Presentation on virtual team research as part of my PhD defense at Iowa State University, Nov 1, 2013

1. Process protocols for virtual
team effectiveness
Christopher Sean Cordes
November 1, 2013
Iowa State University
1

2. HCI Path: work and academics
Design, manage, & teach interactive machine and human systems.
2008-> Instructional Design
Associate Professor
Instruction Services
Coordinator
Assistant Professor
Instructional Technology
Librarian
Research assistant for
MoDOT, the HS Truman
Library, and MU Provost
2007 Human Computer Interaction
2004 Educational Technology
& Information science
1999 Human Factors
& Technical Communication
2

3. Problem, purpose, contribution,
questions
• Virtual teams: the fastest growing work unit
• 97% said organizations planned to increase
virtual work options or keep them the same
(Leonard, 2011).
• 43 percent of HR professionals predict a larger
proportion of their workers will be telecommuting
in five years (Lockwood, 2010).
3

4. VT Challenges
More importantly…
A recent report study of nearly 30,000 multinational
companies found virtual teams challenged by:
• reading nonverbal cues (94%).
• establishing rapport and trust (81%).
• managing conflict (73%).
• expressing opinions (64%).
• decision making (69%) (Hastings, 2010).
4

5. The Problem
• Virtual teams are distinctly different, especially in terms of
boundaries, spatial, temporal, relational
• Virtual team effectiveness study has grown; but questions remain
about fit of communication media, process, and team level
outcomes
• Alignment of interaction processes, technology, and surrounding
conditions gives outcomes that are relatively favorable (DeSanctis
and Poole, 1993).
• Bell and Kozlowski (2002) call for more research on interaction
between communication technology and task type on team
processes and effectiveness
• Process and display structures foster interaction leading to gains in
attitudes and performance, and provide insight into how teams will
behave in the future given their unique operating conditions.
5

6. Guiding Questions
• To what extent does action process structure
influence perceptions of team work climate?
• To what extent does action process structure
influence justice perceptions of procedures?
• To what extent does action process structure
impact team decision performance?
• To what degree does technology affordance
moderate performance and attitudes?
6

7. Review of the Literature
• Defining virtual
teams
• Conceptual basis of
the research
• Framework of team
effectiveness
7

8. Team definition
• There is overlap between groups, teams, and
virtual team definitions, especially in terms of
outcomes and boundaries.
• In this study, virtual teams are groups of people
who work interdependently across boundaries
using technology to communicate, collaborate
and reach a common goal.
8

9. Theories
The study uses five schools based on the idea that teams
are mechanisms that:
• have member influence on each other and the team
• use interaction patterns to communicate information about
problems and solve them
• do tasks with resources, strategies, and interactions required
for effective outcomes
• use cognitive processes to make sense of information
• represent a dynamic of members, tools, resources, task and
technology
9

10. Model Framework
• Input-Process-Output (McGrath, 1984)
INPUT
Inputs are properties
of group structure, the
task, and properties of
the environment
PROCESS
Process represent
interdependent acts; convert
inputs to outcomes through
cognitive, verbal, and
behavioral action directed
toward taskwork to achieve
collective goals
OUTPUT
Outputs parallel input
classes and represent
changes process makes
to input variables
10

11. Process and Display Structures
• Action Process
Structure
– Monitoring
– Backup
– Coordination
• Collaborative Display
Structure
– Collaborative text
editing and chat
– Chat only
11

12. Team Climate
• Team climate represents shared perception of types of
behaviors, practices, and procedures that are supported
in a specific setting
• Four dimensions, participative safety, support
innovation, vision, task orientation
• When climate is strong, members are more likely
to…
• participate and contribute to the team
• express support for new ideas and bring them forward
• make practical efforts to make resources available
• enable effective monitoring and review of team actions
• share information and acquire knowledge
12

