Talent Dispersion: Core/Periphery Distinctions, Team Performance, and Individual Talent Development

Abstract

Talent dispersion, and the hierarchy it creates, has the potential to be both functional and dysfunctional in teams. We argue and demonstrate that an overly broad conception of talent dispersion contributes to the disagreements in the literature. Through incorporating the notion of core and peripheral team members, we are able to conceptually and empirically investigate talent dispersion associated with certain members of the team, which allows for a cleaner use of relevant theory (in particular, the functionality of hierarchy) and less noisy tests of dispersion’s consequences. Specifically, we focus on talent dispersion associated with individuals’ core and peripheral positions on the team to better understand dispersion’s effects on team performance. We also investigate how well the core members coordinate the tasks at hand as an important explanation for when talent dispersion may be beneficial to team performance. Finally, we recognize that talent dispersion’s implications for learning, opportunities to perform, and incentives may also influence the development of individuals over time. This heretofore unstudied dynamic may speak to talent dispersion effects in a new way, further illustrating our emphasis on the need to consider the individual team members to fully understand the collective talent dispersion construct in teams.