Publication Date

2019

Document Type

Dissertation/Thesis

First Advisor

Santuzzi, Alecia M.

Degree Name

M.A. (Master of Arts)

Legacy Department

Department of Psychology

Abstract

Virtual teams help organizations efficiently utilize their employees for a task without the requirement of co-location. The literature on team performance suggests that teamwork is integral to a team’s success; however, in virtual teams this is often a challenge. Certain personality characteristics on virtual teams may be particularly important to the development of effective teamwork. An under-investigated factor is the role agreeableness in virtual team processes and how it affects the overall team performance. The main research question of this study is how the degree of agreeableness on a virtual team affects the overall team performance through predicted associations with team identification and shared mental models. The data were collected at University of California–Fresno’s assessment center using 58 teams with an average of 4 MBA students per team. Results indicated that there was no significant relationship between the degree of agreeableness on a virtual team (or proportion) and overall team performance. The results also indicate that there was no significant mediating relationship through the teamwork variables and the team score for case outline and presentation with either the mean level or proportion of agreeableness. The direct relationship between the shared mental model of initiative and team case presentation with the mean and proportion level of agreeableness was significant. Both the team identification (IOS) and an exploratory identification composite were positive and significantly related to both the mean and proportion level of agreeableness as well. Future research should investigate this relationship on more traditional work teams where individuals may be more engaged in the mission. However, this research does contribute to the field by its novel measurement of shared mental models and team identification.

Extent

123 pages

Language

eng

Publisher

Northern Illinois University

Rights Statement

In Copyright

Rights Statement 2

NIU theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from Huskie Commons for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without the written permission of the authors.

Media Type

Text

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