Springer Nature also maintains publishing policies addressing research integrity, editorial standards, and publication ethics. It publishes Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, the journal examined in this article.
Scott M. Graffius is a technology leader, researcher, award-winning author, practitioner, consultant, thought leader, and international public speaker specializing in AI, Agile, project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), PMO leadership, and teamwork tradecraft. His work explores the intersection of human ingenuity and emerging technology, with a strong practitioner voice grounded in research, experimentation, and experience. His focus includes innovation, organizational performance, and the evolving practice of teamwork, including the "exotic team dynamics" that emerge when people collaborate with advanced artificial intelligence (agentic, autonomous, or autopoietic AI). Graffius has delivered more than $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations spanning technology, entertainment and media, financial services, healthcare, government, and other industries.
Businesses, professional associations, government agencies, universities, publications, and media outlets use Graffius and his work. Examples include Adobe, Bayer, Boston University, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Ford, Gartner, Harvard Medical School, IEEE, Innovation Project Management, Johns Hopkins University, Microsoft, MSN, National Academy of Sciences, Oracle, Pinterest Inc., Project Management Institute, UC San Diego, Verizon, Yale University, and others.
The following sections highlight his experience, leadership, contributions, research, and enduring influence across industries and institutions worldwide.
Experience
Graffius heads the professional services firm Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions, along with its subsidiary Exceptional Agility. These consultancies offer strategic and tactical advisory, training, embedded expertise, and consulting services to the public, private, and government sectors. They help organizations enhance their capabilities and results in agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership, supporting innovation and driving competitive advantage. The consultancies confidently back services with a Delighted Client Guarantee™.
Graffius is a former VP of project management with a publicly traded provider of diverse consumer products and services over the Internet. Before that, he ran and supervised the delivery of projects and programs in public and private organizations with businesses ranging from e-commerce to advanced technology products and services, retail, manufacturing, entertainment and media, and more.
He has experience with consumer, business, reseller, government, and international markets.
Additional information is on LinkedIn.
Award-Winning Author
Graffius has authored three books.
Graffius' first book, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions, earned 17 awards. It provides a practical, step-by-step guide to Scrum, enabling teams to deliver products in short cycles with rapid adaptation, fast time-to-market, and continuous improvement—which supports innovation and drives competitive advantage.
Additional information on Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions is here.
His second book, Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change, was named one of the best Scrum books of all time by BookAuthority. It tells the compelling story of an entertainment company's agile transformation—offering lessons that apply across industries.
Additional information on Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change is here.
Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum, is his third book—and his first work of fiction.
It's a fast-paced satirical story by that dismantles corporate Agile cosplay and other forms of "fake Agile" while delivering practical insights, actionable guidance, and proven practices for real-world Agile transformation success.
Packed with humor, quirky characters, sharp commentary on corporate culture and workplace absurdities, and actionable tips, it’s a must-read for Scrum Masters, Product Owners, Agile Coaches, Agile Project Managers, and other professionals interested in Agile project management and enterprise agility.
Additional information on Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum is here.
International Public Speaker
Organizations worldwide engage Graffius to present on technology (including AI), Agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership. He crafts and delivers unique and compelling talks and workshops.
Graffius has conducted 99 sessions across 25 countries. Select examples of events include Agile Trends Gov, BSides (Newcastle Upon Tyne), Conf42 Quantum Computing, DevDays Europe, DevOps Institute, DevOpsDays (Geneva), Frug’Agile, IEEE, Microsoft, Scottish Summit, Scrum Alliance RSG (Nepal), Techstars, and W Love Games International Video Game Development Conference (Helsinki), Future of Work and Advanced AI (Paris, France), and more.
With an average rating of 4.82 (on a scale of 1-5), sessions are highly valued.
The request form is here.
Thought Leadership and Influence
Prominent businesses, professional associations, government agencies, and universities have showcased Graffius and his contributions—spanning his books, talks, workshops, and beyond. Select examples include:
Graffius has played a key role in the Project Management Institute (PMI) in developing professional standards. He was a member of multiple teams that authored, reviewed, and produced:
He was also a subject matter expert reviewer of content for the PMI’s Congress. Beyond the PMI, Graffius also served as a member of the review team for two of the Scrum Alliance’s Global Scrum Gatherings.
Authority on Teamwork Tradecraft
Graffius is a renowned and highly-cited authority on teamwork tradecraft. Informed by the research of Bruce W. Tuckman and Mary Ann C. Jensen, over 150 subsequent studies, and Graffius' first-hand professional experience with, and analysis of, team leadership and performance, Graffius created his "Phases of Team Development" intellectual property as a unique perspective and visual conveying the five phases of team development.
First introduced in 2008 and periodically updated, his work provides a diagnostic and strategic guide for navigating team dynamics. It provides actionable insights for leaders across industries to develop high-performance teams.
Its adoption by esteemed organizations—such as Yale University, IEEE, Cisco, Microsoft, Ford, Oracle, Broadcom, the U.S. National Park Service, and the Journal of Neurosurgery, among others—highlights its utility and value, solidifying its status as an indispensable resource for elevating team performance and driving organizational excellence.
In 2026, Graffius added human-AI teamwork—including the "exotic team dynamics" which emerge when advanced AI collaborates as a teammate—to his "Phases of Team Development." The 2026 edition is here.
Expert on Temporal Dynamics on Social Media Platforms
Graffius is also an authority on temporal dynamics on social media platforms. His "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research—first published in 2018 and updated annually—delivers a precise quantitative analysis of post longevity across digital platforms, utilizing advanced statistical techniques to determine mean half-life with precision. It establishes a solid empirical base, effectively highlighting the ephemeral nature of content within social media ecosystems.
Referenced and applied by leading entities—such as Fast Company, GoDaddy, Journal of Hand Surgery (European Volume), Ministère de la Culture, Pinterest Inc., PNAS, and Telecommunications Policy, among others—his research exemplifies methodological rigor and sustained significance in the field of digital informatics.
The 2026 edition of Graffius "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research is here.
Education and Professional Certifications
Graffius has a bachelor’s degree in psychology with a focus in Human Factors. He holds eight professional certifications:
He is an active member of the Scrum Alliance, the Project Management Institute (PMI), and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
Advancing AI, Agile, and Project/PMO Management
Scott M. Graffius continues to advance the fields of AI, Agile, and project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), and PMO leadership. Businesses and other organizations leverage Graffius’ insights to drive their success.
Graffius has generated over $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations served. Put that track record to work for you. For speaking engagements, use the request form; for other inquiries, email him.
Connect with and follow Scott on LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook, Bluesky, Mastodon, and ResearchGate.
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Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
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This article discusses the "Five core themes of intentional team formation" paper by Andrea N. Brennan, Christine R. Rollinson, Hannah Love, Ashley N. Schulz, Brendon Reidy, Jake J. Grossman, Ellyn M. Dickmann, Ellen R. Fisher, Luke McCormack, Andrew D. Richardson, Jalene LaMontagne, Matthew R. Helmus, and Daijiang Li, published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature) on 29 September 2026: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w.
The paper references Scott M. Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" research on teamwork tradecraft.
The paper is © 2026 The Author(s) and is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
This article includes brief excerpts from the paper, attributed to its authors and used under the fair use doctrine (17 U.S.C. § 107) for purposes of news reporting, commentary, and analysis. This article is independent commentary and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the paper's authors or Springer Nature.
"Phases of Team Development" is copyright © Scott M. Graffius. All rights reserved.
If there are any supplements or updates to this article after the date of publication, they will appear here.
Copyright © Scott M. Graffius. All rights reserved.
Content on this site—including text, images, videos, and data—may not be used for training or input into any artificial intelligence, machine learning, or automatized learning systems, or published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without the express written permission of Scott M. Graffius.
Recommended Citation
Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
About This Article
Source information and links for materials cited are provided in the References section.
Introduction
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation," published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature), examines a cross-disciplinary team formed during the COVID-19 pandemic to develop a grant proposal. Based on that experience, the authors identify five themes they recommend teams address: Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow. Spoiler: The paper has many issues.
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" features Scott M. Graffius' research. However, its description of Graffius' work is inaccurate, and the citation is invalid. For those and other reasons, and to proactively clarify any potential misunderstandings, Graffius provides the following objective, evidence-based assessment of the paper, and he does not endorse the paper.
10 Key Issues
1. Problems With References and the Reference List
References should direct readers to identifiable sources that support the claims for which they are cited. The paper falls short on both counts. Select examples illustrate the problem.
The paper cites a RAND Corporation report, "On Distributed Communications: Summary Overview" (attributed to Baran, 2018), to support a claim that team members expanded their collaborations beyond the project. The RAND report concerns distributed communications and the development of resilient communication networks. It does not document expanded collaboration among the team members or substantiate the paper’s claims about team science and grant-writing networks.
The paper cites Tuckman and Jensen’s 1977 work on group development in connection with the proposition that scientific alignment develops through the divergence and convergence of ideas. The paper does not explain how the cited work supports this specific proposition. Without that connection, the reference does not establish the claim for which it is offered.
The reference attributed to Graffius is incorrect. The error is delineated in point 10.
2. The Evidence Is Limited and Non-Comparative
The quantitative evidence consists of four surveys of team members, with 21–36 respondents per survey, analyzed using what the paper calls univariate descriptive statistics, alongside a small network analysis.
The study reports no comparison team, no independent baseline against which to assess the intervention, no inferential statistical analysis, and no reported effect sizes or confidence intervals. The respondents were members of the team whose process was being evaluated. Some had also helped design or implement that process.
Those data can describe participants' reported experiences. They cannot, on their own, establish that the framework caused improvements, that it outperforms other approaches, or that the findings generalize to other teams.
The paper presents the five themes (Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow) as essential targets for teams. A single case can generate useful hypotheses and practical lessons, but it does not provide a sound basis for declaring a set of themes necessary or effective across settings.
The study’s descriptive evidence is not equivalent to validation. The paper does not demonstrate that its framework improves team performance.
3. The Central Constructs Were Not Adequately Measured
The paper places psychological safety, mutual trust, and respect near the center of its argument. It asserts that aligning contributions and expectations through these conditions helps teams achieve their goals.
Yet the paper does not report adequate validated measures of these central constructs. Instead, it relies on selected agreement items and network diagrams, then interprets some observed behaviors as evidence of psychological safety.
