Introduction

This chapter examines collectivity in teamwork. The analytic concern is with how collective action is accomplished in team members' conversations. The example sequences were recorded in a multidisciplinary Child Development Centre (CDC) located within a large National Health Service (NHS) hospital in the United Kingdom. Multiprofessional teamwork is central to the provision of diagnostic and coordinated therapeutic services for children with developmental difficulties. At the time of the study, the physical surroundings of the Centre and its associated daily routines afforded many opportunities for informal discussion between team members concerning their work and case loads.

Multidisciplinary professional services for children

Multidisciplinary professional practice has been widely advocated in the British Isles for organizing the provision of services for children with complex developmental problems (Court Report, 1976; Warnock Report, 1978). It provides a “single gateway” to assessment and therapeutic services. Although widely taken up as a model of professional practice, there has been little evaluation of how such teams actually develop the ways of realizing their daily work activity in a multiprofessional manner. What research there is has either focused on the consultation process between professionals and their clients (e.g., Silverman, 1987; Sharrock & Anderson, 1987) or has examined the flaws in professional practice that surface as a result of professional jealousies and rivalries (Tomlinson, 1981). Such inter professional tensions are interpreted as detracting from good professional practice (Tomlinson, 1981). Research can also be found articulating an ideal that aspires to eliminate professional barriers and to equalize status relationships between professional expert and layperson (Gleidmann & Roth, 1980; Cochran, 1986; Wolfendale, 1986).