13. Procedural Justice
• The six rules: consistency, bias
suppression, accuracy, correctability, representative
ness, and ethicality.
• Positive justice increases
helping, attachment, trust, cooperation, decision
commitment
• change to one rule can be offset by another
• justice levels are positively related to role
performance and conflict perceptions
• justice perceptions tend to align and interact
• Dispersion creates uncertainty so that justice
perceptions are more salient
13

14. Performance
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Comparable to F2F teams
Quality and quantity
Tied to task
May take VT longer
Less interaction
Less information exchange
Less conflict resolution
14

15. Hidden Profiles
The study uses a hidden profile problem
You are member of a four person pilot job search committee.
B
A
C
D
All your team members have
positive and negative information
too. Some is the same. Some is
different.
B
If team members
share all the
information between
them the initial worst
choice becomes the
best.
C
A
D
Critical thinking,
counterfactual
mindset, listing
15

16. Study design
Inputs
Task Design
Shared and unshared
information between
members
Process
Action
Process
Outputs
Performance/
Affective
Monitoring, Backup, &
Coordination protocol vs
ad hoc process
• Decision Performance
• Team Climate
• Procedural Justice
Information
Display
Editable / collaborative
document vs chat only
The within-subject factor was the
exclusive decision information set
for each member.
The between-groups factors were two independent variables, action process
structure and information display structure.
16

17. Methodology
• Population
• Variables &
Measurements
• Treatment conditions
• Hypotheses
17

18. Population
• Participants drawn from 2 universities
• Some participants received extra credit for class
• All participated in a drawing for a large prize, and a $20
bonus for the team with the best performance (time and
accuracy).
• Demographics included information about
diversity, gender, prior knowledge of each other, and
prior work together before the study
• In addition, they were asked about their comfort level
using internet tools.
18

19. Virtual Study Environment
• Study administration, trials, and data collection
performed online.
• Scheduling was done through the Doodle tool
• Correspondence of participants through email
• Task was done in 4 member teams in Google
documents using text-based chat and
collaborative text editing
• Data was collected using Qualtrics survey
software
19

20. Treatment Conditions
Action Process Structure by Information Display Structure
High APS/High IDS
• APS, Discussion monitoring,
backup, coordination, leader
• IDS, Can use chat and edit
document
Low APS/High IDS
APS, Discussion ad hoc team
process
IDS, Can use chat and edit
document
High APS/Low IDS
• APS, Discussion monitoring,
backup, coordination, leader
• IDS, Can use chat, no
collaborative editing
Low APS/Low IDS
APS, Discussion ad hoc team
process
IDS, Can use chat, no
collaborative editing
20

21. Variables & Measures
• Team Climate
Designed by Anderson and West (1994), to measure the overall climate of
the team experience: The inventory has subscales for four specific areas:
group vision, task-orientation, support, and participative safety.
• Procedural Justice
Measures perceptions of procedural fairness, amount of control over
process and outcomes, and the degree of consistency, accuracy,
correctibility, bias, and ethicality.
Jason Colquitt, (2001).
• Decision performance
• Decision accuracy-objective measure coded
1=correct, 0=incorrect
• Decision Quality-suitability candidate prior to and after discussion,
Information Sharing-value of individual shared and unshared attributes
21

22. Hypothetical Model
Action process structure
will increase decision
performance, team
climate, and procedural
justice perceptions.
Ability to list and structure information is
expected to moderate the influence of
action process on outcomes.
22

23. Results
•
•
•
•
Preliminary analysis
Primary analysis
Secondary analysis
Confirmatory factor
analysis
23

24. Reliability and Aggregation
Construct
Team Climate
Procedural
Justice
Information
Sharing
Shared
Information
Unshared
Information
Decision
Accuracy
Decision
Quality
Cronbach’s
Rwg(j) ICC(1)
alpha
.861
.962
.251
ICC2(2)
.876
.725
.875
.180
.624
.880
.711
.213
.837
.815
.784
.140
.790
---
---
---
---
---
---
---
---
24

