Addressing a key concern in human service and other organizational settings concerned with effective teamwork, this book offers a new paradigm for conceptualizing the subject. Based on qualitative research conducted with teams working with the chronically ill, elderly, and with high-risk psychiatric patients, Anne Opie has developed a method of working with teams that focuses on teamwork as "knowledge work" and is applicable to a variety of disciplines and settings.

Most discussions of teamwork have focused on the team players, notably their interpersonal relationships. Drawing on...