Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine, among the possible causes, whether trust in the leader is one of the most relevant factors on the success of a virtual work team by analyzing different antecedents of the trust and its consequences. Design/methodology/approach The influence that certain physical and behavioral characteristics of the leader (attractiveness, empathy and justice) exert on the degree of trust is evaluated. On the other hand, the influence of trust on the efficiency of the team, in terms of organizational citizenship behavior and commitment, is analyzed. To test the model, a survey was conducted on real work teams and the data were analyzed through a model of structural equations. Findings The results support the hypotheses and consequently, the relevance of trust in the leader. Specifically, the leader’s physical and behavioral characteristics have a significant effect on the trust in the leader. This trust results in greater organizational efficiency. Originality/value Despite the undisputable growth in the number of companies using virtual teams, it is also true that many of these teams fail to perform. In this sense, this paper analyzes if certain factors related to leadership can be relevant when influencing the efficiency of a virtual work team. This paper contributes to a better understanding of the internal processes within a virtual team in order to maximize the chances of success in this type of organizations.
Highlights
Virtual teams are ever more important in organizations and their growth and popularity continues to rise
Focusing on the study of leadership, several previous studies have substantiated the importance of the leader’s physical attractiveness in the way they are perceived by their subordinates (e.g. Spisak et al, 2012; Benjamin and Shapiro, 2009). Framing this hypothesis in the context of a virtual environment, we find various studies that support the importance of the physical attractiveness of the leader of a virtual team or community when it comes to influencing subordinates (Zhao et al, 2015)
To contrast the proposed hypotheses, the structural equations model shown in Figure 1 was developed
Summary
Virtual teams are ever more important in organizations and their growth and popularity continues to rise. Virtual team members are geographically dispersed, they interact electronically through telematic networks, have diverse roles and work in temporary systems, there may be team members working in different time zones ( Jarvenpaa and Leidner, 1999). They are frequently self-managed knowledge-based teams with distributed expertise and that can be formed or dissolved depending on the specific objectives of the organization ( Jarvenpaa et al, 2004). A study carried out by OnPoint (2013), found that 25 percent
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