Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations [1 ed.] 9781787563117, 9781787563124

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ORGANISATIONAL ROADMAP TOWARDS TEAL ORGANISATIONS

ADVANCED SERIES IN MANAGEMENT

Previous Volumes: Shared Services as a New Organizational Form ED. TANYA BONDAROUK Social Media in Human Resources Management EDS. TANYA BONDAROUK AND MIGUEL R. OLIVAS-LUJA´N Social Media in Strategic Management EDS. MIGUEL R. OLIVAS-LUJA´N AND TANYA BONDAROUK (Dis)honesty in Management: Manifestations and Consequences EDS.TIIA VISSAK AND MAAJA VADI Commercial Diplomacy and International Business: A Conceptual and Empirical Exploration ED. H. RUE¨L Electronic HRM in Theory and Practice EDS. T. BONDAROUK, H. RUE¨L AND J.C. LOOISE Relational Practices, Participative Organizing EDS. CHRIS STEYAERT AND BART VAN LOOY Autopoiesis in Organization Theory and Practice EDS. RODRIGO MAGALHAES AND RON SANCHEZ Organizations as Learning Systems “Living Composition” as an Enabling Infrastructure ED. MARJATTA MAULA Complex Systems and Evolutionary Perspectives on Organizations: The Application of Complexity Theory to Organizations ED. EVE MITLETON-KELLY Managing Imaginary Organizations: A New Perspective on Business EDS. BO HEDBERG, PHILIPPE BAUMARD AND A. YAKHLEF Systems Perspectives on Resources, Capabilities and Management Processes EDS. JOHN MORECROFT, RON SANCHEZ AND AIME´ HEENE Tracks and Frames: The Economy of Symbolic Forms in Organizations ED. K. SKOLDBERG Human Resource Management, Social Innovation and Technology EDS. TANYA BONDAROUK AND MIGUEL R. OLIVAS-LUJA´N Dead Firms: Causes and Effects of Cross-Border Corporate Insolvency EDS. MIGUEL M. TORRES, VIRGINIA CATHRO AND MARIA ALEJANDRA GONZALEZ PEREZ New Ways of Working Practices: Antecedents and Outcomes ED. JAN DE LEEDE Age Diversity in the Workplace: An Organizational Perspective EDS. SILVIA PROFILI, ALESSIA SAMMARRA AND LAURA INNOCENTI International Business Diplomacy: How Can Multinational Corporations Deal with Global Challenges? ED. HUUB RUE¨L

ORGANISATIONAL ROADMAP TOWARDS TEAL ORGANISATIONS

TANYA BONDAROUK University of Twente, The Netherlands

ANNA BOS-NEHLES University of Twente, The Netherlands

MAARTEN RENKEMA University of Twente, The Netherlands

JEROEN MEIJERINK University of Twente, The Netherlands

JAN DE LEEDE University of Twente, The Netherlands

United Kingdom India Malaysia

North America China

Japan

Emerald Publishing Limited Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK First edition 2018 Copyright r 2018 Emerald Publishing Limited Reprints and permissions service Contact: [email protected] No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without either the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence permitting restricted copying issued in the UK by The Copyright Licensing Agency and in the USA by The Copyright Clearance Center. Any opinions expressed in the chapters are those of the authors. Whilst Emerald makes every effort to ensure the quality and accuracy of its content, Emerald makes no representation implied or otherwise, as to the chapters’ suitability and application and disclaims any warranties, express or implied, to their use. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN: 978-1-78756-312-4 (Print) ISBN: 978-1-78756-311-7 (Online) ISBN: 978-1-78756-313-1 (Epub) ISSN: 1877-6361 (Series)

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Acknowledgements

This work is part of the research programme Innovating Human Resource Management for Employee-driven Innovation with project number 409-13-204, which is (partly) financed by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). We thank the management team and HRM professionals from Livio for their openness for the research and all employees of Livio, who gave interviews; seventeen HRM students for their help in gathering the data; and Keith Townsend and Sut I Wong for their comments on earlier versions of this book.

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Teams are back! Bos-Nehles, Bondarouk, Meijerink, and Renkema have drawn together a wealth of previous literature to review and new empirical data to remind scholars and practitioners of the potential benefits (and pitfalls) of teams, particularly self-managing work teams, within organisations. This book is a timely contribution to scholarship while practitioners can gain a wealth of useful knowledge throughout the seven key sections of this book. The work is well-written, accessible, and covers and inordinate amount of ground as the authors step the reader through decades of history and research, provide an insightful case study of a healthcare organisation, and then tightly link the human resource management activities, and line manager roles in organisations that adopt self-managing teams. This book is an essential guide to practitioners and scholars both looking to understand teams as they continue to evolve two decades in to the twenty-first century. Dr Keith Townsend | Associate Professor, Department of Employment Relations and Human Resources Griffith University, Australia In the seminal work of Rosabeth Moss Kanter, who was one of the pioneers in structural empowerment research, she defines power as the ability to mobilise resources to get things done. Power is on when individuals have access to lines of information, support, resources, and opportunities to learn and to grow. Otherwise, power is off and effective work is impossible. The meaning of power is thus based on positive sum ideology and is closer to mastery than to domination or control over others. These lines of power are sources of structural empowerment within an organisation as a multilevel-system influence an individual’s access to power and opportunity that is, their ability to access and mobilize the resources to work effectively. To create and maintain such empowerment system is hard, yet necessary. This book brilliantly approaches empowerment and self-management from different organisational aspects giving a good account of the complexity of the phenomenon. Sut I Wong, Professor of Communication and Leadership, Nordic Centre for Internet and Society, BI Norwegian Business School, Norway

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Contents

List of Figures List of Tables About the Authors

Introduction

xi xiii xv 1

1.

The Concept of Self-managing Teams: History and Taxonomy

13

2.

Literature Review of Successful Self-managing Teams

29

3.

Healthcare Teams in Long-term and Elderly Care at Livio: A Case Study

53

4.

The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams

65

5.

Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams

101

6.

The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams

147

7.

Discussion and Future Outlook

179

Appendices

197

Index

261

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List of Figures

Introduction Figure 1 Figure 2

Scopus Analysis of the Publications about Self-managing Teams. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Interconnections of Terms Related to the Research into Self-managing Teams. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

3 5

Chapter 2 Figure 1

Framework for Successful Self-managing Teams. . . . . . . .

40

Organisation Structure of Livio. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

54

Chapter 3 Figure 1 Chapter 4 Figure 1

Line Management Roles, Behaviours and Leadership Styles during the Self-managing Team Implementation Process. . . .

90

Chapter 5 Figure 1 Figure 2

The Hiring Process in Self-managing Teams.. . . . . . . . . . The Process of Planning by Self-managing Teams. . . . . . . .

Figure 3

Model of HRM Governance in Organisations with Self-managing Teams. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Chapter 7 Figure 1

Four Approaches to the Introduction of SMTs. . . . . . . . .

Figure 2

The Team Maturity Model. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

108 118 139 184 188

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List of Tables

Chapter 1 Table 1

Taxonomy of Work Group Autonomy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

22

History of Livio’s Choice to Introduce Self-managing Teams. . . . Overview of Interviewees at Livio. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

62 63

Chapter 3 Table 1 Table 2 Chapter 4 Table 1 Table 2

Two-phase Devolution of People Management Responsibilities and Authorities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Summary of Line Management Roles, Behaviours and Leadership Style. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

76 93

Chapter 5 Table 1 Table 2

Overview of Formal and Informal Governance Mechanisms. . . . 122 Formal and Informal Governance Mechanisms at Livio. . . . . . 138

Chapter 6 Table 1

Examples of Specialised Competences for HRM-as-a-service. . . . 162

Chapter 7 Table 1

The Context of the Organisation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186

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About the Authors

Tanya Bondarouk is Professor of Human Resource Management (HRM) and the head of the department of HRM at the University of Twente. She also works as Associate Editor for the International Journal of Human Resource Management and the European Journal of International Management and as Co-editor of the Advanced Series in Management (Emerald Publishers). She has been working on the research area of innovating HRM function, with the focus on Electronic HRM, and has edited a number of special issues in international journals on this topic. Her main publications concern integration of HRM and social aspects of Information Technology Implementations and appear in the International Journal of HRM, Personnel Review, European Journal of Management and European Journal of Information Systems. Her research covers both private and public sectors and deals with a variety of areas such as the implementation of e-HRM, management of HR-IT change and HRM contribution to IT projects. Anna Bos-Nehles is Assistant Professor in the field of HRM at the University of Twente. Her main research interest lies in the role of line managers towards HRM implementation effectiveness, their effect on innovative employee behaviours and their role in digitalisation. She focuses on how line managers implement HR policies and practices at the operational level, in the way they shape the innovative behaviour of employees in all areas of the organisation and how they use digital applications to manage their subordinates. Her research has been published in peer-reviewed international outlets such as Human Resource Management, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Personnel Review, Baltic Journal of Management, Management Revue and European Journal of International Management as well as in peer-reviewed books with an international audience such as HRM and Performance: Achievements and Challenges or the Handbook of Research on Comparative Human Resource Management.

xvi

About the Authors

Maarten Renkema is Doctoral Researcher of HRM at the University of Twente. His PhD research is focused on the link between HRM and Innovation, approached from a multilevel perspective. More specifically, he studies the top-down relationship between HRM policies and practices and the innovative work behaviour of employees on the one hand, and the bottom-up emergence of innovations on the other hand. Moreover, he conducted research projects focused on self-managing teams and self-scheduling in the healthcare sector. Research of Maarten has been published in peer-reviewed international journals such as Human Resource Management Review, Personnel Review and Journal of Organizational Effectiveness: People and Performance. Currently, he is working on the Human Capital project ‘Innovative Human Resource Management for Employee-Driven Innovation’. Jeroen Meijerink is Assistant Professor of HRM at the University of Twente. His research focuses on HRM and value creation in the digital economy. In particular, he studies two digital-enabled sourcing options: HRM shared services and crowdsourcing. The former topic includes the design, implementation and evaluation of HRM shared service models. The latter research topic centres around the HR management and value of crowdsourcing workers that offer their services through online labour platforms. His research is multi-disciplinary in nature and draws on theories and concepts from the HRM and strategy (e.g. intellectual capital theory and the consumer perspective) as well as service marketing literatures (e.g. service dominant logic). He published in peer-reviewed international outlets such as Human Resource Management, Journal of Business Research, Human Resource Management Review, International Journal of Human Resource Management, Personnel Review, European Journal of International Management and The Services Industries Journal. Jan de Leede is Assistant Professor of HRM at the University of Twente (1.5 day a week) and owner of ModernWorkx, a research and consultancy firm. He is focused on research and consultancy in the field of flexible labour, working times, selforganising teams, virtual teams and new ways of working. His PhD was on self-managing teams, including the contribution of such teams to product and process innovation. He published more than 15 articles in international journals, such as Personnel Review, Ergonomics, Creativity and Innovation Management, Human Resource Management Journal, International Journal of Operations and Production

About the Authors

xvii

Management; more than 40 articles in Dutch scientific and other journals and more than 15 books or chapters of books. He participated in European research projects (Innoflex, Saltsa Hospital Network), was Project Manager of several research and consultancy projects at TNO. His consultancy work is focusing on evaluating shift roster systems, designing ergonomic friendly and efficient rosters, self-rostering and self-organisation. Both in industry and healthcare.

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Introduction

The decision to implement self-directed work teams should not be taken lightly. The process requires an enormous amount of organisation and planning. Done right, however, these teams can increase performance, quality and employee involvement. Caudron (1993, p. 78)

Caudron (1993) was describing the reorganisation of the San Diego Zoo in 1988. Employees at the Zoo used to have well-defined jobs: keepers did the keeping and gardeners did the gardening. The clearly defined job design worked as long as there were clear boundaries between animal exhibits, public areas and floral displays. In 1988 the Zoo began to develop bioclimatic zones, in which animals and plants were grouped in cageless fields that resembled their natural habits. Visitors were invited to view the exhibits by walking through them instead of observing them from afar. The management team renewed their vision that a bioclimatic 3.5-acre Tiger River exhibit would provide a healthier environment for animals and plants, and a better educative environment for visitors. The zones became fully interdependent, and employees had to start working closely together, across traditional job functions. The HRM department decided to regroup all employees into self-directed interdisciplinary teams. Starting from this vision and strategy, the Zoo has switched from maintaining traditional functional jobs to self-directed, multidisciplinary teams to manage bioclimatic zones. Self-managing teams are back again. We hear and read familiar discourses: self-organisation, self-management, self-managing teams, ownership, job and work autonomy, worktime control, high-performance work systems, high-involvement work systems, sociotechnical systems approach … Some 50 years after Frederick Herzberg published one of the most influential Harvard Business Review articles ever (Herzberg, 1968), we have witnessed numerous examples of constructs and practices that embody his core concepts of job enlargement, job enrichment and job autonomy. Autonomy is not limited to an individual level; rather, it has been conceptualised and materialised on the team level.

Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations Advanced Series in Management, Volume 19, 1 11 Copyright r 2018 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1877-6361/doi:10.1108/S1877-636120180000019001

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Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations

Druskat and Wheeler (2004, p. 65) report that ‘79% of companies in the Fortune 1,000 and 81% of manufacturing organisations currently deploy such “empowered,” “self-directed” or “autonomous” teams.’ One of the most illustrative modern examples is the thought-provoking book Reinventing Organisations by the corporate consultant Laloux (2014) on Teal organisations. In this book, he makes a substantial statement about modern organisations, in which the development of the organisational world is inspired by the next stage of human consciousness. Grounded in evolutionary and development theory, Laloux views the emergence of the new organisational model as a next stage in organisational development. This new organisational model with self-managing teams as the basic building block is called the ‘Teal organisation’. It is different from the former green, orange, amber and red organisations, in the sense that decisions are made within teams of 10 15 people. There is no boss, no middle management left. Any team member can make decisions; the traditional hierarchies have been moved to the team level. This central idea has numerous consequences for the whole organisational structure, processes, systems, behaviours and attitudes of all organisational members and their stakeholders. An example of how comprehensive and wide-ranging this idea of selfmanagement is concerns the management of time. Traditional organisations impose fixed working hours on their employees, based on the principle that they are ‘resources’. It assumes that people cannot be trusted to set their own goals and do not have the self-discipline to work until they reach their goals. In many organisations, only the higher ranks experience this freedom to determine their own hours, of exercising self-discipline and working until the job is finished. The unspoken assumption according to Laloux (2014, p. 182) is that people in managerial positions put their organisational commitment above any other commitment in their lives. They are always ‘on’, they must obey their corporate cultures at the expense of what they care about the most. In Teal organisations, this freedom is not a privilege reserved for managers, it is available to all organisational members. There is one fundamental difference: they all have the right to dissent and speak up about other important commitments in their lives. They must be able to talk to each other and to reach agreements upon the hours they want to invest in the organisation. In echoing these developments, the recent review of 100 years of team articles in the Journal of Applied Psychology (Mathieu, Hollenbeck, van Knippenberg, & Ilgen, 2017) shows an enormous increase in group/team articles published during 2005 2015. Compared to the preceding 50-year average, the number has quadrupled. While this increase is about teamwork in general, during the last decade there has also been greater interest in self-managing teams. Other journals and book series have opened their pages to manuscripts about self-managing teams. For example, an analysis of the publications in the Scopus database reveals an excessive growth of work on self-managing teams, especially since 1996 (Figure 1). We started writing this book to answer the question of why self-managing teams are becoming popular (again). What are the reasons for the new interest in selfmanaging teams in this decade? We could easily be satisfied with a simple answer: because these teams promise to deliver extra performance results. Indeed, there is

Introduction

3

Scopus

175 150

Documents

125 100 75 50 25 0 1954

1960

1966

1972

1978

1984

1990

1996

2002

2008

2014

2020

Figure 1: Scopus Analysis of the Publications about Self-managing Teams. Source: Copyright @ 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Scopus is a registered trademark of Elsevier B.V.

almost no organisational environment in which teams if done right can’t have a serious evidence-based impact on performance at different levels in organisations. At the same time, we see new developments in modern society that have contributed to the new self-managing teams wave. The first development involves the societal trends of emancipation, individualisation and assertiveness (Bauman, 2000). People in general do not want to be governed, rather they want to decide for themselves. Since the 1960s, people have been longing for more freedom and individual choices. This can be traced back to various typical developments, like the decreasing memberships of churches, political parties (Van Biezen & Poguntke, 2014) and trade unions (Visser, 2006). People are more mobile than ever, more inclined to choose a different trade than that of their parents, and more self-determining of their own working life; in other words, they are more independent. They bring these attitudes to the modern workplace. The basic idea is that traditional hierarchies in organisations do not reflect the expectations of modern assertive citizens. They need organisations in which they can put forward their own ideas, making full use of their own knowledge, skills and competences. Therefore, this long-lasting development of modern society brings ideas like self-management and self-managing teams to the forefront. Step by step, more and more organisations are trying to implement these ideas. The second general trend is the role of technology in modern society and in the corporate world. The use of modern technology, including robotics, manufacturing technologies, communication technologies and social media, has already changed the workplace. Advancement in collaboration technologies has had a major impact on the way teams can operate (Gilson, Maynard, Jones Young, Vartiainen, & Hakonen, 2015; Tannenbaum, Mathieu, Salas, & Cohen, 2012). These technologies enable collaboration at a distance, they have the potential to increase team

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Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations

awareness, and they allow the teams to cooperate 24/7 (MacDuffie, 2007). Many authors are already speaking of the era of ubiquitous computing (Cascio & Montealegre, 2016), in which technology permeates everything, enabling people to access and control their working and life environment at any time and anywhere. It is even possible that technology can replace human team members with robots and avatars. In short, technology may change the nature of teamwork. To extend our argument one step further, we also assume that technology may increase the selfmanaging nature of teams. Given the communication and collaboration technologies, the possibilities to cooperate in teams are just endless, and members do not need to work in proximity. Virtual teams may have team members across all time zones. The same holds for information and knowledge. Advanced technologies can increase the possibilities of how teams share data, information, insights and actions. No hierarchy is needed to coordinate the information flows between team members, it can be part of the workflow enabled by technology and available for every team member.

Goal and Approach in This Book It is interesting to observe the interconnections of terms in the research about teams and self-managing teams. Figure 2 shows that research into (self-managing) teams goes hand in hand with such terms as team performance, team effectiveness, leadership and knowledge management. At the same time, implementation of the selfmanaging teams does not appear as one of the central topics. We were inspired by the observation that there is a consensus about the benefits of self-managing teams in organisations on the one hand, while there is also a consensus that its implementation costs a fortune on the other. With the knowledge that has accumulated about teams and self-managing teams, now is the time to discuss challenges that ‘traditional’ organisations experience once they move towards self-managing organisations. The concept of Teal organisations is not surprising nowadays, but strangely enough, it is still a dream for many organisations. With the few exceptions of smoothly working Teal examples described by Laloux (2014), such as Buurtzorg (healthcare, Netherlands), AES (energy sector, global, born in USA), BSO/Origin (IT consulting, global, started in the Netherlands), RHD (human service, USA), FAVI (metal manufacturing, France) or ESBZ (school in Germany), we dare to conclude that the majority of organisations have hierarchical managerial constructions with little to no self-management. This volume focuses on the transformation towards self-management (teams), the team performance and the organisational and HRM support they need to work successfully. Conceptually and empirically, we illustrate that self-managing teams require a new way of organising, structuring and leadership in organisations. We start with the introduction of self-management in general and self-managing teams in particular by exploring issues related to opportunities and reasons for working with self-managing teams in modern organisations (see chapter ‘The Concept of Self-managing Teams: History and Taxonomy’). We briefly share

Introduction

Figure 2: Teams.

5

Interconnections of Terms Related to the Research into Self-managing

evidence-based observations about the challenges that organisations face when they want to transfer their existing managing structures, traditions and styles towards self-management. We will mainly focus on a systematic overview of existing typologies of self-managing teams. In the chapter ‘Literature Review of Successful Self-managing Teams’ we continue with the historical literature overview of selfmanaging teams since the first articles in the 1950s and 1960s. The evidence-based integrative literature review of almost 60 articles from peer-reviewed international journals will lead to a comprehensive framework for the success of self-managing teams. This framework distils the factors for successful self-managing teams and shows that the ones contributing to success are based on three levels: organisational, team and individual levels, each having its own factors. Taken together, all of the factors are known to enhance managerial ratings of performance, employee ratings of performance, quality of work life and withdrawal behaviours to differing extents. In the chapter ‘Healthcare Teams in Long-term and Elderly Care at Livio: A Case Study’ we introduce our case organisation Livio that decided to take the

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Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations

step towards self-managing teams. We followed its transformation journey towards self-managing teams over a long period and saw how careful and thoughtful decision-making processes, dedicated leadership and patience, and empowerment of employees helped this organisation to go through the change from a traditional to a self-managing team structure. We continue with the analysis of the empirical case study to explore whether and to what extent self-managing teams need managers (or do not) who supervise and lead them to perform well. In the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’ we investigate the shift in responsibilities of line managers by applying a two-way devolution process of people management responsibilities: from HRM managers to line managers and from line managers to self-managing teams. We study the implementation of selfmanaging teams based on the implementation literature and distinguish four implementation phases. Based on role theory, we analyse the role of managers in these four phases. We do this by examining the role change between managers in the different phases of the implementation process and how this change may lead to contradictory expectations between actors and experienced role conflict. The chapter ‘Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams’ discusses the governance mechanisms in self-managing teams from theoretical and empirical perspectives. We focus on how self-managing teams coordinate and collaborate to perform the HRM activities for which they are responsible. This chapter continues with the description of practical examples of which mechanisms and processes within self-managing teams are important for aligning HRM activities to enhance team performance. We argue that the coordination and execution of HRM activities in conjunction with governance mechanisms and processes determine the effectiveness of self-managing teams. In the chapter ‘Discussion and Future Outlook’ we combine conceptual and empirical insights to discuss the changing role of the HRM function in selfmanaging teams. It starts with a reflection on how self-managing teams are part of a broader development in theory and practice in which HRM responsibilities are increasingly delegated to employees (such as online self-services, shared services and job crafting). After reflecting on these developments, the chapter continues with a discussion of which implications the continued devolution of HRM activities has on the role of ‘traditional’ HRM actors such as central HR departments, centres of expertise and HRM shared service centres. Here we argue that the HRM function in self-managing teams moves away from adopting a ‘champion of processes’ role (which controls employees and their enactment of HRM responsibilities) to a service provider role. In the concluding chapter, we will offer implications for future research and organisational practices. Although we acknowledge the benefits of self-managing teams, we are convinced that no single organisation should start implementing self-managing teams without a full understanding of this phenomenon, and without the strategic need for the introduction of self-managing teams. The introduction and implementation of self-managing teams require an enormous amount of thought, analysis and planning.

Introduction

7

Defining Our Terms: Self-management and Self-managing Teams Self-managing teams are not teams of colleagues from one department working on one project, who come together to foster the team spirit. Neither are they crossfunctional groups of colleagues who come together to solve a problem and then return to their original jobs. Neither of these two teams are self-managing because they do not change the way organisations are structured, performance is managed, information flows are changed, the concept of career paths is altered and the work gets done. Allow us to take a step back and introduce definitions of teams, selfmanagement and then self-managing teams. The first step is to focus on teams in organisations. Here, the diversity in teams is as large as the diversity in organisations. Imagine top management teams, project teams, semi-autonomous teams, manufacturing teams, action teams, continuous improvement teams, scrum teams, management teams, taskforces, new-product innovation teams, departmental teams like financial teams or HR teams, cross-functional teams, product teams, ad hoc teams and so on. They all are called teams, and these teams do fit the commonly cited team definitions although they differ in goals, nature, temporality, size and many other aspects. If we take some well-known definitions, all those teams do fit them: A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, set of performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. (Katzenbach & Smith, 1993, p. 112) A team is defined as (a) two or more individuals who; (b) socially interact (face-to-face or, increasingly, virtually); (c) possess one or more common goals; (d) are brought together to perform organisationally relevant tasks; (e) exhibit interdependencies with respect to workflow, goals, and outcomes; (f) have different roles and responsibilities; and (g) are together embedded in an encompassing organisational system, with boundaries and linkages to the broader system context and task environment. (Kozlowski & Ilgen, 2006, p. 79)

These team definitions are to the point and describe all of the important characteristics of teams and teamwork, but they fail to describe the kind of teams, in short, what the organisational task at hand is. Therefore, we agree with Hollenbeck, Beersma, and Schouten (2012) who state that any researcher of teams must struggle to clarify what kind of team is under scrutiny. Otherwise, we are studying similar team processes in different task contexts: top management teams are different from work teams or project teams. The second step is to focus on self-management. In the early stages of team research, the job design theorists defined autonomy as one of the most important aspects of work teams (Hackman, 1987). Autonomy is defined on an individual level, namely as the degree to which the job provides substantial freedom, independence and discretion to the individual in scheduling the work and determining the procedures to be used in carrying it out (Hackman & Oldham, 1976, p. 258). The same focus predominantly on the individual level is taken by organisation

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Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations

psychologists, who define empowerment as the increased task motivation resulting from an individual’s positive orientation to his/her work role (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999). Kirkman and Rosen (1999) have emphasised that empowerment must also be identified at the team level, and they distinguish four dimensions of team empowerment: potency (competence), meaningfulness, autonomy and impact. In this book, we view self-management in a way that integrates both the job design and the psychology perspective. This means that all of the important elements of job autonomy at the team level and the psychological aspects of ownership are addressed. Self-management applied to teams makes self-managing teams. Self-managing teams may have many responsibilities and authority: determining the division of work, allocation of resources, budget expenditures, work strategy development, performance assessment and recruitment and development of new members (Luciano, Mathieu, & Ruddy, 2014). They do this by planning, scheduling, assigning tasks to members and making decisions as a team, without the interference of supervisors or managers. According to Hackman (1987), the team members of self-managing teams (1) take collective responsibility for the outcomes of their work, (2) monitor their own performance by actively seeking data about how they have performed and (3) manage their own performance by making alterations in work strategies when circumstances change or feedback indicates that new approaches are needed. Many scholars agree that self-managing teams are ‘groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks’. This definition stems from Goodman, Devadas, and Griffith Hughson (1988) and forms the basis of definitions mentioned by many followers (Cohen & Ledford Jr, 1994; Cohen, Ledford, & Spreitzer, 1996; De Jong, De Ruyter, & Wetzels, 2005; Janz, Wetherbe, Davis, & Noe, 1997; Kuipers & Stoker, 2009; Langfred, 2004; Moorhead, Neck, & West, 1998; Spreitzer, Cohen, & Ledford, 1999; Stoker, 2008). The characteristics of self-managing teams can be generally described as the collective possession of a variety of work skills, the responsibility for many traditional management tasks (Neck & Manz, 1994), the autonomy to make decisions previously made by the managers (Alper, Tjosvold, & Law, 1998; Liebowitz & Holden, 1995; Rogers, Metlay, Kaplan, & Shapiro, 1995), including monitoring their own performance and altering it as needed (Lambe, Webb, & Ishida, 2009; Thoms, Pinto, Parente, & Druskat, 2002; Wageman, 1997; Wolff, Pescosolido, & Druskat, 2002). More specific team tasks have been mentioned in the literature, too. For example, researchers report that self-managing teams set production schedules and standards, monitor customer feedback and their own performance and develop and train for quality improvement practices (Kirkman, Jones, & Shapiro, 2000; Kirkman & Rosen, 1999; Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001). Some studies emphasise that teams receive feedback and evaluations on their performance (Bishop & Scott, 2000), gather information and meet organisational goals (Muthusamy, Wheeler, & Simmons, 2005; Van der Vegt, Bunderson, & Kuipers, 2010). To focus our message in this book and based on the above-mentioned characteristics of self-managing teams, we suggest that:

Introduction

9

[…] self-managing teams are groups of interdependent individuals who have the autonomy to self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks, they possess a variety of work skills, are responsible for decision making, monitoring and altering their performance, they fulfil traditional management tasks and meet company goals.

Finally, a last remark on the key characteristic of self-managing teams: the degree of autonomy. It is important to view it is a matter of degree. We must analyse the matter of autonomy as precisely as possible. To what degree do teams have autonomy? Does self-management imply the abolition of hierarchies? If we read Laloux (2014), we must ultimately say yes, the team is self-managing, without bosses, managers or executive officers being needed anymore. In practice, as our case study will show, self-managing teams do operate in an organisational context. Therefore, it is important to analyse and write about self-management more precisely. In line with sociotechnical systems theory (e.g. De Sitter, 1994), we must distinguish between (1) the object of autonomy (which tasks are the responsibility of the team), (2) the level of autonomy (team gets information only, team may give advice, participative decision-making and full delegation to the team) and (3) the scope of autonomy (does the decision have consequences for the workplace only, for the department or for the entire organisation). That improves our understanding of the nature of the empowerment and autonomy of self-managing teams.

The Authors’ Self-managing Team We started this project more than a year ago, when we entered the case organisation with our research questions about self-managing teams. Writing the book with five authors has become an intensive journey to coordinate the effort, to unfold historical overviews, to conduct and analyse interviews, to think repeatedly about what does it mean for modern organisations to switch towards self-managing teams. We would like to thank our colleagues and junior researchers who helped at different stages of this project to shape and challenge our opinions, making this research possible: Adina Aldea, Anastasia Cvetkovski, Andre´ Pieffers, Anneke de Bruin, Cindy Wiese, Daphne Veelers, Giulia Mestrovic, Laurens Averesch, Marijn Schrander, Mark Breukink, Patty van Engelen, Rohid Bhansing, Roos ten Vregelaar, Stefan Becking, Ufuk Karakus, Wouter ter Avest and Yosri Mhiri. Our special thanks go to the people from the case organisation: Heinz Reinink and Henk Eleveld, Management Team and the 70 interviewees.

References Alper, S., Tjosvold, D., & Law, K. S. (1998). Interdependence and controversy in group decision making: Antecedents to effective self-managing teams. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 74(1), 33 52. Bauman, Z. (2000). Liquid modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press.

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Bishop, J. W., & Scott, D. (2000). An examination of organisational and team commitment in a self-directed team environment. Journal of Applied Psychology, 85(3), 439 450. Cascio, F. W., & Montealegre, R. (2016). How technology is changing work and organisations. Annual Review of Organisational Psychology and Organisational Behavior, 3(6), 349 375. Caudron, S. (1993). Are self-directed teams right for your company? Personnel Journal, 76 84. Cohen, S. G., & Ledford, G. E., Jr. (1994). The effectiveness of self-managing teams: A quasi-experiment. Human Relations, 47(1), 13 43. Cohen, S. G., Ledford Jr, G. E., & Spreitzer, G. M. (1996). A predictive model of selfmanaging work team effectiveness. Human Relations, 49(5), 643 676. De Jong, A., De Ruyter, K., & Wetzels, M. (2005). Antecedents and consequences of group potency: A study of self-managing service teams. Management Science, 51(11), 1610 1625. De Sitter, L. U. (1994). Synergetisch produceren, Human Resource Mobilisation in de produktie (Synergetic Manufacturing; Human Resource Mobilisation in Manufacturing). Assen: Van Gorcum. (in Dutch). Druskat, V. U., & Wheeler, J. V. (2004). How to lead a self-managing team. MIT Sloan Management Review, 45(4), 65 71. Gilson, L. L., Maynard, M. T., Jones Young, N. C., Vartiainen, M., & Hakonen, M. (2015). Virtual teams research: 10 years, 10 themes, and 10 opportunities. Journal of Management, 41(5), 1313 1337. Goodman, P. S., Devadas, R., & Griffith Hughson, T. L. (1988). Groups and productivity: Analyzing the effectiveness of self-managing teams. In J. P. Campbell & R. J. Campbell (Eds.), Productivity in Organizations (pp. 295 327). San-Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Hackman, J. R. (1987). The design of work teams. In J. Lorsch (Ed.), Handbook of Organisational Behavior (pp. 315 342). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1976). Motivation through design of work: Test of a theory. Organisational Behavior and Human Performance, 16, 250 279. Herzberg, F. (1968). One more time: How do you motivate employees? Harvard Business Review, 40(1), 53 62. Hollenbeck, J. R., Beersma, B., & Schouten, M. E. (2012). Beyond team types and taxonomies: A dimensional scaling conceptualization for team description. Academy of Management Review, 37, 82 106. Janz, B. D., Wetherbe, J. C., Davis, G. B., & Noe, R. A. (1997). Reengineering the systems development process: The link between autonomous teams and business process outcomes. Journal of Management Information Systems, 14(1), 41 68. Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (1993). The discipline of teams. Harvard Business Review, 71(2), 111 120. Kirkman, B. L., Jones, R. G., & Shapiro, D. L. (2000). Why do employees resist teams? Examining the “resistance barrier” to work team effectiveness. International Journal of Conflict Management, 11(1), 74 92. Kirkman, B. L., & Rosen, B. (1999). Beyond self-management: Antecedents and consequences of team empowerment. Academy of Management Journal, 42, 58 74. Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. (2001). The impact of cultural values on job satisfaction and organisational commitment in self-managing work teams: The mediating role of employee resistance. Academy of Management Journal, 44(3), 557 569. Kozlowski, S. W. J., & Ilgen, D. R. (2006). Enhancing the effectiveness of work groups and teams. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 7, 77 124.

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Kuipers, B. S., & Stoker, J. I. (2009). Development and performance of self-managing work teams: A theoretical and empirical examination. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 20(2), 399 419. Laloux, F. (2014). Reinventing organisations. Brussels: Nelson Parker. Lambe, C. J., Webb, K. L., & Ishida, C. (2009). Self-managing selling teams and team performance: The complementary roles of empowerment and control. Industrial Marketing Management, 38(1), 5 16. Langfred, C. W. (2004). Too much of a good thing? Negative effects of high trust and individual autonomy in self-managing teams. Academy of Management Journal, 47(3), 385 399. Liebowitz, S. J., & Holden, K. T. (1995). Are self-managing teams worthwhile? A tale of two companies. SAM Advanced Management Journal, 60(2), 11. Luciano, M. M., Mathieu, J. E., & Ruddy, T. M. (2014). Leading multiple teams: Average and relative external leadership influences on team empowerment and effectiveness. Journal of Applied Psychology, 99(2), 322. MacDuffie, J. P. (2007). Chapter 12: HRM and distributed work. The Academy of Management Annals, 1(1), 549 615. Mathieu, J. E., Hollenbeck, J. R., van Knippenberg, D., & Ilgen, D. R. (2017). A century of work teams in the Journal of Applied Psychology. Journal of Applied Psychology, 102(3), 452 467. Moorhead, G., Neck, C. P., & West, M. S. (1998). The tendency toward defective decision making within self-managing teams: The relevance of groupthink for the 21st century. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 73(2 3), 327 351. Muthusamy, S. K., Wheeler, J. V., & Simmons, B. L. (2005). Self-managing work teams: Enhancing organisational innovativeness. Organization Development Journal, 23(3), 53 66. Neck, C. P., & Manz, C. C. (1994). From groupthink to teamthink: Toward the creation of constructive thought patterns in self-managing work teams. Human Relations, 47(8), 929 952. Rogers, E. F., Metlay, W., Kaplan, I. T., & Shapiro, T. (1995). Self-managing work teams: Do they really work? People and Strategy, 18(2), 53. Spreitzer, G. M., Cohen, S. G., & Ledford Jr, G. E. (1999). Developing effective self-managing work teams in service organisations. Group & Organisation Management, 24(3), 340 366. Stoker, J. I. (2008). Effects of team tenure and leadership in self-managing teams. Personnel Review, 37(5), 564 582. Tannenbaum, S. I., Mathieu, J. E., Salas, E., & Cohen, D. (2012). Teams are changing: Are research and practice evolving fast enough? Industrial and Organisational Psychology, 5(1), 2 24. Thoms, P., Pinto, J. K., Parente, D. H., & Druskat, V. U. (2002). Adaptation to selfmanaging work teams. Small Group Research, 33(1), 3 31. Van Biezen, I., & Poguntke, T. (2014). The decline of membership-based politics. Party Politics, 20(2), 205 216. Van der Vegt, G. S., Bunderson, S., & Kuipers, B. (2010). Why turnover matters in self-managing work teams: Learning, social integration, and task flexibility. Journal of Management, 36(5), 1168 1191. Visser, J. (2006). Union membership statistics in 24 countries. Monthly Labour Review, 129(1), 38. Wageman, R. (1997). Critical success factors for creating superb self-managing teams. Organizational Dynamics, 26(1), 49 61. Wolff, S. B., Pescosolido, A. T., & Druskat, V. U. (2002). Emotional intelligence as the basis of leadership emergence in self-managing teams. The Leadership Quarterly, 13(5), 505 522.

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The Concept of Self-managing Teams: History and Taxonomy

A Short History of Self-managing Teams in Three Waves To improve our understanding of the potential of self-managing teams (SMTs), we have to look into the past. Teams are certainly not a new phenomenon, nor are SMTs. They have been around in the organisational world for decades. Around 100 years ago, the team as an organisational unit appeared. Stemming from the Hawthorne studies back in the 1920s and 1930s, conducted at the Western Electric Company, reported by Roethlisberger and Dickson (1939), the group was ‘discovered’. It is not only the individual who counts, it is the individual and his or her relations with co-workers. The group informal or formal is important in understanding how to improve the work situation of people. What we do know about teams and SMTs, their antecedents and outcomes will be discussed later in a thorough literature review of SMTs. Here we intend to summarise in a structured way the development of the nature and the context of SMTs in a short history of SMT research. Three waves are described here using two main lines of team characteristics: the organisational design and the socio-psychological team processes. The history of SMTs can be read as an interplay between both aspects. The psychology discipline contributed to a better understanding of group processes, team dynamics and power and trust relations within teams and between teams and their environment. The sociologists, management and job design theorists contributed to a better understanding of the structural aspects of teams, the connections between teams and the environment and the embedment of teams within organisations. From time to time, in every wave, attempts have been made to integrate both aspects in ‘grand theories’, such as classic socio-technical systems (STS) thinking (Cherns, 1976; Trist & Bamforth, 1951) in the first wave, modern STS theory (De Sitter, Den Hertog, & Dankbaar, 1997) and empowered teams (Wellins, Byham, & Wilson, 1991) in the second wave and the evolutionary approach (Laloux, 2014) in the third wave.

Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations Advanced Series in Management, Volume 19, 13 27 Copyright r 2018 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1877-6361/doi:10.1108/S1877-636120180000019002

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First Wave: The Classic Self-managing Team Approach (1950 1980) The foundation of the classic SMT approach was the discovery of the power of group relations deep down in the British coal mines. Detailed observation of traditional and new methods of coal mining led to the statement that the social fabric of group relations are vital and cannot be understood without the technology (Trist & Bamforth, 1951). To understand productivity, it is better to think about the joint optimisation of technology and social systems. The new coal mining methods were destroying the previously self-regulating small groups of the traditional hand-got method. Instead, the more industrial longwall method was introduced with a functional structure and led to a kind of alienation of the team members: if supervisors want to do it in this way, we will do it, although it is better to change our behaviour. This was not determined by technology, and other social arrangements are also possible (the concept of organisational choice) and can dramatically increase output and productivity. It required multi-skilled workers, with problem-solving authorities on the shopfloor and good social relations between co-workers and supervisors. The core ideas of SMTs were born: common goals, interdependence, self-regulating capacities, trust relations and multi-skilled workers. Throughout the history of research into teams, we see two models as vitally important and laying the path for future studies into SMTs. The first stream of research was developed by Hackman and his school. Hackman and Oldham (1976) designed the job characteristics model of work motivation, in which they propose core job dimensions, critical psychological states and related personal work outcomes, such as high internal motivation of the proposed work, high-quality work performance, high work satisfaction, low employee turnover and low absenteeism. Almost a decade later, Hackman (1987) used the concepts of the work design theory and job characteristics model in the normative model of group effectiveness. This model looked at how group effectiveness is established by starting with the organisational context and the group design; it considers the influence of group synergy and looks at the process criteria of effectiveness. The model was designed to support and assess work teams. Hackman (1987) and Hackman and Oldham (1976) designed frameworks on team effectiveness and job motivation, which are widely mentioned in later research on team effectiveness and also with regard to SMTs (Cohen, Ledford, & Spreitzer, 1996). Second Wave: The Modern Self-managing Team Approach (1980 2005) The second influential stream of research was developed from the work of Cohen et al. (1996), who designed a predictive model for effective SMTs. We view this model as representing the modern SMT approach. This model makes an important contribution to the literature since it is one of the few models especially designed for SMTs. Cohen published 57 works that earned more than 9,500 citations. Her work is well known, especially her article on ‘a predictive model for effective self-managing teams’.

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Cohen et al. (1996) describe four main predictors for effective SMTs: group task design, group characteristics, encouraging supervisory behaviour and a context that supports employee involvement. These predictors explain different variances in the following dependent variables: manager ratings of performance, team ratings of performance, quality of work life (QWL) and withdrawal behaviours. Since these four antecedents and their outcomes function as the foundation of this literature review, we first provide a more detailed explanation of them. From the literature, we sensed that successful teams possess the following characteristics: they satisfy external and internal clients, develop capabilities for future performance and their members find meaning and satisfaction within their team (e.g. Hackman, 2002). Five conditions to enhance success for teams are described in the ‘Five Factor Model’ by Hackman (2002): being an actual team, providing direction with clear goals, enabling the structure of the team, having a supportive context in place and expert guidance or coaching. Work design and STS theory point out that task design contributes to effective SMTs by its effect on motivation and its impact on self-regulation. There are several attributes of task design that advocate for work team motivation and selfregulation: group task variety, group task identity, group task significance, group task autonomy and group task feedback (Cohen et al., 1996). Group task design is also found to predict team ratings of performance but does not influence QWL. Encouraging supervisory behaviour is the attribute focused on self-leadership in SMTs. This self-leadership is established through a supervisor facilitating it. There are six leadership behaviours this supervisor should adhere to: encourage self-observation/self-evaluation, self-goal setting, self-reinforcement, self-criticism, self-expectation and rehearsal. This self-leadership is found to influence the performance effectiveness of team members since they learn to improve team performance by correctly performing desired behaviours. Self-leadership, just like group task design, has self-regulation as the key to self-management (Cohen et al., 1996). Encouraging supervisory behaviour is found to be negatively related to manager ratings of performance. Group characteristics as an antecedent is divided into the sub-categories of group composition, group beliefs and group processes. Group composition consists of the variables group expertise, group size adequacy and group stability. Group beliefs, which a group shares with its members, can be classified into group norms and group self-efficacy. The sub-category group process refers to the interaction between group members when on the job. Group process is divided into group coordination and group innovation processes. Part of the effectiveness of a SMT may depend upon the ability of the team to solve problems and implement innovative ideas to address the change in task demands (Cohen et al., 1996). Group characteristics were found to predict absenteeism and team ratings of performance but is not related to QWL. The last category mentioned by Cohen et al. (1996) is the employee involvement context. An organisational context that supports the involvement of employees results in more effective SMTs. For SMTs to be effective, several elements of organisational design should be moved to lower levels in an organisation. Cohen et al. (1996)

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mention five design elements: power, information, rewards, training and resources. The further these five elements are moved down the organisation, the more employees will take ownership and responsibility for their task, which in turn motivates performance. The five elements reinforce each other. Employee involvement context has the strongest influence on QWL and manager ratings of performance, and only employee involvement can predict QWL. In line with the model of Cohen et al. (1996), many other authors and researchers came up with their conceptualisation of SMTs. In some cases, they rely more on the cultural and socio-psychological aspects of teamwork, such as Katzenbach and Smith (1993) and Wellins et al. (1991). In other cases, they rely more on the structural and design aspects of teamwork, like modern STS theory (De Sitter et al., 1997). In this short history of SMTs, we must pay some attention to the details of the modern STS approach. van Eijnatten (1993) has identified four different streams of modern STS, which are geographically distinct: the Australian, the North American, the Scandinavian and the Dutch approach. The Australian variant, also called participative design, is an approach with a full emphasis on the participation of all stakeholders, breaking away from the traditional expert approach. Tools in this approach are the search conference, the participative design workshop and some skill-analysis techniques (Emery, 1993). The North American variant, known as modern STS design, is very much related to the QWL programmes. In the 1990s, many projects were carried out under team labels: empowerment, self-directed teams, high-commitment teams, high-performance teams and so on. Taylor and Felten (1993) provide an overview of the STS-thinking in North America. They stress among other things the understanding of the business in which a company is involved and the focus on the product of the STS approach. In the variance control analysis, they emphasise that when key variances occur, they should be controlled by the group of employees where they arise. They also indicate the need for competence development of workers to control these key variances and to understand the company’s environment. The examples they provide are typical mainstream STS implementations, very successful in increasing the internal control of the teams, but less successful in increasing the control of the teams over business responsibilities. The Scandinavian variant of STS democratic dialogue goes beyond the company level, emphasising the formation of networks and open communication between the partners. Local knowledge should be developed in sharing information from other companies. Adler and Docherty (1998) claim that many studies focus on primary work group control, including the development of business control and customer contact for these work group members. The Dutch variant of modern STS offers a detailed design approach, claiming an integral approach to the quality of the organisation, QWL and quality of labour relations through the design of the architecture of the organisation structure. De Sitter et al. (1997, p. 503) recognise that the open systems approach is much more than only QWL and therefore ‘functional requirements with respect to customers, the physical environment, the labour market, suppliers of capital, workers, etc. should be regarded as equivalent’. The concepts developed within the Dutch variant

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include the distinction between the production structure, the control structure and the information structure, as well as the logic of designing them in this sequence. The aim is to reduce the complexity of the organisation and to create primary work groups that are responsible for the whole product flow, from the beginning to the end. Detailed design principles regarding the parallelisation and segmentation of product flows are given. This provides the SMTs with a structural basis for having control over purpose, context and system dynamics. The concept of control capacity (De Sitter, 1994) of primary work groups seems to be quite comprehensive; it is possible to analyse and design a detailed picture of all relevant internal and external decisions and routine and non-routine ones. Firmly based in modern STS, but one step further is the mini-company concept (De Leede, Looise, & Verkerk, 2002). It was Suzaki (1993) who coined the term ‘mini-company’ for primary work groups that are responsible for their supplier client relationships. The organisation is viewed as a collection of mini-companies. Each work group within the organisation has its own process. The next process is viewed as the customer, and the previous process is viewed as the supplier of every unit. The word ‘mini-company’ brings ideas such as ownership, entrepreneurship and client supplier relationships. The mini-company has four characteristics, distinct from socio-technical primary work groups (De Leede et al., 2002; p. 345): (1) The mini-company has a name and a mission statement. Both are formulated by the mini-company itself. This relates to control over purpose. (2) The mini-company identifies its clients and suppliers and is responsible for managing its relationships. While it is not always appropriate for external clients and suppliers to have direct contacts with the mini-company, there are at least the internal client supplier relationships. This is equivalent to control over context. (3) The mini-company is responsible for its own improvement programme. Based on its contacts with clients, suppliers and management, the mini-company is able to identify its weak points, which are open to improvement. This characteristic entails control over system dynamics. (4) The mini-company presents its name, mission, members, customers, suppliers, improvement programme and results on display walls. The mini-company process is the dynamic side of the mini-company concept. It represents a cycle in which the name and mission are under review in every period and the relevant clients and suppliers are identified and visited. These visits are oriented towards overall assessments of the mini-company. In executing the cycle of the mini-company process, the requirements of the customers (internal or external) and suppliers are made visible every time. These requirements are the inputs for the improvement programme. The mini-company concept has the three areas of control that are additional to mainstream STS theory, according to Adler and Docherty (1998). This concerns control over purpose in formulating the group’s business goals, control over context in maintaining the client supplier relationships and control over system dynamics in the learning and improvement aspects. These socio-technical system ideas about a structural basis for SMTs are used and ‘re-invented’ in other approaches of the 1990s and early 2000s. A good example

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is the Business Process Reengineering (BPR) approach of the best-selling book of Hammer and Champy (1993). As Van Hootegem, Benders, Delarue, and Procter (2005) show, BPR stresses that organisations need to be structured around processes. These processes must be organised in a way that is characterised by ideas like ‘several jobs are combined into one’, ‘workers make decisions’, ‘work is performed where it makes the most sense’ and ‘checks and controls are reduced’. These ideas are exactly the same as the modern socio-technical ideas, but written down in an easy-to-understand, non-academic fashion. The last representative of the second wave is what has become known as ‘HighPerforming Work Systems’ (HPWS) or High-Involvement Work Systems (HIWS). The message of a key publication in HPWS (Appelbaum, Bailey, Berg, & Kalleberg, 2000) was that domestic American workplaces could not be saved by superior technological innovation alone, reforms in work systems are needed also, although they are not sufficient on their own. Much discussion has been around in defining the core work practices that belong to HPWS (see Boxall & Macky, 2009), but the core idea again was that teams and individuals on the shopfloor must possess enough autonomy to decide on problems occurring at the workplace. As Human Resource Management (HRM) can be seen as consisting of work practices and employment practices, HPWS tries to align both sets of practices in order to be more effective. The HRM practices must be aligned to encourage employees to take this more empowered role. Further in this book, we will explore in much more detail how HRM practices go along with SMTs. An approach with a slightly different acronym HIWS also focuses on removing the old Taylorist approach of centralised decision-making and problem-solving in the hands of management by replacing them with practices in which the employees themselves are empowered to make these decisions. It is all about the reintegration of planning and execution. The work practices that are used for this are not the same in every context or sector. For example, within the automobile industry, MacDuffie (1995, p. 203) identifies five practices: work teams, problem-solving groups (employee involvement or quality circle groups), employee suggestion schemes, job rotation and decentralisation of quality-related tasks. This type of flexible production requires highly skilled workers. MacDuffie (1995) makes this quite clear: greater involvement in decisionmaking implies better skills. HRM practices for developing employees are necessary. Third Wave: The Contemporary Self-managing Team Approach (2005 2020) The first and second waves have delivered a rich quantity of aspects, practices and policies of self-management and SMTs. Based on overviews of work design theories like the recent one of Parker, Morgeson, and Johns (2017), it is possible to state that after the job characteristics model of Hackman and the STS concepts of group autonomy, no fundamental new aspects have been put forward on the issue of SMTs. Of course, important work has been published on the balance of job demands and job control (Karasek & Theorell, 1990) or on job demands/job

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resources (Demerouti, Bakker, Nachreiner, & Schaufeli, 2001) or on the characteristics of team empowerment (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999). Useful integrative overviews of work design have also been published (e.g. Grant & Parker, 2009) that cover the relational job design perspective and the social context of work design. Nevertheless, to our understanding, fundamentally new perspectives or really new insights on a fundamental level have not been put forward. The basics of job and group autonomy, feedback, goal and task interdependence, social support, interactions with the environment are mentioned and elaborated into a finer set of concepts. New fundamental insights in what we call the third wave of the contemporary SMT approach is based on the evolutionary perspective. In his Foreword to the book of Laloux (2014), Ken Wilber makes an important observation while describing the position of the book. Many writers and theorists on organisations of the past have emphasised their own perspective by claiming a new paradigm: ‘there’sa-great-new-paradigm-and-major-consciousness-transformation’ now underway (ibid, p. xi). The old paradigm, which was analytic or abstract or fragmented or masculine or tayloristic was the cause of all organisational and humanities problems. Now we need a new paradigm: an organic, holistic, systemic, inclusive perspective on organisations, and the good news is: it is here. This kind of black and white reasoning is quite exemplary within business science. Slowly, a new wave of books has been published with a more sophisticated psychological component in which the development of mankind in general and individual people was applied to organisational development. It is not just old and new, it is a development into more stages, with all intermediate levels. Laloux’s contribution (2014) was to describe several levels of consciousness in a clear manner and apply them to organisations. This does not mean that there is only one line of development, from the initial level-1 to the ultimate level-7 in one straight pathway. There are many pathways or lines. In every line (cognitive, moral, emotional and economic), there are different levels. That makes it rather complex, because a single person can be in different levels at the same time, as can an entire organisation. The application of consciousness levels to organisations stresses some interesting aspects concerning the topic of self-management and SMTs. Laloux (2014) shows that the Teal organisation (the organisation which operates on the highest level) no longer works with dominator hierarchies in a classic sense. However, this is not to say that there no hierarchies at all! Hierarchies emerge and pop up everywhere; the examples of Teal organisations simply move these lower, intermediate and higher hierarchies into teams of 10 15 people who are responsible for all the major decisions. All decisions concerning sales, marketing, finance, salary, purchasing and so on are made by these teams themselves. Taken to the extreme, these examples show that top management and middle management hardly exist any longer. They have been replaced by teams who manage themselves. For many organisations, this is still in the future, as we will see in the Discussion and Future Outlook part of this book. What does a Teal organisation look like? Its structure has changed from a pyramid towards a bundle of SMTs. The teams do not have bosses or supervisors, they

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are self-governing and self-organising. Every team member does have some of the managerial tasks that are ‘normally’ in the hands of one person: the boss. Instead of the boss, the teams are provided with support in the form of training, coaching and tools required to be self-managing. All team members are trained in problemsolving techniques, collaboration techniques and communication skills, because these skills are needed to avoid conflict or becoming stuck in the middle. Teal organisations have only the bare minimum of staff functions. Instead of economies of scale, provided by staff in more traditional organisations, Teal organisations have to rely on trust and motivated people. The processes in Teal organisations are as vital as the structure. Decisionmaking processes within SMTs have to be re-invented to reflect the Teal principles. Decision-making is not based on command-and-control, nor on the hierarchical or position power. At the other extreme, decision-making is also not based on consensus, nor can any team member veto the decision-making process. That would lead to endless meetings with a great risk of conflictual situations arising. Instead, any individual a team member or the leader of the organisation who wants to make a decision can do so, but only after having sought advice from those who are affected by that decision. The decision-maker has to take that advice into account, while retaining the responsibility to make a decision. Self-managing organisations do not have authorisation limits or procurement departments, they just rely on the seeking-advice process. No central staff department is needed to benefit from volume discounts or standardisation: if a standard is needed, someone will stand up and call together a knowledgeable group that will make one. To summarise this short history on SMTs, we have seen three waves, the classic approach from 1950 to 1980, the modern approach from 1980 to 2005 and the contemporary approach from 2005 until the present. To avoid misunderstandings, these three waves correspond only loosely with the exact years; some practices and publications do exist in earlier periods, and some contemporary publications reflect the classic or modern approaches. A good example is the story of Semco (Semler, 1993). It is a continuous story of implementing new elements based on new insights, but with a clear vision of employee involvement and employee ownership. Semco is using SMTs as a basis for its manufacturing, and in all other parts of the company, the next step was to split up the plant into smaller ones. The control of teams over their own work was gradually increased, also by aligning all staff functions to the teams. Semco introduced profit-sharing and other HRM practices like selection by team members. The team members can set their own goals and are rewarded according to these goals. In other words, they can set their own salaries. In addition, leave and vacation days are also up to the teams, they can decide on the number of days off and the scheduling of the holidays. In short, Semco is an example of a Teal organisation avant-la-lettre, and it is still developing in that sense, thereby serving as a world-renowned example of SMTs. The development of that Brazilian company is a good example of the evolutionary approach, with different lines on different levels.

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Types of Self-managing Teams A team is not a team. As mentioned in the introduction, there are many types of teams, such as top management teams, project teams, semi-autonomous teams, manufacturing teams, scrum teams, new-product innovation teams, departmental teams, cross-functional teams product teams, ad-hoc teams and so on. Hollenbeck, Beersma, and Schouten (2012) produced a list of 42 types with definitions found in the organisation sciences literature. Similarly, there is not one type of SMT. Our case study will reveal differences between the teams at Livio: there are differences due to the context in which they operate and the maturity of the intra-team and inter-team processes. This section will define some characteristics by which it becomes possible to make useful distinctions between teams. The most important characteristic of SMTs is their autonomy, so we shall start with autonomy typologies (such as Bailey & Adiga, 1997). Next, the renowned Team-Description-Index of Hollenbeck et al. (2012) is described, and we shall conclude with team developmental models like Tuckman (1965), Gersick (1988) and Laloux (2014). Teams differ in their degree of self-managing capacity. Sandberg (1982, p. 5) has already stated that ‘a work group cannot be said to be autonomous or not autonomous, it is autonomous in certain respects and to a certain extent’. Several authors have developed categories of decision areas that can be controlled by teams. Susman (1976) in the classic period of STS distinguished between self-regulation (coordination of production, allocation of resources and boundary management), independence (when and where to produce) and self-government (leadership, membership and task allocation). Wall, Kemp, Jackson, and Clegg (1986) came forward with groups that were granted control over tactical and operational areas. These areas included internal task allocation, achieving quantity and quality goals, resolving production problems, recording production data, scheduling breaks, ordering raw materials, delivering finished goods, calling for external support and training and selecting new members. Bailey and Adiga (1997) proposed a taxonomy of work group autonomy that builds on these early classifications and extends them to include advanced technologies. They propose two dimensions: a technical/administrative dichotomy and an operational/tactical/strategic impact of the decision. The technical and administrative dichotomy distinguishes between decisions about group processes and managerial issues (administrative) versus decisions on products, services, equipment or production processes (technical). They developed well-defined measurements of these types of work group autonomy, which are useful for clarifying to what extent the teams are responsible. This taxonomy is represented in Table 1. This taxonomy can serve as a precise instrument to assess the autonomy and independence of the SMTs. It assists employees who are looking for a guide about the extent to which they are self-managing. The operationalisation of this taxonomy is especially useful for these practical purposes. In addition, for researchers, it is absolutely necessary to be able to compare the degree of autonomy of SMTs in order to compare the effectiveness of such groups.

Operational

Technical

Methods

Set individual methods

Scheduling

Determine job sequence

Administrative

Schedule breaks Schedule overtime

Task allocation

Tactical

Assign production task to members

Resource allocation and management

Prioritise equipment repair

Goals

Set daily production goals

Boundary management

Contact external support (engineers, maintenance, etc.)

Contact suppliers and customers

Resource allocation and management

Schedule equipment maintenance

Schedule training

Evaluate or select new equipment

Determine pay increases for members

Goals

Set weekly or monthly goals

Evaluate individual performance

Scheduling

Schedule vacations

Determine group performance metrics Implement solutions to problems Boundary management

Supply chain management

Select new members Initiate disciplinary actions Fire or expel members Select group leader Evaluate external support performance

Strategic

Resource allocation and management

Assess equipment needs

Goals

Set long-range production goals

Determine group and individual training needs

Determine improvement areas and goals Boundary management

Determine headcount requirements Determine group tasks

Source: Bailey & Adiga (1997), p. 162, adapted.

Organisational Roadmap towards Teal Organisations

Area of Control

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Table 1: Taxonomy of Work Group Autonomy.

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A recent taxonomy of teams has been developed by Hollenbeck et al. (2012). In a thorough review of other taxonomies and 42 types of teams they propose three dimensions based on what teams make teams by definition. Teams are made up of multiple individuals who are linked to each other by structural dependence. Team members do collaborate with each other to achieve their goals and fulfil their tasks. Therefore, in the first place, it is important to know who performs which tasks (skill differentiation). In the second place, teams might differ in the way how authority is defined and organised within the teams (authority differentiation). Finally, the third dimension refers to the extent teams are stable over time (temporal stability). It is these three dimensions who in the view of Hollenbeck et al. (2012) are important to differentiate between teams. In proposing and describing these three dimensions, they move away from the traditional team type discussions in the literature that is more focused on a 2 × 2 matrix, or, more complicated, a 2 × 2 × 2 matrix. In reality, it is not that dichotomous; instead it is crucial for practitioners and researchers to take into account that many teams differ from each other to a certain degree in a particular dimension. For the purpose of our book it is especially important to see how they use the second dimension: the authority differentiation. After all, it is on this dimension where the main differences are between the traditional hierarchical teams and the more democratic and SMTs. As we have seen with the autonomy taxonomy of Bailey and Adiga (1997), autonomy can refer to many objects: both technical and administrative, as well on matters of strategic, tactical and operational value and time horizon. The Hollenbeck taxonomy shows that this autonomy dimension is a true dimensional scale, in the sense that there are many options between the extreme positions. On this scale, the teams they mention vary from ‘judge-adviser system’, via ‘hierarchical decision-making teams’, ‘traditional work teams’, ‘stable emergent leader teams’, ‘rotated leadership teams’ and ‘democratic teams’ to ‘autonomous/ self-managing teams’. Apparently, the role of leadership is important in this dimension; later in this book, we also want to focus on this aspect: the role of managers in SMTs. One last step in describing teams is the level of maturity of the SMTs. Teams differ also on their level of development. We might think of teams who have the same amount of tasks and responsibilities to perform, and are also authorised to perform these responsibilities. In addition, the team composition is similar, so they have the same characteristics in skill differentiation and in temporal stability. And still, some teams perform much better compared to other ones. What makes similar teams perform differently? The difference might be traced back to team dynamics and interpersonal relations within the teams that might be characterised as conflictual or harmonious. They trust each other to a certain degree, they show team cohesion to a certain extent, they are open to each other and rely on each other’s support to a certain degree. These teams can vary on these kind of aspects, what we like to call the team maturity. Team maturity refers to the developmental state in which the teams are situated from an initial low-performing stage to a final high-performing stage. Many authors propose different names for these specific stages in which teams can exist, like the sequence of Katzenbach and Smith (1993), where low

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performing teams are called ‘working groups’, and starting teams that perform even worse ‘pseudo teams’, while better performing teams are called ‘potential teams’, ‘real teams’ and ‘high-performance teams’. Probably the most well-known team development model is Tuckman’s one (1965): teams develop over four stages: ‘forming’, ‘storming’, ‘norming’, ‘performing’, slightly adjusted with a fifth stage by Tuckman and Jensen (1977) ‘adjourning’. This model is the basis of a more recent model of group development, now widely used and tested called the Integrated Model of Group Development (IMGD) (Wheelan, 2005; Wheelan & Hochberger, 1996), which is measured with the Group Development Questionnaire. The IMGD model also consists of four stages of group development. In the first stage, called ‘dependency and inclusion’, team members are highly dependent on the designated leader, it is all about safety, and inclusion issues. In this stage, members are still tending to agree with the suggestions made by the leader. Productivity levels during Stage 1 usually are low. The second stage of group development is called a period of ‘counter dependency and fight’. At this stage, team members increasingly have opposing perspectives about group goals and procedures. Conformity with emerging group norms, evident at Stage 1, decreases. The group’s challenge is to develop a unified set of goals, values, norms and operational procedures. If the group manages to work through the unavoidable conflicts of Stage 2, mutual trust, commitment and willingness to collaborate increase. In the next stage, ‘trust and structure’, teams are having mature negotiations about roles, organisation and procedures. Member conformity with group goals and norms increases during Stage 3 because consensus about these goals and norms has been achieved. Group productivity begins to increase as well. The fourth stage, ‘work and productivity’, is a time of effectiveness. Having resolved the issues of the previous stages, the group can focus most of its energy to achieve their goals and fulfil their tasks. Typically, Stage 4 teams spend 80% of the time on productivity, while Stage 1 groups only 40% (Wheelan & Williams, 2003). Although most authors and researchers of these team development models acknowledge that team development is not a linear process, these models suggest something different that is teams develop from one stage to the other, in short they grow in maturity. Gersick (1988, p. 11) observed the striking resemblance of all stage-based models, they are: deeply grounded in the paradigm of group development as an inevitable progression […] researchers construe development as a movement in a forward direction and expect every group to follow the same historical path.

Theories and models are needed that allow for multiple possible sequences or iterative cycles of group development. In addition, such models need to adequately address mechanisms for change over a group’s lifespan, or when and how a team moves from one stage to the next. Gersick’s (1988) model suggests that teams progress in patterns of ‘punctuated equilibiria’, through inertia and revolution, triggered by member’s awareness of time and deadlines. Progress in team development is highly connected with the context, the relevant stakeholders outside the team,

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a notion which we have seen already with the mini-company concept (De Leede et al., 2002). Still, the growth or development of teams towards a more productive state, being more self-managing is a powerful metaphor. In this book, we will describe teams of one healthcare organisation that are more successful compared to others. They are teams of one and the same organisation, and might be structured and organised in the same manner. They are offered the same HRM policies and practices, nevertheless they are very different in how they work smoothly together or not. They differ in team maturity. This concept of team maturity is a powerful concept to address these socio-dynamic issues. It is also one of the appealing characteristics of the Teal organisation: these organisations have found some mechanisms that open up the possibilities of collaboration within and across the SMTs, they have found ways to increase trust and openness across team members, thereby allowing for high levels of productivity and innovative behaviour. Summary: How to Describe Self-managing Teams in Detail To summarise this section, we have seen a number of different ways in how to distinguish between teams. The taxonomy of Bailey and Adiga (1997) highlights how teams differ on the dimension of autonomy. In line with STS thinking (De Sitter et al., 1997) it is useful to make a detailed analysis on the object of autonomy (which topics the teams are self-managing), the scope of autonomy (to what time horizon these topics refer to as, such as operational, tactical and strategic topics) as well as the organisational scope (to what organisational unit does the autonomy have influence on, such as workplace, department, business unit or entire organisation). To complete this taxonomy, we want to add the level of autonomy, for instance by using the power-influence continuum of Heller, Drenth, Koopman, and Rus, 1988. The level of autonomy can be perceived as a continuum which starts from no, or minimal information sharing and goes through solely information sharing, to giving advice, taking advice into consideration, joint decisionmaking and finally self-management. The four aspects of autonomy, (1) object, (2) time and impact scope, (3) organisational scope and (4) level of autonomy, together provide a detailed picture of how autonomous SMTs are. Only if we have this picture sharp enough, we can make sound and adequate distinctions between different SMTs. However, even with a detailed picture of autonomy, there are more dimensions in which SMTs differ. As we have seen with the Hollenbeck et al. (2012) taxonomy, it is also about skill differentiation (the diversity in experience, competences, knowledge, culture and gender) and temporal stability (the duration of the team). Finally, the team development also does matter. This ‘magic’ factor makes a difference between low and high performing teams and traces it back to all kind of collaboration processes. With this accurate view on what SMTs can look like, we end Part I. Now, we are able to review the literature in order to identify the factors that contribute to the

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success of SMTs. To compare team research, it is a matter of comparing these characteristics of SMTs.

References Adler, N., & Docherty, P. (1998). Bringing business into sociotechnical theory and practice. Human Relations, 51(3), 319 345. Appelbaum, E., Bailey, T., Berg, P., & Kalleberg, A. (2000). Manufacturing advantage: Why high-performance work systems pay off. Ithaca, NY: ILR Press. Bailey, D. E., & Adiga, S. (1997). Measuring manufacturing work group autonomy. IEEE Transaction on Engineering Management, 44(2), 158 174. Boxall, P., & Macky, K. (2009). Research and theory on high-performance work systems: Progressing the high-involvement stream. Human Resource Management Journal, 19, 3 23. Cherns, A. (1976). The principles of sociotechnical design. Human Relations, 29, 783 792. Cohen, S. G., Ledford, G. E., Jr., & Spreitzer, G. M. (1996). A predictive model of self managing work team effectiveness. Human Relations, 49(5), 643 676. De Leede, J., Looise, J. K., & Verkerk, M. (2002). The mini-company: A specification of sociotechnical business systems. Personnel Review, 31(3), 338 355. Demerouti, E., Bakker, A. B., Nachreiner, F., & Schaufeli, W. B. (2001). The job demandsresources model of burnout. Journal of Applied Psychology, 86, 499 512. De Sitter, L. U. (1994). Synergetisch Produceren: Human Resources Mobilisation in de Produktie (Synergetic Manufacturing: Human Resources Mobilisation in Manufacturing). Assen: Van Gorcum. De Sitter, L. U., Den Hertog, J. F., & Dankbaar, B. (1997). From complex organisations with simple jobs to simple organisations with complex Jobs. Human Relations, 50(5), 497 534. Emery, M. (Ed.). (1993). Participative design for participative democracy. Canberra: Centre for Continuing Education, The Australian National University. Gersick, C. J. C. (1988). Time and transition in work teams: Toward a new model of group development. Academy of Management Journal, 31(1), 9 41. Grant, A. M., & Parker, S. K. (2009). 7 redesigning work design theories: The rise of relational and proactive perspectives. The Academy of Management Annals, 3(1), 317 375. Hackman, J. R. (1987). The design of work teams. In J. Lorsch (Ed.), Handbook of organisational behavior (pp. 315 342). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Hackman, J. R. (2002). Leading teams: Setting the stage for great performances. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Press. Hackman, J. R., & Oldham, G. R. (1976). Motivation through design of work: Test of a theory. Organisational Behavior and Human Performance, 16, 250 279. Hammer, M., & Champy, J. (1993). Reengineering the corporation: A manifesto for business revolution. New York, NY: HarperCollins. Heller, F., Drenth, P., Koopman, P., & Rus, V. (1988). Decisions in organisations: A threecountry comparative study. London/Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications. Hollenbeck, J. R., Beersma, B., & Schouten, M. E. (2012). Beyond team types and taxonomies: A dimensional scaling conceptualization for team description. Academy of Management Review, 37, 82 106. Karasek, R. A., & Theorell, T. (1990). Healthy work. New York, NY: Basic Books.

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Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (1993). The discipline of teams. Harvard Business Review, 71(2), 111 120. Laloux, F. (2014). Reinventing organisations. Brussels: Nelson Parker. MacDuffie, J. P. (1995). Human resource bundles and manufacturing performance: Organisational logic and flexible production systems in the world auto industry. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 48(2), 197 221. Parker, S. K., Morgeson, F. P., & Johns, G. (2017). One hundred years of work design research: Looking back and looking forward. Journal of Applied Psychology, 102(3), 403 420. Roethlisberger, F. J., & Dickson, W. J. (1939). Management and the worker. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Sandberg, T. (1982). Work organisation and autonomous groups. Lund: Tavistock. Semler, R. (1993). Maverick: The success story behind the world’s most unusual workplace. New York, NY: Warner Books. Susman, G. I. (1976). Autonomy at work: A sociotechnical analysis of participative management. New York, NY: Praeger. Suzaki, K. (1993). The new shopfloor management: Empowering people for continuous improvement. New York, NY: The Free Press. Taylor, J. C., & Felten, D. F. (1993). Performance by design: Sociotechnical systems in North America. Englewood Cliffs, NJ, Prentice-Hall. Trist, E. L., & Bamforth, K. W. (1951). Some social and psychological consequences of the Longwall method. Human Relations, 4, 3 38. Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 65(6), 384 399. Tuckman, B. W., & Jensen, M. A. (1977). Stages of small-group development revisited. Group and Organisation Studies, 2(4), 419 427. van Eijnatten, F. M. (1993). The paradigm that changed the work place. Stockholm and Assen: Arbetslivscentrum and van Gorcum. Van Hootegem, G., Benders, J., Delarue, A., & Procter, S. (2005). Teamworking: Looking back and looking forward. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 16, 167 173. Wall, T. D., Kemp, N. J., Jackson, P. R., & Clegg, C. W. (1986). Outcomes of autonomous workgroups: A long-term field experiment. Academy of Management Journal, 29, 280 304. Wellins, R. S., Byham, W. C., & Wilson, J. M. (1991). Empowered teams: Creating selfdirected work groups that improve quality, productivity, and participation. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Wheelan, S. A. (2005). Group processes: A developmental perspective. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. Wheelan, S. A., & Hochberger, J. (1996). Validation studies of the group development questionnaire. Small Group Research, 27, 143 170. Wheelan, S. A., & Williams, T. (2003). Mapping dynamic interaction patterns in work groups. Small Group Research, 34, 443 467.

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Literature Review of Successful Self-managing Teams

After explaining the historical developments in the research into self-managing teams (SMTs), we now turn to examine the scholarly literature in a structured way, to review the factors that contribute to the success of such teams. We applied the evidence-based approach (Rousseau, Manning, & Denyer, 2008) to systematically analyse the literature on components that lead to successful SMTs, their design and outcomes. This allowed us to identify components for successful SMTs and to lay the basis for the empirical chapters in this book (Ten Vregelaar, 2017). We start this review by explaining the evidence-based research methodology that was applied to systematically sample data over various studies, particularly those published in peer-reviewed journals, to ensure a more parsimonious conclusion (Baumeister & Leary, 1997). The gathered evidence is then synthesised to shape a framework and to spot gaps in the data to identify further research directions.

Evidence-based Literature Review Methodology At the start of this research, we faced many choices because a literature review should address questions that have the potential to form patterns and connections, leading to theories which lie beyond the scope of one individual (empirical) paper. We decided to conduct a literature review to bridge a gap in the interpretation of individual data sets and individual empirical papers about SMTs (Baumeister & Leary, 1997). We took into account the notion of Rousseau et al. (2008) and Cassell, Denyer, and Tranfield (2006) that much can be gained from systematic literature reviews, which differ from traditional ones. A systematic literature review is to be conducted systematically whereas the traditional literature review can easily lead to cherry picking by the authors to support a point of view and thereby biased results. We were also aware that this research takes place in the field of Management and Organisational Science, where some methods are better suited than others. For Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations Advanced Series in Management, Volume 19, 29 51 Copyright r 2018 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1877-6361/doi:10.1108/S1877-636120180000019003

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example, Cassell et al. (2006) stated that a meta-analysis can be less effective for the social sciences, as it aims to develop algorithmic guidelines and not necessarily cope with variation in study populations, design, context and type of analysis. We followed the recommendations of Cassell et al. (2006) and Rousseau et al. (2008), who suggested conducting an evidence-based or qualitative research method instead. Therefore, we used the proposed framework of Rousseau et al. (2008) that enables systematic but flexible research syntheses that suit the field of management and organisation science. Sample-systematic Search Three major databases were searched: Scopus, Web of Science and Business Source Elite. This enabled us to gather multiple forms of data ‘to compensate for researcher value judgments and uncontrolled validity threats’, while also possibly identifying contextual factors that can influence findings (Rousseau et al., 2008, p. 503). The search protocol used the following search terms: ‘self-managing teams’, ‘self-designing teams’, ‘empowered teams’, ‘autonomous teams’ and ‘self-directed teams’. These search terms are often mentioned in the literature, and the search terms on SMTs and variance are used interchangeably in the literature and are therefore seen as synonymous (Hackman, 1987). The articles were coded according to the search term used to find them first, and they will not appear under other terms even if they are mentioned under several. Since the number of articles on SMTs is growing, we searched only for articles in which the search terms were included as a single phrase in the title to make sure that only articles which truly discuss these search terms were identified (Ten Vregelaar, 2017).

Critical Evaluation of Evidence To critically evaluate the evidence and to make sure that the selected articles were the ones most relevant to the research methodology and the subject, several criteria were considered as proposed by Rousseau et al. (2008). Only peer-reviewed articles were included. Articles from scholarly peer-reviewed journals were categorised as shown in Appendix 1. The articles were first classified by relevance based on abstracts, regarding whether they helped to answer the research question. We used the categories from the framework of Cohen, Ledford, and Spreitzer (1996): group task design, encouraging supervisory behaviour, group characteristics, employee involvement context and new components to Cohen’s framework. After coding based on categories and abstracts of the articles, 56 articles remained.

Categorisation by Methodological Approach Rousseau et al. (2008) recognise four types of relationships between constructs that are key to meeting optimal empirical standards, including for literature reviews:

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conclusion validity (existence of relationships between two constructs), internal validity (whether causality is present in the relationship and, if there is, what sort of direction this causality takes), construct validity (whether the relationship between key constructs is adequate based on the measures used) and external validity (the extent to which the relationship is generalisable and if there are contingency factors that might influence that relationship). The levels of analysis of the individual articles were addressed since different components of successful SMTs can be measured at the individual, team or organisational level. To report the outcomes accurately, we included the level of analysis of these findings. Most articles in the sample focused on the team level of analysis (Ten Vregelaar, 2017).

Results The sample of articles in Appendix 1 was coded by analysing the separate categories. They addressed questions regarding SMTs and their effectiveness, and they dove deeper and studied more detailed parts of self-management. Of the 56 articles, 40 addressed SMTs and specifically answered questions on sub-categories such as personality, organisational context, team design or leadership. Most of the articles (36) focused on the team level of analysis. In 11 articles more than one level of analysis was reported, either organisational and team level or team and individual level. Almost all articles in the sample reported on empirical studies in which the researchers tried to answer theoretically derived hypotheses by examining qualitatively descriptive statistics, as shown in Appendix 1. Five articles reported on literature reviews and four articles on case studies. We address the categories based on the framework by Cohen et al. (1996) that forms the foundation of this evidence-based literature review and identify areas in which more research on the use of SMTs is needed. Group Task Design Cohen et al. (1996) mention several sub-categories: group task variety, group task identity, group task significance, group task autonomy and group task feedback. Of the articles in the Appendix 1, 31 talked about group task design or one or more sub-components of group task design, many in combination with one of the other categories. In this section, 11 articles with findings directly related to group task design as the leading component are discussed. It should be noted that the different sub-components under the heading of group task design are largely recognised by researchers (Atanasova & Senn, 2011; Caudron, 1993; Janz, Wetherbe, Davis, & Noe, 1997; Morgeson & Humphrey, 2008; Spreitzer, Cohen, & Ledford, 1999; Wageman, 2001; Wolff, Pescosolido, & Druskat, 2002). Janz, Colquitt, and Noe (1997) researched the effect of autonomy on teamwork, although they did not look specifically at SMTs. They found that autonomy is positively related to job motivation regardless of the level of interdependence of teams.