That's a substantial gap between the measurement and the claim. A network diagram may show who reported learning from whom or who was identified as a leader. It does not, by itself, establish that participants felt psychologically safe, trusted one another, or experienced mutual respect.
The paper's limitations section acknowledges that antecedent conditions were not measured directly. Its abstract and conclusion nevertheless use language that presents relationships involving these conditions as findings of the study.
The authors need to distinguish between concepts that inform their interpretation and variables their study actually measured. The paper does not make this distinction consistently, leaving insufficient empirical evidence to establish that its conclusions about key constructs are supported by the measurements.
4. Causal Claims Without a Causal Design
The paper suggests that its approaches produced positive outcomes. The design does not establish that conclusion.
Consider the reported growth in connections among team members. People brought together to work on the same grant proposal have an obvious reason to develop new working relationships: they are collaborating on a shared objective. That change could occur without the particular framework or interventions described in the paper.
The paper's conclusion states that the team significantly extended its networks, yet the paper does not report a statistical significance test supporting that claim. An increase in a reported count does not, by itself, establish statistical significance. If the authors intended "significantly" in its statistical sense, the paper does not provide the reported analysis needed to substantiate that interpretation.
The authors may reasonably report that participants described new connections or that the network diagrams contain more reported ties after team formation. Those are descriptive observations. They do not establish that the intervention caused the change.
Causal claims require evidence capable of distinguishing the proposed explanation from plausible alternatives. The study does not do that.
5. The Team Counts and Survey Denominators Need Reconciliation
The paper describes a final team of 25 members and reports 39 members at one point in the project. Its ethics statement separately refers to an original early-phase team of 44 people. The paper does not clearly reconcile these different team-size figures. The four reported survey denominators were 39, 33, 25, and 27.
There may be reasonable explanations for these different figures. Membership may have changed over time, and not every survey need have been administered to the same group. The paper should nevertheless provide a clear account of who was on the team at each stage, who received each survey, and how many people responded.
As presented, the figures do not form a readily reconciled account of team membership and participation.
Attrition also deserves more attention. The paper reports that some individuals who left the team early felt they had gained or strengthened team and people skills. However, it does not clearly explain how former team members were included in, or excluded from, the final survey, or how their experiences were accounted for in the findings.
A change from an original 44-person team to a final team of 25 is not a trivial detail in a study of intentional team formation. The paper identifies several reasons for departures or reduced engagement, including competing commitments, personal circumstances, pandemic fatigue, and perceived lack of fit as the project evolved. However, it does not clearly reconcile the different team-size figures or sufficiently explain how membership changes affected the study's assessments and findings.
The conclusions should account for that uncertainty. Findings drawn largely from those who remained may not represent the experiences of the entire group.
6. The Qualitative Analysis Is Not Sufficiently Documented
The paper states that the five themes emerged when the core author team coded the qualitative data. It provides too little information for readers to evaluate that process. The paper does not adequately explain the coding procedure, identify the number of coders, describe the codebook, explain how disagreements were handled, or specify the volume of qualitative material analyzed. The underlying qualitative data are not available for readers to inspect.
The paper also says that some recommendations draw on facilitators’ experience. That experience may be useful, but it raises a question the authors should address: how much did the five themes emerge from participants' data, and how much reflected frameworks or assumptions the facilitators brought to the project?
The themes overlap with established work on team science and team management. The paper should explain more clearly what is novel about them and how the data support that contribution.
Qualitative analysis can produce valuable findings without following a single prescribed procedure. It still requires sufficient transparency for readers to understand how researchers moved from source material to codes, from codes to themes, and from themes to recommendations. The paper provides only a limited account of that analytical process, making it difficult for readers to assess how the reported themes were derived from the underlying data.
7. The Authors Evaluated a Process in Which They Participated
The paper's evaluation raises questions about independence. All authors were members of the team or contracted team-science facilitators, and some also served on the proposal's leadership team. The team-science professionals hired to support the project participated in the process under evaluation, and some co-authored the paper. The paper declares no competing interests, while several cited works were also co-authored by members of the author team. These circumstances do not automatically invalidate the study. They do, however, heighten the importance of explaining how the evaluation was conducted, how potential bias was managed, and what evidence would have counted as an unsuccessful outcome.
The grant proposal was not funded. The authors acknowledge that outcome but emphasize multiple metrics of success and maintain that the process was nevertheless successful. There is nothing inherently wrong with identifying benefits beyond a grant award. Teams may develop skills, strengthen relationships, and generate useful ideas even when a proposal is unsuccessful. The concern is whether those additional benefits provide sufficient evidence to validate the process, particularly without clearly specified criteria for success, a systematic evaluation, or adequate safeguards against self-assessment bias.
When the people who designed and implemented a framework also determine that it worked, the assessment needs safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper does not adequately demonstrate such safeguards. Consequently, the authors' favorable interpretation is difficult to distinguish from their own assessment of the work, particularly because the paper does not sufficiently establish how potential bias was managed or how the reported evidence was used to evaluate success.
The ethics disclosure also deserves attention. The authors report that participant recruitment, consent, and data collection preceded the institutional review board (IRB) determination. They explain that the activities were initially conducted as a team assessment rather than as research, and that the decision to publish arose later. Written permission to use de-identified survey data for manuscript development was subsequently sought from participants. These circumstances warrant consideration alongside the study’s methods, consent arrangements, and the authors’ account of why prospective IRB review was not required.
8. The Recommendations Go Beyond What Was Tested
The paper's section on cross-disciplinary team applications describes the five themes as "particularly valuable" for five types of teams, including teams forming in virtual environments, large multi-institutional consortia, and teams in high-stakes or high-uncertainty contexts.
The authors attribute these broader recommendations in part to facilitators’ experience. Such experience can inform a proposal, but it does not establish that the framework has been tested or shown to work in all the settings listed.
The paper would be stronger if it identified these applications as hypotheses or practitioner recommendations for future evaluation. As written, the language sometimes presents extrapolations as established findings.
9. Editorial Errors
The paper has editorial problems. For example, the Figure 6 caption gives a response scale as "strongly disagree, disagree, neither agree nor agree, agree, or strongly disagree." The labels are internally inconsistent: the middle category is malformed, the "strongly disagree" endpoint is repeated, and “strongly agree” is absent.
Elsewhere, the paper refers to "a tenant of psychological safety" where "tenet" is intended.
10. The Citation of Graffius’ Work Is Incorrect as Presented
For context and clarity, information on Graffius' work is presented below. Issues with the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper follow it.
Background and Context on Graffius' "Phases of Team Development"
Team development is commonly described as a progression through five phases or stages: Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing, and Adjourning. Bruce W. Tuckman introduced the first four phases in 1965, and he and Mary Ann C. Jensen added the fifth phase in 1977. Tuckman and Jensen described these phases only in broad, general terms, without codifying specific characteristics, strategies, or a performance graph.
Scott M. Graffius subsequently developed and codified what Tuckman and Jensen did not: a detailed, structured set of diagnostic characteristics for each phase; a corresponding set of practical strategies for each phase; and an original, proprietary, empirically derived performance graph built from statistical analysis of thousands of data points across hundreds of diverse projects. Graffius created his "Phases of Team Development" as a unique perspective and visual conveying the five phases of team development, inclusive of a graph showing how performance varies by phase, as well as the characteristics and strategies for each phase. Leaders can apply these insights to advance the effectiveness and success of teams.
Graffius initially developed his unique material in 2008 and periodically updates it. He expanded it, for example, in 2026 to include content on human-AI teaming, where artificial intelligence is advanced (agentic, autonomous, or autopoietic). It builds on his work on hundreds of projects (including AI development), his expertise in teamwork tradecraft (both human teams and human-AI teams, including the exotic team dynamics that emerge from human-AI teams), and his analysis of hundreds of studies on both human-only and human-AI collaboration.
The actionable insights provide a practical framework to navigate the complexities of team dynamics. Graffius' resource helps practitioners advance the effectiveness and success of both human-only and human-AI teams.
Businesses, professional associations, government agencies, universities, publications, and media outlets have used and cited Graffius' "Phases of Team Development." Select examples include:
- Adobe
- American Management Association
- Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute
- Bayer
- Boston University
- Broadcom
- Buckinghamshire New University
- Cisco
- DevOps Institute
- Erste Group Bank AG
- Ford Motor Company
- Government of Finland
- HAN University of Applied Sciences
- Hasso-Plattner-Institut für Digital Engineering GmbH
- How Teams Work
- IEEE Access
- Johns Hopkins University
- Journal of Neurosurgery
- Microsoft
- National Science Foundation’s LTER Network
- Northeast Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA)
- Ohio State University
- Oracle
- Proceedings of the 2023 International Conference on Decision Aid Sciences and Applications (DASA)
- Royal Australasian College of Physicians
- Technical University of Munich
- Torrens University
- Tufts University
- U.S. National Park Service
- U.S. Soccer
- U.S. Tennis Association
- UC San Diego
- UK Sports Institute
- University of Galway
- University of Greenwich
- University of New South Wales
- Warsaw University of Technology
- Yale University
- And many more
Read more here: Phases of Team Development
The "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper states: "Graffius (2024) updates Tuckman and Jensen’s (1977) framework, noting limited practical evidence and strategies specifically for the Forming stage." Immediately before this statement, the authors note, "… studies still flag the team formation stage as a critical but under-explored period." Immediately after the sentence about Graffius, they state, "… demonstrates unexplored dynamics in initial collaboration interaction." However, the paper's characterization of Graffius' work is incorrect. The Forming phase is neither unexplored nor under-explored.
The paper's reference list gives the following citation:
Graffius S (2024) Revisiting Tuckman: evidence-based strategies for the forming stage of team development. J Leadersh Organ Stud 31(1):5–16.
The citation is invalid:
- The paper indicates: "Revisiting Tuckman: evidence-based strategies for the forming stage of team development," on pages 5-16, in issue 1, volume 31, of the Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies.
- However, there is no such article in the Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies. Further, there is no article on pages 5-16 of it. What appears on pages 5-24 is: "Disobeying the Leader: Creative Deviance as a Mechanism Between Psychological Ownership and Social Undermining," written by Jigyashu Shukla, Rebecca Bennett, Robert Folger, and Ronit Kark.
