Team Mindfulness Research Articles

Team mindfulness

PurposeModern business environments present tremendous uncertainties, risks, novelties, and opportunities. Organizational teams must identify emerging cues before they grow into full-blown issues, to adapt effectively to fast-changing environments. Team mindfulness is a socio-cognitive capability that enhances the ability to detect cues and creates richer awareness of the context. This paper proposes a conceptual model highlighting that team mindfulness directly strengthens the team’s adaptive capabilities and also enhances the absorptive capacity to learn from external sources, thereby further promoting readiness toward change and transformation.Design/methodology/approachThis conceptual paper draws from mindfulness theory and team adaptive performance theory to explore how team mindfulness influences the four dimensions of absorptive capacity related to knowledge acquisition, assimilation, transformation, and utilization, which together determine how effectively teams adapt to novelty.FindingsThis paper presents a conceptual model to show that mindfulness directly affects team learning and adaptive capabilities that are specifically related to acquiring and utilizing knowledge from sources outside the team. It suggests several measures and managerial initiatives promoting mindfulness and absorptive capacity in teams.Originality/valueIntegrating research on team mindfulness, absorptive capacity, and adaptive performance, this paper provides a starting point for deeper investigations into the mechanisms through which team mindfulness may enable teams to adapt effectively to novelty and uncertainty. Further, it calls attention to the systematic development of mindfulness in organizational teams.

Team Mindfulness for Healthcare Burnout Reduction

Team Mindfulness for Healthcare Burnout Reduction

Dynamics of Task Conflict for Employees in the Virtual Workplace: Moderating Role of Relationship Conflict and Mediating Role of Team Mindfulness

In the modern-day workplace, conflicts among team members are often observeddue to multiple reasons. Therefore, it is important to study the different aspects associatedwith conflict dynamics. For this research study, the sample was selected from organizationsenabled by information and communication technology, where employees are virtually connected. As a result, this research becomes particularly relevant in post-COVID-19 scenarios.SPSS version 23 was employed for moderation and mediation analyses using the Process Macro developed by Preacher and Hayes (version 3.3). Additionally, linear regression analysis was conducted. The statistical tests demonstrated a significant direct effect of task conflict on the outcome variables, as well as the indirect effects of moderating and mediatingvariables. The moderating variable of relationship conflict had a significant impact on bothtask conflict and team mindfulness. The direct association of task conflict was also assessedusing simple linear regression analysis in SPSS. This research explored a novel relationshipamong variables in virtual and digital organizations, where psychological contract breachessometimes also contribute to conflict dynamics. Thus, the study has investigated this phenomenon from the overarching theoretical perspective of mindfulness theory. Valuable recommendations have been provided for future researchers based on the insights derived from this research.

Twenty years of research on mindfulness at work: A structured literature review

Over the last two decades, mindfulness has become increasingly mainstream in the workplace and has attracted significant scholarly attention. However, there lacks a comprehensive and updated review of mindfulness that identifies historical research trends and establishes the current state of knowledge. To address this gap, we conduct a structured review of 217 articles published in top management and psychology journals between 2003 and 2022. Our findings reveal an uneven development in mindfulness research by topic. For example, while substantial research has examined the associations between mindfulness and both job performance and health outcomes, few studies have considered which factors moderate these associations. We propose five areas for future research that will facilitate a deeper understanding of mindfulness at work: the associations between mindfulness and adaptive performance, the design of mindfulness interventions, the complex nature of mindfulness effects, team mindfulness, and the interactions between different levels of mindfulness.