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In a study on SMTs, providing more autonomy coincided with higher levels of quality of work life (QWL) and performance. High levels of job motivation are associated with team process but depend on the level of maturity of the team. Goal quality and information transmission increase the positive relationship between team process and team effectiveness (Janz, Wetherbe, et al., 1997); this same outcome was found in later research by Hu and Liden (2011). Autonomy was found to be positively related to QWL outcomes, suggesting that higher levels of autonomy lead to better satisfied employees. Stewart (2006) added that autonomy exhibits a moderately strong relationship with team performance. The relation was found to be stronger for physical work than for knowledge work. The same results on autonomy and team performance were reported by Lambe, Webb, and Ishida (2009) in his study of SMTs in a pharmaceutical company. In contrast, Langfred (2004) found that high levels of individual group autonomy can become a liability if SMTs establish high levels of trust and the level of monitoring is low. High levels of trust were only harmful in SMTs that displayed high levels of individual autonomy since this jeopardises collective performance (Millikin, Hom, & Manz, 2010). In a study on self-management and team empowerment, Kirkman and Rosen (1999) found that highly empowered teams are more effective than less empowered teams. Team-based human resource management (HRM) needs more research since the findings indicate that it is an integral driver of team empowerment, and therefore of team effectiveness. These same results were found in later studies, conducted by Mathieu, Gilson, and Ruddy (2006). Team-based HRM practices positively influence empowerment and team processes. The relationship between empowerment and quantitative performance is fully mediated by team processes. Empowerment is further suggested to influence team process; however, this relationship is not reciprocal. Team empowerment influences more than just the psychological state of a team member. Rousseau and Aube´ (2010) conducted a similar study on SMT effectiveness, and their results showed that team self-managing behaviour positively influences three team effectiveness criteria: team performance, viability and process improvement. They further found that teams that engage in self-managing behaviour report higher levels of team process improvement regardless of the routineness of the tasks they perform. Task interdependence was found to be positively related to team and organisational commitment in a study conducted by Bishop and Scott (2000) on the individual level in a self-directed team environment. In a later study on information systems for SMTs, Janz, Wetherbe, et al. (1997) found high levels of correlation between cooperative learning and team development on the team level; high correlations were also found between these two constructs and improved processes and QWL. Autonomy and cooperative learning are both positively correlated to ‘job satisfaction, growth satisfaction, levels of job motivation, self-perceptions of performance, and the perceptions of performance of those external to the team’ (Janz, 1999, p. 184). The relationship between cooperative learning and work outcomes was stronger than the relationship between autonomy and work outcomes.

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Gilson, Mathieu, Shalley, and Ruddy (2005) researched the effect of standardisation and creativity on both customer satisfaction and the performance of teamwork. Their study reported a positive association between customer satisfaction and standardisation but none for creativity. However, they did find that teams in more creative environments perform better. Encouraging Supervisory Behaviour The Appendix 1 shows that 16 articles mentioned forms of leadership in SMTs. Specific sub-categories are not discussed in these articles. Their focus lies on investigating the role of the leader in SMTs. These studies were conducted at the team level of analysis. A case study of Motorola and Corning showed that a team leader’s role is important for the transition to SMTs since team leaders can pass on knowledge (Liebowitz & Holden, 1995). Cohen and Ledford (1994) and Cohen et al. (1996) found that SMTs without a supervisor performed better than SMTs with one. However, they noted that higher-level managers are still needed to answer questions and assist if difficult situations arise. These same results on the performance of SMTs are mentioned in later research (Spreitzer et al., 1999; Wageman, 1997, 2001) on SMTs in a service context. Those findings indicate that the quality of a team’s design had a larger effect on the team’s self-management than did team coaching. However, effective coaching did have a positive effect on well-designed SMTs. Poorly designed SMTs hardly responded to good coaching. Moreover, ineffective coaching had a more profound negative effect on poorly designed teams than it did on well-designed teams. In contrast, Stoker (2008) found evidence that two leadership styles, initiating structure and coaching leadership, did indeed relate to the effectiveness of SMTs and are important for SMTs. The research was conducted on SMTs of a Dutch bank. However, they did note that leadership styles in some situations might cause problems. This also depends on the length of time an individual has spent in a team. Thus, leadership is most effective when it fits individual team members. Lambe et al. (2009) reported that empowerment leads to desired self-management, and they found that management control of a team’s work led to desired selfmanaging behaviour. Research on empowered customer service engineers showed that team coaches’ behaviour towards a team positively influences team empowerment. External team leaders’ behaviour towards empowered teams did not significantly influence team empowerment (Rapp, Gilson, Mathieu, & Ruddy, 2016). Team coaches can play a beneficial role. Hu and Liden (2011) found that servant leadership, a type of leadership with strong ethics components, enhances team effectiveness in work teams in a service setting. A descriptive analysis conducted by Hiller, Day, and Vance (2006) on 277 individuals showed preliminary evidence that leadership in teams might not solely depend

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on one person; leadership can be enacted collectively by team members and is positively related to team effectiveness. Informal leadership in SMTs can be predicted by the use of emotional intelligence, especially empathy, and is important to the success of SMTs, since external leadership might excessively control their SMT (Wolff et al., 2002). Informal leaders in groups are chosen based on how they develop and support others; this choice is also influenced by group task coordination skills. The cognitive skill of perspectivetaking was also directly related to the emergence of informal leadership. Some studies mentioned the role of leaders in SMTs as being supervisory or facilitatory but did not bring forward empirical evidence for the use of these specific leadership roles in SMTs (Bishop & Scott, 2000; Kirkman & Rosen, 1999; Moorhead, Neck, & West, 1998; Rogers, Metlay, Kaplan, & Shapiro, 1995). Group Characteristics Cohen et al. (1996) described that group characteristics can be classified into composition, beliefs and process. Group composition covers the variables group expertise, group size adequacy and group stability. Group beliefs is divided into group norms and group self-efficacy. Group process is composed of group coordination and group innovation processes. Of the sample described in the Appendix 1, 35 articles mention one or more of the group characteristics and describe outcomes based on team characteristics. The articles go deeper into one or more of the categories under composition, beliefs and process. All of the articles aggregated their research to the team level of analysis. To promote clarity, the results have been divided into the above-mentioned three categories. Group Composition: Cohen et al. (1996) found that only group characteristics could predict absenteeism in teams, but this was not related to QWL. This finding is based on US telecom service SMTs. van der Vegt, Bunderson, and Kuipers (2010) found in their research on SMT manufacturing teams of a Volvo plant in Sweden that team turnover negatively affects SMTs due to the disruptive effect it can have on key interaction processes, namely, task flexibility and team learning behaviour. Team learning behaviour is positively associated with SMT performance even after controlling for the effects of tenure, heterogeneity, past performance, changes in experience, team size changes and other measures of group process. Barrick, Neubert, Mount, and Stewart (1998) contributed to the team characteristics category by identifying the relationship between team composition and team effectiveness. However, their research was conducted on maintenance teams, not necessarily SMTs. Their findings show that conscientiousness and high cognitiveability teams perform better. Also, more agreeable and emotionally stable teams are likely to have higher levels of performance. Teams can maintain themselves better if they possess high levels of extraversion and emotional stability. When teams possess a mix of conscious and not so conscious members, their performance declines. This same finding holds for lack of desirable interpersonal traits.

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Stewart (2006) discovered that aggregations of personality, cognitive ability and expertise improve team performance. Team composition does matter. The right mix of personality traits in relation to team performance is still inconclusive, however, and further research is needed, especially in the field of SMTs. Forming teams based on heterogeneity is subordinate to choosing members with high cognitive ability, expertise and desirable personality traits. A clear description for optimal team size is difficult and depends on the type of team and its purpose. Results reported by Stewart (2006) are based on a meta-analytic literature review on teamwork and team effectiveness in general. With regard to another component of team composition, Woehr, Arciniega, and Poling (2013) found in their study on US undergraduate work teams that diversity negatively impacted the process outcomes of those teams. This resulted in lower team cohesion and efficacy and thus led to more conflict. Therefore, relationship conflict is most strongly related to team diversity. Group Beliefs: Manz and Neck (1995) and Neck and Manz (1994) did research on collective thinking within groups, especially SMTs. SMTs are likely to become cohesive groups and are therefore more sensitive to making decisions based on a collective opinion while individual opinions are overshadowed. Based on thirdparty results of SMTs, both studies propose solutions to overcome group think. Their solutions are a combination of establishing awareness of the self-defeating internal verbalisations and teaching SMTs to re-think and design inner group dialogues and group mental imagery, to eventually enhance performance based on more thorough decision-making. Millikin et al. (2010) and Moorhead et al. (1998) discovered that training SMTs in various skills enhances group potency and diminishes the risk of groupthink based on their research of groupthink in SMTs. Findings based on a study of US manufacturing SMTs suggest that the relationships and interactions within SMTs can impact their overall success. The extent to which teams can cooperate interdependently aids constructive discussion of opposing views, which promotes team confidence and results in effective performance. Effective decision-making is positively related to high efficacy in teams. Constructive controversy was found to contribute to team confidence (Alper, Tjosvold, & Law, 1998). Interactions within teams, especially clear and open communication, are also related to team creativity and better collaboration within the team. Open communication and better team performance are results of conflicts that were directly resolved within teams (Brewer & Mendelson, 2003; Somech, Desivilya, & Lidogoster, 2009). Tekleab, Quigley, and Tesluk (2009) found support for a relationship between conflict management and team cohesion leading to better team performance. Future levels of cohesion are based on the ability of teams to address their relationship conflict, since team cohesion leads directly to team satisfaction and viability. Only when teams develop a sense of group identity will they search for ways to solve conflict by adopting solution strategies (Somech et al., 2009). However, when task conflict exists together with relationship conflict, results on

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team performance are negative; the same goes for team member satisfaction, according to data based on Taiwanese work teams (Shaw et al., 2011). Langfred (2007) studied trust and conflict in MBA SMTs and found that higher levels of conflict, especially relationship conflict, resulted in lower levels of individual and task interdependence, which could result in lower performance. Potentially lower performance could be prevented by conflict management training. Thus, the results of this study agree with the findings of the above-mentioned studies on work teams. Jong, Ruyter, and Lemmink (2004) studied beliefs in Dutch service SMTs: that the dynamics of supportive behaviour result in collective beliefs and that the individual beliefs of a team member are influenced by the attitudes and behaviour of other members. The collective understanding of roles and shared beliefs is most important in non-routine service settings. De Jong, De Ruyter, and Wetzels (2006) found in a later study on Dutch SMTs in a bank that the effect of group efficacy on performance is stronger when collectivism within SMTs is high and members work interdependently. Their findings also reported that both team efficacy and group potency are reciprocally related to team performance. Thus, past performance outcomes influence the confidence beliefs of service SMTs significantly. Group potency, shared beliefs of a group that they can affect changes and become more effective, has a positive impact on customer-perceived service quality in SMTs. However, there is a negative effect of group potency on service profitability, the ‘performance paradox’ (De Jong, De Ruyter, & Wetzels, 2005). Management support, functional diversity and inter-team support were empirically verified to positively impact the group potency perceptions of an individual member. SMTs that are composed of members with diverse backgrounds enhance confidence within the team about its capacity to perform effectively across a multitude of tasks. However, group level effects of management and intra-team support and team tenure are moderated by social consensus, meaning that group design and contextual characteristics have less impact on group potency. Shared mental models can support ownership, learning and heedful interrelating in SMTs and therefore enhance performance, as found in a result of a literature review and four case studies on SMTs by Druskat and Pescosolido (2002). Group Process: Janz, Wetherbe, et al. (1997) researched work teams and found that goal quality and information transmission increased the positive relationship between team effectiveness and team process. Mathieu et al. (2006) discovered that the relationship between empowerment and quantitative performance was fully mediated by team processes and that empowerment influences team processes. Team-based HRM practices were also found to have a direct positive effect on team processes. This could mean that SMT members not only felt responsible and autonomous, they also had the right skills to execute team processes. Intra-team processes influence the effectiveness of self-managing work units. The more supportive team members are when making collective SMT decisions, the more they enhance the team’s ability to take adaptive and proactive decisions as a team (Jong & De Ruyter, 2004). This supportive intra-team behaviour and team

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member cooperation lead SMTs to adapt work routines more easily and innovate their services as necessary. Internal relations are negatively related to long-term absenteeism, since members pay attention to each other and might therefore prevent long-term sick leave (Kuipers & Stoker, 2009). A higher average age leads to more proactive behaviour in SMT service teams due to greater experience. Proactive behaviour is also positively influenced by team size and the amount of front-office work the team performs. Findings also show that adaptive recovery influences customer-based performance positively and leads to improvements in service recovery satisfaction and loyalty intentions. In contrast, proactive recovery behaviour leads to teams exerting greater efforts to employ extra resources and to utilise market opportunities better. However, this behaviour is not related to service revenues. The findings are based on SMTs of a large Dutch bank (Jong & De Ruyter, 2004). Employee Involvement Context The employee involvement context component is divided into power, information, rewards, training and resources. Some 20 articles in the sample mentioned the employee involvement context, and eight reported outcomes in this category. Cohen et al. (1996) stated that the employee involvement context has the strongest relationships to QWL and manager ratings of performance when it comes to SMTs. Having an organisational context in place that supports employee involvement turned out to be a key success factor and influenced team performance in two companies using SMTs (Spreitzer et al., 1999). Frequent feedback could also act as a substitute for effective internal work team functioning and could therefore potentially harm the development of a work team (Janz, Colquitt, et al., 1997), but specific data on SMTs and frequent feedback are lacking. Atanasova and Senn (2011), Moorhead et al. (1998), Morgeson and Humphrey (2008), and Wageman (2001) mentioned that reward systems, information, training (De Jong et al., 2005), material resources and power (Jong & De Ruyter, 2004) are moved down to SMTs to support and enhance self-management, but did not state any empirical outcomes. Components New to the Framework of Cohen et al. (1996) The framework created by Cohen et al. (1996) dates from 1996, and developments in the field of SMTs are steadily increasing. There might be components missing from the framework because they did not exist 20 years ago or were irrelevant at the time. To detect those new components, this category was created. Some 19 articles mentioned components new to Cohen’s framework or described sub-categories not yet incorporated in one of the four existing components. In a case study on SMTs at the Diego Zoo and Kodak Park, Caudron (1993) found that HRM has to be on board with the transition even before the actual start,

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since managers have to be educated about the benefits, risks, costs and limitations. They also mentioned that the choice to transition to SMTs should be based on the company culture and business objectives. Atanasova and Senn (2011) and Elmuti (1997) found that management support should be in place and is a key component. This finding is supported by case studies of Motorola and Corning, since management support prevented back sliding (Liebowitz & Holden, 1995). Rapp et al. (2016) found in their study on empowered customer service engineers that HRM and organisational support continuously support team empowerment even a year after transition. Organisational support turns out to be an essential component contributing to team effectiveness in general. Trust is another major component for successful implementation, especially since resistance to change is common when transitioning to a different workstyle. For SMTs to be successful, the company structure and strategy should be re-engineered (Elmuti, 1997). The cultural readiness of an organisation (measured by its organisational climate), missing from the framework, is positively correlated to improved QWL and improved work processes in a study of 27 SMTS from the United States and Canada. Organisational climate is defined as follows: ‘an organisation’s value system in terms of risk taking, reward systems, and providing a warm and supportive environment’ (Janz, Wetherbe, et al., 1997, p. 49). Kirkman, Jones, and Shapiro (2000), Kirkman and Shapiro (1997) and Kirkman and Shapiro (2001) also focus on culture in their research but look at cultural values of individuals in SMTs by means of a literature review and descriptive statistics on American SMTs. They found that culture does affect SMTs since what might work in one culture may not work in another. Secondly, they found that different cultural values lead to different conceptualisations of fairness within SMTs. Cheng, Chua, Morris, and Lee (2012) found that the appropriate combination of cultural value orientations can be enhanced. In later stages of SMT development, the relationship orientation of the team mattered most regarding performance. Cultural values are important because the level of existing cultural values determines the amount of resistance to both teams and self-management. Resistance behaviour accounted for some or all of the variance between cultural values and commitment and satisfaction, as confirmed in a later study on empowered teams (Maynard, Mathieu, Marsh, & Ruddy, 2007). The resistance to SMTs differs by country and is influenced by cultural values. Management trust is again found to be important when change is implemented. Two studies have researched the effect of individual personality, cognitive ability and emotional stability on team effectiveness. Neuman and Wright (1999) found that personality measures explained variance beyond the variables of skills and cognitive ability, both at the team and individual level. More specifically, agreeableness and conscientiousness proved to predict work team performance. The researchers did note that the preferable personality trait and eventually team composition factors depend on the type of tasks work teams perform. Another study on individual-level personality found that conscientiousness, agreeableness, extraversion, openness and attitude were predictors of long-term adaptation to SMTs.

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Personality could explain why some individuals would not want to work in SMTs (Thoms, Pinto, Parente, & Druskat, 2002). Another component on team work came up in the sample, inter-team support, meaning communications and service between different teams or units within an organisation. Inter-team processes have particularly been shown to be influential in determining the effectiveness of work units. This cooperation enables teams to adapt to different work routines efficiently after change or service failure, based on research conducted on SMTs in a service organisation (Jong & De Ruyter, 2004). SMT service climate has been mentioned regarding SMTs in service settings. A service climate has been defined as: ‘the SMTs consensual beliefs about practices, procedures, and behaviours that are supported and rewarded with regard to effective customer service delivery’ (Jong, Ruyter, & Lemmink, 2005, p. 1595). The SMT service climate has been found not to have an impact on productivity, but there is a positive relationship between the tolerance for self-management and service climate. The service climate perceptions of SMTs do positively influence customer-perceived service quality, but negatively affect production (Jong et al., 2004). Inter-team communication is important since SMTs are responsible for gathering and sharing information with other units if they wish to establish a high-quality service climate. On the individual level, age and team member tenure significantly impact the subjective individual assessment of the service climate (Jong et al., 2005). By means of the evidence-based literature review, using integrative synthesis, we examined 56 peer-reviewed articles about SMTs and team effectiveness. With the assistance of Cohen et al. (1996), we built the framework that we call a comprehensive model for successful SMTs (Figure 1). We have indicated sources of inspiration that helped us to model relationships between certain antecedents and outcomes. We also found that some sub-components were claimed to influence the dependent variables indirectly; such cases are indicated with sources of inspiration next to variables. First, the changes made and the implications of these changes are discussed, then theoretical and practical implications are described, followed by recommendations for future research and limitations. As shown in Figure 1, the layout of the new framework differs from the one Cohen et al. created in 1996. The categories used by Cohen et al. (1996) have been adjusted to incorporate new findings and have been divided over the levels of analysis where they belong concerning findings from the literature. In the framework, all parts on the left side together form the components leading to successful SMTs. The individual categories all contribute to the overall success of SMTs via several relationships with the outcomes on the right side, and those individual relationships are shown by means of an arrow together with sources of inspiration. Taken together, the categories on the different levels lead to successful SMTs; it is the combination of these categories that creates the success. Relationships between different categories on the left side exist, too, with some sub-categories indirectly leading to effectiveness. These categories receive sources of inspiration in the box belonging to that category instead of from the published arrows. Thus, components are related and together reinforce their effect on successful outcomes.

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Organisational Roadmap towards Teal Organisations Organizational Level

SMTs

Employee involvement context:

• • • • • • • •

Employee ratings of performance:

Power Information Rewards [6;13;31;42] Training Resources Management support and trust [2;13;31;41] HR involvement [6;41] Cultural readiness [7;23;25;26;34]

• • • • • •

[9;19;47] [9;19]

Leadership:

• •

Quality Productivity Costs Safety Performance Team/organizational commitment

[11;22]

Higher management [8;9;31] Coaching [16;41;47;49;53;54]

Managerial ratings of performance:

Team Level

[4;17;19;28;44;48]

• • • •

Work Design:

• • • • • • • • •

Variety Identity Significance Feedback Autonomy External relations Team based HR [24;33] Cooperative learning Interdependence

[17;19;44]

Efficiency Performance Improved processes

[17;18;19]

Quality of Work Life:

• • • • • •

Group Characteristics: Group Composition

• • • •

Quality

Expertise Size Stability Personality aggregations

[3,48,52]

Job satisfaction Growth needs satisfaction Group satisfaction Organizational commitment Trust Job Motivation

Group Beliefs

• • •

Norms Potency/efficacy Cultural values

[9;27;52] [7;23;25;26]

Group Process

• • • • •

Coordination Innovation Internal relations Inter-team support [21] Team learning behaviour

Withdrawal behaviours:

•

Short term absenteeism

[40]

Individual Level Leadership: Shared/Collective

Characteristics:

• • •

[15]

[40;51]

Personality Cognitive ability Emotional stability Legend: [x]

Sources of inspiration can be found in Chapter 7 “References Article Sample”

Figure 1: Framework for Successful Self-managing Teams (Ten Vregelaar, 2017). Source: Adopted from Ten Vregelaar (2017), with permission. Organisational Level: On the organisational level, the employee involvement context and leadership categories have been incorporated. The five different subcomponents regarding the employee involvement context are still accurate, and taken together the findings have shown that they lead to the overall effectiveness of SMTs. Direct relationships were not found, and therefore we assume that these sub-components indirectly relate to SMT success as indicated in Figure 1.

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Outcomes were based on findings from service and manufacturing SMTs, and these settings could have affected the findings. Other mediators influencing the outcomes were not mentioned in the sample of articles. To generalise the results, other mediators should be researched and accounted for. Based on empirical evidence and case studies, management support and trust, HRM department involvement and cultural readiness of an organisation have been added since they were found to be prerequisites for well-functioning SMTs within organisations, influencing managerial ratings of performance and QWL. Results are based on findings from manufacturing and service companies in the United States, while some articles did not mention specific industries, settings or countries. The settings of these findings could be moderators. The six sub-components described by Cohen et al. (1996) under the leadership heading have been removed since no evidence was found as to what leaders specifically need to do to make SMTs more successful. The sub-components do seem intuitively logical, however, but have not been empirically tested. There have been studies examining the effects of certain types of leadership and leadership styles on the effectiveness of SMTs. The higher management and coaching sub-components have been added to the leadership category, since both higher management assistance in answering questions and passing on knowledge and coaching, specifically good and efficient coaching, have been found to influence SMTs. As shown in the model, no direct link between leadership and the four outcomes is made since the findings did not mention any of the outcome categories or sub-categories. They did describe the effect of leadership on effectiveness, and therefore we assume that leadership indirectly contributes to successful SMTs, as shown by the sources of inspiration. The results might be moderated, so more research on the indirect influence of leadership on SMTs, specific tasks of coaches and effect of higher management should be studied, especially in manufacturing settings and regarding SMTs in different countries. The findings are based on SMTs in service settings without specific country information. Team Level: The team level is divided into two categories, work design and group characteristics. The task design category mentioned by Cohen et al. (1996) becomes work design since this category is not just about the tasks employees perform but also considers the broader context of these tasks. The five sub-components described by Cohen et al. (1996) have not been mentioned explicitly in findings, except for autonomy, which has been found to contribute to the successfulness of SMTs by positively influencing QWL and performance outcomes. The other four components have been added to work design since there is some earlier evidence of the positive influence of these components on team effectiveness. However, newer empirical evidence is lacking, and therefore the above-made assumptions should be tested empirically. New sub-components added to work design are external relations, team-based HRM, cooperative learning and interdependence. All four new sub-components, together with the earlier mentioned sub-components under work design, have been found to influence QWL, managerial and employee ratings of performance, thus

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contributing to successful SMTs. However, the effects and functioning of HRM within teams have hardly been studied, and further research is necessary. The indirect effect is indicated by putting the sources of inspiration in the box. Second, most of the research was conducted in service settings on SMTs in the United States and Canada, meaning that the results of work design might be biased. More research into different settings and countries is necessary to create more generalisable results. The second category under team level is group characteristics. This component has been divided into the sub-components group composition, group beliefs and group process. The sub-characteristics described under these sub-components by Cohen et al. (1996) have been kept the same since they were all mentioned in research as affecting the successfulness of SMTs. Some sub-components have been added to these sub-categories. New research has shown that personality aggregations, as part of Group composition, influences team performance. Research on this topic is still limited, and not yet conclusive. Cultural values have been added as a sub-component to Group beliefs since research on the effect of cultural values of employees on SMTs has been growing but is still new. Early results have shown that culture can predict resistance to selfmanagement and SMTs, but it has not yet been investigated what companies can do to eliminate this threat to the successfulness of SMTs. The results of cultural values on SMTs are assumed to be indirectly related to the success of SMTs. More research in this field is needed to gain more insight into cultural values. This is especially important since more and more companies are dealing with a globalised environment and culturally diverse workforces. Inter-team support and team learning behaviour have been added to the group process sub-category. Inter-team support has been found to lead to better overall performance, since different SMTs from different units working together positively influences organisations. This finding is mediated by service setting and by country (the Netherlands). Team learning behaviour influences the performance of SMTs as well, since the continuous learning in SMTs results in better overall performance, influencing withdrawal behaviours negatively and managerial ratings of performance positively. Moderators are unknown. Together the three sub-categories contribute to the successfulness of SMTs by positively influencing employee and managerial ratings of performance and withdrawal behaviours. Data are based on SMTs in service and manufacturing settings in the US, Sweden and the Netherlands. The findings could be biased by these settings or countries, as information on specific types of industries is limited, and information on country sizes is unknown. On the team level, work design and group characteristics lead to SMT behaviour which in turn leads to overall effectiveness. Individual Level: The individual level has been created based on findings focused on the individual level of analysis. The leadership and characteristics categories have been formed. Leadership research on the individual level has shown broader effectiveness when leadership is shared or collective compared to

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one person being in charge. However, it should be noted that these findings are preliminary and were not focused on SMTs but on work groups in general. Relationships between shared leadership and the outcomes are unknown and therefore assumed to be indirect. Characteristics has been divided into personality, cognitive ability and emotional stability, leading to personality aggregations. This same sub-component is described on the team level. On the individual level, personality aggregations consider the individual and their contribution to SMTs. Both categories lack sufficient data because they are rather new subjects in the field of SMTs, and they need to be researched more. The individual-level characteristics category influences managerial ratings of performance and contributes to the overall success of SMTs. Outcomes of Successful Self-managing Teams: The outcomes of successful SMTs are divided into four categories: employee ratings of performance, managerial ratings of performance, QWL and withdrawal behaviours, on the right side of the framework. These four categories were used in the framework by Cohen et al. (1996), and aside from some minor adjustments, these outcomes have proven to be accurate, even after more than 20 years. Results of improved categories on the right side are based on the empirical evidence of established relationships. Employee ratings of performance have been adjusted, and past performance, performance and team/organisational commitment have been added to this category, since these outcomes were found several times in the sample of articles in relation to work design and group characteristics. Managerial ratings of performance have been broadened by improved processes, which was also found to be an outcome. QWL has been improved by job motivation, shown to be related to team process and work design. QWL is influenced by leadership on the individual level, work design and employee involvement context. The four outcome categories taken together are related to employee involvement context and leadership on the organisational level; work design, group characteristics on the team level; and individual characteristics and leadership on the individual level. Lastly, it should be noted that the strength of the relationships recognised in Figure 1 are not specified. Too little information on the specific strengths of individual sub-components was found to aggregate them into broader componentlevel relationships. More research is needed to establish the strengths of these relationships.

Discussion The findings from this literature review contribute to theory in several ways. First, a renewed framework on the successful use of SMTs within organisations is proposed. The research has also exposed a few gaps in the literature on SMTs, shaping the direction of future research. The framework and associated categories and

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outcomes imply that SMTs are most successful when a combination of the following components is in place: employee involvement context and leadership on the organisational level, work design and group characteristics on the team level, and leadership and individual characteristics on the individual level. These components together reinforce the effect on the outcome variables, meaning that no one individual component is sufficient to reach a satisfactory outcome. Findings derived from this literature review have consequences for practice. The proposed framework gives organisations, specifically managers and HRM professionals, an overview of the components leading to successful SMTs. Before, during and after transition to SMTs, the framework can act as a foundation and provide assistance. It is helpful when obstacles occur in the implementation process or after implementation. We recommend establishing a quantitative, multi-level research programme to test the suggested relationships and see if the different components and relationships hold in practice, and to verify if overlap between certain components and sub-components is, indeed, present. Second, little knowledge is available on the phases from transition to the maturity stage of SMTs. We observed that research on SMTs is usually conducted at different moments in time. Some research is conducted during the initial transition, while other research was conducted after five years of use. Some studies even created temporal SMTs for the sake of their research. Consequently, some components or sub-components of the framework might be more effective during the transition phase or could be more effective in later phases. If the framework is to be used over longer periods of time, more research into time-sensitive SMTs success and reaching the maturity level is needed to create a more stable, reliable framework. Next, more research on service and manufacturing settings, organisation size, type of industry and other possible contextual contingency factors and/or moderators is necessary to observe if they impact the relationships in the model. Studies in the sample of articles looked at service or manufacturing settings or were not specific, and data on company size, type of industry or other possible moderators was lacking. This could mean that some components or subcomponents only hold for SMTs in certain settings. Therefore, we advise testing the new framework in different settings, industries and organisations. Finally, we found several inconclusive findings from this literature review. Findings on the use of team-based HRM, collective leadership, the role of management and team coaches, team and individual personality aggregations, cultural values and their relations to SMTs demand more research, especially focused on SMTs instead of work groups in general, to strengthen the findings and relationships in the proposed framework. This systematic evidence-based integrative literature review on factors for successful SMTs has led to a new comprehensive framework for successful SMTs. The framework suggests three levels of analysis: organisational, team and individual. The six components suit these levels, reinforce each other and are expected to lead together to the outcomes related to the success of SMTs. Finally, this literature review revealed considerable gaps in the literature on SMTs which need to be

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addressed to provide stronger guidance for practice. We believe that this literature review offers a solid starting point for future research by providing both a proposed framework and an empirical foundation.

Acknowledgement The authors are thankful for the contribution by Roos Ten Vergelaar, whose bachelor thesis project made the basis for this chapter.

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15. Hiller, N. J., Day, D. V., & Vance, R. J. (2006). Collective enactment of leadership roles and team effectiveness: A field study. Leadership Quarterly, 17(4), 387 397. doi:10.1016/ j.leaqua.2006.04.004 16. Hu, J., & Liden, R. C. (2011). Antecedents of team potency and team effectiveness: An examination of goal and process clarity and servant leadership. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(4), 851 862. doi:10.1037/a0022465 17. Janz, B. D. (1999). Self-directed teams in IS: correlates for improved systems development work outcomes. Information & Management, 35(3), 171 192. 18. Janz, B. D., Colquitt, J. A., & Noe, R. A. (1997). Knowledge worker team effectiveness: The role of autonomy, interdependence, team development, and contextual support variables. Personnel Psychology, 50(4), 877 904. 19. Janz, B. D., Wetherbe, J. C., Davis, G. B., & Noe, R. A. (1997). Reengineering the systems development process: The link between autonomous teams and business process outcomes. Journal of Management Information Systems, 14(1), 41 68. 20. Jong, A. d., & De Ruyter, K. (2004). Adaptive versus proactive behavior in service recovery: the role of self-managing teams. Decision Sciences, 35(3), 457 491. 21. Jong, A. d., Ruyter, K. d., & Lemmink, J. (2004). Antecedents and consequences of the service climate in boundary-spanning self-managing service teams. Journal of Marketing, 68(2), 18 35. 22. Jong, A. d., Ruyter, K. d., & Lemmink, J. (2005). Service climate in self-managing teams: Mapping the linkage of team member perceptions and service performance outcomes in a business-to-business setting. Journal of Management Studies, 42(8), 1593 1620. 23. Kirkman, B. L., Jones, R. G., & Shapiro, D. L. (2000). Why do employees resist teams? Examining the “resistance barrier” to work team effectiveness. International Journal of Conflict Management, 11(1), 74 92. 24. Kirkman, B. L., & Rosen, B. (1999). Beyond self-management: Antecedents and consequences of team empowerment. Academy of Management Journal, 42(1), 58 74. 25. Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. (1997). The impact of cultural values on employee resistance to teams: Toward a model of globalized self-managing work team effectiveness. Academy of management Review, 22(3), 730 757. 26. Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. (2001). The impact of cultural values on job satisfaction and organisational commitment in self-managing work teams: The mediating role of employee resistance. Academy of Management Journal, 44(3), 557 569. 27. Kuipers, B. S., & Stoker, J. I. (2009). Development and performance of self-managing work teams: a theoretical and empirical examination. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 20(2), 399 419. 28. Lambe, C. J., Webb, K. L., & Ishida, C. (2009). Self-managing selling teams and team performance: The complementary roles of empowerment and control. Industrial Marketing Management, 38(1), 5 16. 29. Langfred, C. W. (2004). Too much of a good thing? Negative effects of high trust and individual autonomy in self-managing teams. Academy of Management Journal, 47(3), 385 399. 30. Langfred, C. W. (2007). The downside of self-management: A longitudinal study of the effects tf conflict on trust, autonomy, and task interdependence in self-managing teams. Academy of Management Journal, 50(4), 885 900. 31. Liebowitz, S. J., & Holden, K. T. (1995). Are self-managing teams worthwhile? A tale of two companies. SAM Advanced Management Journal, 60(2), 11. 32. Manz, C. C., & Neck, C. P. (1995). Teamthink: Beyond the groupthink syndrome in selfmanaging work teams. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 10(1), 7 15.

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33. Mathieu, J. E., Gilson, L. L., & Ruddy, T. M. (2006). Empowerment and team effectiveness: An empirical test of an integrated model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91(1), 97 108. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.91.1.97 34. Maynard, M. T., Mathieu, J. E., Marsh, W. M., & Ruddy, T. M. (2007). A multilevel investigation of the influences of employees’ resistance to empowerment. Human Performance, 20(2), 147 171. 35. Millikin, J. P., Hom, P. W., & Manz, C. C. (2010). Self-management competencies in self-managing teams: Their impact on multi-team system productivity. The Leadership Quarterly, 21(5), 687 702. 36. Moorhead, G., Neck, C. P., & West, M. S. (1998). The tendency toward defective decision making within self-managing teams: The relevance of groupthink for the 21st century. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 73(2 3), 327 351. 37. Morgeson, F. P., & Humphrey, S. E. (2008). Job and team design: Toward a more integrative conceptualization of work design. Research in personnel and human resources management (pp. 39 91). Emerald Publishing. 38. Neck, C. P., & Manz, C. C. (1994). From groupthink to teamthink: Toward the creation of constructive thought patterns in self-managing work teams. Human Relations, 47(8), 929 952. 39. Neuman, G. A., & Wright, J. (1999). Team effectiveness: Beyond skills and cognitive ability. Journal of Applied Psychology, 84(3), 376 389. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.84.3.376 40. Rapp, T. L., Gilson, L. L., Mathieu, J. E., & Ruddy, T. (2016). Leading empowered teams: An examination of the role of external team leaders and team coaches. The Leadership Quarterly, 27(1), 109 123. 41. Rogers, E. F., Metlay, W., Kaplan, I. T., & Shapiro, T. (1995). Self-managing work teams: do they really work? People and Strategy, 18(2), 53. 42. Rolfsen, M., & Johansen, T. S. (2014). The silent practice: Sustainable self-managing teams in a Norwegian context. Journal of Organisational Change Management, 27(2), 175 187. doi:10.1108/jocm-08-2012-0124 43. Rousseau, V., & Aube´, C. (2010). Team self-managing behaviors and team effectiveness: The moderating effect of task routineness. Group and Organisation Management, 35(6), 751 781. doi:10.1177/1059601110390835 44. Shaw, J. D., Zhu, J., Duffy, M. K., Scott, K. L., Shih, H. A., & Susanto, E. (2011). A contingency model of conflict and team effectiveness. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(2), 391 400. doi:10.1037/a0021340 45. Somech, A., Desivilya, H. S., & Lidogoster, H. (2009). Team conflict management and team effectiveness: The effects of task interdependence and team identification. Journal of Organisational Behavior, 30(3), 359 378. doi:10.1002/job.537 46. Spreitzer, G. M., Cohen, S. G., & Ledford Jr, G. E. (1999). Developing effective selfmanaging work teams in service organisations. Group & Organisation Management, 24(3), 340 366. 47. Stewart, G. L. (2006). A meta-analytic review of relationships between team design features and team performance. Journal of Management, 32(1), 29 55. 48. Stoker, J. I. (2008). Effects of team tenure and leadership in self-managing teams. Personnel Review, 37(5), 564 582. 49. Tekleab, A. G., Quigley, N. R., & Tesluk, P. E. (2009). A longitudinal study of team conflict, conflict management, cohesion, and team effectiveness. Group and Organisation Management, 34(2), 170 205. doi:10.1177/1059601108331218 50. Thoms, P., Pinto, J. K., Parente, D. H., & Druskat, V. U. (2002). Adaptation to selfmanaging work teams. Small Group Research, 33(1), 3 31.

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51. van der Vegt, G. S., Bunderson, S., & Kuipers, B. (2010). Why turnover matters in selfmanaging work teams: Learning, social integration, and task flexibility. Journal of Management, 36(5), 1168 1191. 52. Wageman, R. (1997). Critical success factors for creating superb self-managing teams. Organisational Dynamics, 26(1), 49 61. 53. Wageman, R. (2001). How leaders foster self-managing team effectiveness: Design choices versus hands-on coaching. Organisation Science, 12(5), 559 577. 54. Woehr, D. J., Arciniega, L. M., & Poling, T. L. (2013). Exploring the Effects of Value Diversity on Team Effectiveness. Journal of Business and Psychology, 28(1), 107 121. doi:10.1007/s10869-012-9267-4 55. Wolff, S. B., Pescosolido, A. T., & Druskat, V. U. (2002). Emotional intelligence as the basis of leadership emergence in self-managing teams. The Leadership Quarterly, 13(5), 505 522.