As summarized above, Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" has been used and cited by publications and others worldwide. Based on context, the 2024 submission date of the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper, and its reference to Graffius' 2024 work, the correct citation would be:
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
Conclusion
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" documents one team's experience and proposes lessons for other teams. It may offer useful ideas, but it does not establish that its five themes are necessary, that the framework improves team performance, or that its broader recommendations are empirically validated. The study is a single, unreplicated case based largely on internal self-reports, without a comparison group or adequate measurement of several central constructs. Broader claims require clear operational definitions, appropriate measures, transparent analytical procedures, a reconciled account of team membership and survey participation, and research designs capable of testing outcomes.
The paper’s conclusions are further undermined by causal claims unsupported by the study design, network interpretations that exceed the reported analysis, inconsistent accounts of team membership, insufficiently transparent qualitative procedures, and other methodological and reporting issues. The authors also evaluate a process in which they participated and judge it successful despite the grant proposal’s failure to secure funding, without sufficiently establishing safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper mischaracterizes Scott M. Graffius' work and it provides an invalid citation.
Readers should treat the paper’s findings with caution. Graffius does not endorse the paper.
References
Brennan, A. N., Rollinson, C. R., Love, H., Schulz, A. N., Reidy, B., Grossman, J. J., Dickmann, E. M., Fisher, E. R., McCormack, L., Richardson, A. D., LaMontagne, J., Helmus, M. R., & Li, D. (2026, September 29). Five core themes of intentional team formation. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
Graffius, S. M. (2026, January 3). Scott M. Graffius' Phases of Team Development - Applied to Human Teams and Human-AI Teams: 2026 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.18184.89601
About the Authors of the Paper
The authors of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and their affiliations, as listed in the paper, are:
- Andrea N. Brennan, Christine R. Rollinson, Brendon Reidy, and Luke McCormack: Morton Arboretum, Lisle, Illinois, USA
- Hannah Love: Divergent Science, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA
- Ellen R. Fisher: Divergent Science, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA; University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA
- Ashley N. Schulz: Mississippi State University, Starkville, Mississippi, USA
- Jake J. Grossman: St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota, USA
- Ellyn M. Dickmann: Dickmann and Associates, LLC, Loveland, Colorado, USA
- Andrew D. Richardson: Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, Arizona, USA
- Jalene LaMontagne: University of Missouri–St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri, USA; Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, Missouri, USA
- Matthew R. Helmus: Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
- Daijiang Li: University of Wisconsin–Madison, Madison, Wisconsin, USA
About the Paper’s Journal: Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications is a peer-reviewed, fully open-access journal published by Springer Nature. Launched in 2015 as Palgrave Communications, it adopted its current name in June 2020. The journal publishes research across the humanities, social sciences, and behavioural sciences, including interdisciplinary scholarship using theoretical, qualitative, quantitative, and methodological approaches. Its stated editorial commitments include rigorous peer review, robust research, and high editorial and ethical standards. Articles are published online and made freely accessible to readers. The journal’s broad scope encompasses psychology, sociology, management, communication, education, and complex networks.
About the Journal’s Publisher: Springer Nature
Springer Nature is a global research, educational, and professional publisher formed in 2015 through the combination of Nature Publishing Group, Macmillan Education, and Springer Science+Business Media. Its publishing portfolio includes scholarly journals, academic books, and research resources spanning science, technology, medicine, the humanities, and the social sciences. The company supports researchers, educators, students, and professionals through its publishing platforms and related services. Springer Nature also maintains publishing policies addressing research integrity, editorial standards, and publication ethics. It publishes Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, the journal examined in this article.
About Scott M. Graffius
Scott M. Graffius is a technology leader, researcher, award-winning author, practitioner, consultant, thought leader, and international public speaker specializing in AI, Agile, project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), PMO leadership, and teamwork tradecraft. His work explores the intersection of human ingenuity and emerging technology, with a strong practitioner voice grounded in research, experimentation, and experience. His focus includes innovation, organizational performance, and the evolving practice of teamwork, including the "exotic team dynamics" that emerge when people collaborate with advanced artificial intelligence (agentic, autonomous, or autopoietic AI). Graffius has delivered more than $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations spanning technology, entertainment and media, financial services, healthcare, government, and other industries.
Businesses, professional associations, government agencies, universities, publications, and media outlets use Graffius and his work. Examples include Adobe, Bayer, Boston University, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Ford, Gartner, Harvard Medical School, IEEE, Innovation Project Management, Johns Hopkins University, Microsoft, MSN, National Academy of Sciences, Oracle, Pinterest Inc., Project Management Institute, UC San Diego, Verizon, Yale University, and others.
The following sections highlight his experience, leadership, contributions, research, and enduring influence across industries and institutions worldwide.
Experience
Graffius heads the professional services firm Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions, along with its subsidiary Exceptional Agility. These consultancies offer strategic and tactical advisory, training, embedded expertise, and consulting services to the public, private, and government sectors. They help organizations enhance their capabilities and results in agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership, supporting innovation and driving competitive advantage. The consultancies confidently back services with a Delighted Client Guarantee™.
Graffius is a former VP of project management with a publicly traded provider of diverse consumer products and services over the Internet. Before that, he ran and supervised the delivery of projects and programs in public and private organizations with businesses ranging from e-commerce to advanced technology products and services, retail, manufacturing, entertainment and media, and more.
He has experience with consumer, business, reseller, government, and international markets.
Additional information is on LinkedIn.
Award-Winning Author
Graffius has authored three books.
Graffius' first book, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions, earned 17 awards. It provides a practical, step-by-step guide to Scrum, enabling teams to deliver products in short cycles with rapid adaptation, fast time-to-market, and continuous improvement—which supports innovation and drives competitive advantage.
- Paperback ISBN-13: 9781533370242
- Kindle ASIN: B01FZ0JIIY
Additional information on Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions is here.
His second book, Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change, was named one of the best Scrum books of all time by BookAuthority. It tells the compelling story of an entertainment company's agile transformation—offering lessons that apply across industries.
- Paperback ISBN-13: 9781072447962
- Kindle ASIN: B07R9LJLPJ
Additional information on Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change is here.
Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum, is his third book—and his first work of fiction.
It's a fast-paced satirical story by that dismantles corporate Agile cosplay and other forms of "fake Agile" while delivering practical insights, actionable guidance, and proven practices for real-world Agile transformation success.
Packed with humor, quirky characters, sharp commentary on corporate culture and workplace absurdities, and actionable tips, it’s a must-read for Scrum Masters, Product Owners, Agile Coaches, Agile Project Managers, and other professionals interested in Agile project management and enterprise agility.
- Kindle ASIN: B0F2SJ83WT
- Audible ASIN: B0DJG163R5
Additional information on Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum is here.
International Public Speaker
Organizations worldwide engage Graffius to present on technology (including AI), Agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership. He crafts and delivers unique and compelling talks and workshops.
Graffius has conducted 99 sessions across 25 countries. Select examples of events include Agile Trends Gov, BSides (Newcastle Upon Tyne), Conf42 Quantum Computing, DevDays Europe, DevOps Institute, DevOpsDays (Geneva), Frug’Agile, IEEE, Microsoft, Scottish Summit, Scrum Alliance RSG (Nepal), Techstars, and W Love Games International Video Game Development Conference (Helsinki), Future of Work and Advanced AI (Paris, France), and more.
With an average rating of 4.82 (on a scale of 1-5), sessions are highly valued.
The request form is here.
Thought Leadership and Influence
Prominent businesses, professional associations, government agencies, and universities have showcased Graffius and his contributions—spanning his books, talks, workshops, and beyond. Select examples include:
- Adobe,
- American Management Association,
- Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute,
- Bayer,
- BCG,
- BMC Software,
- Boston Consulting Group (BCG),
- Boston University,
- Broadcom,
- Cisco,
- Coburg University of Applied Sciences and Arts - Germany,
- Computer Weekly,
- Constructor University - Germany,
- Data Governance Success,
- Deimos Aerospace,
- DevOps Institute,
- Dropbox,
- EU's European Commission,
- Federal Reserve Bank of New York,
- Ford Motor Company,
- Gartner,
- GoDaddy,
- Harvard Medical School,
- Hasso Plattner Institute - Germany,
- IEEE,
- Innovation Project Management,
- Johns Hopkins University,
- Journal of Marketing,
- Journal of Neurosurgery,
- Lam Research (Semiconductors),
- Leadership Worthy,
- Life Sciences Trainers and Educators Network,
- London South Bank University,
- Microsoft,
- MSN,
- NASSCOM,
- National Academy of Sciences,
- New Zealand Government,
- Ohio State University,
- Oracle,
- Pinterest Inc.,
- Project Management Institute,
- Mary Raum (Professor of National Security Affairs, United States Naval War College),
- Round Square Global Educational Network,
- Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP),
- SANS Institute,
- SBG Neumark - Germany,
- Singapore Institute of Technology,
- Torrens University - Australia,
- TBS Switzerland,
- Tufts University,
- UC San Diego,
- UK Sports Institute,
- University of Galway - Ireland,
- US Department of Energy,
- US National Park Service,
- US Soccer,
- US Tennis Association,
- Verizon,
- Wrike,
- Yale University,
- and many others.
Graffius has played a key role in the Project Management Institute (PMI) in developing professional standards. He was a member of multiple teams that authored, reviewed, and produced:
- The Standard for Artificial Intelligence in Portfolio, Program, and Project Management.
- Agile Practice Guide — Second Edition.
- A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) — Eighth Edition.
- A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) — Sixth Edition.
- The Standard for Program Management — Fourth Edition.
- Practice Standard for Work Breakdown Structures — Second Edition.
- The Practice Standard for Project Estimating — Second Edition.
He was also a subject matter expert reviewer of content for the PMI’s Congress. Beyond the PMI, Graffius also served as a member of the review team for two of the Scrum Alliance’s Global Scrum Gatherings.
Authority on Teamwork Tradecraft
Graffius is a renowned and highly-cited authority on teamwork tradecraft. Informed by the research of Bruce W. Tuckman and Mary Ann C. Jensen, over 150 subsequent studies, and Graffius' first-hand professional experience with, and analysis of, team leadership and performance, Graffius created his "Phases of Team Development" intellectual property as a unique perspective and visual conveying the five phases of team development.