A mindfulness perspective on the link between abusive supervision climate and team conflict

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine whether and how abusive supervision climate impacts team conflict from a mindfulness perspective. Prior research has identified serious dysfunctional effects of abusive supervision climate in teams. Team conflict, which is often a signal for dysfunctional relationships in teams, has however received limited attention. To contribute to this line of research, this study develops and tests a theoretical model on the role of team mindfulness in understanding the link between abusive supervision climate and task, process, and relationship conflict. Design/methodology/approach To test the theoretical model, this study collected and analyzed two-wave time-lagged data from 499 employees in 92 teams. Findings The results showed that abusive supervision climate aggravated task conflict and process conflict via diminishing levels of team mindfulness. Abusive supervision climate also exacerbated relationship conflict, but the effects did not occur via a decrease in team mindfulness. Practical implications While it may not always be possible to prevent the development of an abusive supervision climate in workplaces, other interventions may prevent conflict in teams with abusive leaders. As indicated by the findings, task conflict and process conflict may be reduced if teams are high on mindfulness. Interventions that stimulate team mindfulness might thus improve collaboration in teams with abusive leaders. Originality/value This research offers novel insights regarding how abusive leaders might instigate conflict within teams. Specifically, through the unique perspective of mindfulness, the authors are able to offer new insights into how abusive supervision climate affects task, process and relationship conflict. This study offers a novel, yet important, lens to examine how conflict occurs in teams.

Mindfulness and emotion: a five-level analysis

AbstractBased on the five-level model of emotions in the workplace (FLMEW), we present an analysis of emotion and mindfulness at work. The five levels of emotion are: (1) temporal variations in emotion at the within-person level of analysis, which relate to state mindfulness; (2) stable individual differences in experiencing and expressing emotions at the between-persons level, which correspond with trait mindfulness; (3) perceiving and communicating emotions in dyadic relationships at the inter-personal level, reflecting interpersonal mindfulness; (4) emotional processes and leadership at the group level, which are associated with team mindfulness; and (5) and emotional culture and climate at the organizational level, which relate to organizational mindfulness. We provide a definition of mindfulness at each level. We argue that mindfulness tends to be associated with more positive and less negative affective experience at each level. We highlight practical implications and suggest future research at each level.

Team Mindfulness in Online Academic Meetings to Reduce Burnout

Burnout, a negative job-related psychological state common with health professionals, results in valuable healthcare research loss. Team mindfulness, promoting work engagement, represents an aspect effective in reducing burnout. In a series of diverse-membership academic meetings intended to reduce research burnout—employing writing prompts, doodling, and continuous developmental feedback—team mindfulness was demonstrated when conducted in person. Therefore, whether team mindfulness is evident when meetings are held online is relevant. During the first eighteen months of COVID-19 limitations requiring these meetings to be online, it was previously reported that team mindfulness was diminished. Question-asking, submitted doodles, and feedback responses were analyzed for the following year of the same group, both quantitively and qualitatively, and with respect to COR theory, to determine if the result persisted. Team mindfulness was also compromised in the second year with respect to the entire group but not regarding the individual relationship with the facilitator. For a diverse-membership group to demonstrate team mindfulness, it is suggested that creating and using avatars similar to those used in online games might be effective. To continue the successful aspect of team mindfulness found online for this group or similarly designed groups, a one-on-one meeting between participant and facilitator is recommended.

The Impact of Team Mindfulness on Project Team Performance: The Moderating Role of Effective Team Leadership

The current study aims to investigate the consequences of team mindfulness in project-based organizations by proposing team cohesion as an underlying mechanism and effective team leadership as a boundary condition through which team mindfulness promotes project team performance. Data were collected through a time-lagged survey from Pakistani employees (N = 379). The data supported the proposed model revealing that team mindfulness enhances team cohesion among employees, which increases project team performance and effective team leadership moderates this relationship. This study has identified the team-level factors that can be used by project managers to increase project team performance.

Coping with Workplace Incivility in Hospital Teams: How Does Team Mindfulness Influence Prevention- and Promotion-Focused Emotional Coping?

Incivility is a growing concern for researchers and practitioners alike, yet we know little about how the team context is related to the way that employees respond to it. In this study, we examined the role of team mindfulness and its direct and buffering effects on individual-level promotion- and prevention-focused emotional coping. We also examined how these forms of coping were related to individual work engagement. In a temporally lagged study of 73 hospital teams (involving 440 team members), multi-level analyses showed that team mindfulness was directly negatively associated with individual-level prevention-focused emotional coping (behavioral disengagement, denial, and venting); however, it was not positively related to individual-level promotion-focused forms of coping (positive reframing and acceptance). In addition, a cross-level interaction effect was identified whereby team mindfulness reduced the positive relationship between incivility and venting, meaning there was less individual-level venting following incivility in the context of higher team mindfulness. These findings may have implications for work engagement, which was shown to be negatively related to venting and behavioral disengagement. Our findings are useful for managers of teams that regularly experience customer incivility as it uncovers how they can develop a team context that discourages ineffective coping responses.