References Alper, S., Tjosvold, D., & Law, K. S. (1998). Interdependence and controversy in group decision making: Antecedents to effective self-managing teams. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 74(1), 33 52. Atanasova, Y., & Senn, C. (2011). Global customer team design: Dimensions, determinants, and performance outcomes. Industrial Marketing Management, 40(2), 278 289. Barrick, M. R., Neubert, M. J., Mount, M. K., & Stewart, G. L. (1998). Relating member ability and personality to work-team processes and team effectiveness. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83(3), 377 391. Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1997). Writing narrative literature reviews. Review of General Psychology, 1(3), 311. Bishop, J. W., & Scott, D. (2000). An examination of organisational and team commitment in a self-directed team environment. Journal of Applied Psychology, 85(3). Brewer, W., & Mendelson, M. I. (2003). Methodology and metrics for assessing team effectiveness. International Journal of Engineering Education 19(6):777 787. Cassell, C., Denyer, D., & Tranfield, D. (2006). Using qualitative research synthesis to build an actionable knowledge base. Management Decision, 44(2), 213 227. Caudron, S. (1993). Are self-directed teams right for your company? Personnel Journal, 76 84. Cheng, C. Y., Chua, R. Y., Morris, M. W., & Lee, L. (2012). Finding the right mix: How the composition of self-managing multicultural teams’ cultural value orientation influences performance over time. Journal of Organisational Behavior, 33(3), 389 411. Cohen, S. G., & Ledford, G. E. Jr (1994). The effectiveness of self-managing teams: A quasiexperiment. Human Relations, 47(1), 13 43. Cohen, S. G., Ledford, G. E. Jr., & Spreitzer, G. M. (1996). A predictive model of selfmanaging work team effectiveness. Human Relations, 49(5), 643 676. De Jong, A., De Ruyter, K., & Wetzels, M. (2005). Antecedents and consequences of group potency: A study of self-managing service teams. Management Science, 51(11), 1610 1625. De Jong, A., De Ruyter, K., & Wetzels, M. (2006). Linking employee confidence to performance: A study of self-managing service teams. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 34(4), 576 587.

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Druskat, V. U., & Pescosolido, A. T. (2002). The content of effective teamwork mental models in self-managing teams: Ownership, learning and heedful interrelating. Human Relations, 55(3), 283 314. Elmuti, D. (1997). Self-managed work teams approach: creative management tool or a fad? Management Decision, 35(3), 233 239. Gilson, L. L., Mathieu, J. E., Shalley, C. E., & Ruddy, T. M. (2005). Creativity and standardization: Complementary or conflicting drivers of team effectiveness? Academy of Management Journal, 48(3), 521 531. Hackman, J. R. (1987). The design of work teams. In J. Lorsch (Ed.), Handbook of organisational behavior (pp. 315 342). Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Hiller, N. J., Day, D. V., & Vance, R. J. (2006). Collective enactment of leadership roles and team effectiveness: A field study. Leadership Quarterly, 17(4), 387 397. doi:10.1016/j. leaqua.2006.04.004 Hu, J., & Liden, R. C. (2011). Antecedents of team potency and team effectiveness: An examination of goal and process clarity and servant leadership. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(4), 851 862. doi:10.1037/a0022465 Janz, B. D. (1999). Self-directed teams in IS: Correlates for improved systems development work outcomes. Information & Management, 35(3), 171 192. Janz, B. D., Colquitt, J. A., & Noe, R. A. (1997). Knowledge worker team effectiveness: The role of autonomy, interdependence, team development, and contextual support variables. Personnel Psychology, 50(4), 877 904. Janz, B. D., Wetherbe, J. C., Davis, G. B., & Noe, R. A. (1997). Reengineering the systems development process: The link between autonomous teams and business process outcomes. Journal of Management Information Systems, 14(1), 41 68. Jong, A. d., & De Ruyter, K. (2004). Adaptive versus proactive behavior in service recovery: The role of self-managing teams. Decision Sciences, 35(3), 457 491. Jong, A. d., Ruyter, K. d., & Lemmink, J. (2004). Antecedents and consequences of the service climate in boundary-spanning self-managing service teams. Journal of Marketing, 68(2), 18 35. Jong, A. d., Ruyter, K. d., & Lemmink, J. (2005). Service climate in self-managing teams: Mapping the linkage of team member perceptions and service performance outcomes in a business-to-business setting. Journal of Management Studies, 42(8), 1593 1620. Kirkman, B. L., Jones, R. G., & Shapiro, D. L. (2000). Why do employees resist teams? Examining the ‘resistance barrier’ to work team effectiveness. International Journal of Conflict Management, 11(1), 74 92. Kirkman, B. L., & Rosen, B. (1999). Beyond self-management: Antecedents and consequences of team empowerment. Academy of Management Journal, 42(1), 58 74. Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. (1997). The impact of cultural values on employee resistance to teams: Toward a model of globalized self-managing work team effectiveness. Academy of Management Review, 22(3), 730 757. Kirkman, B. L., & Shapiro, D. L. (2001). The impact of cultural values on job satisfaction and organisational commitment in self-managing work teams: The mediating role of employee resistance. Academy of Management Journal, 44(3), 557 569. Kuipers, B. S., & Stoker, J. I. (2009). Development and performance of self-managing work teams: A theoretical and empirical examination. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 20(2), 399 419. Lambe, C. J., Webb, K. L., & Ishida, C. (2009). Self-managing selling teams and team performance: The complementary roles of empowerment and control. Industrial Marketing Management, 38(1), 5 16.

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Langfred, C. W. (2004). Too much of a good thing? Negative effects of high trust and individual autonomy in self-managing teams. Academy of Management Journal, 47(3), 385 399. Langfred, C. W. (2007). The downside of self-management: A longitudinal study of the effects of conflict on trust, autonomy, and task interdependence in self-managing teams. Academy of Management Journal, 50(4), 885 900. Liebowitz, S. J., & Holden, K. T. (1995). Are self-managing teams worthwhile? A tale of two companies. SAM Advanced Management Journal, 60(2), 11. Manz, C. C., & Neck, C. P. (1995). Teamthink: Beyond the groupthink syndrome in selfmanaging work teams. Journal of Managerial Psychology, 10(1), 7 15. Mathieu, J. E., Gilson, L. L., & Ruddy, T. M. (2006). Empowerment and team effectiveness: An empirical test of an integrated model. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91(1), 97 108. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.91.1.97 Maynard, M. T., Mathieu, J. E., Marsh, W. M., & Ruddy, T. M. (2007). A multilevel investigation of the influences of employees’ resistance to empowerment. Human Performance, 20(2), 147 171. Millikin, J. P., Hom, P. W., & Manz, C. C. (2010). Self-management competencies in selfmanaging teams: Their impact on multi-team system productivity. The Leadership Quarterly, 21(5), 687 702. Moorhead, G., Neck, C. P., & West, M. S. (1998). The tendency toward defective decision making within self-managing teams: The relevance of groupthink for the 21st century. Organisational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 73(2 3), 327 351. Morgeson, F. P., & Humphrey, S. E. (2008). Job and team design: Toward a more integrative conceptualization of work design. In J. J. Martocchio (Ed.), Research in personnel and human resources management (pp. 39 91). London, UK: Emerald Publishing. Neck, C. P., & Manz, C. C. (1994). From groupthink to teamthink: Toward the creation of constructive thought patterns in self-managing work teams. Human Relations, 47(8), 929 952. Neuman, G. A., & Wright, J. (1999). Team effectiveness: Beyond skills and cognitive ability. Journal of Applied Psychology, 84(3), 376 389. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.84.3.376 Rapp, T. L., Gilson, L. L., Mathieu, J. E., & Ruddy, T. (2016). Leading empowered teams: An examination of the role of external team leaders and team coaches. The Leadership Quarterly, 27(1), 109 123. Rogers, E. F., Metlay, W., Kaplan, I. T., & Shapiro, T. (1995). Self-managing work teams: Do they really work? People and Strategy, 18(2), 53. Rousseau, D., Manning, J., & Denyer, D. (2008). 11 Evidence in management and organisational science: Assembling the field’s full weight of scientific knowledge through syntheses. The Academy of Management Annals, 2(1), 475 515. Rousseau, V., & Aube´, C. (2010). Team self-managing behaviors and team effectiveness: The moderating effect of task routineness. Group and Organisation Management, 35(6), 751 781. doi:10.1177/1059601110390835 Shaw, J. D., Zhu, J., Duffy, M. K., Scott, K. L., Shih, H. A., & Susanto, E. (2011). A contingency model of conflict and team effectiveness. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(2), 391 400. doi:10.1037/a0021340 Somech, A., Desivilya, H. S., & Lidogoster, H. (2009). Team conflict management and team effectiveness: The effects of task interdependence and team identification. Journal of Organisational Behavior, 30(3), 359 378. doi:10.1002/job.537

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Spreitzer, G. M., Cohen, S. G., & Ledford, G. E. Jr. (1999). Developing effective selfmanaging work teams in service organisations. Group & Organisation Management, 24(3), 340 366. Stewart, G. L. (2006). A meta-analytic review of relationships between team design features and team performance. Journal of Management, 32(1), 29 55. Stoker, J. I. (2008). Effects of team tenure and leadership in self-managing teams. Personnel Review, 37(5), 564 582. Tekleab, A. G., Quigley, N. R., & Tesluk, P. E. (2009). A longitudinal study of team conflict, conflict management, cohesion, and team effectiveness. Group and Organisation Management, 34(2), 170 205. doi:10.1177/1059601108331218 Ten Vregelaar, R. (2017). Identifying factors for successfullself-managing teams: An evidencebased literature review. Unpublished thesis, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands. Thoms, P., Pinto, J. K., Parente, D. H., & Druskat, V. U. (2002). Adaptation to selfmanaging work teams. Small Group Research, 33(1), 3 31. van der Vegt, G. S., Bunderson, S., & Kuipers, B. (2010). Why turnover matters in self-managing work teams: Learning, social integration, and task flexibility. Journal of Management, 36(5), 1168 1191. Wageman, R. (1997). Critical success factors for creating superb self-managing teams. Organisational Dynamics, 26(1), 49 61. Wageman, R. (2001). How leaders foster self-managing team effectiveness: Design choices versus hands-on coaching. Organisation Science, 12(5), 559 577. Woehr, D. J., Arciniega, L. M., & Poling, T. L. (2013). Exploring the effects of value diversity on team effectiveness. Journal of Business and Psychology, 28(1), 107 121. doi:10.1007/s10869-012-9267-4 Wolff, S. B., Pescosolido, A. T., & Druskat, V. U. (2002). Emotional intelligence as the basis of leadership emergence in self-managing teams. The Leadership Quarterly, 13(5), 505 522.

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Healthcare Teams in Long-term and Elderly Care at Livio: A Case Study

Introduction How do organisations change to self-managing teams (SMTs) in practice, what are the implications for human resource management (HRM), and what are the most important lessons learned? In this book, we share our observations based on an extensive in-depth case study within one of the Dutch home and residential care organisations. We followed an organisation that recently took the decision to make the transformation towards SMTs an organisation that also struggled with the questions of which factors support the introduction of SMTs, and what are the features that influence the success of SMTs. Based on almost 70 interviews, document analysis and observations, we analysed how SMTs were introduced, what changes this implied for teams, and how the HRM activities are changed and managed because of this. The case study organisation is a relatively large healthcare organisation in the Netherlands, called Livio. The annual report shows that in 2016, the revenues of Livio added up to almost h98 million, with a small loss of h239,000 (Livio, 2017). The organisation employs around 2,500 employees (1,300 fte) and is active in the fields of caring, living and health. Their main activities are focused around home care (caring, nursing and helping clients at home), residential care, as well as care for disabled people. The organisation is active in the eastern part of the Netherlands. It has two main business units that are responsible for their own performance (RVE in Dutch): ‘home care’ and ‘residential care’. Livio’s employees are divided over 60 80 teams in home and residential care. The company also has around 1,000 volunteers who support their health care services. Livio has two management levels: the board of directors and the management team. In addition, there are 13 so-called ‘coach-managers’ who support teams with their daily activities. In terms of support staff, there are separate departments for finance, facility services, human resources, quality of care and communication (Figure 1).

Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations Advanced Series in Management, Volume 19, 53 63 Copyright r 2018 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1877-6361/doi:10.1108/S1877-636120180000019004

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Board

Communication Secretariat Quality

Home Care

Figure 1:

Residential Care

Facility Management

Human Resource Management

Organisation Structure of Livio.

The Organisation Livio has formulated its mission as follows: ‘With our services and products we want to provide added value in terms of caring, living and health’. Furthermore, as stated on their corporate website, Livio not only wants to support needy people, but also wants to help people who want to improve their vitality. They aim to do this by having trust in people and looking for innovative solutions for daily issues. For this reason, Livio introduced three core competences: decisiveness, expertise and collaboration. In line with current developments in the Netherlands, the Livio management and employees believe that quality of life is closely related to the extent to which people can lead their own lives and be independent. Livio focuses on things that can be done rather than those that cannot, putting people before rules. The organisation offers services and products in the fields of care, living and healthcare that fit with their positive view on humankind. For that reason, Livio has recently changed its motto to: ‘We are there when needed’, illustrating that Livio employees will provide care when needed, but also that they do not overreach and arrange everything. The new motto replaces the old one: ‘Livio takes care of it’. Based on its belief that people prefer to lead their own lives, Livio also wants clients and their families to be active in the caring process. This fits neatly with the recent ‘participation debate’ in the Netherlands, which emphasises that citizens need to participate actively themselves in societal developments and debates, rather than relying solely on the government. Livio expresses its belief in participation and self-responsibility at all organisational levels and therefore aims to provide both clients and employees with as much freedom of choice as possible. Its new motto was translated into changes to client care and the healthcare teams. The change of motto is the perfect illustration of the new organisation; it emphasises a change from an organisation that arranges and organises everything for both client and

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employee, towards an organisation in which client and employee are in control. The newly developed core competences should ensure that employees can adapt to this new way of working. The mission and vision of Livio were implemented by shared core values that are supposed to guide all activities of Livio’s employees, which are: ‘dedication, professionality, and responsibility’ (Livio website). In line with these developments, Livio’s goal was to take important steps towards assuming one’s own responsibilities and the participation of both clients and employees.

External and Internal Developments External Developments We identified at least four external developments that are relevant for Livio’s decision to adopt SMTs and for the subsequent transformation process: (1) demographic changes, (2) decentralisation of the Dutch healthcare system, (3) participation debates and (4) institutional pressures. Demographic Changes: Livio has to deal with an ageing population; the average age of Dutch citizens is increasing, which means that the number of needy people will keep on growing in the coming years (CBS, 2017). On the one hand, more care needs to be provided to people, while fewer people are available to work to provide the care on the other. Recent reports even show that huge labour shortages are expected in the Dutch healthcare sector (Berenschot, 2017). In other words, because of the ageing population, the demand for personnel in the healthcare sector is increasing while the supply of personnel is potentially decreasing. This entails that healthcare organisations will face difficulty in attracting and retaining sufficiently qualified personnel. To be able to recruit enough employees, it is important to become an ‘attractive employer’. Healthcare organisations can lower the work pressure, reduce administrative burdens and increase equality between management and the work floor (Maurits, De Veer, Spreeuwenberg, & Francke, 2016). Decentralisation of Healthcare to Municipalities: The Dutch healthcare system for long-term and elderly care is grounded in the idea that healthcare is available for everyone, that the health insurance system is based on solidarity in which everyone is obliged to have an insurance, and that the healthcare provided is of good quality. In the Netherlands, there have been recent changes in laws regarding long-term and elderly care (Ministerie van Volksgezondheid, 2014). In 2015, the Algemene Wet Bijzondere Zaken (General Act on Special Affairs, AWBZ) was replaced by several laws that now together form the legal framework of the healthcare system: the social support act (WMO), the health insurance act (Zvw), the act on long-term care (Wlz) and the youth act. The Wet Maatschappelijke Ondersteuning (Social Support Act, WMO) made municipalities responsible for supporting people at home, instead of the central government.

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This so-called decentralisation was intended to encourage people to stay independent and live in their own homes longer. The WMO also states that municipalities are responsible for supporting the self-reliance and participation of their residents who are constrained by health issues for example by offering day-care. The health insurance act (Zvw) manages the reimbursement of curative care in the Netherlands, consisting of both public and private elements. All citizens are required to have a basic health insurance policy, which they can choose freely in the market; and health insurance companies are obliged to accept all citizens. These companies in turn pay for all care that is provided in the basic health insurance policy, the content of which is determined by the government. Nursing and caring at home were made part of the Zvw, the health care insurance, including helping with medication and showering. The central government remains responsible for the care of people who need long-term or intensive care or 24-hour supervision (Wet Langdurig Zorg (Wlz); Long-term Care Act), which can be received in a residential care facility if they cannot stay at home (Ministerie van Volksgezondheid, 2014). These treatments include: residence in a residential home, personal care and nursing. As a consequence of these changes in the healthcare laws, people will stay longer in their own homes. At the same time, more people will require care. Moreover, the care tasks to support needy people changed. There is a need for more and highly qualified personnel because of the increased demand and complexity of care. Simultaneously, due to continuously rising healthcare costs, the Dutch government made the decision to change the financing of long-term care. The available budgets for providing long-term and elderly care were reduced, given the idea that if people stay longer at home, this will save money. Another result of the changes to the law and its consequence that people stay longer at home is that the time clients are nursed in residential facilities has significantly decreased. The turnover of clients has increased, which means that the client population is changing more rapidly, leading to more turbulence and the need for adaptation on the work floor. At the same time, the current clients need additional and more complex care. Participation Discussion: As a result of the transformation of the healthcare laws and other societal developments, people will be more dependent on informal care (mantelzorg in Dutch), provided by family, friends and/or neighbours. People will stay longer in their own homes, and the different care financers will no longer reimburse small care tasks. The idea is that informal care providers will jump into this gap and provide care for their relatives for free. Indeed, reports show that the percentage of people providing informal care has risen between 2004 and 2012 to almost 18%, half of them providing at least two hours of care per week (Josten & de Boer, 2015), a trend that is expected to continue after the law changes. The increase in informal care providers also forces nurses to align their care tasks with more stakeholders. Institutional Pressures: Institutional pressures are an important driver of the choice for adopting self-management in the Dutch long-term and elderly care.

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SMTs seem to be the new standard, and many healthcare organisations have chosen to make the transition towards self-management. One of the first organisations in this sector to fully adopt the concept of self-management was Buurtzorg, an organisation that provides neighbourhood nursing and care. It was founded in 2006 by Jos de Blok and was successful in introducing SMTs and having no overhead. The vision behind Buurtzorg was mainly to improve the quality of care by empowering employees and reducing bureaucracy. The main premise is that the bond between the client and the healthcare professional becomes central again (De Blok & Pool, 2010). Nurses at Buurtzorg work in small teams of 10 12 employees, serving around 50 patients in a well-defined area. The teams are fully self-managing, that is they make decisions about all of the tasks in their teams. The teams can make use of coaching, but the only manager is the founder of the organisation. Within several years Buurtzorg grew from one team to more than 8,000 nurses, and recently Buurtzorg became the largest provider of neighbourhood nursing in the Netherlands. What makes Buurtzorg unique is that it was founded as a self-managing organisation and therefore did not have to go through an organisational change process of restructuring and transformation. Under institutional pressures, many organisations have followed the example of Buurtzorg and had to go through such a transformation, a process that proved to be very challenging. More or less forced by the development of Buurtzorg, almost all long-term care organisations faced the strategic choice of how to respond to the adoption of SMTs in their sector. Frenetic copying by many organisations was observed, not always with success. One essential difference between Buurtzorg and other organisations was noted: Buurtzorg started from scratch, whereas all others had to deal with existing organisational structures. In summary, we identified four major external developments in the long-term and elderly care sector that cannot be ignored when analysing the transformation to SMTs. Our discussion is incomplete and not exhaustive, because there are more developments that are of importance. Nevertheless, the developments show that healthcare organisations face many challenges. Care provision has become more complex, with more stakeholders involved, while at the same time money streams have shrunk and personnel is hard to find. On top of that, organisations faced the transformation towards SMTs. Internal Developments The transformation towards SMTs at Livio was accompanied by several other internal developments that are relevant for the analysis and that match (in part) the above-mentioned external developments: (1) introduction of ‘MyPlan’, (2) training and transformation programme, (3) pilot teams and (4) development of teamwork. The Introduction of MyPlan: Our interviewees shared with us that the concept of ‘MyPlan’ (MijnPlan) has been introduced by Livio to enhance their own responsibilities and the client’s control over the care that is received. Clients of Livio make their own care plan, consisting of three parts: ‘My Wellbeing’, ‘My Indication’ and

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‘My Arrangement’. Livio chose to make an assessment together with the clients and their families of the clients’ needs and demands and the care that Livio can provide given the available budgets and hours. In other words, individual arrangements (‘care packages’) could be made by which customised care could be realised. At the same time, this change requires a transformation of the organisation towards a more client-focused way of working. If clients are in charge, the service delivery to the client changes as well. To facilitate this, Livio decided to increase the autonomy of its employees, since providing client-centred care is only possible when the professional has enough freedom to act. This meant there had to be a team around the client that could provide that care. As a consequence, employees required a new skill set. They needed different knowledge, skills and abilities to facilitate the client-centred care. They also needed to develop their teamwork skills, to find solutions for problems themselves and to give feedback to each other. And they needed to interact more with the client, to find out what was wanted and needed in terms of care, which also required new skills. They had to be solution-oriented in their teams as well as for their clients. The introduction of MyPlan also had another reason: too many staff members were employed in residential care facilities. The client now had a specific care assessment, indicating the care profile and the number of hours needed. Previously, Livio employees spent too many hours relative to the care profile of employees. Together with the client and the family, Livio decided to develop ‘care packages’, indicating the care that will be provided by its employees based on the care assessment, and assuming that all other care tasks will be provided by informal caregivers. This new way of working of making employees more responsible for aligning their care provision and work hours with the care assessment and the corresponding necessary changes to do so caused disruptions, because many teams had to be reshuffled and rearranged. As a consequence, Livio decided that teams in residential care could not start with the transformation towards SMTs at the same time as teams in home care. Training and Transformation Programme: Part of the reorganisation programme involved a re-training and education trajectory for nurses and redefining the role of coach-managers. As a result of the increased complexity of care, specifically home care, nurse assistants (level-2 nurses in the Netherlands) could not be fully planned in the home care routes any longer, because they are not always qualified to provide the complex care. This meant that there were problems with the productivity of these employees, who were otherwise important because their wages were relatively low. Because other skills were required, due to both the increased care complexity and working in SMTs, Livio decided to offer these nurse assistants a re-training and education programme to attain the required qualifications. In practice, this meant that around 650 employees were offered this programme, of which around 200 chose to join it while the others switched teams or left the organisation. As a consequence, gaps and turbulence arose in the home care teams during a period in which they experimented with self-management, necessitating greater flexibility

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of the employees who stayed. The programme also meant that the teams were not stable, resulting in difficulties managing themselves. Correspondingly, the new function of coach-manager was introduced. Based on an assessment, former team managers could apply for the job of coach-manager. The assessment was focused on identifying the coach-related competences of managers. Some managers were sacked, and employees who were seen to be competent as a coach were hired as a coach-manager. The number of coach-managers ended up being small compared with the former number of managers. All of the teams were redistributed over the new coach-managers, who had a lot more teams to support. Subsequently, all new coach-managers received training to learn about how to coach effectively, using a solution-oriented interactive method, which was focused on asking questions of the SMTs and giving them responsibilities. Later on, the coach-manager function changed into coach-coordinator, based on the idea that the coach should not manage anymore. Introduction of Pilot Teams: Before introducing SMTs organisation-wide, Livio decided to join a self-management project in their home care branch subsidised by the government, and started a pilot project to introduce a couple of SMTs. From that moment on, those teams were self-managing and could take decisions for themselves. Not all of the pilot teams were a great success, mainly due to a poor connection with the rest of the organisation, insufficient boundary conditions (e.g. performance goals) and inadequate organisational support (e.g. help with the conduct of new HRM activities). In addition, many of the organisational processes and procedures were not designed for self-management, as coach-managers always had to approve the decisions. An example of malfunctioning SMTs was that some teams were engaged in signing long-term leases for buildings. This was also a reason for the later decision to make a clear distinction regarding which activities are and are not the responsibility of SMTs, such as recruitment and selection, performance appraisal and finances/budgeting. For example, decisions about housing were placed outside the decision-making scope of SMTs. Then a new general manager joined Livio, and the discussion about SMTs was restarted. He explained that Livio had decided to abandon pure self-management, to the annoyance of those teams that performed well under the new regime. Instead, Livio adopted the term ‘professionally organised teams’. Several interviewees from the Livio management indicated that the concept involves giving teams responsibilities and authority, but also entails that teams develop towards more self-management at their own speed: some teams are further along in becoming fully self-managed than others. The aim was that all team members should strive for a high degree of professionalism, enabling them to make their own professional decisions regarding their work. It also entailed that teams differ in the extent to which they are self-managing; some teams can be further along than others, and it was up to the organisation to support this process. Livio also envisioned that teams could decide that some tasks would be performed by others outside the team. Most importantly, Livio developed a clear framework of how teams should work, which will be discussed next.

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Professionally Organised Teamwork: Livio decided to implement professionally organised teams, teams with a high degree of self-management. Teams in the primary process (providing care) were expected to work professionally together and to manage themselves. To do so, Livio developed several leading principles: (1) small teams of fixed employees and clients, (2) shared responsibilities, (3) professionalism and craftsmanship of individual employees, (4) division of roles and tasks within the team and (5) a coach-manager to support and adjust when necessary (Livio, 2016). There were three main goals behind this transformation: the increased participation of clients and thereby also client satisfaction; employee responsibility and ownership; and more efficient management with a minimum amount of coordination. Working in SMTs is a relatively new procedure for Livio, because all teams used to have a manager who was responsible for all managerial tasks. Based on interviews with the management team, we can conclude that Livio decided to have a phased implementation of their SMTs, depending on the development phase of the teams. Their experience showed that some teams proceed faster towards self-management than others for example by already having a coach-manager at a distance in a coaching role. The organisation supported this process by introducing several HRM instruments for training, development and feedback. Differences arose regarding the degree of self-management in teams: the residential care teams started later with the transformation to self-management because they first needed to adapt to working with individualised care packages. In the meantime, Livio continued to develop the framework, boundary conditions and support for self-management in home care while residential care was being transformed according to MyPlan. For that reason, the home care teams started earlier and were more advanced in self-management. The additional responsibilities were introduced to the teams in a step-by-step fashion, mainly by the coach-manager. To put the SMTs into action, Livio developed an outline for its own vision of self-management, including design choices. After the pilots, the management was convinced that self-management for teams would not be possible without a clear framework with boundary conditions. These design features include team tasks, team roles, performance goals and guidelines, team composition, coaches and support staff. For example, based on the pilot teams, team tasks and responsibility areas were identified and included in the task descriptions.

Development Projects As a consequence of the internal and external developments discussed above and the new strategy, Livio went through a transition trajectory. This trajectory was called ‘Transition 2017’ and was intended to shape self-management through 17 different projects (Livio, 2016). The developments require new knowledge and skills to facilitate a new way of working and acting. Unlearning old ways of working and thinking patterns was also important. In general, the ‘mindset’ of employees was identified as a crucial starting point to get the organisational transition underway.

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A few examples of the projects are: ‘neighbourhood-focused marketing’, ‘participation of volunteers’ and ‘team and organisation development’. In internal documents, Livio tried to link all these projects to the goal of professionally organised teams (Livio, 2016). In these projects, different issues were discussed, and guidelines were developed about what teams need to do; as soon as such a product was ready, it needed to be tested and implemented. The business-unit managers were in charge of these projects, and decided when to implement them in collaboration with coachmanagers and teams.

History of Livio’s Choice to Introduce Self-managing Teams Table 1 provides the historical overview of the process and decisions made by Livio to introduce SMTs.

Information Sources We carried out the research at Livio for more than one year, between December 2016 and January 2018. To gather as much information as possible, we closely followed project developments and attended meetings and informal gatherings at Livio. We relied on dedicated multiple data collection techniques, including semistructured interviews, document analysis and observations. In total, 70 employees were interviewed (Table 2). In the first phase of our research, we analysed documents and had informal conversations with contact persons at Livio to understand how the organisation worked. Subsequently, we organised interviews with the management team of Livio, including the general manager, two business-unit managers, HR manager, quality manager and facility manager. Then we interviewed all 13 coach-managers at their own locations. At the same time, HRM professionals were interviewed to understand the role of the HRM department in the transition towards SMTs. The last phase consisted of interviews with healthcare professionals in SMTs. In total, 42 team members were interviewed during this phase. All interviewees were assured of the confidentiality and anonymity of the interviews. Several meetings with our contact persons were organised to present preliminary results and discuss interpretations to enhance the credibility and validity of our results (Yin, 2009). All interviews were audiotaped and fully transcribed verbatim. The average interview lasted around 50 60 minutes. We were also granted access to secondary data such as strategic plans and documents, internal reports, minutes of meetings, presentations, internal communications and HRM policy documents. We participated in several employee meetings. Subsequently, all of the raw data were inserted in a data analysis software programme and analysed through several steps. First, all of the transcripts were read and discussed, and the main ideas were written down. Second, the data were coded based on a combination of theoretical and open coding, using concepts from theory (such as governance mechanisms or i-Deals) but also being open to new concepts. Lastly, the coded texts were analysed, and the initial results were written down. The

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Table 1: History of Livio’s Choice to Introduce Self-managing Teams. Decision-making Stages Re-emergence of SMT movement in the Netherlands (2006 2015)

Developments Success of Buurtzorg in home care healthcare organisation was established in 2006 with SMTs and almost no overhead Demographic changes clients stay longer at home, and care becomes more complex, necessitating new qualifications for nurses Decentralisation of the Dutch healthcare system (in 2015) changes in regulations and laws make municipalities responsible for home care, while reducing the budget

Piloting SMTs (2014 2015)

Livio takes part in a subsidised SMT pilot in home care New general manager came to Livio discussion about self-management starts again

Development of SMT framework (2015 2017)

Reorganisation starts re-training and education for nurses. Development of a clear framework for SMTs at Livio introduction of professionally organised teams (POTs) and new core values Development of client-centred care through introduction of ‘MyPlan’ Change of jobs for first-line managers assessment of former managers and introduction of new function: coach-manager

Implementation of SMTs (since 2016)

Transition 2017 starts 17 different projects to support the transition to SMTs (e.g. professionally organised teams project group) Development of tools, instruments and ICTs to support implementation of SMTs (e.g. team training, assessment and evaluation tools) Introduction of a dashboard with parameters and objectives for SMTs Development and gradual introduction of team tasks and organisational support for SMTs

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Table 2: Overview of Interviewees at Livio. Informants Management team Coach-managers

Number of Interviewees 6 13

Home care

4

Residential care Home & residential

6 3

HRM department Team members

9 42

Home care Residential care Total interviews Total time for interviews (hours) Total time to transcribe interviews (hours)

30 12 70 ∼80 ∼320

results were discussed by the team of researchers, and refinements were made to the concepts.

References Berenschot. (2017). Aan het werk voor een betere arbeidsmarkt in de zorg! Retrieved from https:// www.berenschot.nl/actueel/2017/november/hoe-kunnen-personeelstekorten/. Accessed on November 28, 2017. CBS. (2017). Vergrijzing en de Nederlandse Economie. Retrieved from https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/ achtergrond/2017/11/vergrijzing-en-de-nederlandse-economie. Accessed on February 19, 2018. De Blok, J., & Pool, A. (2010). Buurtzorg: menselijkheid boven bureaucratie. Amsterdam: Boom Lemma uitgevers. Josten, E., & de Boer, A. (2015). Concurrentie tussen mantelzorg en betaald werk. Den Haag: Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau. Livio. (2016). Professioneel Organiseren Ontwikkelen van de Livio-organisatie door de vakmensen. Enschede: Livio. Enschede. Livio. (2017). Jaardocument maatschappelijke verantwoording 2016. Retrieved from Enschede: https://www.livio.nl/over-livio/jaarverslagen. Accessed on February 19, 2018. Maurits, E. E. M., De Veer, A. J. E., Spreeuwenberg, P., & Francke, A. L. (2016). De aantrekkelijkheid van werken in de zorg 2015: Cijfers en trends. Retrieved from Utrecht: https://www.nivel.nl/sites/default/files/bestanden/aantrekkelijkheid-werken-zorg-2015.pdf?. Accessed on February 19, 2018. Ministerie van Volksgezondheid, W. e. S. (2014). De zorg verandert. Retrieved from https:// www.rijksoverheid.nl/documenten/brochures/2014/10/20/de-zorg-verandert. Accessed on February 19, 2018. Yin, R. K. (2009). Case study research: Design and methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

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The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams

After defining self-management and self-managing teams (SMTs), explaining the recurrence of these concepts and determining various antecedents and outcomes of SMTs in an overarching framework in the previous parts, we focus on the role of line managers in SMTs in this chapter. Line managers are broadly defined as those who work between the ‘strategic apex and the operating core’ of the organisation (Floyd & Wooldridge, 1994, p. 53). Although this term aggregates various managerial positions at different levels in the organisation, ranging from first-line managers to middle and senior managers, we focus on the first-line managers (including supervisors, front-line managers and team leaders) (Townsend & Hutchinson, 2017) because they were responsible for managing SMTs before they were empowered. SMTs have a lot of autonomy and decision-making capacity and are responsible for, e.g., their division of work, allocation of resources, budget expenditures, work strategy development, performance assessment and recruitment and development of new members (Luciano, Mathieu, & Ruddy, 2013). They do this by autonomously planning, scheduling and assigning tasks to members (Moe, Dingsoyr, & Oyvind, K., 2009). Although SMTs gain control over all these responsibilities, they do this within a structure and with goals set by others (Wageman, 2001). Wageman (2001) stresses that the degree of self-management does not have a linear relationship to team effectiveness, and thus she concludes that teams that are highly self-managing are rather ineffective, while teams that are manager-led are rather effective. This shows that line managers still play a role in the management of SMTs. In fact, SMTs usually rely on external leadership, and many scholars agree that the success and effectiveness of SMTs depend on the actions of line managers (e.g. Luciano et al., 2013; Stewart, Courtright, & Manz, 2011; Stoker, 2008). However, we know little about the relevance of line managers in managing SMTs. We claim that their role may vary in the process of implementing SMTs in organisations. Organisations that have recently decided to introduce SMTs may need different forms of leadership than organisations

Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations Advanced Series in Management, Volume 19, 65 100 Copyright r 2018 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1877-6361/doi:10.1108/S1877-636120180000019005

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that have already gained experience in self-management. The relevance of line managers may also vary between different phases of SMT implementation. This is why we are focusing on the role of line managers in SMTs based on the management and human resource management (HRM) devolution literature to (1) describe the tasks and responsibilities that line managers usually have and how they change once organisations have decided to empower teams and make them autonomous of their managers, (2) compare the role of line managers with the role of SMTs in two phases of the HRM devolution and (3) explain how line managers should manage the implementation of SMTs once an organisation has decided to introduce SMTs. Research has shown that teams that gain more leadership attention perform better and score higher on member job satisfaction and team empowerment (Luciano et al., 2013), that active leader intervention activities were positively related to effectiveness as events became more disruptive (Morgeson, 2005), and that team members with a short team tenure reported higher levels of individual performance when their line manager demonstrated directive leadership behaviour (Stoker, 2008). Based on the research results, we can already conclude that line managers play an important role in the effectiveness of SMTs and that their way of leading and managing the teams determines SMT performance. In the first part, we particularly shed light on the HRM role of line managers and apply insights from the HRM devolution literature to the people management responsibilities in SMTs. In the second part, we describe the role, behaviour and leadership styles of line managers during various phases in the implementation of SMTs. We share some insights about the role of line managers in SMTs based on the Livio case study before we move to our conclusions about the relevance of line managers in managing SMTs.