First introduced in 2008 and periodically updated, his work provides a diagnostic and strategic guide for navigating team dynamics. It provides actionable insights for leaders across industries to develop high-performance teams.
Its adoption by esteemed organizations—such as Yale University, IEEE, Cisco, Microsoft, Ford, Oracle, Broadcom, the U.S. National Park Service, and the Journal of Neurosurgery, among others—highlights its utility and value, solidifying its status as an indispensable resource for elevating team performance and driving organizational excellence.
In 2026, Graffius added human-AI teamwork—including the "exotic team dynamics" which emerge when advanced AI collaborates as a teammate—to his "Phases of Team Development." The 2026 edition is here.
Expert on Temporal Dynamics on Social Media Platforms
Graffius is also an authority on temporal dynamics on social media platforms. His "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research—first published in 2018 and updated annually—delivers a precise quantitative analysis of post longevity across digital platforms, utilizing advanced statistical techniques to determine mean half-life with precision. It establishes a solid empirical base, effectively highlighting the ephemeral nature of content within social media ecosystems.
Referenced and applied by leading entities—such as Fast Company, GoDaddy, Journal of Hand Surgery (European Volume), Ministère de la Culture, Pinterest Inc., PNAS, and Telecommunications Policy, among others—his research exemplifies methodological rigor and sustained significance in the field of digital informatics.
The 2026 edition of Graffius "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research is here.
Education and Professional Certifications
Graffius has a bachelor’s degree in psychology with a focus in Human Factors. He holds eight professional certifications:
- Certified SAFe 6 Agilist (SA),
- Certified Scrum Professional - ScrumMaster (CSP-SM),
- Certified Scrum Professional - Product Owner (CSP-PO),
- Certified ScrumMaster (CSM),
- Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO),
- Project Management Professional (PMP),
- Lean Six Sigma Green Belt (LSSGB), and
- IT Service Management Foundation (ITIL).
He is an active member of the Scrum Alliance, the Project Management Institute (PMI), and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
Advancing AI, Agile, and Project/PMO Management
Scott M. Graffius continues to advance the fields of AI, Agile, and project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), and PMO leadership. Businesses and other organizations leverage Graffius’ insights to drive their success.
Booking
Graffius has generated over $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations served. Put that track record to work for you. For speaking engagements, use the request form; for other inquiries, email him.
Connect with and follow Scott on LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook, Bluesky, Mastodon, and ResearchGate.
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(Want more features? You can always upgrade to a paid plan.)
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How to Cite This Article
Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
Coming soon
Content Acknowledgements
Names, marks, and content are the property of their respective owners.
This article discusses the "Five core themes of intentional team formation" paper by Andrea N. Brennan, Christine R. Rollinson, Hannah Love, Ashley N. Schulz, Brendon Reidy, Jake J. Grossman, Ellyn M. Dickmann, Ellen R. Fisher, Luke McCormack, Andrew D. Richardson, Jalene LaMontagne, Matthew R. Helmus, and Daijiang Li, published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature) on 29 September 2026: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w.
The paper references Scott M. Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" research on teamwork tradecraft.
The paper is © 2026 The Author(s) and is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
This article includes brief excerpts from the paper, attributed to its authors and used under the fair use doctrine (17 U.S.C. § 107) for purposes of news reporting, commentary, and analysis. This article is independent commentary and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the paper's authors or Springer Nature.
"Phases of Team Development" is copyright © Scott M. Graffius. All rights reserved.
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Post-Publication Notes
If there are any supplements or updates to this article after the date of publication, they will appear here.
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A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research
14 October 2026
BY SCOTT M. GRAFFIUS | ScottGraffius.com
Recommended Citation
Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
About This Article
Source information and links for materials cited are provided in the References section.
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation," published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature), examines a cross-disciplinary team formed during the COVID-19 pandemic to develop a grant proposal. Based on that experience, the authors identify five themes they recommend teams address: Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow. Spoiler: The paper has many issues.
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" features Scott M. Graffius' research. However, its description of Graffius' work is inaccurate, and the citation is invalid. For those and other reasons, and to proactively clarify any potential misunderstandings, Graffius provides the following objective, evidence-based assessment of the paper, and he does not endorse the paper.
1. Problems With References and the Reference List
References should direct readers to identifiable sources that support the claims for which they are cited. The paper falls short on both counts. Select examples illustrate the problem.
The paper cites a RAND Corporation report, "On Distributed Communications: Summary Overview" (attributed to Baran, 2018), to support a claim that team members expanded their collaborations beyond the project. The RAND report concerns distributed communications and the development of resilient communication networks. It does not document expanded collaboration among the team members or substantiate the paper’s claims about team science and grant-writing networks.
The paper cites Tuckman and Jensen’s 1977 work on group development in connection with the proposition that scientific alignment develops through the divergence and convergence of ideas. The paper does not explain how the cited work supports this specific proposition. Without that connection, the reference does not establish the claim for which it is offered.
The reference attributed to Graffius is incorrect. The error is delineated in point 10.
2. The Evidence Is Limited and Non-Comparative
The quantitative evidence consists of four surveys of team members, with 21–36 respondents per survey, analyzed using what the paper calls univariate descriptive statistics, alongside a small network analysis.
The study reports no comparison team, no independent baseline against which to assess the intervention, no inferential statistical analysis, and no reported effect sizes or confidence intervals. The respondents were members of the team whose process was being evaluated. Some had also helped design or implement that process.
Those data can describe participants' reported experiences. They cannot, on their own, establish that the framework caused improvements, that it outperforms other approaches, or that the findings generalize to other teams.
The paper presents the five themes (Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow) as essential targets for teams. A single case can generate useful hypotheses and practical lessons, but it does not provide a sound basis for declaring a set of themes necessary or effective across settings.
The study’s descriptive evidence is not equivalent to validation. The paper does not demonstrate that its framework improves team performance.
3. The Central Constructs Were Not Adequately Measured
The paper places psychological safety, mutual trust, and respect near the center of its argument. It asserts that aligning contributions and expectations through these conditions helps teams achieve their goals.
Yet the paper does not report adequate validated measures of these central constructs. Instead, it relies on selected agreement items and network diagrams, then interprets some observed behaviors as evidence of psychological safety.
That's a substantial gap between the measurement and the claim. A network diagram may show who reported learning from whom or who was identified as a leader. It does not, by itself, establish that participants felt psychologically safe, trusted one another, or experienced mutual respect.
The paper's limitations section acknowledges that antecedent conditions were not measured directly. Its abstract and conclusion nevertheless use language that presents relationships involving these conditions as findings of the study.
The authors need to distinguish between concepts that inform their interpretation and variables their study actually measured. The paper does not make this distinction consistently, leaving insufficient empirical evidence to establish that its conclusions about key constructs are supported by the measurements.
4. Causal Claims Without a Causal Design
The paper suggests that its approaches produced positive outcomes. The design does not establish that conclusion.
Consider the reported growth in connections among team members. People brought together to work on the same grant proposal have an obvious reason to develop new working relationships: they are collaborating on a shared objective. That change could occur without the particular framework or interventions described in the paper.
The paper's conclusion states that the team significantly extended its networks, yet the paper does not report a statistical significance test supporting that claim. An increase in a reported count does not, by itself, establish statistical significance. If the authors intended "significantly" in its statistical sense, the paper does not provide the reported analysis needed to substantiate that interpretation.
The authors may reasonably report that participants described new connections or that the network diagrams contain more reported ties after team formation. Those are descriptive observations. They do not establish that the intervention caused the change.
Causal claims require evidence capable of distinguishing the proposed explanation from plausible alternatives. The study does not do that.
5. The Team Counts and Survey Denominators Need Reconciliation
The paper describes a final team of 25 members and reports 39 members at one point in the project. Its ethics statement separately refers to an original early-phase team of 44 people. The paper does not clearly reconcile these different team-size figures. The four reported survey denominators were 39, 33, 25, and 27.
There may be reasonable explanations for these different figures. Membership may have changed over time, and not every survey need have been administered to the same group. The paper should nevertheless provide a clear account of who was on the team at each stage, who received each survey, and how many people responded.
As presented, the figures do not form a readily reconciled account of team membership and participation.
Attrition also deserves more attention. The paper reports that some individuals who left the team early felt they had gained or strengthened team and people skills. However, it does not clearly explain how former team members were included in, or excluded from, the final survey, or how their experiences were accounted for in the findings.
A change from an original 44-person team to a final team of 25 is not a trivial detail in a study of intentional team formation. The paper identifies several reasons for departures or reduced engagement, including competing commitments, personal circumstances, pandemic fatigue, and perceived lack of fit as the project evolved. However, it does not clearly reconcile the different team-size figures or sufficiently explain how membership changes affected the study's assessments and findings.
The conclusions should account for that uncertainty. Findings drawn largely from those who remained may not represent the experiences of the entire group.
6. The Qualitative Analysis Is Not Sufficiently Documented
The paper states that the five themes emerged when the core author team coded the qualitative data. It provides too little information for readers to evaluate that process. The paper does not adequately explain the coding procedure, identify the number of coders, describe the codebook, explain how disagreements were handled, or specify the volume of qualitative material analyzed. The underlying qualitative data are not available for readers to inspect.
The paper also says that some recommendations draw on facilitators’ experience. That experience may be useful, but it raises a question the authors should address: how much did the five themes emerge from participants' data, and how much reflected frameworks or assumptions the facilitators brought to the project?
The themes overlap with established work on team science and team management. The paper should explain more clearly what is novel about them and how the data support that contribution.
Qualitative analysis can produce valuable findings without following a single prescribed procedure. It still requires sufficient transparency for readers to understand how researchers moved from source material to codes, from codes to themes, and from themes to recommendations. The paper provides only a limited account of that analytical process, making it difficult for readers to assess how the reported themes were derived from the underlying data.
7. The Authors Evaluated a Process in Which They Participated
The paper's evaluation raises questions about independence. All authors were members of the team or contracted team-science facilitators, and some also served on the proposal's leadership team. The team-science professionals hired to support the project participated in the process under evaluation, and some co-authored the paper. The paper declares no competing interests, while several cited works were also co-authored by members of the author team. These circumstances do not automatically invalidate the study. They do, however, heighten the importance of explaining how the evaluation was conducted, how potential bias was managed, and what evidence would have counted as an unsuccessful outcome.