Extending the Transformative Potential of Mindfulness Through Team Mindfulness Training, Integrating Individual With Collective Mindfulness, in a High-Stress Military Setting.

Mindfulness has come to be considered an important approach to help individuals cultivate transformative capacity to free themselves from stress and suffering. However, the transformative potential of mindfulness extends beyond individual stress management. This study contributes to a broadening of the scope of contemplative science by integrating the prominent, individually focused mindfulness meditation literature with collective mindfulness scholarship. In so doing, it aims to illuminate an important context in which mindfulness interventions are increasingly prevalent: workplaces. Typically, the intended effect of workplace mindfulness training is to help workers manage stress better. Since mindfulness in organizations impacts individual and collective processes, the study blends the above literatures to create a cross-level “next-generation” Team Mindfulness Training (TMT) pilot. Its potential in helping individuals and teams to manage work stress better is investigated via a two-phase mixed-methods research study in high-stress military work populations, and compared to a conventional (“first-generation”) 8-week mindfulness meditation program based on mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR). Results suggest that compared to the “first-generation” mindfulness program, TMT seems no less effective in raising individual stress management skills, and may hold more promise in generating collective capacity to manage stress and unexpected difficulty, linked to an apparent interdependence between collective and individual mindfulness capacity development. Based on these empirical results, the study contributes to theory in three important ways: first, it outlines how individual and collective mindfulness in workplaces may be interdependent. Second, it explains why “next-generation” workplace training interventions should apply a cross-level approach. And third, it illustrates how its transformative potential for people at work, individually as well as collectively, can be extended by moving beyond an inward-looking meditation focus in mindfulness training. The study contributes to practice by providing a detailed outline of the pilot TMT program, and offers a series of follow-up research opportunities to inspire further scientific innovation in workplace mindfulness training, especially for high-stress work populations. The study’s ultimate aim is to prompt a shift away from adapting clinically oriented, self-focused “first-generation” mindfulness training protocols, and towards mindfulness as team sport: a more prosocially oriented mindfulness science intent on generating wisdom and compassion, for one and all.

Team mindfulness, team commitment and team respectful engagement: the lens of the conservation of resources theory and the broaden-and-build theory

Purpose This conceptual paper aims to present a model and propositions regarding the positive effect of team mindfulness on team commitment and how team respectful engagement moderates the positive effect of team mindfulness on team commitment. Design/methodology/approach This is a conceptual study that presents a model and propositions from an exploration of the previous literature by using the conservation of resources (COR) theory and the broaden-and-build theory. Findings The contribution of this study shows that team mindfulness has a positive effect on team commitment. Then, when team respectful engagement is high, it strengthens the positive effect of team mindfulness on team commitment. When team respectful engagement is low, it weakens the positive effect of team mindfulness on team commitment. Research limitations/implications The limitation of this research is that it only explains the causal relationships related to team mindfulness, team commitment and team respectful engagement through propositions built from the synthesis of various previous studies, without empirically confirming those relationships. Practical implications Teams should consider mindfulness training, such as mindfulness-based stress reduction. In addition, managers should also pay great attention to team respectful engagement, so that the interactions within the team are based on respect. Originality/value Limited research has been conducted to propose the model and propositions related to team mindfulness, team commitment and team respectful engagement by using the COR theory and the broaden-and-build theory.

