Leading Multicultural Teams in Agile Organizations

Abstract

Background: Multicultural teams provide diverse skill sets, and members’ different experiences could through effective leadership be leveraged to improve organizational performance, especially in the agile organization. Effective multicultural team leadership can drive the goals of agile organizations and support their realization. The problem is organizational leaders have a critical knowledge gap on how the competencies and skills of managers can be utilized to improve the effectiveness of multicultural teams. Methodology: This integrative literature review focused on the study of current research findings on managers’ experiences in leading multicultural teams within agile organizations. This study is framed by two key concepts of agile leadership models and leadership emergence in multicultural teams. Findings: This integrative literature review provides in-depth knowledge to formulate new knowledge and recommendations for further research that can be applied to measure the leadership effectiveness of multicultural teams in agile organizations. Managers and leaders of multicultural teams need to have a high intercultural competence to successfully integrate employees with diverse cultural backgrounds in their teams and also to facilitate fruitful communication and knowledge sharing among them using agile management tools. Originality: This integrative literature review can be utilized by future researchers as foundational material in studies to extend theoretical foundations and to extend the results of prior related studies. It has helped to highlight managerial and theoretical implications and to inform recommendations for future research that could contribute to improving the leadership of multicultural teams and, thus, their performance within agile organizations.