The Role of Line Managers in SMTs Since we focus on first-line managers in this chapter, we define first-line managers as managers at the first level of management to whom non-managerial employees report (Hales, 2005). These line managers are considered as ‘the lowest line managers at the operational level, who manage a team of operational employees on a day-to-day basis’ (Nehles, van Riemsdijk, Kok, & Looise, 2006, p. 257). This role incorporates control and supervisory functions and thus line managers are usually in direct and regular contact with employees by managing their teams (Townsend & Hutchinson, 2017). We argue that first-line managers as defined by Hales (2005) and Nehles et al. (2006) are those managers who have formerly led teams and whose tasks are partly transferred to self-managing employees. According to research results of Hales (2005), the supervisory role of line managers has increased in importance due to ‘the adoption of stringent controls both internal to the organisation and in relation to people management activities and the influence of external regulatory forces’ (Townsend & Hutchinson, 2017, p. 142). Based on this research, Hales (2005) distinguished between six overlapping groups of responsibilities of first-line managers, which have diminishing degrees of prevalence and

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importance: (1) responsibility for performance-oriented supervision, which considers tasks such as day-to-day direction and control, monitoring, reporting and improving work performance, allocating work and planning, scheduling and coordinating the team, (2) monitoring quality, which covers the tasks related to dealing with problems relating to customers, the work process, equipment and staffing, and implementing changes and improvements, (3) looking after a work area by maintaining equipment, tidiness and cleanliness as well as looking after people, through counselling and making recommendations for promotion, (4) translating strategy into operations, which reflect communicating organisational objectives, substituting for staff, allocating equipment to jobs and controlling costs, (5) financial responsibility, such as managing budgets and stock levels, conducting appraisals and giving verbal warnings and (6) business management responsibility, which consists of coordinating two or more teams, setting as well as managing a budget, keeping personnel records and disciplining staff. The SMT literature is not clear on the kind of tasks and responsibilities that are retained by line managers. Their main role is to lead employees to lead themselves (Manz & Sims, 1987) by guiding and assisting team activities, coordinating these activities and acting as a bridge between team leaders and the top management, also known as the boundary spanner (Yang & Shao, 1996; Yazid, 2015). It seems important that line managers facilitate the development of SMTs by helping employees to gain self-control and self-determination (by slowly accepting responsibility and decision-making power and being able to manage team tasks with fewer organisational controls) (Cohen, Chang, & Ledford, 1997; Luciano et al., 2013). Other voices call for line managers to control SMT activities and make key team decisions (Morgeson, 2005; Yang & Shao, 1996). That is why we cannot clearly indicate which of the six responsibilities presented by Hales (2005) remain the responsibility of line managers and which are shifted to self-managing employees, but we can present the various ideas, beliefs and research outcomes of the SMT literature. In accordance with Hales (2005), the line manager role of performance-oriented supervision remains crucial in SMTs. Although SMTs eventually need to guide and monitor their own performance, line managers stay an important source of support, facilitation and advice (Antoni, 2005; Cohen et al., 1997; Elloy, 2005; Luciano et al., 2013; Stewart et al., 2011). By providing hands-on coaching (Elloy, 2005; Hagen & Gavrilova Aguilar, 2012; Morgeson, 2005; Taggar, Hackett, & Saha, 1999; Wageman, 2001), which is a process of guiding discussions and activities, and helping employees to solve problems or carry out a task more efficiently or effectively (Hagen & Gavrilova Aguilar, 2012), line managers help their team to manage itself and the work. They do this by designing the team in a way that fosters selfmanagement and performance effectiveness (Moe et al., 2009; Wageman, 2001), coordinating team tasks (Yazid, 2015), monitoring or collecting team information, such as absolute levels of team performance (Morgeson, 2005), and providing performance feedback or implementing solutions to maintain or improve team performance (Morgeson, 2005). In this role, they would also provide rewards and reinforcements for self-managing behaviours (Morgeson, 2005; Wageman, 2001) and facilitate employees through questioning, guiding, advising and challenging

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(Hagen & Gavrilova Aguilar, 2012). This means that line managers keep responsibility for their team’s performance (Druskat & Wheeler, 2004). Closely related to the performance-oriented supervision role is the monitoring quality role of line managers. We would even argue that they form one role, because by monitoring the performance (which they still do), they also monitor the quality of selfmanaging employees. Since the two roles overlap, we did not find much evidence in the literature for this as a separate role. There are some authors who encourage a more active role of line managers in SMTs by proactively planning, controlling and scheduling work processes (Yang & Shao, 1996) and monitoring team performance and the work environment for potentially disruptive events (Morgeson, 2005). What Hales (2005) discussed as line managers looking after the work area does not seem to be the case in SMTs. This responsibility seems to be devolved to SMTs. In the literature, we found only one indication of line managers being responsible for looking after the work area, e.g. by dealing with customers and purchasing equipment (Morgeson, 2005). Translating strategy into operations is a role that seems to remain with line managers, even in self-managing organisations. Wageman (2001) explained that SMTs have a lack of authority to set or alter their purposes, goals or objectives, and thus line managers need to structure the performing unit and its context. This is why line managers need to initiate and formulate goals for SMTs (Taggar et al., 1999). Strategic decisions would change the way in which teams are built, resulting in a line manager role with a focus on designing the team in a way that fosters selfmanagement and performance effectiveness. Based on Wageman’s (2001) research, we know that the way line managers design their teams is positively related to team self-management, the quality of member relations, member satisfaction and team task performance. Langfred (2004, 2007) has shown that team design is essential for team performance, because in situations of high trust between individual team members these members choose to monitor each other less line managers need to alter the team design by decreasing the level of individual autonomy to keep team performance at a high level (Langfred, 2004). But in opposite situations, when team members have conflicting opinions or want to take conflicting decisions, line managers need to alter the design of SMTs to prevent the performance from decreasing (Langfred, 2007). Moe et al. (2009) agree on the role of team designer, because they stress that the team needs to be manned by the right people. We would argue that the responsibilities for financial and business management overlap considerably because managing the business would automatically include having financial responsibilities. Although we found less evidence for the financial role, line managers do stay responsible for the business management role. This role incorporates helping the team to interact with the environment (Morgeson, 2005; Stewart et al., 2011) by interpreting environmental changes and forecasting future conditions to determine which events may be about to occur. The line manager would then need to deal with these problems or events (Morgeson, 2005) to protect the team and make sure they can focus on the everyday business. In this case, they would intervene in the team and help the team adapt. Research even showed that active forms of intervention are most effective when disruptive events occur

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(Morgeson, 2005). The boundary spanner would be another important task that fits in this domain (Druskat & Wheeler, 2003; Yang & Shao, 1996; Yazid, 2015). In this role, the line manager manages the team’s boundaries (Morgeson, 2005) by developing and building relationships between the team and the broader organisation, inside the team and across the organisation (Druskat & Wheeler, 2004), as well as building social and political capital with outside parties (Druskat & Wheeler, 2003). The line manager would also carry the responsibility to seek and provide the team with access to relevant information (Douglas, 2002; Druskat & Wheeler, 2004; Taggar et al., 1999). Another task that fits this role involves overseeing multiple teams (Druskat & Wheeler, 2004; Luciano et al., 2013). According to the SMT researchers, line managers retain management responsibilities although day-to-day activities are reallocated to self-managing employees. What Hales (2005) identified as the most important management role, the performance-oriented supervision role, seems to remain the most important role of external managers in SMTs. Although they are not part of the team anymore, there is considerable evidence in the literature that line managers are still responsible for the performance of employees in the teams they are responsible for. They facilitate SMTs in gaining and interpreting performance-related information, help SMTs solve problems, especially disruptive events, and provide performance-related feedback. However, the form of supervision and the way of supervising changes. The focus lies on advising, facilitating and coaching SMTs to supervise themselves, which means that SMTs take the decision with the advice provided. By monitoring performance levels and thus quality, the line manager can and will take decisions for the team when they do not manage to keep the performance level up to standard. There are even suggestions in the literature that indicate that line managers take over or retain day-to-day responsibilities in e.g. planning and scheduling work (Yang & Shao, 1996), hiring and firing employees or dealing with customers (Morgeson, 2005), which would rather fit the management role that focuses on looking after the work area. Generally, this role seems to be devolved to SMTs. The responsibility for translating strategy into operations remains with line managers, and they fulfil it by structuring the unit and designing the team. Since designing the team towards selfmanagement goals is essential for the success of SMTs, this is revealed to be an important management role for SMTs. The last management role also remains important for line managers of SMTs. In this role, line managers receive a completely new management task, of overseeing several teams, a task they did not have before when they were a member of the team. By interacting with the environment, providing SMTs with information (access to it) and playing the boundary spanner between different actors inside and outside the organisation, managers support SMTs considerably. Especially when they deal with unexpected events and help SMTs to solve problems, they play a crucial role in the success of SMTs. We will continue discussing the role and responsibilities of line managers in the next section by focusing on the people management or HRM responsibilities of line managers based on the devolution literature.

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The Devolution of People Management Responsibilities Devolution is a term used in the HRM literature to indicate the transfer of HRM responsibilities from HR managers to line managers. HR managers have redistributed these tasks closer to the operation in a structural move towards decentralisation. This makes line managers responsible for the implementation of HRM policies and practices in their units and teams. To do this, they execute HRM policies and practices to build a link between strategy development and HRM (Bos-Nehles, 2010). The drive in Europe to devolve HRM responsibility to the line started in the 1980s, when Guest argued that ‘if HRM is to be taken seriously, personnel managers must give it away’ (Guest, 1987, p. 51). This call was made in response to various organisational trends, such as managing through cost-centres, a need for a comprehensive people management approach in which HRM is linked with other aspects of day-to-day management, the growing influence of the service industries and the identification with customers, the increasing ‘real-time’ pressure on decision-making (HRM was too slow to take decisions) and a restructuring movement to reduce managerial levels (Brewster & Larsen, 2000). As a result, line managers gained more responsibility for the management of their subordinates, and the HRM departments reduced control over operational activities by increasing the autonomy of line managers to become key decision-makers in people management issues (Harris, Doughty, & Kirk, 2002; Larsen & Brewster, 2003). The idea was that the HRM department would coordinate the activities of the line by devolving some of their authority to these non-specialists, and that HRM would thus become a shared function between HR managers and line managers (Guest, 1987; Larsen & Brewster, 2003; Renwick, 2000). HR and line managers were thus supposed to work in a partnership (Nehles et al., 2006; Whittaker & Marchington, 2003), in which line managers handle operational HRM activities and HR managers focus on the strategic aspects of HRM. Although there are many good reasons to reallocate HRM responsibilities to the line, implementing this shift in responsibility and authority also brings many challenges and issues. In fact, many would argue that line managers have failed to become effective people managers (Hope-Hailey, Farndale, & Truss, 2005; McGovern, Gratton, Hope-Hailey, Stiles, & Truss, 1997) because they were reluctant to carry out these tasks effectively (Hall & Torrington, 1998; Harris et al., 2002; Nehles et al., 2006). For example, Renwick (2003) explained that although line managers were keen to take on HRM responsibilities, they were ineffective in carrying out these responsibilities and delivering value. As a result, line managers often did not implement HRM practices in the way they were supposed to be executed. Researchers described differences between the intended HRM policies and practices, those practices that were developed and designed by HRM managers on the basis of strategic objectives, and the ones line managers actually implemented at the operational level (Khilji & Wang, 2006; Purcell & Hutchinson, 2007; Wright & Nishii, 2013). There are many potential reasons for this intended-actual gap

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(Makhecha, Srinivasan, Prabhu, & Mukherji, 2016). On the one hand, HR and line managers may have different perceptions and frames of HRM practices and their implementation (Bondarouk, Bos-Nehles, & Hesselink, 2016; Wright & Nishii, 2013). Line managers may just have a different idiosyncratic understanding of the reality of HRM than HR managers (Bowen & Ostroff, 2004) and different expectations of the same HRM practices (Bondarouk, Looise, & Lempsink, 2009). On the other hand, line managers may purposefully restrict HRM implementation by ignoring some HRM practices (Guest & Bos-Nehles, 2013), feigning their acceptance by simply paying lip service (Bos-Nehles, Bondarouk, & Labrenz, 2017), or deciding not to pay attention to some HRM practices or issues (Woodrow & Guest, 2014). Whatever the intention, there seem to be some factors that constrain line managers from effectively implementing HRM practices. While Nehles et al. (2006) distinguished five constraining factors lack of desire to perform HRM practices, insufficient capacity for HRM responsibilities, lack of HRM-related competences, little or poor HRM support and insufficient or unclear policies and procedures concerning their HRM responsibilities and how to apply them later studies focused on the ability, motivation and opportunity (AMO) factors that seem to constrain line managers that is, lack of ability, motivation and opportunity to implement HRM practices (BosNehles, Van Riemsdijk, & Looise, 2013; Kellner, Townsend, Wilkinson, Lawrence, & Greenfield, 2016). Considering the current attention in the HRM literature being paid to HRM implementation (Bondarouk, Trullen, & Valverde, 2016; Bos-Nehles et al., 2017; Gilbert, De Winne, & Sels, 2015; Op de Beeck, Wynen, & Hondeghem, 2016; Trullen, Stirpe, Bonache, & Valverde, 2016), these issues do not seem to be resolved yet. At the same time, however, the next step seems to have been taken, a devolution of people management responsibilities from line managers to employees. We discussed above how managers have devolved some of their managing responsibilities to employees in SMTs. These responsibilities also include the performance of HRM activities (Stewart et al., 2011). Line managers became responsible for evaluating the performance of employees and making decisions as a result of these evaluations during the HRM devolution (Casco´n-Pereira & Valverde, 2014), while employees have gained the same responsibilities in SMTs. In the HRM devolution, line managers were fighting for discretion, authority and decisionmaking capacities to take people management decisions (Casco´n-Pereira, Valverde, & Ryan, 2006). We could imagine that in SMTs employees perceive the same struggles about a lack of authority. The only difference is that in the HRM devolution literature, the HRM responsibilities were devolved from HR managers to line managers, and in the self-management literature the same responsibilities are devolved from line managers to employees in SMTs. What we see in the SMT literature, the allocation of responsibilities and authorities from managers to selfmanaging employees, is in fact a second wave in devolution. We argue thus that the devolution actually consists of two phases: in the first phase, line managers were given people management responsibilities and fought for the accompanying authority and decision-making power, in order to devolve these responsibilities further to employees in SMTs in the second phase. Based on this premise, we argue in the following part that the actors become different from the first to the second phase, but

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that the devolved responsibilities remain broadly the same. To compare the two devolution phases, we explore the devolution of people management responsibilities in the health-care sector. Health-care organisations like to rely on self-management because empowering teams offer the care teams more discretion and autonomy to provide the best possible care for clients and patients. One famous example of a successful self-management organisation in the health-care sector is Buurtzorg, whose teams focus on the client by providing independent solutions that aim for the best possible quality of life. For the first phase of the HRM devolution, we look at the examples of two Catalonian hospitals, in which Casco´n-Pereira and Valverde (2014) described the devolution of HRM responsibilities from HR managers to line managers based on interviews with doctor and nurse line managers as well as various representatives of the administrative and operational management. For the second phase in the HRM devolution, we use examples from the Livio case about the implementation of SMTs. Based on interviews with line managers and self-managing employees in home care and residential care, we examine the devolution of HRM responsibilities from line managers to employees. Casco´n-Pereira and Valverde (2014) argue that the devolution of HRM is a multidimensional phenomenon that distinguishes between four dimensions: (1) the implementation of tasks, such as the transfer of various HRM practices this is the ‘doing’ of task implementation, (2) decision-making power, or the ability to decide on the material and human resources that are managed this is the ‘deciding’ of task implementation, (3) financial power, that is, having the necessary budget to manage human and material resources and (4) knowledge, such as information and training needed to carry out the responsibilities devolved. Based on the two samples in the health-care sector, we discuss the devolution of these four dimensions. Task Implementation During the first phase of the devolution, responsibilities for the task implementation were devolved to line managers (doctors and nurses) in both hospitals. However, differences were evident between what was formally and informally devolved. In the second phase of devolution, employees became responsible for the task implementation. But there, differences were obvious between home care and residential care. Employees in home care are more self-managing than their colleagues in residential care. Decision-making Power Although line managers were responsible for the ‘doing’ of the task implementation in the first devolution phase, they did not necessarily gain the authority for ‘deciding’ about various HRM practices. In comparison, employees in SMTs partly gained the authority to take decisions in the second phase of devolution.

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The decision-making power about the implementation of HRM practices was stronger for employees in home care than for those in residential care. Recruitment and Selection: The decision-making power for recruitment and selection differed between nurse and doctor line managers in Catalonian hospitals. Nurses had less decision-making power than doctors, i.e. nursing recruitment was controlled from higher up the chain of command. Neither doctors nor nurses had any decision-making power to decide about increasing staff numbers: such a decision needed approval from the medical administration and management. Once this approval was given, doctors either had complete power over the selection of candidates or could influence and were part of the selection panel. Nurse managers could either participate in the decision-making with the HRM assistant or the nursing management, or could communicate their selection preferences. However, the selection of nurses was carried out centrally by the management, and not by the nurse managers. Thus, line managers partly gained the decision-making power for recruiting and selecting their own colleagues in the first devolution phase, although this power was greater for doctors than for nurses. In SMTs, management sets the boundaries for recruitment and selection by deciding about the team design and structure, deciding about increasing staff numbers and forbidding full-time contracts. There were strict requirements about how the team should be composed. Again, we saw strong differences between SMTs in home care and residential care. Employees in home care had the decisionmaking power to recruit and select their own colleagues, whereas employees in residential care were dependent on their line manager. In home care, employees either recruited by themselves by using a wide range of media and were active in producing flyers and writing texts to advertise their home care and attract new personnel, or they preferred to depend on the recruitment process of the HRM department and waited until they were provided with candidates. Those who recruited independently were usually dissatisfied with HRM services and thus decided to do it themselves. They felt that recruiting their own candidates delivered higher-quality candidates from which they could get a better fit with their team. Home care employees also selected their own colleagues independently, only occasionally in consultation with their line manager. In residential care, however, employees were hardly involved in the recruitment of new employees. Their line manager applied for new staff members and asked the HRM department to start recruiting. Afterwards, the line manager selected the employees, sometimes advised by one or two employees of the SMT. One employee per team was thus allowed to influence the selection decision, but the decision stayed with the line manager. In this case, the line manager even decided on the number of contract hours. Performance Assessment: The decision-making power for performance assessment was devolved to line managers in the first devolution phase. Doctor and nurse managers were fully responsible for carrying out performance assessments, but they had no power to take either positive or negative actions based on the results of these assessments, such as promotions or financial incentives. As a result, they considered

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performance assessments as pointless and did not show serious involvement in them. In the second devolution phase, SMTs were usually not formally assessed on their performance. Their performance was measured, and they were given performance feedback, but this was not done on a formal and structural basis. It was usually done during team meetings, thus not one-on-one, but management decided to limit the number of team meetings since direct client contact was considered more important. In home care, employees monitored their own performance and took action regarding conflicts or underperformance by discussing these matters in team meetings. The line manager was usually only informed about the productivity and performance rates. In case of underperformance, however, the line manager or higher management would take over this responsibility and monitor the performance closely. In residential care, the line manager had a more active role in monitoring the performance of team members by providing feedback and proactively discussing performance issues. Training and Development: The decision-making power for this HRM practice was largely devolved to line managers in the first phase of devolution and to employees in the second phase. However, certain requirements were imposed. During the first phase, line managers had the decision-making power to identify training needs, but whether they were met depended on the budget. Doctor managers had a higher training budget and more power to organise their shifts and responsibilities to attend training courses than nurse managers. The decision-making authority for home care and residential care employees was largely comparable regarding training and development. Decisions about the quantity and quality of the training courses offered resided with the management. Employees believed that the training supply was insufficient, especially for the more specialised and highly educated employees who required more advanced training courses. Employees had the decision-making power to decide which of the offered training courses to follow. However, if they wanted to follow other courses than those provided, they needed their line manager to agree to this. Compensation and Rewards: In the first phase of HRM devolution, line managers had no decision-making power over compensation and rewards. Compensation was fixed and set by collective labour agreements. This resulted in line managers having no authority to alter salaries or provide any financial incentives. They were limited to providing non-monetary incentives, such as recognition, development opportunities or scheduling times and holidays according to preferences. The employees in SMTs also lacked decision-making power for compensating and rewarding employees. Compensation was set by collective labour agreements and by standardised salary brackets that employees had no authority to change. Similarly to the line managers, employees were limited in providing any financial incentives. However, they had the opportunity to reward people by increasing the volume of the contracts, by e.g. granting more hours.

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Task Distribution and Organising Schedules: The authority to distribute tasks and organise schedules was devolved to line managers in the first devolution phase. They used this authority to incentivise their staff members, because it gave them the opportunity to reward employees by distributing preferred projects or accounts and schedule shifts in line with personal preferences. In the second phase, these responsibilities were devolved to employees in SMTs. SMTs distributed the scheduling responsibility to one or two team members who would use the smartphone application to schedule work. Employees could use scheduling to incentivise team members, i.e. they could provide preferred shifts and increase the scope of the contract (offer more hours) as a reward for good performance. However, if team tasks were unallocated, the line manager would take over to avoid cherry-picking. Communication: This decision-power was devolved to line managers but not to employees in the second devolution phase. As ‘intermediaries between management and staff’ (Casco´n-Pereira & Valverde, 2014, p. 155), line managers had the authority to decide what to communicate and to filter information that was communicated or not. They kept the decision-making power over communication in SMTs because they were regarded as the link between the organisation and the SMTs and should thus decide what information to share. Financial Power: Financial power was not devolved to line managers during the first devolution phase, but it was devolved to employees in the second phase. Line managers lacked financial power because they did not have budgetary decisionmaking authority. They needed to rely on top management to finance what they needed. Budgets were subject to variations in health-care provision over which line managers had no control. Employees in SMTs seemed to have the financial power to make their own budgetary decisions, because they had their own educational budget, service budget and purchasing budget for anything they needed to provide excellent care. Comparable to the line managers in the Catalonian hospitals, employees in SMTs are also restricted in employing staff in this area they lack financial power. Knowledge: The required information and training to carry out devolved responsibilities were only partly devolved to line managers. There was some knowledge transfer to line managers in the two hospitals, but it was rather restricted. Receiving training usually depended on the line managers’ own initiative, and they struggled with small training budgets and little time to follow courses. There was also a lack of access to information for decision-making, which was reinforced by high levels of bureaucracy. In SMTs, employees usually had access to information for decision-making. However, they also perceived a lack of knowledge transfer and training/education to be able to bear the SMT responsibilities. Although they had their own training budgets, the supply of training and education offered was regarded as insufficient to prepare them for the SMT tasks. Table 1 highlights the differences between the first and the second devolution phases by presenting the shift of people management responsibilities and authority

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Table 1: Two-phase Devolution of People Management Responsibilities and Authorities. Devolution Dimension

First Phase of Devolution: Second Phase of Devolution: From HR Managers to Line From Line Managers to Managers Employees in SMTs

Task implementation Devolved to line managers Decision-making power Not devolved to line managers

Recruitment and selection

Devolved to employees Devolved to employees in home care, not to employees in residential care More devolved to doctor line Devolved to employees in managers than to nurse line home care, not to managers both had no employees in residential decision-making power to care restricted by decide on increases in staff management decisions numbers, but doctor about team composition, managers could select increasing staff numbers candidates, whereas nurse and part-time contracts managers could only indicate their preferences

Performance assessment

Devolved to line managers, but without decision-making power to act upon the performance assessment

Devolved to employees in home care, partly devolved to employees in residential care line managers took over performance assessment in case of underperformance

Training and development

Devolved to line managers, but dependent on budget

Devolved to employees, but dependent on availability of training

Compensation and rewards Distribution of tasks and organisation of schedules

Not devolved to line managers Devolved to line managers

Not devolved to employees

Communication Financial power

Devolved to line managers Not devolved to line managers

Not devolved to employees Devolved to employees

Knowledge

Partly devolved to line managers

Fairly well devolved to employees

Devolved to employees

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from HR managers to line managers and from line managers to employees in SMTs. While the responsibility for task implementation, the ‘doing’, was devolved to line managers in the first phase and to employees in the second phase, having the responsibility was clearly not the same thing as having the authority to ‘decide’, since the decision-making power was not necessarily devolved. Here we recognised that self-managing employees in the second devolution phase had more decision-making responsibilities for HRM practices than line managers in the first phase, at least those employees working in home care in phase 2 versus the nurse line managers in phase 1. Those employees could decide independently how to recruit and whom to select, which training courses to follow, how to assess themselves and their colleagues and how to distribute tasks and schedule work. Although they also had some restrictions (i.e. they could not decide when to select new candidates and how many, they were bound by the requirements of team composition, and they were limited by the design of the HRM practices available, limited supply of training courses and education, no formalised and structural performance assessment and no opportunities to financially incentivise good performers), they had the decision-making power to implement these practices in the way it suited them. During both phases of devolution, authority for compensation and rewards was not devolved. Neither line managers nor SMTs had the decisionmaking power to decide on salaries or to reward people for good performance. This authority was bound by collective labour agreements and thus resided in the hands of HR managers. One HRM responsibility was devolved to line managers in the first devolution phase, but was not devolved to employees in the second phase: the decision-making power to communicate organisational information remained with line managers once it had been devolved to them. One striking aspect was the devolution of financial power and knowledge. Whereas line managers were not granted the authority to master their own budgets and be financially independent of higher management, employees in SMTs had decision-making power over their own budgets. Although for unplanned or larger expenses the self-managing employees still needed to get permission from the line managers or senior managers, they had their own education, service and purchasing budgets over which they had the power to decide. The necessary knowledge to master the people management responsibilities and authorities was not completely devolved from HR managers to line managers in the first devolution phase, and self-managing employees also felt ill-prepared in terms of knowledge to handle the responsibilities. However, the difference was that whereas line managers and employees felt a lack of ability, selfmanaging employees at least were provided with the necessary information to take decisions. Although employees in SMTs were empowered to take people management decisions for the people on their teams, they were not completely independent. We noted many restrictions: (1) the design of HRM practices, (2) team composition and increasing staff members, (3) sufficient knowledge and (4) the danger of losing authority when the performance dropped. Good HRM practices can be implemented well once employees obtain the responsibility and authority to do so, but does the same occur with poor HRM .

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practices? Employees in SMTs could not formally and structurally assess their colleagues because there was no performance assessment practice offered to the SMTs, and employees could not decide on the compensation of their colleagues or financially incentivise them because the compensation practice did not allow this. In this case, employees felt the same restrictions as line managers in implementing HRM practices well. Although Purcell and Hutchinson (2007) stressed that line managers could rescue poor HRM, and thus the same would probably also be true for employees in SMTs, those responsible for the implementation of HRM are rather bound by the design of the HRM practices (Guest & Bos-Nehles, 2013). By devolving HRM responsibilities first to line managers and then to SMTs, the role of the HRM department changes. We see that this department is still important to design good HRM practices, but we do not yet know what role they could play in the second devolution phase. Their role and how the HRM department can support SMTs will be discussed later in the book (e.g. in the chapter ‘The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams’). Being responsible for team success becomes difficult when self-managing employees are restricted regarding how many employees they may select and when to select them, as well as how to compose the team. Wageman (2001) explained that SMTs were not responsible for team design and that this responsibility usually remained with management, and we saw that this was also true in the second devolution phase. Bos-Nehles et al. (2013) explained that line managers were restricted by policies and procedures from implementing HRM practices effectively, and the same could apply to self-managing employees. Employees in SMTs are also restricted by the policies and procedures around team composition and increasing staff levels. Managing SMTs without the necessary knowledge is difficult. When the supply of training courses and education possibilities is limited or the budget for training is restrained, then employees feel ill-prepared to carry people management responsibilities and authority. The HRM devolution literature noted that line managers needed some ability to implement HRM practices, such as HRM-related knowledge and skills (Bos-Nehles et al., 2013). Without ability, employees will also find it difficult to manage SMTs. Although employees have many responsibilities and the authority to manage SMTs, they may lose these responsibilities if the team does not meet performance standards. We saw above that line managers took over the performance assessment and monitoring of underperforming employees, and the same can happen if the entire team underperforms. As soon as SMTs perform poorly, their independence will become limited, and their empowerment will be reversed. In this case, SMTs will be severely restricted in their self-management and reverse devolution takes place: from phase 2 back to phase 1. By using two examples of the devolution of people management responsibilities in the health-care sector, we were able to illustrate the complexity of the devolution process. We could show that devolution is a two-phase phenomenon and that while line managers became quite independent of HR managers in the first devolution phase, employees in SMTs also became quite independent of their line managers in

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the second phase. By comparing the devolution phases according to the four dimensions of devolution (Casco´n-Pereira & Valverde, 2014), we highlighted many similarities between the first and the second phases. Having said this, we believe that the SMT literature could benefit from the HRM devolution and the HRM implementation literature. For example, we believe that self-managing employees also need AMO to perform well (Bos-Nehles et al., 2013; Kellner et al., 2016). We showed above that ability, or knowledge, is essential to manage SMTs and that employees were restricted by missed opportunities or policies and procedures. When employees are not motivated to take on responsibilities to manage themselves, the responsibilities will stay in the hands of line managers. The HRM devolution literature also described the danger of HR managers who are not willing to let go of their responsibilities (e.g. Hall & Torrington, 1998). Why would line managers release their responsibilities and give up their authority after having fought for them in the first place (Valverde, Ryan, & Soler, 2006)? Line managers were given people management responsibilities in the first phase of devolution, so why should they agree to give them up again in the second phase? The SMT literature could learn from the HRM devolution literature because the latter suggested that HR managers needed to be given other, more strategic responsibilities. These alternative responsibilities might also help line managers to accept their loss of people management responsibilities. The HRM implementation literature distinguished between various types of gaps between intended and actual HRM practices (Makhecha et al., 2016; Wright & Nishii, 2013). Line managers implement HRM practices differently than intended because they perceive them differently (Bondarouk et al., 2016), they do not regard them as valuable (Bos-Nehles et al., 2017) or they think they may hurt team performance (Woodrow & Guest, 2014). What might be the reasons for employees in SMTs to diverge from the intended course of action and implement HRM practices according to their own ideas? The HRM implementation literature might offer suggestions about this.

The Implementation of Self-managing Teams in Organisations Once organisations decide to follow the trend and introduce SMTs, they need to implement them at the operational level. The implementation literature stresses the importance of moving through different phases to achieve a successful transition. Since we consider SMTs as an innovation for managing people in organisations, we base our analysis of the implementation of SMTs on organisational innovation process models. While the original organisational innovation models distinguish between three phases in the implementation of innovation (Pierce & Delbecq, 1977; Thompson, 1969), later models extend this and distinguish between six phases (Kwon, Zmud, & Hirschheim, 1987). In this chapter, we use a four-phase SMT implementation process model, which combines some of the six phases Kwon et al. (1987) distinguished in their IS implementation process model: Initiation, Adoption

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and Adaptation, Use and Incorporation. The ‘Initiation’ of SMTs is the result of a perceived pressure to change, and thus in this phase organisational actors decide how to proceed, who is in charge and which resources are necessary. The following stage, ‘Adoption and Adaptation’, establishes process, performance and behaviour requirements for the upcoming phases. Resources will be invested that are necessary to accommodate the change effort (Kwon et al., 1987). ‘Use’ represents the stage of preparing for the completion of the transition by determining whether the introduction of SMTs will be appropriate or inappropriate. The final implementation process phase is called ‘incorporation’. In this stage, SMTs become embedded within the organisation’s routine and are applied to their full potential (Kwon et al., 1987). In this phase, it is crucial to continuously stabilise the transition towards SMTs. Hut and Molleman (1998) also distinguish between four phases to describe the transition process to team empowerment. Following these phases will lead to selfmanagement. However, they stress that self-management is not a solid endpoint, but rather a dynamic process, and not each phase needs to be taken in a particular order. The first phase focuses on job enlargement by training employees to advance their level of multi-functionality and by looking for redundancies in present functions. In this phase, employees need to develop a broader set of skills and to get to know their new added responsibilities. In the next phase, job enrichment, SMTs need to redesign the control structure. This means that they need to reconsider responsibilities between members and to decide about the authority of the line managers. Employee tasks shift from routine to non-routine by taking on tasks and responsibilities that the employees did not use to have. In the third phase, the focus lies on teamwork and the self-reliance of the team. Self-managing employees need to learn to build a team, communicate with each other and take decisions independently. By gaining more autonomy, the team needs to become independent of their line manager in their day-to-day work. In the fourth and last phase, the team needs to learn to solve non-routine issues, such as relationships with other teams or individuals. Hut and Molleman (1998) call this phase the developmental learning and boundary management phase. The four-phase implementation process model marks the path for implementing SMTs. According to Wageman (2001), the line manager can become the driving power behind the change to effectively incorporate a SMT structure. SMT success is dependent, according to her, on the way the team is set up and supported as well as on the kind of behaviour the line manager uses in day-to-day interactions with the team. This is why in the SMT implementation process, organisations need to choose appropriate leadership models and ways to design teams that lead to the goal of solely independent teams. The line management role, behaviour and leadership style are essential to effectively implement SMTs. However, this process requires time, and not each organisation and team will move from phase to phase in a linear way. The implementation process may move in a more dynamic way, in which various scenarios of implementation are possible (Bos-Nehles et al., 2017; Van Mierlo, Bondarouk, & Sanders, 2018). In the following, we describe a four-phase SMT implementation process. In each phase, we concentrate on the role of line managers that is needed for SMTs to

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perform well. We describe the required leadership styles and line management behaviours that are needed to accomplish this role and provide examples of the Livio case about which line management role, behaviour and styles are expected in each phase. Initiation For a SMT to be effective, it needs to grow gradually towards self-management (Wageman, 2001). A necessary factor for this is having the organisational structure aligned with the team structure (Tata & Prasad, 2004) and the presence of a supportive organisational environment (Wageman, 2001). Organisations need to decide about the degree to which they want to implement SMTs and the extent to which management decisions will be transferred to SMTs. In the beginning, SMTs rely on the direction and structure given by the external leader. In this role, the line manager tells the team what to do and how to perform their tasks. An important task of the line manager in this phase encompasses helping inexperienced team members to acquire new skills (Stewart et al. 2011; Stoker, 2008). Line managers will use a directive leadership style to reduce uncertainty and ambiguity among the team members. This style seems to fit best with a behaviour that focuses on initiating structure (Judge, Piccolo, & Ilies, 2004; Schriesheim, Cogliser, & Neider, 1995). This behaviour is marked by directive behaviours such as planning and scheduling the team’s activities as well as maintaining organisational expectations and performance standards. Line managers assign particular tasks to group members, which is described by Wageman (2001) as team design. Team design is done on the basis of a framework or model that guides the setup of the team by deciding on the provision of necessary organisational resources and support. Effective team design is based on four requirements (Hackman, 1986): (1) building a real team, i.e. a bounded social system with clear membership that is reasonably stable over time, (2) providing clear direction, i.e. the degree to which the purposes of a team are stated clearly, focusing on not too many purposes and on the ends to be achieved, (3) enabling a team structure that focuses on the appropriate team size not larger than the minimum required to accomplish the work, optimal skill diversity sufficient heterogeneity of task-relevant skills among members, but still manageable in terms of coordinating efforts, task interdependence among team members to accomplish the collective work of the team, challenging task goals and articulated strategy norms and (4) a supportive organisational context, which provides a reward system that recognises and rewards excellent team performance, an information system to competently plan collective work, an education system that is available to provide training or technical consultation, and material resources needed to carry out the work. Wageman (2001) found that designing teams according to these principles helps SMTs to become more self-managing and more effective. According to Stoker (2008), directive behaviours based on the initiating structure trait are beneficial for effective team performance when teams have a short team tenure. Coaching behaviours of line manager would lead to even lower levels

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of individual performance and higher levels of emotional exhaustion in the initiation phase (Stoker, 2008). This means that in the initiation phase of SMTs, line managers need to behave in a directive way in order to guarantee team performance. Application of the Initiation Phase at Livio: Livio decided to pilot the introduction of SMTs with two newly formed teams. These two teams were highly supported by coach managers and got a lot of attention from the organisation. Although employees participating in the pilot experienced the initiation of SMTs as positive, they perceived the timing of this pilot as inappropriate. Livio decided to initiate the pilot just before the summer break and thus many people were absent during this period. Further, to initiate SMTs, Livio offered training courses about how to deal with problems and making work-related rules independently of the manager. They also provided explanations and information on the intranet about SMTs. They designed working groups, in which employees needed to decide about how to divide the new tasks and prepare their own schedules. However, not all employees participated in the training courses or found the information provided. Participation in the working groups happened outside office hours, because employees needed to keep their production running and reach production targets. The Livio case teaches us that in this phase, both line managers and employees are often unclear about their roles and responsibilities and look for boundaries within which self-managing employees and managers can move. Employees, for example, struggled with a lack of personnel during the initiation of SMTs, since they needed to form their own teams, learn their new tasks and responsibilities and decide on the rules of the game for their own teams. The initiation of SMTs proceeded differently between teams, depending on whether teams participated in the pilot, followed training courses, were allowed to design their own teams instead of being put together by line managers, the team design and lack of consistency of the line managers responsible for their teams. Line managers clearly struggled with the new situation of SMTs, not knowing their exact role and lacking guidelines on how to behave. They had less time to spend with the teams since they had become responsible for more teams. On average, line managers were responsible for five teams in this phase. As a result, Livio experienced a high turnover of line managers in this phase. They see that in some situations and in some teams, setting deadlines is important, while in other situations and teams, this is already done by the teams themselves. Some teams still need a manager who tells them what to do and miss the sense of hierarchy, while others take on responsibilities and the authority to manage themselves. This results in confused line managers who look for their role to play in the transition to SMTs. The same goes for allocating working hours. Teams clearly need to learn how to do this, and line managers need to be in a position to train them. In this phase, line managers struggle with missing information and unclear boundaries, because the management is also not yet clear about the direction in which they are heading. They also feel that supportive services do not match self-management. An example of this is that the line manager still needs to

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approve and check contracts or supplies, although the teams are supposed to be self-managing. Adoption and Adaptation: In the next phase, SMTs are developed further, but they are still not able to decide about external structures. They seem to have enough authority to organise and manage their own work. In this context, Wageman (2001) stressed the significance of the appropriate leader and the importance of team design and coaching for the further implementation of SMTs. She showed that the positive effect of team design on team effectiveness is dependent on the coaching behaviour of line managers. Two coaching behaviours contributed positively and significantly to self-management: coaching in a way that provides cues and informal rewards for self-managing behaviours as well as coaching by problem-solving consultation. As the team tenure increases, it seems important for line managers to transform their role from a directive one to a coaching one (Stoker, 2008). In this phase, line managers should start to coach self-managing employees by helping them to improve their competences and by transferring more responsibility to them. Research shows that with increasing team tenure, team members are able to take on more obligations, and thus line managers can reduce the directive leadership style (Stoker, 2008). In this phase, line managers should encourage and inspire team members to take on more responsibilities and find new and creative ways to improve team members’ work performance (Williams et al., 2010; Douglas, 2002). According to Hagen and Gavrilova Aguilar (2012), line managers should show conscious behaviour in this phase, by questioning, guiding, advising and challenging team behaviours to develop more empowered, informed and motivated employees. This involves coaching team members to solve problems and carry out tasks more efficiently and effectively as well as delegating tasks to team members in order to engage in a close employee-member relationship (Hagen & Gavrilova Aguilar, 2012). Douglas (2002) agrees on the necessity to build good relationships with team members, as he stresses the development of high-quality leader-member exchange (LMX) between team members and line managers. To reach a high level of mutual trust and respect between leaders and members, behavioural adjustments on the part of the line manager seem necessary. Line managers need to accept that team members have increased authority, that they need unrestricted access to organisational information, and that their strict control over the team is diminishing. In addition, enhanced task feedback, the creation of a shared vision and encouraging the team to perform beyond expectations are additional crucial duties a leader needs to fulfil in order to push SMTs into a more independent direction (Elloy, 2005; Williams et al., 2010). The focus on coaching behaviours in this phase indicates that as SMTs develop, they need less active involvement by their line manager. However, passive or absent leader behaviour remains negatively associated with team member’s job satisfaction, team performance and team empowerment (Luciano, Mathieu, & Ruddy, 2013). Thus, employees still need attention and guidance from their line managers, because without it, they feel uncertain. Luciano, Mathieu and Ruddy (2013) found that

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team members who received more attention from their line managers engaged in higher team empowerment and team effectiveness than those who received less attention. Application of the Adoption and Adaptation Phase to Livio: At Livio, the transition from phase 1 to phase 2 went too fast for many employees. Some line managers became responsible for 10 teams, and the turnover rate among line managers was high, so employees in SMTs felt abandoned and ambiguous about tasks and responsibilities. As indicated by Luciano et al. (2013), leader absenteeism or passivity led to lower job satisfaction. Employees experienced that the lack of supervision can raise some issues, such as accepting negative feedback from your direct team members instead of a manager or insecurity about performance levels. Since Livio does not appraise the performance of employees in a structured and regular way and the line manager no longer provided constant guidance, feedback and monitoring, employees were uncertain about whether they performed well. Employees needed to learn that they could not rely on their line manager any longer, and had to start solving their own problems by thinking independently and starting to ask direct colleagues for support. They still need their line managers to provide structure in team meetings, solve team problems and decide how things should be done. The line managers also need to adjust to the new situation. Since they are responsible for more teams, they have more responsibilities. Although Livio provided line managers with training courses about coaching exercises, line managers were often too busy to participate in them. This made it difficult for them to guide each team through the transition with the same level of attention. They needed to unlearn direct leadership and instead coach from a distance. Use: Simultaneously with developing and adapting an appropriate leadership and team design, the range of tasks for SMTs grow. ‘As self-managed teams develop and mature, the formal leader becomes less involved in the daily work activities of the team’ (Elloy, 2005, p. 121), and teams are able to set their own work schedules, determine budgets, order and allocate resources needed for production, monitor product quality, select and terminate workers (Yang & Shao, 1996; Stewart et al., 2011; Luciano et al., 2013). Nevertheless, there is still a need for external supervision. Since team members are often completely involved in day-to-day activities, they are not always able to critically monitor each other and focus on external issues at the same time (Morgeson, 2005). Therefore, an external leader is responsible for serving as a ‘boundary spanner’, dealing with unexpected problems or events that occur and solving problems that the team is unable to manage by itself (Morgeson, 2005; Yazid, 2015).

