Adaptive Team Performance: The Influence of Membership Fluidity on Shared Team Cognition.

Wendy L Bedwell

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02266

Abstract

Team membership change literature has traditionally focused on performance effects of newcomers to teams. Yet, in practice, teams frequently experience membership loss without replacement (e.g., downsizing) or membership exchanges—replacing a member who has left the organization with a current, experienced employee. Despite the prevalence of these practices, little is known about the impact of such changes on team performance. Drawing upon two complementary team adaptation theories, the influence of both membership loss without replacement and loss with replacement by experienced personnel on the cognitive processes underlying adaptation (operationalized as development of effective team mental models – TMMs) was examined. Results suggested that Teammate TMMs (i.e., shared knowledge of member preferences/tendencies) and Team Interaction TMMs (i.e., shared knowledge of roles/responsibilities) are differentially influenced by the movement of members in and out of teams and differentially predict adaptive team performance. Further, TMM measurement choice (i.e., the use of similarity versus distance scores) matters as relationships differed depending on which metric was used. These results are discussed in the context of team adaptation theory, with implications for strategic human resource management.

Highlights

Downsizing has become common for organizational survival, as evidenced by the 2009 economic recession, when mass layoffs (i.e., ≥50 employees) increased dramatically (US Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2011)
With the exception of work on team downsizing (DeRue et al, 2008), research on membership fluidity—the dynamic flow of members in and out of teams (e.g., Edmondson et al, 2001; Edmondson, 2003; Tannenbaum et al, 2012)—has historically focused on newcomer socialization
Adaptive performance was regressed onto membership condition, as well as the various team mental models (TMMs) measures

Summary

Introduction

In work teams, downsizing creates membership loss without replacement or requires job rotation of current employees into new teams; here these “new members” are not novices but have task experience. Despite the prevalence of such practices, little is known about their impact, as research has rarely compared dynamic to stable team configurations, let alone membership loss to membership replacement (Tannenbaum et al, 2012). With the exception of work on team downsizing (DeRue et al, 2008), research on membership fluidity—the dynamic flow of members in and out of teams (e.g., Edmondson et al, 2001; Edmondson, 2003; Tannenbaum et al, 2012)—has historically focused on newcomer socialization (see Moreland and Levine, 2001 for a comprehensive review).

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Discussion

Conclusion