Advocates of self-managed teams, a common strategy for organizing work, suggest that teams may be a solution to gender inequality in the workplace. According to this argument, the nonteam-structured workplace is typically stratified by gender with women occupying the lower stratum of the hierarchy. Women's formal and informal interactions are therefore limited to mostly other women in similar low-status positions. This gendered pattern of interaction is said to negatively affect women's career opportunities and outcomes because women's positions prevent them from accessing and mobilizing good social capital - benefits from ties to influential persons within the organization. Self-managing teams that cross-cut workplace positions and subunits provide access to good social capital, thus enhancing women's work outcomes. I tested this argument with data from a case study of employees in the asset management subdivision of a multinational insurance and asset management company dubbed Finco Asset Management. In general, the results confirm the benefits of participation in self-managing teams. First, in Chapter 3 I found that workgroups, the nonteam structure at Finco, were more likely to be segregated by gender than self-managing project teams. In Chapter 4, I found that workplace position, workgroup and the perceived importance of another for one's career advancement determined the informal structure at Finco. Tie importance attenuated the effect of joint project team participation, which suggests that employees were strategic about forming ties with influential persons in project teams. In Chapter 5, I found that the informal structure, particularly indegree centrality and outdegree centrality, were key predictors of promotion and pay increase. Indegree centrality alone determined layoffs, however. Thus consistent with the social capital argument, self-managing project teams reduced gender segregation, provided access to important informal networks and the informal networks influenced employee work outcomes. However, gender mattered as well. Women were more likely to share workgroups and less likely to be in upper management. Women were also less likely to have same-sex informal networks within their subdivision after accounting for tie importance; however, they were more likely to have same-sex ties in other subdivisions. Women also reported lower job commitment and saw fewer opportunities for mobility at Finco in comparison to men. Hence, while participation in cross-cutting, self-managing teams does improve women's work outcomes, gender differences persist in positions and attitudes.

Despite significant regulatory and academic interest in sell-side analyst forecasts and an extensive literature demonstrating the impact of teamwork in general, we lack evidence of the effect of teamwork on analyst forecasts. In 2005 analyst teams issued nearly three-fourths of analyst reports for a sample of 89 large, heavily followed companies. Over a twelve-year period 86 of those companies had more reports issued by analyst teams than by individual analysts. Using a hand-collected sample of more than 17,000 analyst reports, I document that forecasts issued by analyst teams systematically differ from the forecasts of individual analysts in ways predicted by team literature. I find that prior to the year 2000 analyst teams issue forecasts that are less accurate and more biased than forecasts issued by individual analysts. Beginning in 2000, the relative benefit of analyst teamwork strengthens, consistent with changes due to Regulation Fair Disclosure, brokerage closures, and other regulatory interventions. In addition I find that, within company-year, team-issued forecasts are less pessimistically biased but not less optimistically biased than the forecasts issued by individual analysts. Lastly, the benefits of teamwork vary with the size of the team and over the life of the team, following an inverted u-shaped pattern. My results inform regulators as they consider factors that impact analyst forecast accuracy and bias.

Fundamental to the conceptualization of leader-membership exchange (LMX), particularly within the context of teams, is that leaders do not necessarily treat each follower equally. Studies that have examined LMX within the context of the team often fail to capture these complexities, or rely exclusively upon self-report, or survey-based data to make inferences. Therefore, it is the purpose of this study to examine the effects of experimentally manipulated relative LMX within teams on individual conflict processes, attitudes, and psychological distress, as well as team-level performance. This study examined conflict processes and outcomes within 113 virtual, project teams engaged in a decision-making task that required intensive interdependence. Teams were composed of three subordinates and a confederate leader who engaged in behaviors designed to heighten LMX with all, some, or none of the participants, depending on the condition. Results suggest that objectively manipulated leader behaviors influenced perceived levels of LMX as well as leader and teammate satisfaction, psychological distress, use of collaborative and individualistic conflict processes, and motivation to perform with the team. Results also indicate that relative LMX condition moderates the relationship between LMX condition and outcomes of interest, such that LMX condition has a stronger effect on outcomes when individuals are in a minority configuration (i.e., have a higher RLMX) than when they are in a shared configuration.

The main aim of this research is to investigate how elements of the dynamic and temporary team environment of construction project teams influence trust, commitment, satisfaction and learning in the teams. While much can be learnt from the current literature about teams, the theories have mainly derived and focused on teams from permanent environments such as manufacturing, hospitality, health care, education and technology sectors. The uniqueness of construction project teams (for example, temporariness and multi-organisations involvement) creates a team working environment different from common permanent work teams. As such, numerous questions arise when we consider how construction project teams function and how the members are influenced by the temporary and dynamic team environment. For example, how do the project team members establish trust and commitment in the project team environment? How does the interdependency on each other to accomplish their assigned tasks influence individual members?? attitudes and learning in the project teams? The research adopted a cross-sectional mixed method research design employing both quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection in Singapore construction industry. The quantitative method involved survey questionnaires collected from 136 construction practitioners from 47 project teams. The qualitative method involved in-depth interviews with 28 construction practitioners. Quantitative statistical analysis was performed on the survey data using Statistical Package for Social Scientists (SPSS) and qualitative thematic analysis was performed on the interview data using computer-assisted qualitative data analysis software - NVivo. Amongst other things the research findings indicated that individual team members?? perceived task interdependence and reward interdependence are positively related to their trust and commitment in the team. Additionally, their satisfaction in the team played a mediating role between the relationships. With respect to team learning, the research found that team goals, task interdependence and reward interdependence influence team learning, and team learning contributes to the performance of project teams. On a broad view, the circumstances in which how team members?? trust, commitment, satisfaction and team learning are influenced appear to be similar with other work teams. However, in-depth interviews with construction professionals revealed many complex and subtle factors relating specifically to construction project teams, such as, multi-projects and multi-organisations involvement, and degree of familiarity between the members before the team is set up. These factors are central to the team members. In conclusion, this study has brought insights into how temporary construction project team environment influence members?? team attitudes and team learning experience.