The study by Yang and Shao (1996) found that SMTs require training by the top management to become skilled in self-management. They need to learn various leadership roles: to become directive and goal-oriented, coordinate and monitor all operations and performance, facilitate and mentor team processes by supporting each other. They also need to foster adaptation and change by identifying trends and establishing external relationships to sell products and services and buy

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resources. Although these leadership roles are quite wide-ranging, team members must be able to perform all of them in order to achieve success. The role emphasis will vary depending on the stage a team is operating in (Yang & Shao, 1996). At this phase of the SMT implementation process, line managers need to coordinate and manage the boundary between the team and the larger organisation (Druskat & Wheeler, 2003; Yazid, 2015). This responsibility remains in the hands of line managers. Boundary spanning is essential for SMTs to enable a successful collaboration between the SMT and the wider organisation, resulting in an improved team performance. The research by Yazid (2015) shows that line managers play an important role in this phase. When SMTs took responsibility for their work in the first phases of the SMT implementation process, they ran into issues in the usage phase. After initial attempts to solve obstacles arising between team members, the teams failed to deal with their conflicts and did not come to any agreement. This led to an unsatisfactory work environment. Only after accepting that assistance was required did the employees consult their line manager and transfer the project’s responsibility to him/her. Often in this phase, team members are fully involved with their daily tasks, which make it difficult for them to simultaneously manage their co-workers and take care of changes in the environment (Morgeson, 2005). Therefore, Morgeson (2005) suggests that the line manager should interfere when disruptive and especially unforeseen events occur. They should prepare their teams for problems or events that have not yet occurred, to build up the necessary capabilities to face these problems. Morgeson (2005) also proposes that line managers should continue coaching SMTs to become self-managing by direct interactions with the team. Positive forms of coaching (Wageman, 2001), such as providing rewards and reinforcement for self-managing behaviour, have been found to increase the team’s self-confidence. Line managers should further interfere in team activities by anticipating upcoming events and immediately offering the team suitable interpretations and solutions. Although the more active line management intervention activities were negatively related to team satisfaction with leadership, they were positively related to team effectiveness when events became more disruptive (Morgeson, 2005). The previous results show that before SMTs are completely implemented in an organisation, the tasks of line managers do not diminish much, but they change. In this phase, line managers need to support and reward autonomous behaviour and advise the team to successfully interact with each other and with the environment (Stewart et al. 2011). One of these support mechanisms involves effective conflict management, since conflicts can disturb team processes and performance (Nicolaides et al., 2014; Solansky, 2008; Stewart et al., 2011). Although more experienced SMTs can solve simple conflicts on their own, line managers need to solve bigger issues which SMTs are not capable of solving themselves. To increase awareness of the team’s capabilities to complete tasks, Stewart et al. (2011) and Solansky (2008) suggest the use of transactive memory systems. These systems should help SMTs to collectively encode, store and retrieve knowledge. They are also valuable when line managers become less involved in daily processes, because they help them to monitor past performance. Stewart et al. (2011) stressed the

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importance of shared mental models together with the use of transactive memory systems. They integrate individual goals with those of the whole team and are helpful because without a formal hierarchical leader, SMTs lack the communication of common goals, tasks and responsibilities. These support mechanisms can compensate for a lack of leadership to some degree, but cannot completely replace a successful manager. Application of the Use Phase to Livio: In this phase of the SMT implementation process, Livio employees learned to become independent and self-managing and experimented with the situation. Livio has developed several tools to help SMTs to develop their team in a way that improves self-management. Examples include a team development instrument, which SMTs can use to diagnose their strengths and weaknesses to support improved team performance; talent motivation analysis, which helps the teams to identify talents and use this diagnostic to improve task division; and the solution-oriented interactive method to enhance team communication and organise team meetings more effectively. More information about these tools will be provided in the chapter ‘Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams’. Although the relationship with the line manager is much more distant than it used to be, employees learn that they can rely on their coach-manager in case of emergencies or when problems arise. For example, when clients are dissatisfied with the services provided, they usually complain to the coach-managers. Coachmanagers assist the teams in dealing with these issues and handling the complaints or client contacts. At Livio, they also assist SMTs in approving new systems that they need, such as getting permission to purchase new telephones or tablets. The decision-making authorities for purchasing new systems are not yet devolved to SMTs, and the coach-managers need to assist with these processes. SMTs perceive that they hardly need managers any more, but they appreciate the help in handling issues, changing ways of working and purchasing new equipment. At Livio, coach-managers reward self-managing behaviours. In this phase, Livio implemented team-based rewards for high-performance teams that allowed them to keep any surplus. Instead of turning over any surplus to the company, they could now use it to increase their budgets. These examples show that although SMTs are very independent already and take many decisions autonomously, they still rely on line managers in case of unexpected events or problems, such as complaints or families fighting about the best way to care for their family members. Incorporation: When SMTs have reached the incorporation phase, they are fully self-managed. In this phase, the most appropriate leader is one who can lead others to lead themselves (Manz & Sims, 1987). Scholars distinguish between two internal leadership types: rotated (emergent/transformational) leadership and peer evaluation. Although employees usually work independently, they rely on the collaboration with other team members, which includes providing assistance and information flows. In SMTs the role distinctions are somewhat fluid as team

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members shift between being leaders and followers (Nicolaides et al., 2014). They use rotated leadership models to deal with the dual role of leader and follower. In such a model, all team members share leadership responsibilities by engaging in a dynamic and interactive influence process with their peers, with the aim to achieve group goals (Muethel & Hoegl, 2013). These leaders are individuals who ‘emerge as leaders through their consistently noteworthy contributions to their team over extended periods of time and through the inspiration they provide other team members’ (Eseryel & Eseryel, 2013, p. 108). Employees in SMTs depend on the collaboration and coordination with other team members because the influence of an individual team member is determined by other team members’ possible contribution to accomplishing their own task. According to Erez, LePine, and Elms (2002), designating a temporary leader especially helps to ensure that critical team management functions are accomplished and that members perceive a sense of their place in the team. This leadership approach clarifies tasks and responsibilities among team members, which leads to ‘fewer misunderstandings and overall, a smoother system of interpersonal interaction’ (Erez et al., 2002, p. 934). Another benefit of this leadership design is an increase of appreciation and respect because team members have all been in the role of the leader and understand the difficulty associated with this position. Working with rotated leadership entails fair sharing of the team’s workload and allows all team members a voice (Erez et al., 2002). The norm of reciprocity needs to be monitored in SMTs to make sure that team members perceive equal rights in workload sharing, offering and receiving well-balanced constructive feedback and regular interactions with all team members. This is why rotated leadership is based on a social exchange between team members. Muethel and Hoegl (2013) explain that only if attempts at influence by one party are perceived as a favour by the other party will those parties perceive the obligation to reciprocate the favour. In such a team-member exchange, each team member can demonstrate leadership behaviour by temporarily taking an influencing role towards other team members. This implies that each team member can be a leader in one situation and a follower in another. However, rotated leadership does come with some obstacles. Since independent self-managing employees’ behaviour is driven by the individual’s self-interest, their behaviour is contingent on rewarding the actions of others (Muethel & Hoegl, 2013). This means that individuals will only be willing to demonstrate any form of shared leadership behaviour when the expected rewards exceed the expected costs. Advising and leading each other can be difficult when team members do not cooperate with other team members’ persuasion attempts and when they are not perceived as contributing towards their own goals within the project (Muethel & Hoegl, 2013). Furthermore, there is an overall lack of leverage due to the even distribution of power amongst the team members, which means that ‘individual team members aiming to influence the team, have to largely depend on others’ willingness to follow’ (Muethel & Hoegl, 2013, p. 427). The authors conclude that it is important that team members not only consider their own goals but also the outcome of the entire project. This requires the effort to understand task

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interrelationships and take initiatives to influence the team, but it also requires accepting influence by others to ensure that project objectives are met. Further issues can arise such as the problem that not emerged leaders ‘feel less responsible for team outcomes’ (Erez et al., 2002, p. 933) and rely solely on the evolved leader to take over tasks and responsibilities. Another drawback is that the emergent leader status is unofficial and unrecognised, leading to an informal role (Erez et al., 2002; Muethel & Hoegl, 2013). This can result in a decreasing effort to accomplish team goals, especially when appropriate rewards for the additional responsibilities are lacking. Peer evaluation is defined as the evaluation of a team member’s performance by another individual internal to the team (Erez et al., 2002). In comparison to leader evaluations, peer evaluations for reward purposes can promote the functioning of the team, because members will perceive increased monitoring of their behaviour and better understand that there are consequences for their behaviour. In peerevaluated teams, team members are usually more involved and perceive more opportunities to suggest changes than under the control of an external leader. Another benefit is that cooperation among peer-evaluated teams is high because employees want to be seen as team players and because unwillingness to collaborate can have material as well as group internal consequences. However, this approach also has a crucial drawback. Employees may feel uncomfortable in the role of the rater and judge team members insufficiently as they prioritise upholding the positive culture of the team (Erez et al., 2002). Research has shown that both peer evaluation and rotated leadership can contribute positively to the team’s success (Erez et al., 2002; Nicolaides et al., 2014; Solansky, 2008). For example, Erez et al. (2002) discovered that rotated leadership and peer evaluations are both positively related to team effectiveness as indexed by team performance and member satisfaction. Solansky (2008) found that teams with shared leadership have motivational and cognitive advantages over teams that take the traditional approach of relying on a single leader and have higher collective efficacy, for example. Nicolaides et al. (2014) compared the effectiveness of shared leadership versus vertical leadership and concluded that shared leadership contributed to an incremental variance in team performance. However, not every design fits each team. Shared leadership, for example, is particularly effective when interdependence between team members is high, because those members work closely with one another by integrating their actions (Nicolaides et al., 2014). The same study showed that shared leadership models are less suitable for teams with a longer team tenure, as they may be suffering from power struggles and power inequalities, resulting in tensions, conflict and anger within the team. Although the positive results of both self-managing leadership approaches have been documented, many scholars would agree that they are not necessarily better than leadership by a single designated leader (e.g. Erez et al., 2002). Stewart et al. (2011) consider self-leadership as a temporary solution and believe that it cannot be a complete substitute for external leadership. Instead, this influence process can be complementary to and facilitated by external leadership. Eseryel and Eseryel (2013)

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believe that emergent leaders eventually take on the same tasks and responsibilities as external leaders because they need to exhibit a clear understanding of the team’s future, create high follower confidence, invite trust and admiration, inspire others, lead by example and be considerate of the feelings of others. Solansky (2008) suggests combining the resources of shared leaders and vertical leaders because he believes that combining the talents and interests of several individuals is likely to increase the teams’ long-term success. These arguments suggest that even when SMTs are fully implemented in organisations and incorporated into existing systems within the organisation, leadership is still essential. Since rotated or emerging leadership styles are very common in the incorporation phase and scholars suggest shared leadership between internal and external leaders, SMTs do not seem to be leader-free. It seems that SMTs will always depend on some sort of leader, be it an internal leader, an external leader or a mixed form with internal and external leaders working in cooperation. Application of the Incorporation Phase to Livio: SMTs at Livio have not yet reached the incorporation phase. While some home care teams are quite far along in the implementation process, residential care teams are still in the Adoption and Adaptation phase. We envisage some processes that will help SMTs to reach this phase eventually. We realise that due to the absence of an external leader, internal leaders will emerge in SMTs at Livio. Coaching SMTs from within and designing teams in a way that balances them with appropriate skills and competences is still considered a challenge for some Livio SMTs. In order to support teams with reaching this phase, Livio has started to implement self-evaluation tools to facilitate and improve the provision of feedback. With this tool, employees evaluate their own performance. Every team member is expected to use this tool on a regular basis to assist peer evaluation methods. Although some Livio SMTs have started to incorporate SMTs, this process is not yet finished, and thus they are not completely independent. Line Management Roles, Behaviours and Leadership Styles in the Implementation Process of Self-managing Teams SMTs have gained importance in organisations within the last few years because of their many benefits, including increased innovativeness, performance and quality standards. On the basis of the prior findings, we see that implementing SMTs is a complex process that takes time, organisational efforts from various stakeholders in the process and various adaptations before organisations find a self-management model that works for them. Organisations may not take the time to analyse organisational, team and individual conditions and requirements before initiating SMTs. Thus, they may transfer too many responsibilities too quickly, which may lead to unprepared team members and overtaxing of employees. Organisations need to understand that before teams can use self-management methods, they need to learn to take on new tasks and responsibilities, to communicate with each other and build

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INITIATION

ADOPTION & ADAPTATION

Introducing SMTs

Developing SMTs

Initiator / Directive manager

Full decision authority and control over team activities

Authorative style

Coach / Supervisor

Encouraging, inspiring, guiding, challenging/ creation of shared vision Daily hands-on coaching style

USE

INCORPORATION

Regularly using SMTs Institutionalising SMTs Supporter / Boundary spanner / Team trainer / Monitor Dealing with problems / disruptive events / conflicts Managing boundary between team and environment Problem-solving

Internal leader Internal leader takes over external management functions Team members provide assistance and information Rotated leadership / peer evaluation

Team independence

Figure 1: Line Management Roles, Behaviours and Leadership Styles during the Self-managing Team Implementation Process (adapted from Mestrovic, 2017).

a team. These kinds of collaborations require time and careful consideration by individuals within the team, otherwise they may result in the alienation of team members. It is crucial to support SMTs by using appropriate line management roles, behaviours and leadership styles during the implementation. Active line management interventions may sometimes seem needed when teams start to underperform, when conflicts arise, when unexpected and disruptive events occur, such as complaints from customers or clients, or when responsibilities are shirked by team members. Our analysis has determined that there is not just one best leadership style for SMTs; rather, a range of different line management roles, behaviours and leadership styles is needed. In addition, those characteristics change and need to be adapted during different phases of the implementation process. Based on the analysis of the literature and the Livio case, we were able to assign different line management roles, behaviours and leadership styles to each phase in the SMT implementation process. Figure 1 documents the increase of the team’s independence and tenure as the four implementation phases proceed. Implementation starts with the initiation of SMTs and requires a directive leader who provides structure and assigns tasks to team members. This approach is necessary since employees still have a very low team tenure and must acquire skills to become more independent. Research supports this conclusion (Stoker, 2008). A

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leader who practises a ‘laissez-faire’ style would probably overload team members and endanger team performance. On the other hand, transferring too many responsibilities and too much authority to team members in a short time would produce uncertainty and ambiguity among team members. Thus, at this stage, the authority to take decisions remains with an external leader, usually the line manager, who designs a team that is capable of coping with independence and autonomy and in which various skills and education levels are combined. He/she would then start slowly transferring tasks and responsibilities to team members and train them in dealing with the new tasks and responsibilities. In the second phase, the Adoption and Adaptation phase, organisations proceed with further team development. Teams need to acquire self-management skills. Line managers also need to adapt in this phase and change their behaviour. They need to let go of some of their tasks and responsibilities and take on a more coaching role to help SMTs bear the new responsibilities. It might be difficult for some line managers to accept the increasing loss of team control. We saw in the Livio case that employees also find it difficult to accept the new team dynamics and need to unlearn asking their line managers for daily feedback and advice. For both actors, this led to insecurity and ambiguity. Line management activities focus on encouraging and inspiring employees in SMTs to take on more task responsibilities as well as creating stronger LMX relationships with their team and smooth information flows. Since line managers lose some authority, they are dependent on a highquality LMX relationship with their team to influence and coach decision-making processes. Research has shown that too much leader intervention in this phase was perceived negatively by team members, whereas rewarding autonomous behaviour was perceived positively. This already proves that with increasing team tenure and improved self-management abilities, teams start to move away from the controlled, authoritative style of their leaders. During the use phase, teams start working autonomously on a regular basis. This means that the role of line managers now focuses primarily on supporting and setting boundaries. The employees rely less and less on external leader supervision and, instead, manage many parts of their work internally. However, teams may still occasionally get into trouble due to unforeseen obstacles and disruptive events. In these situations, their dependence on the line management intervention increases again. In the Livio case, we described how line managers handled complaints and family issues of the clients. These external challenges intrude into daily business, and SMTs find it difficult to focus on solving these issues in addition to their daily tasks and responsibilities. The reason for this is that SMTs usually do not have internal leaders in this phase, and thus there is no contact person in the team available who could handle disruptive events. Consequently, the line manager is still responsible for issues arising and managing the boundary between his/her team and the wider organisation or external conditions. To enter the last phase, employees in SMTs need to learn leadership skills and styles in order to share leadership tasks and evaluate themselves or for internal leaders to emerge. Various leadership styles contribute to a balanced repertoire of leadership activities, which are necessary to manage a team successfully. In this

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phase, employees in SMTs have to be able to manage conflicts quickly and efficiently, be familiar with each other’s responsibilities and ensure the establishment of a shared value system. Research has shown that for teams to cooperate effectively in the incorporation phase, they need to share the workload and make sure each team member has a voice and uses it in decision-making processes and cooperates with the other team members to guarantee the best possible performance outcomes. Two leadership styles seem appropriate here. The first describes the role of the transformational/emergent leader, in which one or more individuals stand out due to their behaviour resembling that of an external leader such as encouraging, inspiring and leading the team to desired outcomes. In contrast to an external leader, leadership in an internally managed team is rotated among team members. Rotating leadership tasks contribute to a shared decision-making and value system. In the rotated leadership model, team members share responsibilities from time to time, and thus they are forced to collaborate. The other leadership style peer evaluation seems to be one of the best ways to manage SMTs in the incorporation phase. If SMTs manage to give each team member an equal share in the decision-making power and provide them with a voice to share their opinions, peer evaluation increases teamwork and fair collaboration. We might assume that SMTs in this phase are fully self-managed, but this is not necessarily the case. There are several reasons for this. First, as soon as performance levels drop, SMTs become more dependent on their line manager again to help them solve internal problems, re-structure team processes and coach and support them on how to increase performance. Second, line managers usually stay involved in SMT management by coaching and advising from the outside. Although their control over the teams decreases, they remain responsible for coaching the teams. Third, this phase is part of the process of becoming selfmanaging. The question thus would be when are SMTs fully self-managed? Is it already at the beginning, in the middle or only at the end of this phase? And is complete self-management the goal of SMTs? We will come back to this issue in the conclusion and in the last part of this book. Another reason, which is related to the question of whether it is possible and desirable to reach complete selfmanagement, involves what is an implementation process. In our understanding, there is not necessarily an end stage since the SMT implementation process is a dynamic one. Thus, the incorporation phase does not need to be the ‘last’ phase. SMTs can go back to the Use or Adoption and Adaptation phases as they restructure team processes, change self-management methods, and start working with different tools to support self-management. These changes usually require training, hands-on coaching and finding new ways of distributing responsibilities, tasks which are usually developed in the second or third phase of the SMT implementation process. Table 2 summarises the main findings of the leadership and line management tasks in the four-phase SMT implementation process split into line management roles, behaviours and leadership styles.

Table 2: Summary of Line Management Roles, Behaviours and Leadership Style. Implementation Phase/ Leadership Roles

• External leader → Initiator

Adoption and Adaption

• External leader → Coach, supervisor

Use

• External leader → Supporter, ‘boundary spanner’

• External leader → Internal, emergent, transformational leader • Rotated leadership • Peer evaluation • Among team members: providing assistance and information flows • Task of internal leader: encourage, inspire, and lead team to desired outcomes • Three team processes workload sharing, voice and cooperation • Three characteristics of transformational leadership help convey strongly held beliefs and values; actions stimulate innovative problemsolving; generating high degree of follower

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• Team members: becoming skilled in leadership roles • External leader takes • Accepting the gradual • Managing the team’s over decision loss of control boundaries; dealing authority with unexpected • Encouraging, inspiring problems or disruptive • Leader tells team what employees to take on events; solving to do and how to do more responsibilities, to problems the team is their tasks question daily unable to manage by • Helps team to acquire conditions itself new skills • Establish close leader • Initiating structure member relationships, • Intervening when planning, scheduling guiding, advising, troublesome issues team activities, and challenging occur maintaining • Creating shared vision, • Managing boundary organisational giving task feedback between team and expectations as well as • Equal consideration of wider organisation performance all team members • Advising team to standards • Providing cues and successfully interact informal rewards for with its environment as self-managing well as with each other behaviours

Incorporation

The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams

Behaviours

Initiation

Table 2: Continued. 94

Styles

Initiation

• Directive approach • Coercive and authoritative style

Adoption and Adaption

Use

Incorporation

• Problem-solving and rewarding confidence by protecting consultation autonomous behaviour the team • Identifying team • Train for effective problems conflict management, • Leader task intervention transactive memory systems, shared mental model • Coaching style daily • Problem-solving • Rotated leadership hands-on approach emergent/ (helps to transfer to transformational team more leader emerge as responsibility and leaders through improve their consistently noteworthy competences) contributions to their team over extended periods of time and through the inspiration they provide to other team members • Peer evaluation team members rate each other’s performances to keep up a quality and performance standard and foster teamwork

Source: Adapted from Mestrovic (2017). Please also see Appendix 2.

Organisational Roadmap towards Teal Organisations

Implementation Phase/ Leadership

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Discussion about the Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams Having discussed the management tasks and responsibilities of line managers and SMTs, the two-phase devolution of people management responsibilities, and the role, behaviours and leadership styles of line managers in the implementation process of SMTs, we should be in a position to explain the relevance of line managers in SMTs. When we consider the six line management roles explained by Hales (2005), we see that line managers retain tasks and responsibilities in almost all of them. The only role in which line managers do not retain tasks and responsibilities seems to be the role of looking after the work area, which is the main reason why organisations decide to implement SMTs in the first place. Although we could not distinguish all six roles from each other performance management and monitoring performance as well as financial and business management roles seem to overlap too much we saw that line managers remain relevant. They provide SMTs with the relevant information to evaluate their performance, help them to interpret performance management results, and monitor team performance. They keep on translating strategy into operations because SMTs usually do not have the authority to set strategic goals. We do see that some teams develop their own team goals. Here, again, line managers advise and coach them to do this. The financial and business management roles remain the responsibility of line managers. Although we saw that Livio teams were given financial responsibility by having an independent budget, they still needed approval from management for purchasing equipment, adding more staff and deciding on the scope of a contract. In this role, line managers set the boundaries of the team by building and developing relationships between the team and the internal and external context of the organisation. Line managers also actively interact with the environment and help SMTs by handling unexpected problems and disruptive events. They even gain a new responsibility, since they oversee multiple teams. When we compared the devolution of HRM tasks and responsibilities between the first phase of the HRM devolution (from HR managers to line managers) with the second devolution phase (from line managers to SMTs), we realised that it was quite comparable. Based on the examples of Catalonian and Dutch healthcare organisations, we could see that the responsibility for implementing HRM practices was devolved in both devolution phases, but that the decision-making authority was not necessarily devolved along with the responsibilities. In both phases, the actors lacked the discretion to increase staff numbers, influence their compensation or provide financial incentives, and decide which training programmes or packages would be appropriate to offer. Line managers in the first phase and SMTs in the second phase struggled with financial responsibilities and the necessary knowledge and information to take informed decisions. SMTs seemed to have more responsibilities than line managers in the first devolution phase. We also realised the level of complexity of the devolution process of HRM responsibilities. There is not one reality, not even when looking only at the

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health-care sector, because we saw the need to distinguish between the devolution of responsibilities to nurse and doctor line managers and to home care and residential care teams. Comparable distinctions can be expected for other sectors, e.g. between education levels, organisational cultures and climates, as well as personality traits. A very important factor influencing SMT effectiveness, and thus also the level of devolution, is team tenure. Stoker (2008) showed that teams with a low tenure require different interventions to perform effectively than teams with a high tenure. Line management guidance and a directive leadership style seemed to be crucial for low-tenure teams to perform well. This distinction according to team tenure was the basis for distinguishing between four phases of the SMT implementation process. We also saw that active forms of line management interventions are needed in the first phase of the implementation process to prevent team insecurity, ambiguity and role overload. Although the active role of line managers diminishes in the process of developing as SMTs, line managers continue to coach, assist and guide from the outside. They remain a valued and respected sparring partner for SMTs and help SMTs to deal with any external events or problems that are difficult to handle due to day-to-day activities and operational pressures. At each point in the implementation process, the line management influence can increase again. Situations such as underperformance, conflicts within and between teams, complaints from the outside, and shirking responsibilities call for a more active intervention of the line manager. All of the above examples show that line managers stay relevant even when teams are self-managing. Their availability and active supervision diminish and their interventions change from managing and deciding to coaching and supporting, but they remain relevant in nearly all managerial responsibilities, in the devolution of all different people management responsibilities and in the four phases of the SMT implementation process.

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Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams

Recently, we have witnessed a new wave of adoption of the concept of selfmanagement. To achieve adaptability and flexibility, more and more organisations are introducing self-managing teams (SMTs) (Maynard, Gilson, & Mathieu, 2012). The introduction of self-management within existing organisations involves many changes to the human resource management (HRM) responsibilities of different actors (see also the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’ of this book). Therefore, the idea of SMTs has important implications for the ways in which employees can be empowered, motivated and supported through HRM activities. Transforming from a centralised and functional structure towards a more decentralised, organic structure necessitates a change of the HRM function (Banner, Kulisch, & Peery, 1992). Employees in SMTs become more responsible for performing HRM activities themselves. Teams need to organise and structure the devolution of HRM policies and practices, as well as people management activities, thereby affecting team dynamics and processes. In the literature, there has been an extensive debate about how teams can be empowered to achieve team effectiveness and performance (Seibert, Wang, & Courtright, 2011). Highly empowered teams are found to be more effective than less empowered teams (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999). Team-based HRM is an important driver of team empowerment and is therefore crucial to enhance team effectiveness. In a study by Mathieu, Gilson, and Ruddy (2006), team-based HRM practices were found to positively impact empowerment and team processes, which in turn affected team performance. There has also been a debate about which HRM responsibilities should be executed by SMTs. Some scholars claim that SMTs do not adopt all of the existing HRM-related functions (Spreitzer, 2008), and others assert that SMTs still need an external leader to increase their effectiveness (Morgeson, Reider, & Campion, 2005; Rapp, Gilson, Mathieu, & Ruddy, 2016). Therefore, HRM-related tasks such as selection and termination of workers, setting working schedules, determination of

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budgets, planning and quality assessment can be devolved to SMTs (Barker, 1993; Stewart, Manz, & Sims, 1999), whereas other HRM-related functions such as team training and performance feedback remain outside their scope (Spreitzer, 2008). The redistribution of HRM responsibilities changes the way in which HRM is referring delivered to and used by employees. The so-called HRM supply chain to ‘the structure and delivery channels of the HRM function, the flow of HRM practices across the organisation, and the management or governance techniques applied to ensure both structure and flow are operating effectively to reduce uncertainty and achieve organisational goals’ (Farndale, Paauwe, & Boselie, 2010, p. 850) changes during the transformation towards SMTs, and the result is that HRM practices change, too. As a consequence, to achieve high team and organisational effectiveness, it is important that HRM activities are both aligned with each other as well as with other units of the organisation. In the HRM literature, these concepts are described as internal fit the extent to which HRM practices are consistent with each other to achieve the organisation’s goals and competitive advantage (Kepes & Delery, 2007; Lepak & Gowan, 2009). One way to ascertain the fit of HRM activities in self-managing organisations is through governance mechanisms. Governance of the HRM function can ensure that the interests of management are aligned with those of employees across organisational levels (Farndale et al., 2010). Given that HRM departments and line managers do not primarily determine the HRM practices any longer, team members themselves need to coordinate and perform the HR-related tasks. New governance mechanisms should be in place to achieve suitable coordination between the different parts of the HRM system, to safeguard positive synergies between HRM practices and increase performance. Given the increasing use of SMTs and the described developments, it is necessary to understand how SMTs perform HRM activities and to explore which mechanisms can be used to synchronise HRM activities across organisational levels. This chapter addresses these issues and describes how traditional organisations can transform into self-managing ones.

Empowerment of Self-managing Teams Mathieu et al. (2006) describe two conceptualizations of empowerment, a structural one and a psychological one. Structural empowerment is related to work design features, whereas psychological empowerment relates to the feelings of empowerment of employees (Mathieu et al., 2006). The structural approach is related to a set of practices that involve the delegation of authority and responsibility to employees and is based on job design theory (Hackman & Oldham, 1976) and job characteristics (Campion, Medsker, & Higgs, 1993). Through job enrichment, groups of employees gain more authority and responsibility and thereby develop into SMTs (Manz & Sims, 1987). The conceptualization of structural empowerment is focused on transferring leadership responsibilities to team members (Alper, Tjosvold, & Law, 2000; Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001).

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The psychological conceptualization of empowerment is based on employees’ experiences and cognition (Mathieu et al., 2006). Team psychological empowerment is defined as: […] the extent to which work group members have the ability to make business decisions, are accountable for the outcomes of their decisions, accept responsibility for the outcomes, and can solve problems on their own. (Hyatt & Ruddy, 1997, p. 562)

Another influential stream in the psychological empowerment literature defines psychological empowerment as a four-dimensional construct, including the experienced abilities, autonomy, meaningfulness and impact (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999; Spreitzer, 1995). Team empowerment refers to the shared perception of team members about the collective level of psychological empowerment (Chen, Kirkman, Kanfer, Allen, & Rosen, 2007). Based on the work of Menon (2001) and the discussion about the distinction between structural and psychological team empowerment, Mathieu et al. (2006) defined team psychological empowerment as ‘team members’ collective belief that they have the authority to control their proximal work environment and are responsible for their team’s functioning’ (p. 98). They chose to integrate two dimensions of psychological empowerment, namely the experience of authority and responsibility. Drawing on the structural conceptualization, SMTs are a feature of work design, given that organisations can make a choice to adopt SMTs as a management practice. Structural empowerment interventions or changes of the work design that can be implemented are the delegation of authority and responsibility for HRM functions such as recruitment and selection and performance appraisal. Research has provided evidence that these structural empowerment interventions and the related changes in work design can increase the psychological empowerment of teams (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999; Mathieu et al., 2006). An empowered work design can lead to more effective self-management and team effectiveness (Wageman, 2001). Therefore, the extent to which authority and responsibility are provided to teams determines the degree to which the teams become self-managing. The transfer of authority and accountability is determined and possibly limited by the rules and goals set by higher management within an organisation (Wageman, 2001). We could further distinguish between authority and responsibility as provided to teams or as accepted by teams. In the literature some authors write about giving employees responsibility (Stewart & Manz, 1995), whereas others examine the responsibility accepted by employees (e.g. Carroll, 1996). Tjepkema (2003) provides a middle way and focuses on whether teams carry responsibility, a situation that can be achieved by the implementation of SMTs. Given that the degree of team autonomy is related to team performance (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999; Rapp et al., 2016), the performance of SMTs is influenced by the management and HRM, which can give teams a greater amount of authority and accountability. In this chapter, we use the concept of empowerment

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to analyse how teams are empowered to perform HRM activities. Now that we know what team empowerment is, we will focus in the next section on which types of activities SMTs are responsible for.

Transformation towards Self-managing Teams The idea behind SMTs is to give employees and teams more responsibility and the authority to make their own decisions. At the same time, the shift in responsibility and authority is one of the reasons why the transformation towards SMTs is challenging. One of the explanations is that team members fail to take on the responsibilities that were formerly performed by managers (Wageman, 1997). Many issues can arise during the transition: managers can still be inclined to take decisions, team members keep on doing their work individually, problems are not being solved within teams, or decisions are postponed. Eventually, all these problems boil down to the lack of collective effort and responsibility of teams and team members. The transformation and change in attitudes in teams do not come overnight; employees have a long history of working in traditional organisations, with strong hierarchical leadership. Oftentimes, employees were told what to do for almost their entire career. Discussing plans and making decisions are rather unnatural tasks for many employees and may be perceived as a revolution. In addition, working together with team members is not usually a daily routine for operational employees team members have to solve their problems together and are therefore are more reliant upon each other. Their work becomes more interdependent, at least when it comes down to organisational tasks. To achieve a well-functioning team, a good team atmosphere and working relationship are therefore preconditions. SMTs are responsible for managing themselves and the tasks they have to perform as a primary work process. Therefore, two distinct functions can be identified: (1) operational functions, related to the primary process and (2) regulatory functions, related to planning, monitoring, problem-solving and improving team performance (e.g. Amelsvoort & Scholtes, 1994). While the regulatory functions are often performed by managers in traditional organisations and teams, in SMTs both functions are the responsibility of the collectivity of team members, representing a shift of responsibility. This shift is predominantly related to the regulatory functions. Many of these regulatory functions are related to HRM activities, such as recruitment & selection, training, performance monitoring, (strategic) planning, etc. Therefore, we predominantly focus here on the regulatory functions that are related to HRM activities. Applying the above distinctions to HRM responsibilities, we can expect to see a shift of HRM responsibilities from the line manager to the SMTs. The integration of responsibilities for the operational functions (e.g., providing healthcare) and the regulatory functions (e.g. recruitment of new colleagues) is what enhances the autonomy of teams (Sips & Keunen, 1996). Given that SMTs need to execute both the operational and regulatory functions, it is expected that the

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role of the HRM department, of the line manager, and of the team members will change accordingly. Potentially, the HRM department will need to focus more on the teams, rather than the line managers and individual employees. The team members are responsible for making decisions regarding HRM activities and performing HRM tasks, while the line managers are predominantly responsible for coaching the teams (see also the chapter ‘Healthcare Teams in Long-term and Elderly Care at Livio: A Case Study’). For many organisations that adopt SMTs, this leads to the following questions: how should the HRM function be organised? What are the HRM activities that SMTs can perform? And what governance mechanisms aid organisations and teams to adopt, perform and align HRM responsibilities?

HRM Activities for Self-managing Teams For several decades, researchers have been considering the influence of organisational or contextual features on team outcomes (Campion et al., 1993). One of the factors in the organisational context is HRM. For example, Kirkman and Rosen (1999) showed that team-based HRM policies are positively related to team empowerment. Mathieu et al. (2006) and Rapp et al. (2016) also found that teambased HRM is beneficial for team processes. While these studies have provided valuable insights into how to enhance team processes and effectiveness, they were predominantly focused on team empowerment and did not consider the wide range of HRM practices to support SMTs, nor did they focus on how SMTs perform the HRM activities themselves. Therefore, we shall discuss the most relevant HRM practices and highlight the implications of these practices when considering SMTs. We draw from both HRM and teams research to analyse HRM policies and practices for SMTs. We place the development of team empowerment in a broader development in the HRM literature that describes HRM policies and practices used to empower employees. In the HRM literature, high-involvement work systems mostly concentrate on the empowerment of employees (Zacharatos, Barling, & Iverson, 2005). The high-involvement philosophy is the management’s intentions for their employees to be involved, empowered and supported to be autonomous (Guthrie, 2001; Lawler, 1992). Guerrero and Barraud-Didier (2004) found that information sharing, skill development, compensation and empowerment appear together as the most important practices for high-involvement HRM. Pare´ and Tremblay (2007) discuss five distinct high-involvement practices that may influence employees’ work-related attitudes and performance behaviours: empowerment, competence development, information-sharing, recognition and rewards. Another relevant HRM system is the high-performance work system (HPWS), which combines elements of both high-commitment and high-involvement HRM (Zacharatos et al., 2005). HPWS consists of best practices such as selective staffing, individual and group incentives, benefits, intensive training, performance appraisal, teamwork, employee involvement, work life balance policies and information sharing (Lepak,

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Liao, Chung, & Harden, 2006). It is a way to increase the involvement of lowerlevel employees, leading to enhanced intrinsic motivation, organisational commitment and job satisfaction (Appelbaum, Bailey, Berg, & Kallenberg, 2000). Most of these HRM policies and practices have been studied before, but their theoretical and empirical findings cannot be directly translated and applied to SMTs. And rather than focusing on one or two team-based HRM policies and practices, it is important to consider the whole HRM system, because strategic HRM research has argued that it is the HRM system that can induce competitive advantage rather than individual practices (Kepes & Delery, 2007). Therefore, we shall discuss the most frequently studied HRM activities (policies and practices) and discuss how they, in combination, can contribute to the effectiveness of SMTs.

HRM Activities within Self-managing Teams Before describing the governance mechanisms that are used to manage HRM activities, it is important to first analyse the HRM activities in organisations with SMTs and depict how teams develop and enact these responsibilities. We discuss the most prevalent HRM policies and practices and outline how these activities are executed when introducing SMTs. We focus on recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management, compensation and rewards, job design, and planning and scheduling. These HRM policies and practices have been discussed extensively in the HRM literature. Literature reviews and meta-analyses have shown that HRM systems and practices have a positive effect on performance (e.g. Combs, Liu, Hall, & Ketchen, 2006). Nevertheless, to date, existing studies have not yet focused on the role of SMTs in these HRM activities. Current knowledge about HRM policies and practices may not necessarily be applied to a context where SMTs are responsible for designing, implementing and evaluating HRM activities. Most studies in the HRM literature have focused on HRM policies and practices as designed by the HRM department. Recently, studies have examined HRM as implemented by line managers (Bos-Nehles, Van Riemsdijk, & Looise, 2013), as perceived by employees (Liao, Toya, Lepak, & Hong, 2009; Nishii, Lepak, & Schneider, 2008), and as consumed by employees (Meijerink, Bondarouk, & Lepak, 2016; Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017). To address the relative absence of teams’ responsibility for HRM activities, we discuss different HRM policies and practices here and describe these HRM activities in the context of SMTs. More specifically, we provide an overview of different HRM policies and practices, describe how organisations can design them for teams, and illustrate how they are materialised by SMTs. Recruitment and Selection Recruitment and selection are crucial strategic practices in HRM (Wilkinson & Johnstone, 2016). Recruitment is defined as ‘[…] the process of generating a pool of

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capable people to apply for employment to an organisation’ (Bratton & Gold, 2007, p. 239), whereas selection is the process through which HRM actors use instruments to choose a person from a pool of candidates who is most likely to succeed in the job (Bratton & Gold, 2007). In traditional organisations, the HRM department plays an important role in recruiting and selecting new employees. Studies show that recruitment and selection for autonomous teams is somewhat different from recruitment and selection in a traditional organisational environment (Morgeson et al., 2005). This is especially the case for achieving contextual performance, which is more related to activities that support the organisational, social and psychological environment (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993) rather than task performance (which reflects activities that are formally part of the job). This has implications for how HRM systems can support the transformation to self-management, as well as how teams themselves can recruit and select new colleagues. Social skills, conscientiousness, extraversion and teamwork knowledge are important factors for achieving contextual performance (Morgeson et al., 2005), which might not be automatically present in the traditional teams. This raises the question of what self-managing organisations can do in this area should they intervene and take care of the recruitment and selection of new employees who meet these criteria? Or should they help teams to deal with this issue themselves, with the risk that nothing changes? A work design in which HRM decisions about, for example staffing, are made by the team positively affects both team empowerment and team performance (Mathieu et al., 2006). How should this be managed by the organisation? Organisations that choose to introduce SMTs have to consider the type of employees they need to adopt SMTs successfully. Research has shown that some types of employees are more suitable for working in teams, especially those who are more collectivistic and open to teamwork (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2000). Team members of SMTs are jointly responsible for the recruitment and selection of new employees. Recruitment and selection are important tasks for SMTs, because team members can make decisions about whom they want to work with. It is especially significant given that team members are more dependent on each other and have to make decisions together. For that reason, it is unsurprising that employees in SMTs of Livio reported their involvement in recruitment and selection activities. Two SMT members are usually involved in the recruitment and selection process. We encountered teams that preferred to be involved in the whole process, as well as teams that only selected the candidates that were recruited for them. For example, some teams developed recruitment processes themselves by making flyers, newspaper advertisements and posts on social media. The teams that made use of this opportunity also claimed that recruiting by themselves is more effective, because they could select someone who fits their specific context: As soon as the recruitment process is being handled by the HRM department, it becomes too general. But if we start a recruitment action ourselves, with flyers, pictures, and text, it works perfectly, and we’ll find someone. That is the advantage of being self-steering. (SMT)

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Workforce planning

Figure 1:

New employee needed

Recruitment

Evaluation criteria

Job interviews

Selecting candidate

Induction and socialisation

The Hiring Process in Self-managing Teams.