25. Preliminary Analysis
• Control Variables-These variables for internet
comfort level, age, and ethnicity were controlled
for in the regression tests.
• Internet technology comfort level was positively
correlated with team climate and procedural
justice scores.
• Ethnicity was positively correlated with
procedural justice
• Age was positively correlated with team climate.
25

26. Outcomes by Factor
Dependent Variable
High Action
process, High
Information
Display
High Action
process, Low
Information
Display
Low Action
process,
High
Information
Display
Low
Communication
Display, Low
Information
Display
Team Climate
3.95 (.561)
3.80 (.520)
3.68 (.573)
3.52 (.520)
Procedural Justice
4.00 (.590)
3.70 (.561)
3.55 (.672)
3.70 (.532)
Decision Accuracy
.807 (.410)
.673 (.473)
.635 (.470)
.462 (.480)
Decision Quality
3.80 (1.34)
3.50 (1.30)
3.50 (1.40)
3.27 (1.23)
Information Sharing
Shared
3.70 (.512)
4.01 (.433)
3.70 (.620)
3.94 (.388)
3.67 (.661)
3.67 (.734)
3.40 (.844)
3.61 (.734)
Unshared
26

27. Hypothesis Test Results
Hypothesis
Hypothesis
Hypothesis
Hypothesis
Tested
1:
2:
3a:
Supported
Yes
Yes
Yes
Hypothesis 3b:
No
Hypothesis
Hypothesis
Hypothesis
Hypothesis
Yes
No
Yes
No
3c:
4:
5:
6:
P-Value
.001
.008
.003
.582
.108
.006
.535
.009
.462
Effect Size
h2=.049
h2.=036
h2=.045
h2=.001
h2=.012
OR=2.34
h2=.001
h2=.042
OR=.794
27

28. Factor Analysis
Goodness-of-Fit Measures
(x2=201.94, df= 63, x2/df, 3.20, GFI = 0.88,
CFI = 0.82, IFI =0.82, RMSEA =.103).
Factor Loadings
Most factors (11 of 13) loaded significantly (p <
.001) on latent constructs with acceptable factor
loadings above 0.50. Two indicators, PJ6 (ability to
appeal) and PJ7 (ethical and moral standards) were
non-significant).
Reliability
R-Square values for all indicators but three were
less than the level of 0.50. The range of variance
explained across all 13 indicators extended from
0.01 or 1% (PJ7) to 0.64 or 64% (TC2).The data
showed the model had relatively low explanatory
power on most indicators.
28

29. StudyConclusions, Discussion, and
Recommendations
• Summary, Conclusions
Discussion
• Limitations
• Recommendations
29

30. Main Effects
• There is evidence monitoring, backup and
coordination processes support team climate
and justice perceptions, and accurate, higher
quality decisions.
• Display structure also influenced climate
independently, but not justice or decision
accuracy
• But impact may be small as shown by the
modest effect size indicators.
30

31. Moderating Effects
• Action process and information display structure
had separate influence on team climate
• In addition, increased technology affordance
was found to moderate action process impact on
justice climate, but experimental groups had
similar scores to ad hoc
• Finally, display affordance enhances action
process structure so teams make more accurate
decisions than when action process structure is
used alone. But this effect is not interactive.
31

32. Factor analysis
• Examination shows correcting of error
covariances with and between justice and
climate indicators will improve model fit.
E1E3 (TC1PS and TC3 Vision)
E1 E6 (TC1PS, and PJ2 Outcome control)
Model fit indices: (x2=71.70, df= 40; x2/df, 1.80;
GFI=0.95; CFI =0.96; IFI=0.96; RMSEA=.062
32

33. Limitations
•
•
•
•
•
•
Factor separation (control groups ad hoc)
Constraints of chat
Outside collaboration
Figurative vs literal interpretations
Instrument length, fatigue
Technology usability
33

34. Recommendations
• Team designers and members can implement
action process structuring to meet unique task,
technology, and virtual environment conditions
• Exploration of team and justice climate facets in
varying contexts and in longitudinal studies may
provide better understanding of action process
and display structuring impact
34