Emergence and outcomes of shared leadership: unraveling the role of transactive memory system and team mindfulness using mixed-methods approach

PurposeShared leadership literature has primarily focused on investigating its positive impact on performance. Thus, the existing understanding of the emergence of shared leadership is limited. Also, there is a dearth of literature identifying the impact of shared leadership on affective outcomes. This study investigates the impact of transactive memory system and team mindfulness on shared leadership, and subsequently, the impact of shared leadership on team satisfaction through the mediating mechanism of thriving.Design/methodology/approachThe study adopted a mixed-methods approach with sequential explanatory research design. Quantitative study was carried out with a sample of 40 teams. Data were collected at four different time points. Qualitative interviews with 10 teams were carried out to provide insights about the relationships which emerged from the quantitative study.FindingsThe study found support for the impact of transactive memory on shared leadership. However, contrary to our hypothesis, the study found that the interaction effect of transactive memory system and team mindfulness on shared leadership is such that team mindfulness has preventive impact on lack of transactive memory. The results indicate that shared leadership influences team satisfaction through the mediating mechanism of employee thriving.Originality/valueThe study examines under-explored antecedent and boundary condition of emergence of shared leadership, i.e. transactive memory system and team mindfulness. Also, the study makes a methodological contribution by examining the dynamics of shared leadership through both quantitative and qualitative approaches.

Examining the associations of using the Calm app with team mindfulness and psychological safety in remote workers

Examining the associations of using the Calm app with team mindfulness and psychological safety in remote workers

COVID-19 Limitations on Doodling as a Measure of Burnout.

Pre-COVID-19, doodling was identified as a measure of burnout in researchers attending a weekly, in-person health narratives research group manifesting team mindfulness. Under the group’s supportive conditions, variations in doodling served to measure change in participants reported depression and anxiety—internal states directly associated with burnout, adversely affecting healthcare researchers, their employment, and their research. COVID-19 demanded social distancing during the group’s 2020/21 academic meetings. Conducted online, the group’s participants who chose to doodle did so alone during the pandemic. Whether the sequestering of group participants during COVID-19 altered the ability of doodling to act as a measure of depression and anxiety was investigated. Participants considered that doodling during the group’s online meetings increased their enjoyment and attention level—some expressed that it helped them to relax. However, unlike face-to-face meetings during previous non-COVID-19 years, solitary doodling during online meetings was unable to reflect researchers’ depression or anxiety. The COVID-19 limitations that necessitated doodling alone maintained the benefits group members saw in doodling but hampered the ability of doodling to act as a measure of burnout, in contrast to previous in-person doodling. This result is seen to correspond to one aspect of the group’s change in team mindfulness resulting from COVID-19 constraints.

Rethinking the role of team mindfulness in team relationship conflict: A conflict management perspective

SummaryWhy and when does team mindfulness help to reduce team relationship conflict? To answer this question, we develop and test a theoretical model that builds on Deutsch's theory of cooperation and competition. A two‐wave time‐lagged survey was conducted with 68 teams in an airline food service company located in China. The results showed that team mindfulness was negatively related to team relationship conflict via an increased cooperative conflict approach and a decreased competitive conflict approach. Further, high team job demands were shown to weaken the positive direct effect of team mindfulness on a cooperative conflict approach, as well as the indirect effect of team mindfulness on team relationship conflict via a cooperative approach. Theoretical contributions and practical implications are discussed.

Online Meeting Challenges in a Research Group Resulting from COVID-19 Limitations

COVID-19 social distancing limitations have resulted in the utilization of hybrid online formats focused on visual contact among learners and teachers. The preferred option has been Zoom. The focus of one voluntary, democratic, self-reflective university research group—grounded in responses to writing prompts—differed. Demanding a safe space for self-reflection and creative questioning of other participants, the private Facebook group was chosen over video conferencing to concentrate on group members’ written responses rather than on visual contact. A narrative research model initiated in 2015, the 2020/21 interaction of the group in the year’s worth of Facebook entries, and the yearend feedback received from group participants, will be compared with previous years when the weekly group met in person. The aim is to determine the appropriateness of the online platform chosen compared with when the group met in person, pre-COVID-19, and suggest changes to improve future online group meetings. The results in relation to COVID-19 limitations indicate that an important aspect of self-directed learning related to trust arising from team mindfulness is lost when face-to-face interaction is eliminated with respect to the democratic nature of these meetings. With online meetings the new standard, maintaining trust requires improvements to online virtual meeting spaces.