The grant proposal was not funded. The authors acknowledge that outcome but emphasize multiple metrics of success and maintain that the process was nevertheless successful. There is nothing inherently wrong with identifying benefits beyond a grant award. Teams may develop skills, strengthen relationships, and generate useful ideas even when a proposal is unsuccessful. The concern is whether those additional benefits provide sufficient evidence to validate the process, particularly without clearly specified criteria for success, a systematic evaluation, or adequate safeguards against self-assessment bias.
When the people who designed and implemented a framework also determine that it worked, the assessment needs safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper does not adequately demonstrate such safeguards. Consequently, the authors' favorable interpretation is difficult to distinguish from their own assessment of the work, particularly because the paper does not sufficiently establish how potential bias was managed or how the reported evidence was used to evaluate success.
The ethics disclosure also deserves attention. The authors report that participant recruitment, consent, and data collection preceded the institutional review board (IRB) determination. They explain that the activities were initially conducted as a team assessment rather than as research, and that the decision to publish arose later. Written permission to use de-identified survey data for manuscript development was subsequently sought from participants. These circumstances warrant consideration alongside the study’s methods, consent arrangements, and the authors’ account of why prospective IRB review was not required.
8. The Recommendations Go Beyond What Was Tested
The paper's section on cross-disciplinary team applications describes the five themes as "particularly valuable" for five types of teams, including teams forming in virtual environments, large multi-institutional consortia, and teams in high-stakes or high-uncertainty contexts.
The authors attribute these broader recommendations in part to facilitators’ experience. Such experience can inform a proposal, but it does not establish that the framework has been tested or shown to work in all the settings listed.
The paper would be stronger if it identified these applications as hypotheses or practitioner recommendations for future evaluation. As written, the language sometimes presents extrapolations as established findings.
9. Editorial Errors
The paper has editorial problems. For example, the Figure 6 caption gives a response scale as "strongly disagree, disagree, neither agree nor agree, agree, or strongly disagree." The labels are internally inconsistent: the middle category is malformed, the "strongly disagree" endpoint is repeated, and “strongly agree” is absent.
Elsewhere, the paper refers to "a tenant of psychological safety" where "tenet" is intended.
10. The Citation of Graffius’ Work Is Incorrect as Presented
For context and clarity, information on Graffius' work is presented below. Issues with the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper follow it.
The "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper states: "Graffius (2024) updates Tuckman and Jensen’s (1977) framework, noting limited practical evidence and strategies specifically for the Forming stage." Immediately before this statement, the authors note, "… studies still flag the team formation stage as a critical but under-explored period." Immediately after the sentence about Graffius, they state, "… demonstrates unexplored dynamics in initial collaboration interaction." However, the paper's characterization of Graffius' work is incorrect. The Forming phase is neither unexplored nor under-explored.
The paper's reference list gives the following citation:
Graffius S (2024) Revisiting Tuckman: evidence-based strategies for the forming stage of team development. J Leadersh Organ Stud 31(1):5–16.
The citation is invalid:
As summarized above, Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" has been used and cited by publications and others worldwide. Based on context, the 2024 submission date of the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper, and its reference to Graffius' 2024 work, the correct citation would be:
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" documents one team's experience and proposes lessons for other teams. It may offer useful ideas, but it does not establish that its five themes are necessary, that the framework improves team performance, or that its broader recommendations are empirically validated. The study is a single, unreplicated case based largely on internal self-reports, without a comparison group or adequate measurement of several central constructs. Broader claims require clear operational definitions, appropriate measures, transparent analytical procedures, a reconciled account of team membership and survey participation, and research designs capable of testing outcomes.
The paper’s conclusions are further undermined by causal claims unsupported by the study design, network interpretations that exceed the reported analysis, inconsistent accounts of team membership, insufficiently transparent qualitative procedures, and other methodological and reporting issues. The authors also evaluate a process in which they participated and judge it successful despite the grant proposal’s failure to secure funding, without sufficiently establishing safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper mischaracterizes Scott M. Graffius' work and it provides an invalid citation.
Readers should treat the paper’s findings with caution. Graffius does not endorse the paper.
Brennan, A. N., Rollinson, C. R., Love, H., Schulz, A. N., Reidy, B., Grossman, J. J., Dickmann, E. M., Fisher, E. R., McCormack, L., Richardson, A. D., LaMontagne, J., Helmus, M. R., & Li, D. (2026, September 29). Five core themes of intentional team formation. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
Graffius, S. M. (2026, January 3). Scott M. Graffius' Phases of Team Development - Applied to Human Teams and Human-AI Teams: 2026 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.18184.89601
The authors of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and their affiliations, as listed in the paper, are:
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications is a peer-reviewed, fully open-access journal published by Springer Nature. Launched in 2015 as Palgrave Communications, it adopted its current name in June 2020. The journal publishes research across the humanities, social sciences, and behavioural sciences, including interdisciplinary scholarship using theoretical, qualitative, quantitative, and methodological approaches. Its stated editorial commitments include rigorous peer review, robust research, and high editorial and ethical standards. Articles are published online and made freely accessible to readers. The journal’s broad scope encompasses psychology, sociology, management, communication, education, and complex networks.
Springer Nature is a global research, educational, and professional publisher formed in 2015 through the combination of Nature Publishing Group, Macmillan Education, and Springer Science+Business Media. Its publishing portfolio includes scholarly journals, academic books, and research resources spanning science, technology, medicine, the humanities, and the social sciences. The company supports researchers, educators, students, and professionals through its publishing platforms and related services. Springer Nature also maintains publishing policies addressing research integrity, editorial standards, and publication ethics. It publishes Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, the journal examined in this article.
Scott M. Graffius is a technology leader, researcher, award-winning author, practitioner, consultant, thought leader, and international public speaker specializing in AI, Agile, project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), PMO leadership, and teamwork tradecraft. His work explores the intersection of human ingenuity and emerging technology, with a strong practitioner voice grounded in research, experimentation, and experience. His focus includes innovation, organizational performance, and the evolving practice of teamwork, including the "exotic team dynamics" that emerge when people collaborate with advanced artificial intelligence (agentic, autonomous, or autopoietic AI). Graffius has delivered more than $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations spanning technology, entertainment and media, financial services, healthcare, government, and other industries.
Businesses, professional associations, government agencies, universities, publications, and media outlets use Graffius and his work. Examples include Adobe, Bayer, Boston University, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Ford, Gartner, Harvard Medical School, IEEE, Innovation Project Management, Johns Hopkins University, Microsoft, MSN, National Academy of Sciences, Oracle, Pinterest Inc., Project Management Institute, UC San Diego, Verizon, Yale University, and others.
The following sections highlight his experience, leadership, contributions, research, and enduring influence across industries and institutions worldwide.
Experience
Graffius heads the professional services firm Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions, along with its subsidiary Exceptional Agility. These consultancies offer strategic and tactical advisory, training, embedded expertise, and consulting services to the public, private, and government sectors. They help organizations enhance their capabilities and results in agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership, supporting innovation and driving competitive advantage. The consultancies confidently back services with a Delighted Client Guarantee™.
Graffius is a former VP of project management with a publicly traded provider of diverse consumer products and services over the Internet. Before that, he ran and supervised the delivery of projects and programs in public and private organizations with businesses ranging from e-commerce to advanced technology products and services, retail, manufacturing, entertainment and media, and more.
He has experience with consumer, business, reseller, government, and international markets.
Additional information is on LinkedIn.
Award-Winning Author
Graffius has authored three books.
Graffius' first book, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions, earned 17 awards. It provides a practical, step-by-step guide to Scrum, enabling teams to deliver products in short cycles with rapid adaptation, fast time-to-market, and continuous improvement—which supports innovation and drives competitive advantage.
Additional information on Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions is here.
His second book, Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change, was named one of the best Scrum books of all time by BookAuthority. It tells the compelling story of an entertainment company's agile transformation—offering lessons that apply across industries.
Additional information on Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change is here.
Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum, is his third book—and his first work of fiction.
It's a fast-paced satirical story by that dismantles corporate Agile cosplay and other forms of "fake Agile" while delivering practical insights, actionable guidance, and proven practices for real-world Agile transformation success.
Packed with humor, quirky characters, sharp commentary on corporate culture and workplace absurdities, and actionable tips, it’s a must-read for Scrum Masters, Product Owners, Agile Coaches, Agile Project Managers, and other professionals interested in Agile project management and enterprise agility.
Additional information on Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum is here.
International Public Speaker
Organizations worldwide engage Graffius to present on technology (including AI), Agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership. He crafts and delivers unique and compelling talks and workshops.
Graffius has conducted 99 sessions across 25 countries. Select examples of events include Agile Trends Gov, BSides (Newcastle Upon Tyne), Conf42 Quantum Computing, DevDays Europe, DevOps Institute, DevOpsDays (Geneva), Frug’Agile, IEEE, Microsoft, Scottish Summit, Scrum Alliance RSG (Nepal), Techstars, and W Love Games International Video Game Development Conference (Helsinki), Future of Work and Advanced AI (Paris, France), and more.
With an average rating of 4.82 (on a scale of 1-5), sessions are highly valued.
The request form is here.
Thought Leadership and Influence
Prominent businesses, professional associations, government agencies, and universities have showcased Graffius and his contributions—spanning his books, talks, workshops, and beyond. Select examples include:
Graffius has played a key role in the Project Management Institute (PMI) in developing professional standards. He was a member of multiple teams that authored, reviewed, and produced:
He was also a subject matter expert reviewer of content for the PMI’s Congress. Beyond the PMI, Graffius also served as a member of the review team for two of the Scrum Alliance’s Global Scrum Gatherings.
Authority on Teamwork Tradecraft
Graffius is a renowned and highly-cited authority on teamwork tradecraft. Informed by the research of Bruce W. Tuckman and Mary Ann C. Jensen, over 150 subsequent studies, and Graffius' first-hand professional experience with, and analysis of, team leadership and performance, Graffius created his "Phases of Team Development" intellectual property as a unique perspective and visual conveying the five phases of team development.
First introduced in 2008 and periodically updated, his work provides a diagnostic and strategic guide for navigating team dynamics. It provides actionable insights for leaders across industries to develop high-performance teams.
