PWR-190 · Team & Collective Intelligence

Transactive memory

Teams can remember more by knowing who knows what—but only if knowledge is accessible, documented and resilient when people leave.

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Revision 7T · Full Tutorial Edition · Release manifest · Methodology · Corrections

One source of teaching truth

Canonical Power learning unit · TLU-PWR-190

A small fictional team routes questions to validated holders, retrieves the answer, records its source and still succeeds after one member becomes unavailable.

Canonical Power page
PWR-190 · Transactive memory
Full tutorial
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Practical authority
The tutorial teaches a low-risk method that may be practised inside its stated limits.
Current treatment
Full low-stakes tutorial
Research depth
detailed · 4 bound sources
Risk framing
moderate to high
Capability self-practice
Permitted inside the tutorial's stated low-risk limits
Pathway membership
G-CUR-020

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Explanation is not permission.

This dossier explains the evidence and its limits. It is not a diagnosis, personal recommendation, assessment, clearance, performance promise or training programme. Actionable teaching appears only when the canonical Power record explicitly authorises it.

Complete bounded explanation

What this power means.

Capability to develop or express transactive memory in a declared context without inheriting broader claims.

What the current evidence supports

Teams trained together can develop transactive memory that improves a bounded group task, with field associations in project teams.

How to observe or measure it without overclaiming

Declare expertise domains, validation, retrieval, records, membership stability, access, error, redundancy, communication channel, delay and team outcome; knowing whom to ask is not knowledge retention.

Myth

Build a team that never forgets

Metric

Correct retrieval, redundancy and task outcome across delay and membership change

Boundary

An expertise map cannot replace documentation, prove institutional memory or justify surveillance.

Negative and limiting findings

  • Evidence relied on stable small groups and bounded tasks.
  • Face-to-face communication effects did not generalize to every channel, and observational field associations do not prove causation.

Claims this evidence cannot support

  • team memory never forgets
  • map who knows everything
  • replace documentation with key people
  • identify expendable workers
  • organizational memory score

Individual tutorial · FULL SELF GUIDED TUTORIAL

How to learn this Power now.

A small fictional team routes questions to validated holders, retrieves the answer, records its source and still succeeds after one member becomes unavailable.

  1. Get readyUse fictional records and no real confidential organisational knowledge.
  2. Learn the method8 concrete steps teach the permitted method from start to finish.
  3. See right and wrong4 comparisons show correct or safer execution beside common wrong or riskier choices.
  4. PractiseRun six retrieval questions weekly for three weeks. Test one member absence in week two and a source update in week three; review the directory monthly or immediately after membership or scope changes.
  5. Check progressBaseline fixture: A three-person “community fair” team has separate verified cards for permits, power and accessibility. Six questions must be routed, and a second round removes the permits holder. Enter success checks from “Name bounded domains” and “Verify the returned answer”. If “Call someone the team’s universal expert.” occurs, apply its named fix; then score Correct retrieval, redundancy and task outcome across delay and membership change on the unused “Update after change” item.

Authority boundary: Titan teaches a concrete low-stakes method step by step while keeping evidence and transfer claims bounded. The method is Power-specific; its actionability follows this treatment.

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Related Powers: PWR-185 · PWR-186 · PWR-187 · PWR-188

Direct evidence register

Sources that support—and limit—the claim.

Citation roles are explicit. A source may support existence or trainability while simultaneously limiting transfer, certainty, generalisation or safety.

  1. Primary empirical supportLimiting / contrary
    Group Versus Individual Training and Group Performance: The Mediating Role of Transactive Memory

    Diane Wei Liang; Richard Moreland; Linda Argote · 1995 · Primary research

  2. Primary empirical supportLimiting / contrary
    Knowledge and Performance in Knowledge-Worker Teams: A Longitudinal Study of Transactive Memory Systems

    Kyle Lewis · 2004 · Primary research

  3. Official boundary context
    TeamSTEPPS 3.0

    Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality · 2023 · Official authority

  4. Limiting / contraryOfficial boundary context
    Employment practices and data protection: monitoring workers

    Information Commissioner’s Office · 2023 · Official authority

Current teaching and evidence boundary

The next gate remains visible.

External confirmation is required before higher-authority use because: a clinical, high-risk or regulated configuration.

A Power-specific tutorial is available at /tutorials/pwr-190/. It contains a plain-English method, 8 ordered steps, a worked example, right-versus-wrong comparisons, specific mistakes and corrections, practice, measurement, accessibility, stopping rules and evidence. Its self guided mode remains controlling.