Performance and diversity in self-managed work teams

Abstract

Diversity in Self-Managed Work Teams (SMWTs) performing modern workplace software and service development in Agile multi-national distributed organizations, has become a new norm for many organizations and enterprises. Much research has been done regarding the effects of surface-level and deep-level diversity on team performance and efficiency. In recent years work has been done to conceptualize the different aspects of team performance and its contributing factors, such as the inner/social processes in teams, the output related performance and the matching feedback models. This study investigated multi-national research & development teams in a global aerospace enterprise (The Boeing Company, TBC). It modeled different forms of team performance (self-set goals, external-set goals performance, and member interactions peer performance insights) derived from recently conceptualized models and merges them with surface-level and deep-level diversity to find their contributions to the three levels of team performance. In addition, it investigates the same input diversity factors and the performance levels with team process ratings based on peer evaluations. It strives to reflect the vast variety of existing input parameter based research on team performance and reflecting it over such modern Agile software and services teams. It provides recommendations to practitioners on how to capitalize on these findings. The study confirms many previous findings regarding diversity factors as input parameters. It found additional diversity factors likely contributing to team performance, like native language diversity and education level diversity. It also found contributing factors from the culture dimension models — a field not extensively researched to date. Positive effects from higher levels of risk, directness and independence were found. New knowledge was created by relating the individual effects to the operationalized three levels of team performance. The study found that known input factors and newly found factors are not always contributing to all performance levels at the same level, or even at all to the modern forms of SMWTs. The findings also hint to practitioners that learnings and knowledge from more recent conceptualizations, that focus more on the dynamics and processes within a team, such as the Contingent Configuration Approach (CCA) or the Categorization-Elaboration Model (CEM) need much more attention when using frameworks such as Agile or Pragmatic Marketing. Just focusing on mere input parameters and maximizing there for output may underutilize the concepts existing. Recommendation are developed for managers and practitioners for such
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teams based on the empirical findings and the reviewed and conceptualized models of team performance and diversity.