Perceptions of team performance: a comparison of male and female engineering students

Teaching engineers to work effectively on teams has become a critical component of engineering education. It is no longer adequate for engineering students to graduate with strong technical skills. They must also be able to work effectively on teams. The authors believe that the current team emphasis in engineering provides a unique opportunity to maximize the role of women by capitalizing on their unique blend of technical and relational strengths. This study examines perceptions of the relative performance of men and women on first year engineering fundamentals project teams. To measure perceptions of team performance, the authors gave a peer-rating instrument (Team Developer) to 263 men and 43 women assigned to 68 teams. They compared males and females on self-rating, team rating and self-team rating discrepancy along four behavioral dimensions: communication, collaboration, decision-making and self-management. Contrary to expectations, they found no overall difference between self and team ratings and no difference between males and females in self-ratings, team ratings, or self-team rating discrepancy. They discuss the implications of their findings for female students on predominately male teams.