Other teams were more dependent on the HRM department when it came to recruitment, meaning that they waited for them to select potential candidates. Nevertheless, the SMTs conducted the job interviews and made the decisions about whom to select as a new colleague. SMTs reported that the responsibility for the selection process was beneficial for them, because they could select a candidate with the desired characteristics, for example in terms of contract size and preferred hours of work. The HRM department was mainly involved in the administrative activities such as employment conditions and contracts and administering them in the systems. The SMTs were also responsible for monitoring new recruits during their trial period and making decisions about whether or not the employees’ contracts should be extended. The entire process of hiring a new colleague consists of several steps, from analysing whether a new employee is needed to induction and monitoring the newly recruited colleague (Figure 1). Training and Development Another key strategic HRM practice for organisational effectiveness is training and development (Peretz & Rosenblatt, 2011). Training and development focus on improving the knowledge, skills and abilities of employees. Training is defined as the range of programs to develop these knowledge, skills and abilities (Evans & Davis, 2005). In a meta-analysis, training has been found to positively affect organisational performance (Combs et al., 2006). Traditionally, developing training and development programs has been an important activity of HRM departments. When organisations adopt SMTs, the responsibility for training and development is shared between the HRM department and the teams. While HRM departments formerly assessed the training needs, now SMTs are required to actively engage in analysing the training and development they need. The HRM department can support this by introducing programs that fit the needs of SMTs. Therefore, organisations should pay attention to training, both for individual employees and for teams. A meta-analysis by Salas et al. (2008) showed that team training interventions are a worthwhile approach for organisations to increase team performance. This means that training should target the team as a whole, instead of the individual employee, and aim to improve team processes, for example by training teams to make better decisions (Orasanu & Fischer, 1997). Studies show that team-based HRM support such as cross-training, teambased pay and participation in staffing decisions are significantly related to team empowerment (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999), indicating that support from the HRM

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department is important for SMTs (Rapp et al., 2016). Research also suggests that team-based HRM support such as training and feedback positively influence outcomes such as team empowerment and team processes (Mathieu et al., 2006). For example, cross-training can lead to higher flexibility and experience, eventually increasing employees’ confidence in their own skills (Guzzo, Yost, Campbell, & Shea, 1993). In turn, these employees might train their colleagues to successfully perform selection, appraisal and feedback tasks (Gibson & Kirkman, 1999). In this way, training about HRM tasks provided by the organisation can lead to improved HRM knowledge in SMTs. In SMTs at Livio, we found that training and development were based on a combination of team and individual responsibilities. It showed that the management made most of the decisions regarding the quantity and content of training sessions. Team members chose what training courses they want to follow and when, but their choice was restricted by the courses provided by the organisation. The training courses were provided by a team of specialists within the organisation, in combination with incidental sessions given by external parties such as educational institutions, coach-managers, or specialised employees. Livio implemented an e-Learning system in which employees could choose individually to go to training or to do an assessment (mandatory). The HRM department developed its own ‘Livio Academy’ for this purpose. The Academy was mostly focused on the development of knowledge and knowledge-sharing among employees as part of the ‘expertise promotion’ program and organisational changes. Every team member could access the e-Learning system, in which they could see the completed education and training and the knowledge and skills that are needed per team. Internal and external training could be found including courses about team tasks and skills. Employees also attended symposia that were offered through the Academy or national professional association. These symposia were visited by nurses with more advanced education, who needed to get accreditation points for their nurse registration. Within Livio, SMTs could also develop their own training and initiatives. We found examples of SMTs who arranged their own training courses, for which they used the education budget that was provided to them by the organisation. These instances show that SMTs consult with the coach-manager or HRM department to approve and organise these training sessions. Eventually, teams were made responsible for getting the right qualifications and organising training sessions tailored to their needs, with the support of the Livio Academy. Livio also offered several tools for team development: a team development instrument (TDI), a talent motivation analysis (TMA) and the solution-oriented interactive method (SIM). The team development instrument is what Wageman, Hackman, and Lehman (2005) refer to as a team diagnostic survey, which is an instrument to diagnose the strengths and weaknesses of teams. The TDI of Livio provided insights about the development of the team and what aspects could be improved to form a more professional team. The TMA revealed individual talents, motives, and development opportunities, and facilitated the process of task division within SMTs: it aimed to find out which team tasks would fit which person best. When all team members used this tool, a team TMA could be made to identify and

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analyse the SMT as a whole, and facilitated the effective division of tasks and roles. The idea behind the TMA was to use it for recruitment and selection, to analyse which skills and talents to look for in new colleagues. The SIM was provided to SMTs to enhance communication quality and help them to effectively organise meetings. These instruments show that providing training instruments is important for SMTs and supports the notion that team-based training can enhance team effectiveness (Mathieu et al., 2006; Rapp et al., 2016). The interviews with SMTs at Livio revealed that these tools have been used by only a small number of teams because of a limited capacity to conduct them. Those teams that have used the tools were relatively positive about them, and other teams indicated that they would also like to use them. Performance Management, Appraisal and Feedback Performance management is the process of continuously identifying, measuring and developing the performance of employees and teams, and aligning the performance with strategic objectives of the organisation (Aguinis, 2009). Performance management describes the HRM activities that are designed to motivate employees to perform in line with the organisational goals (Farndale, 2016). One element of performance management is performance appraisal, which is the evaluation talk or assessment of an employee’s performance over a period of time (Farndale, 2016). In traditional organisations, the HRM department often develops and implements performance management practices. In close coordination with managers, appraisal talks are held to ensure that employees are assessed on the basis of the organisational objectives. However, after introducing SMTs, performance management will look completely different. On the one hand, the teams will need to be assessed on their effectiveness and performance. On the other hand, team members need to provide feedback to each other about their individual performance. Developmental feedback by peers in SMTs has a significant positive effect on members’ group-related attitudes (Druskat & Wolff, 1999). In line with the definition of Aguinis (2009), the performance goals of teams should be aligned with the organisational objectives, the performance should be evaluated and accompanied by feedback, and good performance should be recognised and rewarded. Therefore, the following measures are important to consider when managing the performance of SMTs. First, team members need to understand and agree upon the objectives set for them by the organisations before making their own plans, monitoring their progress and evaluating their performance (Armstrong & Baron, 2005). Organisations that work with SMTs also adopt objectives for their teams. The development of objectives and goals was found to be part of the management’s responsibilities. The management and HRM department of Livio were focused on outcome-based performance management, meaning that they set goals in terms of productivity and quality. These goals were seen as boundary conditions, within which teams need to perform. SMTs were involved in goal-setting regarding how to achieve these

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outcomes, for example by making improvement plans for the next year and developing team goals. Second, to achieve the SMTs’ objectives, feedback that shows the progress towards the goals is necessary (Locke & Latham, 2006). To provide feedback, the performance should be monitored and reported back to the SMTs. Traditionally, performance appraisal talks are used as a formal feedback mechanism to assess an employee’s performance. In SMTs, there are no managers who can hold these talks, and therefore team members evaluate each other. This means team members are responsible for peer feedback (Druskat & Wolff, 1999). The organisation needs to provide feedback about the performance of the team as a whole. At Livio, SMTs received feedback about their team performance from the organisation and feedback about individual performance from the team members. The performance management at Livio from the organisational perspective was focused on performance objectives and outcomes. More specifically, the management developed four important performance indicators for SMTs: productivity, service quality, client satisfaction and employee satisfaction. For example, teams needed to spend at least 80% of their hours doing productive work hours spent on clients depending on their function. This goal was pre-determined, and teams could not influence it. The time that SMTs spent on meetings, discussions and performing HRM-related tasks (team tasks) was also categorised as non-productive. For each of the team performance indicators (TPIs), the organisation developed instruments: financial performance overviews, quality inspections, client surveys and employee surveys. Productivity scores were presented to teams on a dashboard, where all information about hours worked was made available. In the future, Livio wants to include the other TPIs on the dashboard as well. For the performance evaluation within teams, SMTs rely on trust and controls (De Jong & Dirks, 2012). Trust in teams refers to the level of trust that team members have in their team colleagues (Langfred, 2004). Trust plays a crucial role in informal control and has also been found to support team performance (Dirks, 1999). However, there still needs to be a certain level of monitoring, even in teams with high levels of trust (Langfred, 2004). To enforce control, peer monitoring can be used, with team members keeping track of their colleagues to ensure that rules and procedures are followed properly and goals are achieved (Salas, Sims, & Burke, 2005). SMTs at Livio organised team meetings during which the TPIs were discussed and team members gave feedback on each other’s functioning. During these meetings, other team goals were discussed as well, in order to assess whether they had been achieved. The task-holder ‘finances and productivity’ is responsible for communicating and tracking the goals and evaluation of TPIs to the team, and s/he receives weekly updates with productivity scores including team and individual scores. The team as a whole is responsible for the performance; the task-owner only informs, identifies and monitors the performance of the team and its individual members. To make this system work, employees need to administer their client hours, travel time and other working hours correctly, an activity that is also checked and monitored by the task-owner. The SMTs were also made responsible for discussing incidents and making plans for improvement. Coach-managers and

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management also received the performance outcomes of teams and monitored teams that underperformed. The official responsibilities of SMTs did not extend as far as evaluating coworkers’ performance. At the same time, several interviewees reported that giving and receiving peer feedback was important. Some teams had held evaluation talks with coach-managers, but most team members reported an absence of official appraisal talks. Instead, SMTs relied on peer feedback, which was usually provided during team meetings, and concerned issues of quality, communication, scheduling and performance in general. Some interviewees did report the management of underperforming employees, which was mostly addressed by higher-level nurses in a talk, sometimes together with the coach-manager who is also involved by the team if a team member is underperforming and not improving. Yes, we are a team in which we can say anything to each other, and with issues concerning the quality of care or the lack of quality I will start a conversation. (SMT)

Along with peer feedback, Livio started implementing a self-evaluation tool for feedback. This is what is called self-appraisal by Campbell and Lee (1988), a system in which employees evaluate their own performance in contrast to one in which performance is assessed by supervisors. By using this tool, every team member could perform a self-evaluation every 24 months, if needed with the support of the HRM department. The SMTs could decide which aspects should be included in this evaluation. The goal behind this tool is to use it for the division of team tasks and roles and for developing a training and education plan. Although this tool was presented in documents and discussed during interviews with managers, we did not find support for its use in practice yet. To summarise, the performance management practices are mainly focused on outcome-based control and incidents or underperformance among team members. This runs the risk that attention is only being paid to negative feedback, and there is no room for positive or developmental feedback. Salary and Rewards Reward management has been referred to as the area of HRM that involves how employees are remunerated and motivated to improve performance (White, 2016). In traditional organisations, compensation and benefits programs are often the responsibility of HRM professionals. Usually, these programs have a strong link with performance management, in order to match compensation with performance. In organisations with SMTs, performance management is the responsibility of the team, and therefore assessing and rewarding performance at the individual level becomes unfeasible. Only SMTs know how individuals are performing. Therefore, when organisations implement team-based work, they often choose to introduce team-based rewards as well (Johnson, 1993; Manz & Sims, 1995). Team-based rewards are defined as rewards that team members receive, which are dependent on

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the performance of the team as a whole (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2000). Some studies found that team-based rewards can enhance team performance (Mohrman, Cohen, & Morhman, 1995), while other studies found no performance differences between teams receiving individual and team rewards (Wageman, 1995). Rewards and feedback should be linked to the performance of the team to support positive team behaviour (Campion et al., 1993). Johnson et al. (2006) found that the reward system of a team influences the level of information-sharing and thereby also the decision-making process. Research has also shown that different types of employees are receptive to team-based rewards. For example, Kirkman and Shapiro (2000) found that employees who were more collectivistic and open to teams were more sympathetic towards team-based rewards. At Livio, we did not identify a comprehensive compensation system. In fact, because the organisation was bound to collective labour agreements in the Netherlands and the organisation is publicly financed, almost no attention had been paid to rewards. The salaries of team members are determined by Livio, based on standardised salary scales. There was no indication of performance-based rewards, but there was also no consensus among interviewees whether pay-forperformance would be a good thing. Livio did offer other benefits to its employees, including health insurance and discounts for items in its store. Although these benefits were appreciated, this was not perceived as a motivator for better performance. One team-based reward practice was giving boxes of candies to the teams with the highest client satisfaction scores. Several employees indicated that they had higher expectations about rewards for these team performance indicators: We scored high on the client satisfaction research and I expected a little bit better reward. (SMT)

Livio decided to focus more on team-based rewards later in the process of implementation. They made the decision to reward high-performing teams by letting them keep any surplus that they had left at the end of the year, whereas before any surplus was returned to the organisation. This meant that working more efficiently could lead to negative effects within teams, as fewer hours would be worked and therefore fewer employees were needed. The effects of this decision were not yet recognised in our empirical data.

Job Design Job design is defined as ‘the content and organisation of one’s work tasks, activities, relationships and responsibilities’ (Parker, 2014, p. 662). There are two distinct approaches to job design, the first one being the technical or mechanistic approach and the second the psychological or motivational approach, arguing for or against specialised jobs (Morgeson & Campion, 2002). A key theoretical perspective is the job characteristics model (JCM) of Hackman and Oldham (1976), which argues

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that there are five core job characteristics: skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy and job-based feedback. Motivational job characteristics have been shown to predict performance, commitment and job satisfaction (Humphrey, Nahrgang, & Morgeson, 2007). The socio-technical systems theory has been influential regarding the job design of teams. SMTs are based on the socio-technical systems theory of design, which proposes that the workplace consists of social and technical systems (Cummings, 1978). SMTs have interdependent tasks and are responsible for providing a product or a service; and they have discretion over decisions concerning work assignments, work methods and planning of work (Goodman, Devadas, & Griffith Hughson, 1988). Although empowerment researchers have argued that SMTs are a feature of job design (Mathieu et al., 2006), in this section we describe how other job characteristics are affected when SMTs are introduced. In other words, we argue that SMTs arise from a choice of job design, and in turn these SMTs can change their own job design. In fact, SMTs make decisions about the content and organisation of work tasks, activities and relationships. Hence, we focus on how SMTs make decisions about tasks and activities within their teams. The Livio case study highlighted several ways in which the job design changed after the introduction of SMTs. The management made decisions about the basic team structure and introduced the team framework, including the team composition, number of employees, required qualifications and team tasks. It also made strategic decisions about the scheduling tools and the development instruments of SMTs. In a way, the management developed a framework for SMTs that was quite extensive and left few decisions to the SMTs themselves. Hence, the case study shows several job design choices, which we will describe in more details below. First, the composition of teams is an important success factor for SMTs. The results of our case study highlight that an appropriate team composition is one of the crucial preconditions for teams to succeed. The composition of Livio’s teams changed significantly during a period of restructuring, creating turbulence among employees. Some teams had problems attracting sufficient numbers of qualified colleagues, leading to difficulties in filling work schedules. During the transformation towards SMTs, the organisation decided that employees should be well educated because their jobs would become more complex. For that reason, it offered training courses to employees to allow them to attain higher qualifications. Multiple interviewees reported that the education and enhanced expertise had a positive effect on the team dynamics, but also increased work pressure and absenteeism: One of the things that are very pleasant is proper expertise. The expertise has gone up. For example, in our team we have 4 nurses now, and the minimum qualifications are level 3. (SMT)

Some teams had the advantage that their team composition favoured the idea of self-management more. A statement that recurred in many interviews was that teams with more highly educated employees could be more self-managing. Nurses with more qualifications were allowed to make their own care assessment,

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indicating the type and amount of care needed for the client, which makes them and the team more autonomous. And teams that had already worked for some time without a manager or were located separately from their manager(s) were also already more independent and therefore could adapt more easily to SMTs, as highlighted by the following quotes: But as team [name], we had a head start, because we had already worked for some time without a supervisor, these were the nurses level 5. We worked for 1.5 years without a nurse level 5. (SMT) Team [name] has its own location, which also stimulates [for self-management]; running your own business. […] I really think it has to do with the feeling of the team; ‘OK, we really have to do it ourselves now’. (Coach-manager)

During the first stages of the transformation process towards SMTs, some teams missed the support from the organisation to explain what was expected of them. Team composition seems to be an especially important aspect of the first phase of transformation because the decision had to be made of which employees would form a SMT. In our case study, some traditional teams suddenly became SMTs, without considering their composition. As one member of such a team explained, this can lead to deterioration of the team dynamics by worsening of the atmosphere and functioning of teams: A team with only followers is useless, there has to be some leadership. However, a team with only leaders is also no good. There has to be a right balance, but that is something that wasn’t considered at all. […] The old teams just became the new self-managing teams. (SMT)

Based on the above, we can conclude that the team composition of SMTs is a crucial factor for their effectiveness. The most important feature of team composition in our case study organisation was the collaboration between nurses with different levels of education. To our surprise, throughout the interviews, the qualifications of employees were discussed in terms of collaboration. While in some teams, nurses and nurse assistants worked together very well, in other teams there were constant clashes over leadership and control. Therefore, the attitude of the nurses and nurse assistant towards each other is very important to create healthy team dynamics. Second, research showed that power dispersion within teams is an important predictor of team outcomes (Greer & van Kleef, 2010). In line with this, the idea of Livio was that one team-task was performed by two employees and that all tasks were divided over different employees. By doing so, the organisation aimed to prevent burdening some employees with all the tasks or making one employee the de facto team leader. In reality, the results showed that in some teams, the nurses were responsible for performing all team-tasks while the nurse assistants were not involved. Nevertheless, we also found multiple instances in which teams shared the HRM responsibilities more equally, often encouraged by nurses who dared to give responsibilities to the whole team. Hence, the ways in which power is distributed

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within teams is more dependent on the teams themselves than on formal rules from the organisation. Third, team decision-making was found to be an important aspect of the job design of SMTs. The difference between effective and ineffective teams depended to a large extent on the team dynamics concerning decision-making and leadership. For example, team members could fight for leadership positions, leading to lower effectiveness, while teams that share leadership and address issues together seemed to be more content with the functioning of their teams: But I have to say, our team has an advantage. We simply have a good team, and I see a lot of teams around me where things don’t run this smoothly. There are clashes in these teams because there are too many people who want to take charge, which does not work. And in this team we collaborate, we can discuss things very well. I think that is most important. (SMT)

In our interviews, we found that the organisation aimed to influence the decisionmaking of the teams. The organisation’s vision was to implement consent-based decision-making instead of consensus-based decision-making. This means that decisions are made based on a ‘no objections policy’, which entails that decisions can be approved as long as team members do not have major objections. The fear is that consensus-based decision-making in which everybody needs to agree leads to the postponement of decisions because teams cannot reach consensus. To effectuate this philosophy, Livio started to provide training courses in an instrument that teams could use to make decisions, the solution-oriented interactive method (see also ‘Training and Development’ section): We have chosen for an instrument, an ideology, the ‘solution-oriented interactive method’. In essence, this is about ‘yes, and […]’ and not ‘yes, but […]’. It is about finding solutions together. And the solution should not be based on consensus, but on consent. That is very essential. So you won’t discuss until you reach consensus. No, the outcome should be consent: ‘we will take these actions, unless someone can convince me that is will lead to fatal errors. (HRM professional)

Workforce Planning and Scheduling Planning and scheduling concern the development of work schedules for the whole team. Workforce planning is a core HRM activity that involves ensuring the right number of people at the right time, in the right place with the right skills, and with alignment to the organisation’s strategy (Baron, Clarke, Pass, & Turner, 2010). Given that many teams work in shifts, planning is crucial, and scheduling is an important task. In the literature, workforce planning and scheduling are the responsibility of SMTs (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001), and activities that SMTs are expected to perform more effectively than external actors (Rapp et al., 2016). Being able to set schedules is also one of the factors that contributes to the psychological empowerment of teams (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999).

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At Livio, workforce planning was found to be an important HRM activity because of the labour shortages in the healthcare sector in the Netherlands. During our research, many SMTs were understaffed and had difficulty to conduct the workforce planning successfully. SMTs were granted a high degree of autonomy to make decisions about workforce planning. Information was made available to them about their productivity and hours spent (see ‘Performance Management’ section), on which basis they could make decisions about workforce planning. SMTs first needed to analyse the demand for care and align this with the amount of contract hours available in the team. A disparity between the two meant that SMTs had to take action, for example by hiring new personnel or by increasing the contract hours of current team members. The responsibility for these staffing issues was formerly assigned to the manager, but since the introduction of SMTs, the teams themselves were made responsible for workforce planning issues. In fact, managers reported that effective workforce planning was one of the indicators that teams could be successfully self-managing. This included both responding to new clients or a higher demand for care by increasing contract hours, and decreasing contract hours if the number of clients declined. These tasks require strong coordination between the task-owners ‘recruitment’ and ‘finances’ because they are both needed to make decisions about changing the team composition in terms of contract hours. Some SMTs were already calculating whether they were overstaffed or understaffed themselves, while the majority of SMTs still depended on the help of HRM, a business controller, or a coach-manager. Several interviewees from both SMTs and HRM indicated that the HRM department and/or the coach-manager helped teams with making these calculations or conducted a final check before advertising a job vacancy: Someone [from the team] calls me then, with the task recruitment and selection, telling me they need a nurse for 16 hours. And they already coordinated this with finances. It could be that I have to check this, sometimes they ask me this. Can we actually hire someone? (HRM professional) We make our own decisions [about staffing]. Recently, we hired a new colleague for 32 hours because we had a lot of overtime work. That is the point when we say, OK, guys, we need to hire someone new. (SMT) Of course you recognise that the supply of clients grows and that you need to work more hours, more direct client hours to be exact. And if you cannot cope within the team, you’ll need additional capacity. (SMT) Sometime you can see in advance that the demand is increasing, that there are more requests for care or that our routes have become extra busy. You can expect to add another route, and then you see that you are short on capacity, or we just need to plan extra hours. (SMT)

Regarding the right skills, employees in SMTs were able to identify their needs regarding training and qualifications (see ‘Training and Development’ section), including if they wanted to develop a new skill or start an education. In addition, team members of SMTs were required to have minimum qualifications, and the

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certificates of new hires were checked. In terms of alignment with the organisational strategy, specific performance goals were set by the organisation (see ‘Performance Management’ section). These goals were presented on a dashboard and monitored by one or two persons in each SMT, and these goals were discussed during team meetings. Once the demand for work was known and the workforce planning was completed, the work schedules had to be made. The ways in which work schedules are determined has important implications for employees and their families (Kossek, Piszczek, McAlpine, Hammer, & Burke, 2016). In many organisations a scheduler develops and monitors the working schedules of employees. Nevertheless, research has shown that more control over working times leads to positive employee outcomes such as work life balance and job-related outcomes for example, by introducing self-scheduling (Nijp, Beckers, Geurts, Tucker, & Kompier, 2012). At Livio, the decision was made to introduce self-scheduling for teams, with an online tool that team members can use to plan their working schedules. By doing so, SMTs are made responsible for solving short-term scheduling issues within the team. During our interviews, scheduling was mentioned most often in terms of self-management responsibilities and devolution of HRM activities. All teams are reported to have adopted scheduling responsibilities to some degree. Several interviewees stated that they had to solve scheduling problems among themselves, rather than asking the manager what to do. In addition, Livio decided to cancel the ‘flexpool’ of workers who could be hired in case of sick leave. Instead, SMTs are responsible for solving these planning issues themselves. In all SMTs, there are one or two team members responsible for the scheduling of the whole team, the so-called scheduling taskowners. While all team members could indicate their preferences for working times, the task-owners had the final say and determined the final schedule. They were responsible for the absenteeism within their teams, kept track of working hours of all team members, and were active in rescheduling, redistribution of tasks, and short-term redesigning of client routes. Changes to existing routes for example, due to new clients or client turnover were included in the schedules by the SMTs themselves. Therefore, the process of planning consisted of the following steps: (1) analysing the amount of work based on clients, (2) assessing and calculating the number of working hours needed and (3) developing a schedule (see Figure 2). Hence, SMTs are responsible for workforce planning and scheduling, and the organisation takes care of the software to facilitate them.

# Clients

Figure 2:

Workforce planning

The Process of Planning by Self-managing Teams.

Scheduling

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Governance Mechanisms and Human Resource Management As we have seen, the coordination and execution of HRM activities in self-managing teams are important for their effectiveness, partly because SMTs are responsible for organising their tasks. This entails HRM activities such as recruitment and selection, training, and scheduling, but also marketing and finance. Many of these tasks were formerly the responsibility of the first-line manager (see the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’), but when an organisation decides to implement SMTs, these responsibilities mostly shift to the team members themselves. In the strategic HRM literature, one of the most prominent propositions is the concept of the HRM system as a source of competitive advantage rather than individual practices (Kepes & Delery, 2007). In the field of HRM, this refers to the idea of fit. Lepak and Gowan (2009) describe internal fit as the degree to which HRM practices are consistent with each other in order to achieve organisational objectives. A coherent and internally aligned HRM system can benefit from synergies between practices and therefore create positive organisational outcomes (Becker & Huselid, 1998). This so-called configurational perspective adopts the idea of equifinality and suggests that there are complementarities between different HRM practices that lead to performance (Delery & Doty, 1996). For that reason, it is important that the HRM activities of organisations with SMTs are aligned with each other. HRM policies and practices in these organisations are determined by multiple actors. SMTs are partly responsible for designing, monitoring and evaluating HRM practices themselves. This could mean that aligning HRM practices with organisational goals and with each other becomes more challenging. On the one hand, HRM practices within the whole organisation need to be aligned, and on the other hand HRM practices within SMTs need to be aligned. As a consequence, governance mechanisms in SMTs are important and necessary to achieve effectiveness. In the next section, we discuss different types of governance mechanisms that can be used to organise HRM policies and practices and ensure alignment of HRM activities, and we show how governance mechanisms are used in practice by organisations and SMTs. We start by describing the two types of fit that are discussed in the literature in terms of alignment: horizontal and vertical fit. Horizontal and Vertical Alignment The ‘best fit’ concept in HRM research entails both the horizontal fit (or internal fit) and vertical fit (external fit), denoting the coherence among individual HRM practices in a system and alignment between HRM practices and strategy (Delery & Doty, 1996). In other words, horizontal fit refers to the idea that there are synergistic effects between HRM practices, meaning that the value of HRM practices cannot be simply added up, but that we should look at complementarities between practices (Gerhart, 2007; Kepes & Delery, 2007) . These synergistic effects are sometimes called powerful connections and deadly combinations (Becker, Huselid, Pickus, & Spratt,

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1997). The idea behind this effect is that complementary HRM activities have greater effects on organisational effectiveness than the sum of individual HRM practices’ effects (Ichniowski, Shaw, & Prennushi, 1997). Kepes and Delery (2007) mention the example of performance appraisal and pay-for-performance systems, which should be synergistic because they work together. On the other hand, there could also be negative synergies, for example through a combination of teamwork and individual incentives, which could do harm when used in combination. Vertical fit entails the alignment of HRM practices with the organisation’s strategy. In later publications, more types of fit are being addressed: from within HRM system vertical fit (fit between philosophies, policies and practices) to intra-HRM activity fit (fit between practices within one policy domain) (Kepes & Delery, 2007). It should not be a surprise that organisations with SMTs face issues with both vertical and horizontal fit of their HRM activities. Based on these ideas of fit, we describe mechanisms below that can be used to ensure HRM alignment. We focus on the two main types of fit for organisations with SMTs horizontal and vertical fit by discussing how HRM practices are aligned with each other within SMTs, and how the HRM practices are aligned with the organisation’s objectives and strategy. Self-managing Teams and Governance Mechanisms One way to ascertain these different types of fit is through governance mechanisms. Governance mechanisms sometime called control mechanisms can make sure that all these activities are aligned. They are described in many fields of management and usually refer to instruments that are used to influence individual actions in such a way that employees’ collective action leads to desirable organisational outcomes (Foss, 2007; Gooderham, Minbaeva, & Pedersen, 2011). They can help to achieve coordination between HRM activities and synchronization with other parts of the organisation. Governance of the HRM function can ensure that the interests of management are aligned with employees’ interests across organisational levels (Farndale et al., 2010). The vertical alignment of HRM practices with business systems is necessary for HRM to be effective (Brewster, Houldsworth, Sparrow, & Vernon, 2016), as well as the horizontal alignment between HRM practices (Wood, 1999). Because alignment is so crucial for performance, the HRM function is expected to ensure that vertical and horizontal alignment are achieved (Farndale et al., 2010). The introduction of self-management in organisations can severely impact the way in which HRM is delivered to employees. The so-called HRM supply chain refers to ‘the structure and delivery channels of the HRM function, the flow of HRM practices across the organisation, and the management or governance techniques applied to ensure both structure and flow are operating effectively to reduce uncertainty and achieve organisational goals’ (Farndale et al., 2010, p. 850). As the delivery channels of HRM practices change during the transformation towards selfmanaging teams, the result is that the HRM supply chain and the governance of

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HRM practices need to change accordingly. In the original definition of the HRM supply chain, the ultimate customers of the HRM function are the employees and line managers (Farndale et al., 2010). To facilitate the process that HRM practices are consistent, transparent and experienced as intended, it is crucial that there are coordination mechanisms in place (Farndale et al., 2010). These coordination mechanisms change with the introduction of SMTs. Given that HRM professionals do not exclusively determine HRM practices any longer and line managers are not responsible for their implementation (see the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’), team members themselves need to coordinate and perform the HRM-related tasks. Therefore, line managers can no longer secure the alignment between recruitment and training practices. The teams themselves need to consider how their recruitment practices fit with their training and performance appraisals. Governance mechanisms are a method to achieve proper coordination between the different parts of the HRM system, to safeguard positive synergies between HRM practices. They need to reflect both the horizontal alignment between HRM activities and the vertical alignment of HRM activities at different organisational levels. Ultimately, they also need to ensure that HRM practices are aligned with the organisational objectives. There are multiple types of mechanisms: (1) mechanisms that ensure that HRM practices within teams are aligned, (2) mechanisms that ensure that HRM practices between teams are aligned, (3) mechanisms that coordinate HRM practices between teams and HRM departments and (4) mechanisms that coordinate the HRM practices between teams and managers. Hence, the introduction of SMTs disrupts the HRM supply chain and requires a change in governance mechanisms to support the vertical and horizontal alignment of HRM activities. Regarding vertical alignment ensuring that the HRM activities of teams are aligned with HRM activities of the HRM department/ organisation governance mechanisms are needed because of a traditional agency problem. According to agency theory, agents can be opportunistic and pursue goals that are in conflict with those of the principal (e.g. Eisenhardt, 1989). The teams (agents) can make decisions that are not in line with the intentions of the HRM department and management (principal), therefore the organisation develops governance (or control) mechanisms to ensure that teams do not act opportunistically. In line with agency theory, organisations have to consider the optimal contract form/control strategy for the relationship between the principal (organisation) and the agent (SMTs) (Eisenhardt, 1985). This strategy is based on the availability of information about the agent’s behaviour. When the principal can observe the agent’s behaviour, this presents a case of complete information, and both principal and agent know if the agent acted in accordance with expectations. However, often there is a case of incomplete information, because the principal cannot observe the agent. In this case, the principal can choose between two different strategies: (1) gain information about the agent’s behaviour and reward those behaviours or (2) reward the agent on the basis of outcomes/performance (Eisenhardt, 1985). Hence, based on agency theory, organisations that adopt SMTs should choose between two underlying strategies for

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control: outcome-based or behaviour-based. Both strategies can be implemented through the use of HRM practices such as performance management and rewards. Formal and Informal Governance Mechanisms There are two types of governance mechanisms available for organisations to ensure the compliance of SMTs: formal and informal mechanisms (Jaworski & MacInnis, 1989). Others divide these mechanisms into two broad categories: (1) formal control (contracts) and (2) social control (informal means) (Dyer, 1996; Uzzi, 1997), where social control mechanisms are based on trust to stimulate desirable behaviours, while formal control mechanisms rely on explicit contracts (Dyer and Singh, 1998). Formal controls are also represented by an ‘arm’s length’ relationship, meaning that the so-called ‘agent’ is constrained by controls of output (Maatman & Meijerink, 2017). They are written down, initiated by management to ensure that the behaviours of employees are in line with their objective (Jaworski & MacInnis, 1989). Informal or social control mechanisms are often unwritten and may not be consistent with the objective (Jaworski, 1988). An informal control mechanism also includes a relationship or norms-based approach (Farndale et al., 2010). In Table 1 we provide an overview (non-exhaustive) of examples of formal and informal governance mechanisms. These formal and informal governance mechanisms can substitute for each other (Farndale et al., 2010), meaning that organisations can choose either a more formal approach or a more informal approach. Other studies show that formal and informal control can also be used in combination. For example, Meijerink and Bondarouk (2013) claimed that these control mechanisms are interdependent in order to achieve high HRM shared service value. A study in China highlighted that formal and informal control may be substitutes in a domestic buyer-supplier relationship, but may be complementary in international relationships (Li, Xie, Teo, & Peng, 2010). A recent study added to this debate by showing that these formal and informal mechanisms are indeed dependent. In a study among HRM shared service centres (SSCs), Maatman and Meijerink (2017) have shown that formal control mechanisms (in this case contracts and service-level agreements) are negatively related to the service value of HRM SSCs, while this relationship becomes positive when mediated by informal control mechanisms (trust and shared language). In this Table 1: Overview of Formal and Informal Governance Mechanisms. Formal Governance Mechanisms Contracts, rules, procedures, audits, performance indices, dispute resolution mechanisms, reporting requirements, hierarchical

Informal Governance Mechanisms Trust, information sharing and communication, cooperation, empowerment, relationship-based, social control

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way, the use of formal control is dependent on the use of informal control and not the other way around. Informal controls can be further divided into professional and self-control, while formal controls can be distinguished into process and output controls (Jaworski & MacInnis, 1989). Formal controls can also be categorised as controls that are aimed at sanctioning and signalling whether there is a need to collaborate (Maatman & Meijerink, 2017). These informal and formal governance mechanisms also play a role at the team level, as teams use both trust and control to function effectively (De Jong & Dirks, 2012), with team trust entailing the level of trust that members of a team have in their colleagues on the team (Langfred, 2004). Trust is an important part of informal governance mechanisms. Although trust is found to be related to team performance (Dirks, 1999), there still needs to be a certain level of monitoring (Langfred, 2004). Several studies show that there is a positive relationship between trust and performance (De Jong & Elfring, 2010), while others find negative relationships (Langfred, 2004) or no relationships (Aubert & Kelsey, 2003). To enforce control, peer monitoring can be used, referring to team members who keep track of their colleagues to ensure that rules and procedures are followed properly (Salas et al., 2005). To summarise, the introduction of SMTs essentially entails a decentralisation of control. The control over HRM practices shifts from the HRM department and line managers to teams and team members. Several researchers have examined the governance mechanisms that are used in this decentralization of control to ensure that HRM value is created (Coelho, Martins, & Lobo, 2012; Farndale et al., 2010). Fundamentally, there are two levels of control mechanisms: between the organisation and teams, and within teams themselves. Control structures and mechanisms are often closely related to HRM practices. Some HRM practices are inherently a control mechanism, while other control mechanisms can be implemented through the use of HRM policies and practices. In the organisational control literature, there are two fundamental basics for control strategies: through performance evaluation and through minimising divergence of employees’ preferences (Eisenhardt, 1985; Ouchi, 1978). The first one can be achieved by HRM practices such as performance appraisal talks and rewards, and the second by recruitment and selection, training and socialisation (Eisenhardt, 1985). We analysed the governance mechanisms used in our case study, based on the above classification. The case study materials were analysed based on the themes from the literature, including formal and informal governance mechanisms, at the organisation level and the SMT level, to explore the vertical and horizontal governance mechanisms. Vertical Governance Mechanisms for SMTs Formal Governance Mechanisms: In almost all interviews with managers of Livio, formal governance mechanisms were described as success factor for SMTs. According to them, it was necessary for the organisation to develop a clear