Its adoption by esteemed organizations—such as Yale University, IEEE, Cisco, Microsoft, Ford, Oracle, Broadcom, the U.S. National Park Service, and the Journal of Neurosurgery, among others—highlights its utility and value, solidifying its status as an indispensable resource for elevating team performance and driving organizational excellence.
In 2026, Graffius added human-AI teamwork—including the "exotic team dynamics" which emerge when advanced AI collaborates as a teammate—to his "Phases of Team Development." The 2026 edition is here.
Expert on Temporal Dynamics on Social Media Platforms
Graffius is also an authority on temporal dynamics on social media platforms. His "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research—first published in 2018 and updated annually—delivers a precise quantitative analysis of post longevity across digital platforms, utilizing advanced statistical techniques to determine mean half-life with precision. It establishes a solid empirical base, effectively highlighting the ephemeral nature of content within social media ecosystems.
Referenced and applied by leading entities—such as Fast Company, GoDaddy, Journal of Hand Surgery (European Volume), Ministère de la Culture, Pinterest Inc., PNAS, and Telecommunications Policy, among others—his research exemplifies methodological rigor and sustained significance in the field of digital informatics.
The 2026 edition of Graffius "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research is here.
Education and Professional Certifications
Graffius has a bachelor’s degree in psychology with a focus in Human Factors. He holds eight professional certifications:
He is an active member of the Scrum Alliance, the Project Management Institute (PMI), and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
Advancing AI, Agile, and Project/PMO Management
Scott M. Graffius continues to advance the fields of AI, Agile, and project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), and PMO leadership. Businesses and other organizations leverage Graffius’ insights to drive their success.
Graffius has generated over $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations served. Put that track record to work for you. For speaking engagements, use the request form; for other inquiries, email him.
Connect with and follow Scott on LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook, Bluesky, Mastodon, and ResearchGate.
Read more.
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Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
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Names, marks, and content are the property of their respective owners.
This article discusses the "Five core themes of intentional team formation" paper by Andrea N. Brennan, Christine R. Rollinson, Hannah Love, Ashley N. Schulz, Brendon Reidy, Jake J. Grossman, Ellyn M. Dickmann, Ellen R. Fisher, Luke McCormack, Andrew D. Richardson, Jalene LaMontagne, Matthew R. Helmus, and Daijiang Li, published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature) on 29 September 2026: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w.
The paper references Scott M. Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" research on teamwork tradecraft.
The paper is © 2026 The Author(s) and is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
This article includes brief excerpts from the paper, attributed to its authors and used under the fair use doctrine (17 U.S.C. § 107) for purposes of news reporting, commentary, and analysis. This article is independent commentary and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the paper's authors or Springer Nature.
"Phases of Team Development" is copyright © Scott M. Graffius. All rights reserved.
If there are any supplements or updates to this article after the date of publication, they will appear here.
Copyright © Scott M. Graffius. All rights reserved.
Content on this site—including text, images, videos, and data—may not be used for training or input into any artificial intelligence, machine learning, or automatized learning systems, or published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without the express written permission of Scott M. Graffius.
Recommended Citation
Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
About This Article
Source information and links for materials cited are provided in the References section.
Introduction
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation," published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature), examines a cross-disciplinary team formed during the COVID-19 pandemic to develop a grant proposal. Based on that experience, the authors identify five themes they recommend teams address: Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow. Spoiler: The paper has many issues.
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" features Scott M. Graffius' research. However, its description of Graffius' work is inaccurate, and the citation is invalid. For those and other reasons, and to proactively clarify any potential misunderstandings, Graffius provides the following objective, evidence-based assessment of the paper, and he does not endorse the paper.
10 Key Issues
1. Problems With References and the Reference List
References should direct readers to identifiable sources that support the claims for which they are cited. The paper falls short on both counts. Select examples illustrate the problem.
The paper cites a RAND Corporation report, "On Distributed Communications: Summary Overview" (attributed to Baran, 2018), to support a claim that team members expanded their collaborations beyond the project. The RAND report concerns distributed communications and the development of resilient communication networks. It does not document expanded collaboration among the team members or substantiate the paper’s claims about team science and grant-writing networks.
The paper cites Tuckman and Jensen’s 1977 work on group development in connection with the proposition that scientific alignment develops through the divergence and convergence of ideas. The paper does not explain how the cited work supports this specific proposition. Without that connection, the reference does not establish the claim for which it is offered.
The reference attributed to Graffius is incorrect. The error is delineated in point 10.
2. The Evidence Is Limited and Non-Comparative
The quantitative evidence consists of four surveys of team members, with 21–36 respondents per survey, analyzed using what the paper calls univariate descriptive statistics, alongside a small network analysis.
The study reports no comparison team, no independent baseline against which to assess the intervention, no inferential statistical analysis, and no reported effect sizes or confidence intervals. The respondents were members of the team whose process was being evaluated. Some had also helped design or implement that process.
Those data can describe participants' reported experiences. They cannot, on their own, establish that the framework caused improvements, that it outperforms other approaches, or that the findings generalize to other teams.
The paper presents the five themes (Team Development, Effective Communication, Perspective Alignment, Team Management, and Project Workflow) as essential targets for teams. A single case can generate useful hypotheses and practical lessons, but it does not provide a sound basis for declaring a set of themes necessary or effective across settings.
The study’s descriptive evidence is not equivalent to validation. The paper does not demonstrate that its framework improves team performance.
3. The Central Constructs Were Not Adequately Measured
The paper places psychological safety, mutual trust, and respect near the center of its argument. It asserts that aligning contributions and expectations through these conditions helps teams achieve their goals.
Yet the paper does not report adequate validated measures of these central constructs. Instead, it relies on selected agreement items and network diagrams, then interprets some observed behaviors as evidence of psychological safety.
That's a substantial gap between the measurement and the claim. A network diagram may show who reported learning from whom or who was identified as a leader. It does not, by itself, establish that participants felt psychologically safe, trusted one another, or experienced mutual respect.
The paper's limitations section acknowledges that antecedent conditions were not measured directly. Its abstract and conclusion nevertheless use language that presents relationships involving these conditions as findings of the study.
The authors need to distinguish between concepts that inform their interpretation and variables their study actually measured. The paper does not make this distinction consistently, leaving insufficient empirical evidence to establish that its conclusions about key constructs are supported by the measurements.
4. Causal Claims Without a Causal Design
The paper suggests that its approaches produced positive outcomes. The design does not establish that conclusion.
Consider the reported growth in connections among team members. People brought together to work on the same grant proposal have an obvious reason to develop new working relationships: they are collaborating on a shared objective. That change could occur without the particular framework or interventions described in the paper.
The paper's conclusion states that the team significantly extended its networks, yet the paper does not report a statistical significance test supporting that claim. An increase in a reported count does not, by itself, establish statistical significance. If the authors intended "significantly" in its statistical sense, the paper does not provide the reported analysis needed to substantiate that interpretation.
The authors may reasonably report that participants described new connections or that the network diagrams contain more reported ties after team formation. Those are descriptive observations. They do not establish that the intervention caused the change.
Causal claims require evidence capable of distinguishing the proposed explanation from plausible alternatives. The study does not do that.
5. The Team Counts and Survey Denominators Need Reconciliation
The paper describes a final team of 25 members and reports 39 members at one point in the project. Its ethics statement separately refers to an original early-phase team of 44 people. The paper does not clearly reconcile these different team-size figures. The four reported survey denominators were 39, 33, 25, and 27.
There may be reasonable explanations for these different figures. Membership may have changed over time, and not every survey need have been administered to the same group. The paper should nevertheless provide a clear account of who was on the team at each stage, who received each survey, and how many people responded.
As presented, the figures do not form a readily reconciled account of team membership and participation.
Attrition also deserves more attention. The paper reports that some individuals who left the team early felt they had gained or strengthened team and people skills. However, it does not clearly explain how former team members were included in, or excluded from, the final survey, or how their experiences were accounted for in the findings.
A change from an original 44-person team to a final team of 25 is not a trivial detail in a study of intentional team formation. The paper identifies several reasons for departures or reduced engagement, including competing commitments, personal circumstances, pandemic fatigue, and perceived lack of fit as the project evolved. However, it does not clearly reconcile the different team-size figures or sufficiently explain how membership changes affected the study's assessments and findings.
The conclusions should account for that uncertainty. Findings drawn largely from those who remained may not represent the experiences of the entire group.
6. The Qualitative Analysis Is Not Sufficiently Documented
The paper states that the five themes emerged when the core author team coded the qualitative data. It provides too little information for readers to evaluate that process. The paper does not adequately explain the coding procedure, identify the number of coders, describe the codebook, explain how disagreements were handled, or specify the volume of qualitative material analyzed. The underlying qualitative data are not available for readers to inspect.
The paper also says that some recommendations draw on facilitators’ experience. That experience may be useful, but it raises a question the authors should address: how much did the five themes emerge from participants' data, and how much reflected frameworks or assumptions the facilitators brought to the project?
The themes overlap with established work on team science and team management. The paper should explain more clearly what is novel about them and how the data support that contribution.
Qualitative analysis can produce valuable findings without following a single prescribed procedure. It still requires sufficient transparency for readers to understand how researchers moved from source material to codes, from codes to themes, and from themes to recommendations. The paper provides only a limited account of that analytical process, making it difficult for readers to assess how the reported themes were derived from the underlying data.
7. The Authors Evaluated a Process in Which They Participated
The paper's evaluation raises questions about independence. All authors were members of the team or contracted team-science facilitators, and some also served on the proposal's leadership team. The team-science professionals hired to support the project participated in the process under evaluation, and some co-authored the paper. The paper declares no competing interests, while several cited works were also co-authored by members of the author team. These circumstances do not automatically invalidate the study. They do, however, heighten the importance of explaining how the evaluation was conducted, how potential bias was managed, and what evidence would have counted as an unsuccessful outcome.
The grant proposal was not funded. The authors acknowledge that outcome but emphasize multiple metrics of success and maintain that the process was nevertheless successful. There is nothing inherently wrong with identifying benefits beyond a grant award. Teams may develop skills, strengthen relationships, and generate useful ideas even when a proposal is unsuccessful. The concern is whether those additional benefits provide sufficient evidence to validate the process, particularly without clearly specified criteria for success, a systematic evaluation, or adequate safeguards against self-assessment bias.