This thesis investigates the research question: What is the individual's experience within a work team? The concern is for respondents' meaning and understanding of the team experience and how team membership impacts their lives. The introductory chapter considers the researcher's concerns leading to the formulation of this question, including the uncritical nature of much of the literature on teams and the limited attention given to impacts and outcomes for individual team members. These concerns are expanded further in a review of both current and extant literature on teams. The current research is predominantly focused on team effectiveness and productivity, and this research is examined before moving on to review research conducted into individual factors relating to teams using a qualitative research methodology. The Heideggerian phenomenology, used in this study, is discussed. Data analysis is outlined. The research methods lead to the development of the model, comprising four themes. The first theme discusses respondents' concerns regarding the positioning of their immediate team within broader team structures within the organisation. Next, respondents' desire for, and expectation of, support from within the team is considered. The third theme, ambiguity,examines the uncertainty experienced by respondents with respect to team goals. Finally, respondents' experiences of dissonance and incongruity with relation to their teams are discussed, again considering the related issues of organisational rhetoric and sensemaking. The implications for organisations is discussed, and avenues for future research are presented. / Master of Commerce (Hons)

This study aims to contribute to a better understanding of communication differences in effective and ineffective teams. It investigates task and socio-emotional verbal behaviours over time and its relationship to team effectiveness and team members' self-perceived member viability. The author used an aural observational method to examine verbal communication of three teams. Participants were post-graduate students formed into teams, working on a complex and dynamic task over a project duration of five days in a classroom setting. Spoken interaction was audio recorded and analysed using Bales' (1950) Interaction Process Analysis (IPA). Three questionnaires were developed, mainly by combining existing measurement instruments from communication and small group research, measuring team effectiveness and member viability. The analysis of selected team meetings with IPA displayed interesting task and socio¬emotional communication differences in effective and ineffective teams. These differences were more visible in socio-emotional interaction than in task-related interaction. Observed interaction patterns changed over time, although communication behaviours were more stable in the effective teams. Findings indicate that a consistently high level of positive socio-emotional communication in combination with a consistently low level of negative socio-emotional interaction seem to facilitate team effectiveness, while a high level of negative socio-emotional interaction or constantly changing socio-emotional behaviour seems to inhibit team effectiveness. It seems to suggest that communication behaviours impact upon team effectiveness and member viability. When communication behaviours could be described as task focused with a consistent level of positive reactions, outweighing negative reactions, effectiveness and member viability can increase. Opposite behaviours, shifting from task to interpersonal issues in combination with negative reactions outweighing positive reactions can lead to low levels of perceived member viability and a lack of effectiveness. The results lead to the suggestion that communication behaviours and member viability, particularly cohesion and willingness to continue as a member of this team, seem to be indicators for a team's 'well-being' and impact upon its effectiveness. These factors seem to be especially visible at the beginning and the temporal midpoint of a project. During these two periods, monitoring of the team process is recommended, either self-managed or with support from outside the team in order to prevent communication problems impacting on team effectiveness.

<p>In an environment, demanding both innovation and flexibility, higher requirements of competitiveness and productivity is a necessity. Changed conditions of today's working situations have resulted in an actualization of new ways and methods of working. This has contributed to a development of participating working processes in form of groups and teams. The purpose of these communal working processes is that they ought to result in an increased knowledge and understanding among the group members which in turns will generate positive results in the daily work. This drives the search for new knowledge and development possibilities to handle these changed working processes. This contributes to that learning has become one of the most essential questions as a prerequisite to be able to meet these increasing demands of further development and improvements in the working life. When and how we are learning have become key questions in today's working life and what positive and negative effects these new learning processes results in. Thus, a focus on a communal learning has been actualized which have enthused the content of this study. This, in the purpose of elucidating how representatives in authentic working conditions experiences the appliance of a communal learning in relation to how this is described in the field of pedagogy as a branch of knowledge. This is done to investigate if there is a distinction between how representatives in authentic working conditions apprehend communal learning and how researchers use their theoretical conceptions.</p>

Thesis (M.A. (Social Work))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2008.

Thesis (M. Ed. (Educational Management) -- University of Pretoria. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 103-108)

In an environment, demanding both innovation and flexibility, higher requirements of competitiveness and productivity is a necessity. Changed conditions of today's working situations have resulted in an actualization of new ways and methods of working. This has contributed to a development of participating working processes in form of groups and teams. The purpose of these communal working processes is that they ought to result in an increased knowledge and understanding among the group members which in turns will generate positive results in the daily work. This drives the search for new knowledge and development possibilities to handle these changed working processes. This contributes to that learning has become one of the most essential questions as a prerequisite to be able to meet these increasing demands of further development and improvements in the working life. When and how we are learning have become key questions in today's working life and what positive and negative effects these new learning processes results in. Thus, a focus on a communal learning has been actualized which have enthused the content of this study. This, in the purpose of elucidating how representatives in authentic working conditions experiences the appliance of a communal learning in relation to how this is described in the field of pedagogy as a branch of knowledge. This is done to investigate if there is a distinction between how representatives in authentic working conditions apprehend communal learning and how researchers use their theoretical conceptions.