Status Inertia and Member Replacement in Role-Differentiated Teams

The arrival of a new member can provide the impetus for learning and performance improvement in groups, but only if the newcomer is accorded status within the new group. We examine newcomer status in cases of member replacement, i.e., when a newcomer assumes an existing role within an established gr...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Organization science (Providence, R.I.) R.I.), 2014-01, Vol.25 (1), p.57-72
Main Authors: Bunderson, J. Stuart, Van der Vegt, Gerben S., Sparrowe, Raymond T.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis
Business teamwork
Construction engineering
Economic performance
Experimental methods
Finance
Financial management
Group dynamics
Group performance
Hypothesis
Knowledge transfer
membership change
Organization theory
Organizational behavior
Organizational behaviour
Organizational change
Roles
Saliency
Simulation
Simulations
Social interaction
Statistical variance
status
Studies
Teams
turnover
U.S.A
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The arrival of a new member can provide the impetus for learning and performance improvement in groups, but only if the newcomer is accorded status within the new group. We examine newcomer status in cases of member replacement, i.e., when a newcomer assumes an existing role within an established group. Drawing from status characteristics and status construction theories, we suggest that status in role-differentiated groups is inertial—nominal roles acquire status value, and these role-related status attributions carry forward to affect the status of a replacement newcomer. We also suggest that these inertial status dynamics can be affected by the relative performance of the host versus donor group and that they will have consequences for group performance. These hypotheses were supported in a controlled setting using teams engaged in several rounds of a management simulation exercise. The theory and results of this study have important implications for research on intragroup status, membership change in groups, and the transfer of knowledge through member rotation.
ISSN:1047-7039
1526-5455
DOI:10.1287/orsc.2013.0835