When the people who designed and implemented a framework also determine that it worked, the assessment needs safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper does not adequately demonstrate such safeguards. Consequently, the authors' favorable interpretation is difficult to distinguish from their own assessment of the work, particularly because the paper does not sufficiently establish how potential bias was managed or how the reported evidence was used to evaluate success.
The ethics disclosure also deserves attention. The authors report that participant recruitment, consent, and data collection preceded the institutional review board (IRB) determination. They explain that the activities were initially conducted as a team assessment rather than as research, and that the decision to publish arose later. Written permission to use de-identified survey data for manuscript development was subsequently sought from participants. These circumstances warrant consideration alongside the study’s methods, consent arrangements, and the authors’ account of why prospective IRB review was not required.
8. The Recommendations Go Beyond What Was Tested
The paper's section on cross-disciplinary team applications describes the five themes as "particularly valuable" for five types of teams, including teams forming in virtual environments, large multi-institutional consortia, and teams in high-stakes or high-uncertainty contexts.
The authors attribute these broader recommendations in part to facilitators’ experience. Such experience can inform a proposal, but it does not establish that the framework has been tested or shown to work in all the settings listed.
The paper would be stronger if it identified these applications as hypotheses or practitioner recommendations for future evaluation. As written, the language sometimes presents extrapolations as established findings.
9. Editorial Errors
The paper has editorial problems. For example, the Figure 6 caption gives a response scale as "strongly disagree, disagree, neither agree nor agree, agree, or strongly disagree." The labels are internally inconsistent: the middle category is malformed, the "strongly disagree" endpoint is repeated, and “strongly agree” is absent.
Elsewhere, the paper refers to "a tenant of psychological safety" where "tenet" is intended.
10. The Citation of Graffius’ Work Is Incorrect as Presented
For context and clarity, information on Graffius' work is presented below. Issues with the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper follow it.
Background and Context on Graffius' "Phases of Team Development"
Team development is commonly described as a progression through five phases or stages: Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing, and Adjourning. Bruce W. Tuckman introduced the first four phases in 1965, and he and Mary Ann C. Jensen added the fifth phase in 1977. Tuckman and Jensen described these phases only in broad, general terms, without codifying specific characteristics, strategies, or a performance graph.
Scott M. Graffius subsequently developed and codified what Tuckman and Jensen did not: a detailed, structured set of diagnostic characteristics for each phase; a corresponding set of practical strategies for each phase; and an original, proprietary, empirically derived performance graph built from statistical analysis of thousands of data points across hundreds of diverse projects. Graffius created his "Phases of Team Development" as a unique perspective and visual conveying the five phases of team development, inclusive of a graph showing how performance varies by phase, as well as the characteristics and strategies for each phase. Leaders can apply these insights to advance the effectiveness and success of teams.
Graffius initially developed his unique material in 2008 and periodically updates it. He expanded it, for example, in 2026 to include content on human-AI teaming, where artificial intelligence is advanced (agentic, autonomous, or autopoietic). It builds on his work on hundreds of projects (including AI development), his expertise in teamwork tradecraft (both human teams and human-AI teams, including the exotic team dynamics that emerge from human-AI teams), and his analysis of hundreds of studies on both human-only and human-AI collaboration.
The actionable insights provide a practical framework to navigate the complexities of team dynamics. Graffius' resource helps practitioners advance the effectiveness and success of both human-only and human-AI teams.
Businesses, professional associations, government agencies, universities, publications, and media outlets have used and cited Graffius' "Phases of Team Development." Select examples include:
- Adobe
- American Management Association
- Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute
- Bayer
- Boston University
- Broadcom
- Buckinghamshire New University
- Cisco
- DevOps Institute
- Erste Group Bank AG
- Ford Motor Company
- Government of Finland
- HAN University of Applied Sciences
- Hasso-Plattner-Institut für Digital Engineering GmbH
- How Teams Work
- IEEE Access
- Johns Hopkins University
- Journal of Neurosurgery
- Microsoft
- National Science Foundation’s LTER Network
- Northeast Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA)
- Ohio State University
- Oracle
- Proceedings of the 2023 International Conference on Decision Aid Sciences and Applications (DASA)
- Royal Australasian College of Physicians
- Technical University of Munich
- Torrens University
- Tufts University
- U.S. National Park Service
- U.S. Soccer
- U.S. Tennis Association
- UC San Diego
- UK Sports Institute
- University of Galway
- University of Greenwich
- University of New South Wales
- Warsaw University of Technology
- Yale University
- And many more
Read more here: Phases of Team Development
The "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper states: "Graffius (2024) updates Tuckman and Jensen’s (1977) framework, noting limited practical evidence and strategies specifically for the Forming stage." Immediately before this statement, the authors note, "… studies still flag the team formation stage as a critical but under-explored period." Immediately after the sentence about Graffius, they state, "… demonstrates unexplored dynamics in initial collaboration interaction." However, the paper's characterization of Graffius' work is incorrect. The Forming phase is neither unexplored nor under-explored.
The paper's reference list gives the following citation:
Graffius S (2024) Revisiting Tuckman: evidence-based strategies for the forming stage of team development. J Leadersh Organ Stud 31(1):5–16.
The citation is invalid:
- The paper indicates: "Revisiting Tuckman: evidence-based strategies for the forming stage of team development," on pages 5-16, in issue 1, volume 31, of the Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies.
- However, there is no such article in the Journal of Leadership and Organizational Studies. Further, there is no article on pages 5-16 of it. What appears on pages 5-24 is: "Disobeying the Leader: Creative Deviance as a Mechanism Between Psychological Ownership and Social Undermining," written by Jigyashu Shukla, Rebecca Bennett, Robert Folger, and Ronit Kark.
As summarized above, Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" has been used and cited by publications and others worldwide. Based on context, the 2024 submission date of the "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" paper, and its reference to Graffius' 2024 work, the correct citation would be:
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
Conclusion
"Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" documents one team's experience and proposes lessons for other teams. It may offer useful ideas, but it does not establish that its five themes are necessary, that the framework improves team performance, or that its broader recommendations are empirically validated. The study is a single, unreplicated case based largely on internal self-reports, without a comparison group or adequate measurement of several central constructs. Broader claims require clear operational definitions, appropriate measures, transparent analytical procedures, a reconciled account of team membership and survey participation, and research designs capable of testing outcomes.
The paper’s conclusions are further undermined by causal claims unsupported by the study design, network interpretations that exceed the reported analysis, inconsistent accounts of team membership, insufficiently transparent qualitative procedures, and other methodological and reporting issues. The authors also evaluate a process in which they participated and judge it successful despite the grant proposal’s failure to secure funding, without sufficiently establishing safeguards against self-confirmation. The paper mischaracterizes Scott M. Graffius' work and it provides an invalid citation.
Readers should treat the paper’s findings with caution. Graffius does not endorse the paper.
References
Brennan, A. N., Rollinson, C. R., Love, H., Schulz, A. N., Reidy, B., Grossman, J. J., Dickmann, E. M., Fisher, E. R., McCormack, L., Richardson, A. D., LaMontagne, J., Helmus, M. R., & Li, D. (2026, September 29). Five core themes of intentional team formation. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w
Graffius, S. M. (2024, January 5). Phases of Team Development: 2024 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.28629.40168
Graffius, S. M. (2026, January 3). Scott M. Graffius' Phases of Team Development - Applied to Human Teams and Human-AI Teams: 2026 Update. ScottGraffius.com. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.18184.89601
About the Authors of the Paper
The authors of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and their affiliations, as listed in the paper, are:
- Andrea N. Brennan, Christine R. Rollinson, Brendon Reidy, and Luke McCormack: Morton Arboretum, Lisle, Illinois, USA
- Hannah Love: Divergent Science, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA
- Ellen R. Fisher: Divergent Science, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA; University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA
- Ashley N. Schulz: Mississippi State University, Starkville, Mississippi, USA
- Jake J. Grossman: St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota, USA
- Ellyn M. Dickmann: Dickmann and Associates, LLC, Loveland, Colorado, USA
- Andrew D. Richardson: Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, Arizona, USA
- Jalene LaMontagne: University of Missouri–St. Louis, St. Louis, Missouri, USA; Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, Missouri, USA
- Matthew R. Helmus: Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
- Daijiang Li: University of Wisconsin–Madison, Madison, Wisconsin, USA
About the Paper’s Journal: Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
Humanities and Social Sciences Communications is a peer-reviewed, fully open-access journal published by Springer Nature. Launched in 2015 as Palgrave Communications, it adopted its current name in June 2020. The journal publishes research across the humanities, social sciences, and behavioural sciences, including interdisciplinary scholarship using theoretical, qualitative, quantitative, and methodological approaches. Its stated editorial commitments include rigorous peer review, robust research, and high editorial and ethical standards. Articles are published online and made freely accessible to readers. The journal’s broad scope encompasses psychology, sociology, management, communication, education, and complex networks.
About the Journal’s Publisher: Springer Nature
Springer Nature is a global research, educational, and professional publisher formed in 2015 through the combination of Nature Publishing Group, Macmillan Education, and Springer Science+Business Media. Its publishing portfolio includes scholarly journals, academic books, and research resources spanning science, technology, medicine, the humanities, and the social sciences. The company supports researchers, educators, students, and professionals through its publishing platforms and related services. Springer Nature also maintains publishing policies addressing research integrity, editorial standards, and publication ethics. It publishes Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, the journal examined in this article.
About Scott M. Graffius
Scott M. Graffius is a technology leader, researcher, award-winning author, practitioner, consultant, thought leader, and international public speaker specializing in AI, Agile, project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), PMO leadership, and teamwork tradecraft. His work explores the intersection of human ingenuity and emerging technology, with a strong practitioner voice grounded in research, experimentation, and experience. His focus includes innovation, organizational performance, and the evolving practice of teamwork, including the "exotic team dynamics" that emerge when people collaborate with advanced artificial intelligence (agentic, autonomous, or autopoietic AI). Graffius has delivered more than $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations spanning technology, entertainment and media, financial services, healthcare, government, and other industries.