The role of regulatory focus and team mindfulness in megaproject conflicts

PurposeProject conflicts are inevitable. Megaproject conflicts need to be managed across different levels. The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of individual-level regulatory focus and organization-level team mindfulness in managing megaproject conflicts.Design/methodology/approachBy combining the individual motivation basis and organizational background of conflict resolution, this study constructed a multi-level structural equation model. The hypothesis is tested based on data collected from 182 respondents.FindingsThe findings of this study show that project manager's promotion focus has a direct positive effect on task conflict and a negative effect on relationship conflict. Prevention focus has a positive effect on relationship conflict and a negative effect on task conflict and process conflict. Team mindfulness has a negative effect on relationship conflict and process conflict and a positive effect on task conflict. Task conflict was negatively affected by the interaction between team mindfulness and promotion focus. The interaction between team mindfulness and prevention focus had a positive effect on relationship conflict.Originality/valueThis study verifies the positive role of project manager's promotion focus and prevention focus in conflict management and clarifies the strengthening role of team mindfulness in constructive conflict and the prevention role in destructive conflict. This study also confirms that team mindfulness can act as a reinforcement and complementary factor of regulatory focus in megaproject conflict, contributing to the current understanding of the project manager's role in megaproject mindfulness contexts.

How and when team average individual mindfulness facilitates team mindfulness: The roles of team relational stress and team individual mindfulness diversity

SummaryAlthough mindfulness has attracted increasing attention from scholars and practitioners, we do not have a clear understanding of whether, how, and when individual mindfulness composites may shape team mindfulness. Based on the input–process–output (IPO) model and integrating mindfulness theory and team composition perspective, we propose a team‐level model theorizing that the additive accumulation of individual mindfulness among members (i.e., the mean level of individual trait mindfulness within a team) reduces team relational stress and that this reduction in turn enhances team mindfulness. Furthermore, team individual mindfulness diversity (i.e., the variability of individual trait mindfulness within a team) serves as a moderator, such that the indirect effect of team average individual mindfulness on team mindfulness via reduced relational stress is stronger when team individual mindfulness diversity is low rather than high. The results from a three‐wave field survey data support our hypotheses. Our findings resolve important unanswered questions relating to how and when individual mindfulness composites shape team mindfulness, and illuminate critical implications for managerial practice.

Unfazed by Shackles: Do Constraints Really Affect Team Mindfulness?

Although research shows that collective mindfulness may have significant organizational consequences, studies have not adequately addressed how collective mindfulness is manifested in organizational sub-units such as groups and teams. Nor have these studies addressed the question- what affects collective mindfulness in teams. Using survey data from a housing finance organization, we explore how ‘team mindfulness’ is affected by two antecedents, namely- organizational constraints, and the connectedness of team members with people outside the team. We find that constraints, particularly those which are interpersonal in nature, negatively affect team mindfulness, while connectedness moderates these relationships. By exploring the antecedents of team mindfulness, we contribute to a deeper understanding of collective mindfulness in organizations. We discuss the implications of this study for theory and practice. Keywords: team mindfulness; constraints; connectedness

Task conflict and team creativity: The role of team mindfulness, experiencing tensions, and information elaboration

In this study, we examine how task conflict affects team creativity from the information processing perspective. To address this question, we develop a moderated mediation model at the team level to uncover the underlying mechanisms (i.e., experiencing tensions, information elaboration) and a conditional variable (i.e., team mindfulness). Two field studies with four-wave, multi-source samples were conducted. Results indicate that task conflict facilitates team creativity through the sequential mediation of experiencing tension and information elaboration. In addition, team mindfulness enhances the positive relationship between task conflict and experiencing tension, and the positive relationship between experienced tension and information elaboration. When team mindfulness is high, the relationship between task conflict and team creativity through the mediation of experiencing tension and information elaboration gets stronger than when it is low. We discuss theoretical contributions, practical implications, and future directions.