Businesses, professional associations, government agencies, universities, publications, and media outlets use Graffius and his work. Examples include Adobe, Bayer, Boston University, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Ford, Gartner, Harvard Medical School, IEEE, Innovation Project Management, Johns Hopkins University, Microsoft, MSN, National Academy of Sciences, Oracle, Pinterest Inc., Project Management Institute, UC San Diego, Verizon, Yale University, and others.
The following sections highlight his experience, leadership, contributions, research, and enduring influence across industries and institutions worldwide.
Experience
Graffius heads the professional services firm Exceptional PPM and PMO Solutions, along with its subsidiary Exceptional Agility. These consultancies offer strategic and tactical advisory, training, embedded expertise, and consulting services to the public, private, and government sectors. They help organizations enhance their capabilities and results in agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership, supporting innovation and driving competitive advantage. The consultancies confidently back services with a Delighted Client Guarantee™.
Graffius is a former VP of project management with a publicly traded provider of diverse consumer products and services over the Internet. Before that, he ran and supervised the delivery of projects and programs in public and private organizations with businesses ranging from e-commerce to advanced technology products and services, retail, manufacturing, entertainment and media, and more.
He has experience with consumer, business, reseller, government, and international markets.
Additional information is on LinkedIn.
Award-Winning Author
Graffius has authored three books.
Graffius' first book, Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions, earned 17 awards. It provides a practical, step-by-step guide to Scrum, enabling teams to deliver products in short cycles with rapid adaptation, fast time-to-market, and continuous improvement—which supports innovation and drives competitive advantage.
- Paperback ISBN-13: 9781533370242
- Kindle ASIN: B01FZ0JIIY
Additional information on Agile Scrum: Your Quick Start Guide with Step-by-Step Instructions is here.
His second book, Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change, was named one of the best Scrum books of all time by BookAuthority. It tells the compelling story of an entertainment company's agile transformation—offering lessons that apply across industries.
- Paperback ISBN-13: 9781072447962
- Kindle ASIN: B07R9LJLPJ
Additional information on Agile Transformation: A Brief Story of How an Entertainment Company Developed New Capabilities and Unlocked Business Agility to Thrive in an Era of Rapid Change is here.
Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum, is his third book—and his first work of fiction.
It's a fast-paced satirical story by that dismantles corporate Agile cosplay and other forms of "fake Agile" while delivering practical insights, actionable guidance, and proven practices for real-world Agile transformation success.
Packed with humor, quirky characters, sharp commentary on corporate culture and workplace absurdities, and actionable tips, it’s a must-read for Scrum Masters, Product Owners, Agile Coaches, Agile Project Managers, and other professionals interested in Agile project management and enterprise agility.
- Kindle ASIN: B0F2SJ83WT
- Audible ASIN: B0DJG163R5
Additional information on Agile Protocol: The Transformation Ultimatum is here.
International Public Speaker
Organizations worldwide engage Graffius to present on technology (including AI), Agile, project management, program management, portfolio management, and enterprise PMO leadership. He crafts and delivers unique and compelling talks and workshops.
Graffius has conducted 99 sessions across 25 countries. Select examples of events include Agile Trends Gov, BSides (Newcastle Upon Tyne), Conf42 Quantum Computing, DevDays Europe, DevOps Institute, DevOpsDays (Geneva), Frug’Agile, IEEE, Microsoft, Scottish Summit, Scrum Alliance RSG (Nepal), Techstars, and W Love Games International Video Game Development Conference (Helsinki), Future of Work and Advanced AI (Paris, France), and more.
With an average rating of 4.82 (on a scale of 1-5), sessions are highly valued.
The request form is here.
Thought Leadership and Influence
Prominent businesses, professional associations, government agencies, and universities have showcased Graffius and his contributions—spanning his books, talks, workshops, and beyond. Select examples include:
- Adobe,
- American Management Association,
- Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute,
- Bayer,
- BCG,
- BMC Software,
- Boston Consulting Group (BCG),
- Boston University,
- Broadcom,
- Cisco,
- Coburg University of Applied Sciences and Arts - Germany,
- Computer Weekly,
- Constructor University - Germany,
- Data Governance Success,
- Deimos Aerospace,
- DevOps Institute,
- Dropbox,
- EU's European Commission,
- Federal Reserve Bank of New York,
- Ford Motor Company,
- Gartner,
- GoDaddy,
- Harvard Medical School,
- Hasso Plattner Institute - Germany,
- IEEE,
- Innovation Project Management,
- Johns Hopkins University,
- Journal of Marketing,
- Journal of Neurosurgery,
- Lam Research (Semiconductors),
- Leadership Worthy,
- Life Sciences Trainers and Educators Network,
- London South Bank University,
- Microsoft,
- MSN,
- NASSCOM,
- National Academy of Sciences,
- New Zealand Government,
- Ohio State University,
- Oracle,
- Pinterest Inc.,
- Project Management Institute,
- Mary Raum (Professor of National Security Affairs, United States Naval War College),
- Round Square Global Educational Network,
- Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP),
- SANS Institute,
- SBG Neumark - Germany,
- Singapore Institute of Technology,
- Torrens University - Australia,
- TBS Switzerland,
- Tufts University,
- UC San Diego,
- UK Sports Institute,
- University of Galway - Ireland,
- US Department of Energy,
- US National Park Service,
- US Soccer,
- US Tennis Association,
- Verizon,
- Wrike,
- Yale University,
- and many others.
Graffius has played a key role in the Project Management Institute (PMI) in developing professional standards. He was a member of multiple teams that authored, reviewed, and produced:
- The Standard for Artificial Intelligence in Portfolio, Program, and Project Management.
- Agile Practice Guide — Second Edition.
- A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) — Eighth Edition.
- A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) — Sixth Edition.
- The Standard for Program Management — Fourth Edition.
- Practice Standard for Work Breakdown Structures — Second Edition.
- The Practice Standard for Project Estimating — Second Edition.
He was also a subject matter expert reviewer of content for the PMI’s Congress. Beyond the PMI, Graffius also served as a member of the review team for two of the Scrum Alliance’s Global Scrum Gatherings.
Authority on Teamwork Tradecraft
Graffius is a renowned and highly-cited authority on teamwork tradecraft. Informed by the research of Bruce W. Tuckman and Mary Ann C. Jensen, over 150 subsequent studies, and Graffius' first-hand professional experience with, and analysis of, team leadership and performance, Graffius created his "Phases of Team Development" intellectual property as a unique perspective and visual conveying the five phases of team development.
First introduced in 2008 and periodically updated, his work provides a diagnostic and strategic guide for navigating team dynamics. It provides actionable insights for leaders across industries to develop high-performance teams.
Its adoption by esteemed organizations—such as Yale University, IEEE, Cisco, Microsoft, Ford, Oracle, Broadcom, the U.S. National Park Service, and the Journal of Neurosurgery, among others—highlights its utility and value, solidifying its status as an indispensable resource for elevating team performance and driving organizational excellence.
In 2026, Graffius added human-AI teamwork—including the "exotic team dynamics" which emerge when advanced AI collaborates as a teammate—to his "Phases of Team Development." The 2026 edition is here.
Expert on Temporal Dynamics on Social Media Platforms
Graffius is also an authority on temporal dynamics on social media platforms. His "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research—first published in 2018 and updated annually—delivers a precise quantitative analysis of post longevity across digital platforms, utilizing advanced statistical techniques to determine mean half-life with precision. It establishes a solid empirical base, effectively highlighting the ephemeral nature of content within social media ecosystems.
Referenced and applied by leading entities—such as Fast Company, GoDaddy, Journal of Hand Surgery (European Volume), Ministère de la Culture, Pinterest Inc., PNAS, and Telecommunications Policy, among others—his research exemplifies methodological rigor and sustained significance in the field of digital informatics.
The 2026 edition of Graffius "Lifespan (Half-Life) of Social Media Posts" research is here.
Education and Professional Certifications
Graffius has a bachelor’s degree in psychology with a focus in Human Factors. He holds eight professional certifications:
- Certified SAFe 6 Agilist (SA),
- Certified Scrum Professional - ScrumMaster (CSP-SM),
- Certified Scrum Professional - Product Owner (CSP-PO),
- Certified ScrumMaster (CSM),
- Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO),
- Project Management Professional (PMP),
- Lean Six Sigma Green Belt (LSSGB), and
- IT Service Management Foundation (ITIL).
He is an active member of the Scrum Alliance, the Project Management Institute (PMI), and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).
Advancing AI, Agile, and Project/PMO Management
Scott M. Graffius continues to advance the fields of AI, Agile, and project/program/portfolio management (PPPM), and PMO leadership. Businesses and other organizations leverage Graffius’ insights to drive their success.
Booking
Graffius has generated over $3.1 billion in business value for Fortune 500 companies and other organizations served. Put that track record to work for you. For speaking engagements, use the request form; for other inquiries, email him.
Connect with and follow Scott on LinkedIn, X, YouTube, Facebook, Bluesky, Mastodon, and ResearchGate.
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List of Additional Articles
Read more.
Meta CTO Called the AI Reorganization “Atrocious” — What Went Wrong and the Lessons for Human-AI Teams
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How to Cite This Article
Graffius, S. M. (2026, October 14). A Critical Analysis of "Five Core Themes of Intentional Team Formation" and Its Use of Scott M. Graffius' Research. ScottGraffius.com. https://scottgraffius.com/blog/files/critical-analysis-of-five-core-themes-of-intentional-team-formation.html
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Content Acknowledgements
Names, marks, and content are the property of their respective owners.
This article discusses the "Five core themes of intentional team formation" paper by Andrea N. Brennan, Christine R. Rollinson, Hannah Love, Ashley N. Schulz, Brendon Reidy, Jake J. Grossman, Ellyn M. Dickmann, Ellen R. Fisher, Luke McCormack, Andrew D. Richardson, Jalene LaMontagne, Matthew R. Helmus, and Daijiang Li, published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature) on 29 September 2026: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-026-09246-w.
The paper references Scott M. Graffius' "Phases of Team Development" research on teamwork tradecraft.
The paper is © 2026 The Author(s) and is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
This article includes brief excerpts from the paper, attributed to its authors and used under the fair use doctrine (17 U.S.C. § 107) for purposes of news reporting, commentary, and analysis. This article is independent commentary and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the paper's authors or Springer Nature.
"Phases of Team Development" is copyright © Scott M. Graffius. All rights reserved.
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