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framework with parameters to facilitate teams to manage themselves. At the same time, these formal governance mechanisms ensure a degree of alignment between the different HRM activities. The first formal governance mechanism was the development of a policy document that described all the team tasks that needed to be fulfilled by SMTs. The organisation wanted to bring more structure to its teams and decided to write down tasks that teams should do themselves once they become self-managing. Together with contributions from multiple employees from the teams and the staff departments, these team tasks were written down. The second formal governance mechanism involved the introduction of parameters, a range of performance indicators that included performance goals and showed how teams functioned. A third formal governance mechanism related to the development of a dashboard. Of all the available company data, only the relevant data was selected and offered in a simplified form to the teams. A fourth formal governance mechanism involved monitoring HRM activities by identifying task-owners in teams. This allowed HRM professionals to directly contact SMTs about the team-tasks. The final formal mechanism is organisational support; the organisation developed instruments and training programs to facilitate learning and support for SMTs. For example, former line managers were trained in their new function as coach. Also, teams were offered e-learning modules to get the necessary qualifications and to learn new methods. The first mechanism can be categorised as a process/behaviour-based control mechanism, designed to monitor employees and dictate how activities should be performed (Ouchi, 1978). The second and the third formal governance mechanisms are more closely related to output controls. They evaluate whether the teams’ activities lead to the required outcomes in order to ensure that they choose the right activities (Eisenhardt, 1985; Ouchi, 1978). Below we discuss how formal governance mechanisms are used to control the performance of HRM activities by SMTs. Recruitment and Selection: A key component of SMTs is that team members make decisions together about recruitment and selection. Nevertheless, the case study company displayed several mechanisms for governing recruitment. First, Livio actively recruited employees through official job channels (e.g. job agencies), with whom they had contracts. Second, the organisation used online and offline media to advertise jobs. Lastly, team members were encouraged to use their own connections to recruit new colleagues. These examples show that Livio put mechanisms in place that could ensure that SMTs would recruit suitable candidates for their vacancies. In our case study, we saw that teams and HRM also worked together regarding selection of new employees, and we came across several governance mechanisms on the part of HRM. First, task-owners had to contact the HRM department when they wanted to recruit a new employee. Second, HRM sometimes checked whether hiring a new employee was financially feasible, based on the information made available to them regarding team finances and contract hours. Third, the HRM department forwarded candidates in their database to teams, thereby checking

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which candidates go to which team. Lastly, HRM had a conversation with the selected candidates (selected by the team) to discuss terms of contract, check the resumes and qualifications, and deal with all administration. Based on these examples, we can conclude that the organisation also developed governance mechanisms to control the selection processes. To the irritation of some SMTs, HRM still needed to determine and sign the contracts as well, as the following examples show: I only check the resumes, does she have the IG certificate? (HRM professional) When I have a shortage in my team, I have to create a vacancy. I can do that all by myself, I can decide how many hours should be added. I can invite people. But as soon as there need to be conversations about salary and the actual labour contract, I cannot do that. That still needs to be done by HR. There is always a check afterwards. I actually do the preliminary work, which is not my job, and I have had extensive discussions about that with the organisation. Actually, I am doing the tasks of HR. (SMT)

In addition, the HRM department gathered information about teams and their current workforce. By doing so, the HRM department developed additional governance mechanisms to control the organisational recruitment process in several ways. First, it allowed them to check if teams actually invited the candidates that were sent to them. Second, HRM professionals coordinated recruitment between different teams to ensure that candidates were not rejected in one team while other teams desperately needed new colleagues. This allowed a governance mechanism of the organisation-wide recruitment process to be put in place, because SMTs were only responsible for the recruitment of their own team. For that reason, potential candidates were sometimes rejected, because of a misfit with the team. HRM professionals reported that in those cases, they took control of the recruitment process and reshuffled candidates over the teams, to prevent candidates from walking away from the organisation. Fourth, the HRM department developed an online recruitment system where people could apply for jobs. Lastly, the organisation developed rules for the composition of teams, decreasing the leeway to recruit employees by SMTs. As the following example shows, SMTs consist of a certain number of employees with pre-specified qualifications: At the moment, we can only hire nurse assistants or ‘higher’, and we can only hire two people with level 5 within our team. We can only have so many people of a certain level within our team, and the team size cannot be greater than 16. (SMT)

Training and Development: At Livio, we found that SMTs were responsible for their own training and qualifications. Nevertheless, Livio implemented a formal control mechanism to ensure alignment between the SMTs and organisational goals. They implemented an e-learning system through which employees have to follow courses and do assessments, the ‘Livio Academy’. The Academy was mostly focused on development and knowledge-sharing among employees, as part of the ‘expertise promotion’ program and organisational changes. The ultimate goal of the Academy was to ensure that all employees show the desired behaviours, so in that

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sense it is also a formal governance mechanism to ensure that organisational objectives are met, as the following shows: So those are the main themes that we are working on, and the goal is the desired behaviours that everyone will show, which we want to see and we have agreed upon. (HRM professional)

Furthermore, one of the team-tasks is called ‘expertise promotion’, and one of the activities was to check whether all team members have all the required qualifications. Another formal governance mechanism that was implemented at the start of the transition towards SMTs was the required education program. The most important aspect of the reorganisation of the organisation was the new qualification requirements of employees. That means that we asked 660 employees with level 2 if they wanted to train for level 3. That holds the organisation prisoner for 1 1.5 years. Because of those 660, there were 400 who said ‘No way.’ Well, that was the end of flexibility in the teams, because the level 2 employees were filling all the holes. (Management)

Performance Management: One of the ways to formally control SMTs is to introduce output-based governance mechanisms, to manage the performance of teams based on outcomes rather than behaviours (Eisenhardt, 1985). Many respondents at Livio reported about the importance of performance management. The organisation used output-based control mechanisms to ensure that organisational objectives are met. It is not surprising that the organisation used team-based performance management tools as it focused particularly on four parameters: productivity, quality of care, client satisfaction and employee satisfaction. Performance scores on these parameters were based on different types and sources of information: accounting information, internal and external audits, client surveys and employee surveys. Information from all SMTs was used to make a scorecard per team to see how well they were performing. Hence, for all parameters, the organisation has developed tools to generate scores. For example, internal audits were held to check the quality of care, in addition to the audits that were executed by the government institutions. In turn, the scores were made available to all SMTs and coach-managers within the business unit, with the idea that SMTs could also learn from each other. Based on these results and scores on the four parameters, teams were required to define goals and develop plans for improvement to achieve these goals. For example, one employee reported that their team created goals based on the quality of care assessment, which includes information about numbers of clients, etc. Based on these numbers, teams are expected to set goals and to discuss resources and plans for how to achieve those goals. I know that there is an annual LPZ-test, in which they analyse the number of patients, incontinence of patients, wound of patients, which results in a graph. Based on the graph you can develop new goals, like we want this percentage fewer patients with decubitus wounds, how are we going to do that? Well, by using resources and adapting measures. We have to do that ourselves. (SMT)

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Job Design and Task Division: An important aspect of SMTs is that team members together manage both operational and regulatory functions. However, the contradiction of SMTs is that the teams did not make the decision to transform themselves into self-management. The case study shows that many strategic decisions regarding job design are made at the management level. The board took the decision to introduce SMTs, not the teams themselves. The teams also had no control over the management and information systems with which they have to work. For example, regarding a new scheduling system, the management made the choice for a specific software package. Consequently, a project team developed so-called ‘teamtasks’ which represent all the regulatory tasks that SMTs have to do such as recruitment and selection, development and scheduling. Hence, a formal control mechanism to ensure that teams work according to the organisation’s objective was to prescribe the team-tasks that SMTs should do. A document was developed in which these tasks are described which can be classified as extended job descriptions. Moreover, the organisation also introduced rules about how to put these teamtasks into practice. First, team-task owners were introduced, referring to the team members who are responsible for a specific task, such as scheduling or finances. The team-task owner is delegated by the team to perform tasks related to a specific area. However, the team as a whole remained responsible for the results and performance of the team. Second, teams had to appoint a back-up person for every team-task owner. This is especially important because otherwise the team-tasks might not be done when the first responsible person is unavailable or leaves the organisation. Lastly, a rule was introduced that forced teams to change task-owners every two years, with the idea that some team members should not get too much power and to elicit new ideas about ways of working. Nevertheless, the division of teak-tasks was up to the teams themselves. They had to divide tasks among their members and were supported by a talent motivation analysis (TMA) to find out which tasks would be a good personal fit (see ‘Training and Development’ section). Workforce Planning and Scheduling: Livio decided to implement team-based selfscheduling using a new self-scheduling software package. This can be seen as a formal top-down control mechanism to ensure that SMTs fulfil their care tasks. Previously, it was predominantly the manager who decided which shifts were needed to serve all clients. After the introduction of SMTs, coach-managers and team members worked in close collaboration to make changes to the original workforce planning. Next, the team-based self-scheduling software allowed team members to choose their shifts in several rounds, from a completely voluntary first round to a third round in which the scheduling task-owners made the final decisions. Hence, the formal governance mechanisms to control the planning and scheduling mainly involved a control mechanism to influence the shifts that are needed. SMTs received more freedom of choice about how these shifts should be filled. The task-owner has an important role to make sure the schedule is complete and is therefore responsible for the satisfaction of team members with the working schedule. As a mechanism to support the introduction of the new scheduling

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system, training sessions were given to make employees familiar with the system and functionality: The last months we are more and more busy with that [scheduling], and we are supported by the person who is responsible for scheduling now. We also got instructions about what the system looks like. All our colleagues got these instructions. (SMT)

The organisation also introduced the software package to show employees how many hours they have worked, and how this compared with the contract hours. By adopting this system, the responsibility for working hours could be shifted to the employees, because they also had the information needed to make decisions. More importantly, by introducing this system, the organisation provided itself with performance information about the teams that was otherwise unavailable. The system translated the hours worked in productivity and financial outcomes, which the organisation used as a governance mechanism to ensure that teams were performing in line with organisational objectives. We use the system InPlanning, and we will use it for scheduling. We can see how many hours we have worked. […] You can also see what the schedule is and how many hours negative or positive I have. Because we work irregular hours, sometimes you have too many or too few hours, and the responsibility to manage this lies with us. However, the system indicates that you cannot have more than 20 hours negative. (SMT)

Informal Governance Mechanisms: At Livio, informal governance mechanisms played a less prominent role for vertical alignment at the organisational level. Nevertheless, we identified three main governance mechanisms that are more dependent on informal means and social control: (1) information sharing, (2) coaching and (3) organisational values. First, top-down information sharing was particularly important for SMTs to perform effectively. The most striking example was the transparency of staffing and planning. Previously, all the budgets and outcomes were made available only to line managers, but during the transition managers communicated these numbers to SMTs, in order to enhance their understanding about planning and work design. These insights show that teams can become self-managing only when they receive the right background information and the authority that they need to improve their work design and staffing. The sharing of information is predominantly based on trust that SMTs will use the information for the right purposes to improve their performance. In this case, it helped team members to know about the hours they could spend on certain care tasks and the actual hours they worked. Based on these numbers, they could improve the work and planning, and reduce costs: Our team coordinator opened up the numbers. That was for me the moment I thought: ‘we should have seen this much earlier’. The openness that you know how we are planning, […] that you see how things stand, how many hours you can spend. At this moment we are much more aware of these things, and I think we made a lot of progress in that area. (SMT)

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Second, another relationship-based mechanism to establish vertical alignment was the transformation from first-line managers to coach-managers. By implementing a new ‘leadership’ function, the former manager became responsible for coaching teams and helping them with the transformation to self-management (see also the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’). This way, coach-managers also formed a bridge between SMTs and the management to share information upwards and downwards and to identify problems within teams. Coaching became another informal governance mechanism that is used by Livio to ensure and control that SMTs behave and perform in line with the organisational objectives. Several coach-managers reported that they developed an overview of all task-owners within the teams, enabling them to facilitate and coach SMTs to align HRM activities. Third, Livio chose to change its organisational mission and core values. To accomplish the transition towards SMTs, Livio redesigned its core competences, main development areas, and its core values for employees. Its new core competences reflected the professionalism that Livio strives for: ‘decisiveness, expertise and collaboration’. When employees develop these competences, it enables them to take their own responsibilities and attain a high level of professionalism. By constantly communicating these principles to its employees, Livio aimed to change the culture within the organisation towards self-management. The attempt to change the organisational culture by addressing the importance of pre-selected behaviours should be seen as an informal governance mechanism, which is particularly based on social control. Horizontal Governance Mechanisms in SMTs Formal Governance Mechanisms: Vertical alignment between HRM activities was found to be primarily related to informal governance mechanisms. Nevertheless, the Livio case also highlighted multiple formal governance mechanisms at the team level (horizontal), used to manage and align the different HRM activities within the team. First, all teams held regular team meetings with all team members present. From all interviews it became clear that these team meetings were the most important mechanism to manage team issues and HRM activities within the team. Second, the task division between different team members was a crucial factor for designing, monitoring and evaluating HRM activities within the team. Third, many interviews showed that rules for decision-making were a very important feature of the governance of SMTs. And lastly, in some instances SMTs developed and used their own rules, processes, and apps to govern the HRM activities. One of the ways to structure the processes in SMTs is by organising team meetings. In these meetings, all employees in the team are present and get the opportunity to discuss what is on their mind. These meetings are also meant to make decisions about HRM activities within the team: Every three weeks we hold a team meeting in which we discuss all sorts of things. We have an online format in which everyone can write something. Everyone can put their inputs on the

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We also found examples that highlight that some degree of formal governance mechanisms within SMTs could be necessary because an absence would lead to problems. Given that SMTs have more freedom and autonomy over how to do their tasks, there is a danger regarding the differentiation of work, meaning that team members might have different ideas about the ways in which they do their tasks. An example of Livio shows how this might eventually turn into conflict on the work floor and sick leave of employees: We had two persons who worked differently, and then you’ll get gaps. This was not supervised by management. In our team we had the same, that you wanted to bring a certain structure in the team. I voiced my opinion and one colleague could not handle that and went on sick leave, whereas two others stated that they did not want to work with me anymore. If we would have had a manager from the beginning to supervise the whole process, the emotions would not have been this high. (SMT)

Informal Governance Mechanisms: We came across many examples of informal governance mechanisms that were used to align different HRM activities within SMTs. Multiple interviewees reported that communication and coordination were particularly important because different employees have different HRM-related responsibilities. To manage these issues of distributed responsibilities, teams organised team meetings during which they discussed the different team-tasks and made decisions as a team about HRM activities. Subsequently, these decisions were delegated to the task-owners, who then put them into operation. This example shows that individual team members, responsible for different team-tasks, need to communicate and coordinate with each other to perform HRM activities. Therefore, to align HRM practices within teams, communication between team members is crucial. This also shows that fit between practices can be established when communication is of high quality and when team members trust each other. Furthermore, several interviews indicated that the process-control mechanisms as used by Livio did not work as originally intended by the management. For example, the policy manual describing the team-tasks was often unknown by coachmanagers and team members: To me it is not clear. Which tasks are there? Is it a large package or a small one? There is still some discussion about these points. Which tasks should you do and what amount of time do you get to do them? (Coach-manager) Everybody states that team-tasks should be described, but nobody does something. So that is quite funny. (HRM professional)

Nevertheless, in other teams, these governance mechanisms were used as intended. Some teams and their coach-managers even developed their own additional control mechanisms, also supported by the organisation. For example, in some teams, there

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was a centralised system that listed the persons responsible for team-tasks to facilitate coordination and communication: Scheduling is a team-task, making an agenda for team meetings. […] There is a team-task ordering medication, a team-task nursing home orders, etc. […]. Our secretary keeps track of who does what team-task. She made a one-drive of every team and enters the person who is responsible for what task. (Coach-manager)

What is also worth noting is the absence of governance mechanisms with regard to giving both responsibilities and authority to teams. The interviews showed that in the transformation process towards SMTs, responsibilities were often assigned to teams, while the authority was not assigned accordingly. In practice, this meant that teams were, for example, responsible for hiring a new colleague but could not take the final decision because the former line manager still needed to sign the forms. I have to order the fridge, isn’t that funny? Because I have to sign and therefore I am still ultimately responsible. That is the difference. Well, if you want the responsibilities to be in the team, you should also put them there. (Coach-manager)

Therefore, some of the ‘old’ governance mechanisms interfered with the transformation towards SMTs. Governance mechanisms in organisations needed to be updated because teams could not make their own decisions. In some instances, our case study showed that the policy manuals and procedures had not been updated, while the teams were already self-managing. Our manuals, if you look into our manuals, you will still find that the coach-manager decides. You have to put question marks there if you want self-managing teams. The teams have to make those decisions. I am not the gate-keeper anymore. […] These things still need to be agreed upon. (Coach-manager) If you have unexpected expenses, you still have to ask for the signature of your coachmanager. (SMT) No, that is not necessary [signing], HRM does this often also. In principle, if it’s good, I don’t have to be in between [teams and HR]. (Coach-manager)

Below we discuss how informal governance mechanisms are used to manage the HRM activities by SMTs. Recruitment and Selection: Along with the formal mechanisms, there are also informal mechanisms within the SMTs to structure the task of recruitment and selection. In principal, different team task-owners have to discuss among themselves if there is a possibility to hire a new colleague. The recruitment and selection taskowner has to agree with the finances task-owner if the recruitment of a new colleague is financially feasible. Previously, these issues were the responsibility of

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the manager, but since the introduction of SMTs, team members have to discuss and make decisions themselves. Before these decisions can be made, SMTs need to identify the different task-owners and the responsibilities of those team members. This shows that informal governance mechanisms are also needed to align HRM activities within SMTs. Hence, in SMTs, the HRM responsibilities of recruitment and selection were devolved to the team members, who in collaboration needed to figure out if and when new colleagues can be recruited. As an example, an HRM professional explained the process of recruitment and her role in it: We also have a team task finances in that team. Together with the recruitment and selection task-owner, they will say, ‘Well, we need a new nurse assistant because we have a new route’ and the finance task-owner will say, ‘Well, that is the question, because these are our incomes, and this our formation, we cannot hire new employees because we should be able to manage with these employees’. So as a team, they will discuss these things. (HRM professional)

Our analysis also shows that SMTs used other informal mechanisms to recruit and select new colleagues. For example, they were active on Facebook and posted job vacancies with their own pictures, and they used their own professional networks to contact potential new colleagues. Training and Development: Along with formal arrangements from the organisation, SMTs also appeared to have some informal mechanisms for training and development. Although most of the training was offered to individuals, sometimes the SMT initiated such activities. In fact, we found cases that SMTs acted upon unexpected patient care by arranging specific training, and some teams had to exert an effort into getting budgets for the training: Like a few years ago, we had a client with a nasal probe. We had to apply tube feeding, but we hadn’t done that in years. So we took immediate action and explained how we should deal with tube feeding. (SMT) We had to organise it ourselves. With this coach-manager we have put things into operation, but before this was not taken into account in the budgets, and they forgot about us. (SMT)

Performance Management, Appraisal and Feedback: Since team members of SMTs are jointly responsible for the performance of the team, it is important that they are able to give and receive feedback. In the literature, this concept is called peer feedback. Peer feedback seemed to play an important role as an informal control mechanism. Based on peer feedback, SMTs could bridge between trust and control. We found that team members should feel supported enough to express their opinions and to speak out, but they should also trust that colleagues will not abuse the situation to personally attack others. Hence, teams can use team meetings as feedback sessions to implement a control mechanism for colleagues. They can try to understand why some team members might fail to act according to rules or objectives and find ways for improvement together. In line with these ideas, some employees

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in SMTs reported that communication and feedback are the most important factors for achieving high team performance: I think we are very strong communicatively. Everyone knows what to say to each other. […] When someone tells me, ‘I don’t think you can do this and this’, I know who said it, so I can handle it. […] We are also very open. Sometimes during meetings we talk about someone’s mistakes, and these things are simply discussed in the meeting because the whole team should be involved. It could feel like an attack, you have to be able to deal with it as a person, but I think that everyone can explain why things happened, and then we can find solutions together. (SMT)

In SMTs of Livio, feedback was also an important factor for job satisfaction. Providing performance feedback to each other, and getting praise from colleagues after doing a good job, motivated employees in SMTs and increased their job satisfaction. Yes, it is satisfying when if you help people and there is an unexpected event you hear from others that you did the right thing. […] It is nice to know what you have to do, and to get to hear that you did a good job or not. […] No, among colleagues, in our teams we do everything with the colleagues. (SMT)

On the other hand, the results showed that giving and receiving feedback among colleagues in a SMT is difficult. For example, one interviewee reported that she was more comfortable that in those cases a coach-manager would jump in for a case of underperformance, but also to stimulate SMTs when performance is high: For example, when a colleague doesn’t quite work properly, you always have to start a conversation with that colleague yourself. And they [management] think that we are all equals. So that makes it considerably difficult to speak to your colleague about it. At such a moment, I think the coach-manager should play a role. (SMT) Sometimes I miss the compliments. Never, or almost never, we get compliments about how well we are dealing with our current situation. There is always some point of criticism, or things we have to pay attention to. It would be nice to get compliments once in a while, about that we are doing quite fine. (SMT)

As indicated earlier, the organisation developed performance indicators, of which the productivity score was often perceived as very important. The organisation set goals for all the teams and individual employees. For example, nurses needed to achieve a productivity score of 80%. Furthermore, some employees reported that although the organisation developed objectives, they sometimes formulated their own ones. These informal governance mechanisms at the team level show that outcome-based control can lead to different work methods in teams. And those are the objectives that we have to abide by, which are also shared in the organisation. […] Based on these objectives, we develop our own goals. For example, if you see that this is not achievable, you’ll take a side road in order to get to the same point the organisation wants us to be. (SMT)

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Productivity norms set by the organisation were used as a formal outcome-based control mechanism, but some SMTs responded to this by adopting their own informal governance mechanisms. Many interviewees had problems with the focus on productivity, but the following team member is an example of how productivity norms can damage team effectiveness, if not coordinated and supported sufficiently: We felt very bad when we did not make the productivity norms, because we did everything to make it. At a certain moment, colleagues thought not to record their hours anymore, so they were de facto doing voluntary work, because they were afraid that we as a team would be dissolved. (SMT)

Job Design: Teams received a message explaining that they were responsible for multiple new team-tasks. For every task, SMTs had to find two persons to perform these activities, and teams themselves had to make this selection. Although the idea of the organisation was that SMTs would divide the tasks based on a talent analysis, teams divided the tasks based on personal interest and convenience: With some things we just said, well this fits well with you, and that is something for you. And other things we just divided. (SMT)

Furthermore, teams all have their own ways of working, according to one employee who worked in several teams: Yes, I noticed that everyone works differently in the teams, and multiple teams function very well, but they work different from us, they do it in their own way. It is simply how you agree together. (SMT)

In SMTs, collective responsibilities are important, and taking responsibility for HRM is sometimes necessary, since no one else will take these responsibilities. However, some interviewees reported that, during the transition period, SMTs had trouble taking on responsibilities. The absence of a manager caused employees occasionally to feel anxious about taking responsibilities for their actions. As an informal governance mechanism, we saw that those team members contacted HRM professionals and asked for their help and insights. HRM professionals responded by confirming decisions from SMTs and acting on behalf of them: And now she thinks, I call HRM, because HRM said it was OK to recruit a new colleague. So they put the responsibility on my plate. I don’t care, I can take the responsibility. But for them […] they are still quite anxious. (HRM professional)

Another important informal governance mechanism was related to the way in which teams divided team-tasks. While the organisation decided that team-tasks should be divided over the team members, the SMTs themselves had to put these tasks into practice. The case study showed that every team had its own mechanism to deal with this obligation. For example, some teams chose to prioritise the

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team-tasks because of time constraints, and other teams deviated from the intention to change task-owners regularly: Well, I have to say that some team-tasks are not performed because we can use only little indirect time, and to restrain indirect time, the unimportant tasks are not being done. […] In principal we have a system in which we change tasks every year, but the scheduling we are not going to change, because that is a different form of art. One should really like that. So we put it outside the task rotation. (SMT)

Other teams developed their own governance mechanisms, for example a home care team who decided to switch one of the two task-owners every year to facilitate peer-learning: Every team task is now divided over two colleagues. And every year one of them will be replaced by a new colleague, to enable learning from each other. (SMT)

Furthermore, informal control mechanisms are important in SMTs to align care responsibilities with external parties. As one employee reported, multiple team members have developed contacts with other organisations, allowing them to succeed in self-management. Hence, when SMTs develop high-quality governance mechanisms, they can function more effectively and independently of higher management: If I have to arrange something for the municipality, then there is a nurse in the team who works often with the municipality, and also holds conversations with them on behalf of Livio. So I can call on her help, because she knows more about this subject. […] This way, a couple of persons have their own specialty areas. […] Then I don’t need someone from management for these things. (SMT)

In SMTs, informal governance mechanisms emerged to structure the team-tasks. Some teams worked closely according to the team-tasks, while others developed their own tasks. These so-called focus areas are used to divide tasks and are mostly used in nursing homes. Examples of such tasks are planning, hygiene and finances. For planning, some teams used a plan board displaying all clients and the care they needed. It was especially important for SMTs that they could resolve changes in the care planning themselves, for example when a patient died or needed a different type of care. The data showed several informal mechanisms of teams for dealing with task design. For example, one team used a specific app for communication, and ordered everyone to go to the office after the shift to talk together. We try as much as possible, through ‘Praathuis’, everyone needs to come to office after the shift to talk to each other, using the telephone, because you work on your own, it is difficult to communicate perfectly and collaborate with each other. So we try that as much as possible, but you recognize that a lot of things are not coordinated. (SMT)

Teams that experienced the transition towards SMTs in home care developed their own informal governance mechanisms to succeed. During the first stage of the

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transition, Livio decided that managers should step back and leave all the decisions up to the teams. Although we have seen that this led to problems in some teams, other teams developed their independence of the manager during that period. These teams established their own mechanisms to deal with all the additional team-tasks and give these tasks their own twist. In the meantime we developed ourselves as a team. With every issue that we discussed within our team, we assessed whether or not it should be a team-task. From management we got the message; these are the tasks and you have to perform them, but as a team we did it ourselves and now it goes pretty well. (SMT)

SMTs also influenced their own tasks as they were allowed to do their own home care assessments, meaning that nurses indicated the type and amount of care clients needed, which they then provided as a team. The fact that level-5 nurses can make home care assessments since 5 years has worked out very well for us. Because you can discuss these things very well. When you exceed the time, we adapt it, because we won’t do things that aren’t allowed. So if you do need more time, this will be adapted in the team. (SMT)

Workforce Planning and Scheduling: Another informal, relation-based control mechanism at the team level involved scheduling and planning. Teams were expected to make a plan for their own team, with the idea that all problems should be solved in small teams. However, some teams decided for practical reasons to collaborate with other teams, ignoring instructions from the organisation. This led to new, informal mechanisms emerging from the work floor within teams to manage HRM activities, in this case planning and scheduling: We work closely with team […], but that is officially not allowed. We are two separate teams and we have to solve our problems separately. For some time we also worked like that, but then we worked from 7:00 to 17:00 and again at 18:30 because we could not share our clients with team […]. So at some point we said, we are not going to do that anymore, and we again started our collaboration. Done. (SMT) Last year there were a couple of things about which the management thought differently from us, and we did not comply with that. Eventually, multiple teams appeared to defy the instructions and then it was good. It had to do with being on call for different teams. (SMT)

The self-scheduling involved employees having more control over their own working times if SMTs know how to deal with the scheduling system. Although the empirical results showed that control over working times very much depends on the number of work hours available (which can be insufficient because of illness or labour shortage), teams that make good use of the opportunity of self-scheduling experience this as something very positive: I have to be honest; I experience this as very positive for our team, because you can plan already for the whole year. Now we can already say that we change the schedule and open it

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until the end of December. So you have the opportunity to analyse together when you want to work and you already know when you will work until December. […] You have much more of a choice. Before, the schedule was printed and everybody checked when they were planned to work, now you have way more control. (SMT)

The case study shows that SMTs have also developed their own systems and processes to handle planning, which is mostly related to filling up gaps in the working schedules. Informally, SMTs use social media such as WhatsApp to manage gaps and find colleagues who can fill in shifts. We are responsible when people get ill. Then we’ll send a WhatsApp message: ‘tomorrow or today she is ill, who wants to work?’ (SMT) Like yesterday, someone posted a message in the App: ‘I am ill, I’m not coming today’. The person present put it in the App, people react and we change the schedule. The routes. Everybody can do that. (SMT)

In addition, the case study shows that there are also downsides to devolving staffing and recruitment to SMTs, as some teams reported that their effectiveness and service quality suffered from personnel shortages: They are busy with that, but there is no personnel. There simply is an enormous shortage. […] You start to make mistakes, you overlook things. Your head is just too full with everything you have to do. (SMT)

Team dynamics also played an important role in scheduling and planning within SMTs. Given that teams had to make decisions about their schedules themselves, team members sometimes had to make concessions for the team. This required more flexibility from employees because formerly the manager would appoint a team member to work or hire someone from outside the team. Now, team members needed to solve these issues among themselves. The interviews revealed that reciprocity is an important informal governance mechanism in solving scheduling problems: team members were willing to fill in gaps in the schedule when their colleagues were on sick leave or absent for personal reasons, because they would also like to be replaced when they themselves cannot work. Interviewees reported that scheduling sometimes caused problems, because some employees were always available or wanted to work more hours, while others were inflexible and never filled in empty shifts. These are situations in which team members are required to be frank and step forward to give feedback about the issue, which many found uncomfortable in the beginning, illustrating that trust is also an important governance mechanism. There are always colleagues who want to work more and who are very flexible, and there are colleagues who are consciously/unconsciously less flexible. It would be nice if there would be someone to talk to these persons, like ‘come on’. […] And sometimes colleagues don’t deal with this very well. (SMT)

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Teams need to ensure that the work is divided equally among their members. For example, when there was a shift open due to illness, in some teams the same persons were always asked to work extra hours. The ‘scheduling’ task-owner held a lot of informal power, and team dynamics were found to be dependent on how teams coped with issues in scheduling. Although the organisation’s intentions were to introduce shared leadership and responsibility, in practice it turned out in some teams that a couple of employees had more control over their colleagues. In that sense, teams adopted informal governance mechanisms to cope with new responsibilities (i.e. scheduling) that were contradictory to the organisation’s intentions, mostly for practical reasons. Therefore, informal governance mechanisms were shown to impact the ways SMTs perform HRM tasks, and thereby affect team dynamics: It can be a pitfall, you have to be careful because there is always a group of employees who always say ‘yes’, they don’t dare to say no when someone is ill. I have to say, I was always responsible for scheduling […] I always called the persons of whom I knew that they would say yes, because then I didn’t have to call ten persons. But well, now you are in a small team, and now you think if that one always works, then she will get ill as well. So you look out for these things. (SMT)

Governance Mechanisms and Alignment between HRM Activities We came across many examples of governance mechanisms for individual HRM activities in SMTs. To achieve alignment between different HRM activities, a combination of what are called formal and informal governance mechanisms was used (Jaworski & MacInnis, 1989). Vertical alignment was predominantly based on formal governance mechanisms, while horizontal alignment was to a large extent reliant on informal governance mechanisms. The use of either formal or informal mechanisms seems to be related to the maturity of SMTs; more effective teams are found to make use of informal governance mechanisms, while teams with more problems did not have effective informal governance mechanisms. In other words, trust, cooperation and communication were important factors for the execution and horizontal alignment of HRM activities within the team, which in turn related to its effectiveness. On the other hand, the vertical alignment between SMTs and the organisation was focused on formal mechanisms, such as performance metrics, task descriptions and audits (see Table 2 for an overview). Table 2: Formal and Informal Governance Mechanisms at Livio. Formal Governance Mechanisms Performance goals, metrics, role division, task-ownership, team-tasks (procedures), decision-making structures, team meetings, authority to sign

Informal Governance Mechanisms Trust, delegation, communication and coordination, reciprocity, peer-feedback

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Informal governance mechanisms were specifically important for horizontal HRM alignment in SMTs, because HRM responsibilities were distributed over different team members, forcing them to coordinate their actions when designing, monitoring and evaluating HRM activities. The results showed that team meetings were particularly crucial as a mechanism to manage HRM activities. Team meetings have both a formal and informal governance mechanisms component: formal because the organisation arranged these meetings to facilitate the transition to SMTs, and informal because SMTs themselves are responsible for continuing to organise them and particularly to manage their content. During these meetings, most decisions are made regarding HRM activities, for example about recruitment and selection, workforce planning and performance management. The execution and implementation of these decisions are being done by one or two team members who are task-owners and are therefore delegated to act on behalf of the SMT. These task-owners need to coordinate their activities, for example when the workforce planning task-owner indicates that new personnel are needed, s/he needs to collaborate with the recruitment task-owner who is responsible for actually looking for and selecting candidates. Furthermore, trust within the SMT is important for having fruitful discussions and effective decision-making during team meetings. Based on the results of our case study, the HRM governance mechanisms in organisations with SMTs can be classified along two dimensions: the type of governance mechanism (formal vs. informal), and the type of alignment of HRM activities (vertical vs horizontal) (Figure 3). The first dimension involves the type of governance mechanism used, while the second dimension involves the type of alignment achieved between HRM activities. The type of alignment is related to the Vertical alignment Performance metrics Organisational values Authority

Audits Coaching

Team-task descriptions Information sharing

Formal governance

Governance

Team meetings

Alignment

Dual-responsibility

Informal governance

mechanism

Relationships

Trust

Reciprocity

Role-division Peer-feedback Delegation

Communication & coordination

Horizontal alignment

Figure 3: Model of HRM Governance in Organisations with Self-managing Teams.

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organisational level of governance mechanisms, such that vertical alignment is more closely related to the organisation level while horizontal alignment is more closely related to the team level. We analysed the mechanisms that are used to ensure the vertical link between organisation and SMTs, and those that are used to manage alignment between HRM practices within teams. In Figure 3, we provide an overview of the activities that our case study organisation used to achieve the alignment along the described dimension, such as ‘performance metrics’, which is a formal governance mechanism particularly used for vertical alignment; and ‘trust’, which is an informal governance mechanism that is mostly used for horizontal alignment. Summarising, the case study data shows that the governance of HRM activities in organisations is based on a combination of formal and informal mechanisms. By comparing the alignment of HRM activities according to the two sub-dimensions of governance mechanisms (Jaworski & MacInnis, 1989), we highlighted many ways in which vertical and horizontal alignment can be achieved. Formal governance mechanisms were mainly applied to manage the vertical alignment of HRM activities, while informal governance mechanisms were used for horizontal alignment between HRM activities within SMTs. The responsibility for performing HRM activities was mainly devolved to SMTs, while the HRM department was responsible for developing a framework for SMTs, including task descriptions, performance metrics, responsibilities and training programs. The HRM department focused on the alignment of HRM activities between teams, while SMTs did not often transcend their own team when it came to managing HRM activities. SMTs made informal agreements and used cooperation and communication to align HRM responsibilities, and the organisation/HRM department tried to ensure compliance with organisational goals by performance monitoring and describing team tasks. Based on these results, we believe that the SMTs literature can learn important lessons from both the strategic HRM literature regarding alignment and the literature on governance mechanisms. For example, we have illustrated that organisations with SMTs should keep in mind that alignment between different HRM activities, executed by a combination of actors, is important to achieve competitive advantage (Kepes & Delery, 2007). We have shown that both informal and formal mechanisms are crucial to ensure that HRM activities for and within SMTs are aligned with organisational goals. While the team empowerment literature has shown that teams can perform different HRM practices themselves (Spreitzer, 2008), and organisations can offer HRM activities to teams to enhance their effectiveness (Mathieu et al., 2006; Rapp et al., 2016), we added to this by using concepts from HRM research to show how these activities can be aligned across levels. The HRM literature has described how and why HRM activities are aligned and interrelated across organisational levels (Banks & Kepes, 2015), illustrating that team-based HRM activities should be aligned with other HRM activities across the organisation. It has distinguished between different levels of HRM (Renkema, Meijerink, & Bondarouk, 2017), integrating intended, actual and perceived HRM (Wright & Nishii, 2013), HRM philosophies, policies and practices (Schuler, 1992) and organisational levels (Ostroff & Bowen, 2000). Organisations with SMTs could learn from these distinctions to create a horizontally and

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vertically aligned HRM system using several informal and formal governance mechanisms.

Discussion The introduction of SMTs involves a redistribution of HRM responsibilities, because teams are made responsible for designing, monitoring and evaluating HRM activities. To establish alignment between the different HRM policies and practices, governance mechanisms are applied. In this section we described how HRM activities are performed in an organisation with SMTs, showing that teams are becoming increasingly responsible for designing and implementing practices such as recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management, rewards, job design, and workforce planning and scheduling. As a result, the organisation develops governance mechanisms to ensure that SMTs perform in line with organisational objectives. To do so, managers particularly rely on formal governance mechanisms focused on performance management and job descriptions. SMTs also create governance mechanisms to cope with their new responsibilities, predominantly by using informal governance mechanisms such as communication, coordination, peer-feedback and trust. In other words, a combination of governance mechanisms is used to ensure that individual HRM activities are performed in line with organisational goals and that the HRM activities in combination are aligned with each other.

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The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams

Besides having implications for the human resource management (HRM) activities that are devolved to employees and which serve to empower, motivate and support self-managing teams (SMTs) (see Chapters ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’ and ‘Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Selfmanaging Teams’), the SMT concept also brings about changes to the HRM function, i.e the collective of actors who are responsible for the attraction, development and retention of employees (Keegan, Bitterling, Sylva, & Hoeksema, in press; Maatman, Bondarouk, & Looise, 2010; Valverde, Ryan, & Soler, 2006). Several models provide an overview of the actors involved in the adoption, design and implementation of HRM activities, such as the three-legged stool (Ulrich, 1997), the HRM triad (Jackson, Schuler, & Werner, 2009) and the HRM shared services model (Boglind, Ha¨llste´n, & Thilander, 2011; Maatman et al., 2010). Although they put a focus on different HRM actors, the common denominator of these models is that they differentiate the HRM function into actors that specialise in HRM (i.e. corporate HRM department, centres of HRM expertise, HRM shared service centres, HRM outsourcing vendors and local HRM business partners) and non-HRM specialists, such as top management, middle managers and front-line managers, who nevertheless bear HRM responsibilities (Hofman & Meijerink, 2015; Ulrich, Younger, & Brockbank, 2008; Valverde et al., 2006). In practice, the HRM function is often organised in such a way that non-HRM specialists, (front) line managers in particular, are responsible for implementing HRM practices on a day-to-day basis, e.g. selecting new employees, conducting performance appraisals or appraising employees’ efforts (Bos-Nehles, Van Riemsdijk, & Looise, 2013) (see also the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’ for a detailed description of the HRM role of line managers in managing SMTs). Research has shown that line managers often lack the competences, desire and tools to execute their HRM responsibilities

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(Nehles, van Riemsdijk, Kok, & Looise, 2006; Renwick, 2003; Whittaker & Marchington, 2003). To help managers cope with these difficulties, HRM specialists such as HRM business partners, HRM service centres and centres of HRM expertise provide support services that help line managers in implementing HRM practices. These support services include the provision of guidelines and procedures (Nehles et al., 2006) and call centre support on how to operate HRM self-services (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013) or seek top management support for new HRM policies (Trullen, Stirpe, Bonache, & Valverde, 2016). Since HRM specialists operate on behalf of the organisation to safeguard organisational interests (Farndale, Paauwe, & Boselie, 2010; Francis & Keegan, 2006), their activities can be seen as equating to the provision of organisational support. This is in line with organisational support theory, which argues that the actions taken by agents of the organisation (e.g. HRM specialists) are viewed by individuals (e.g. non-HRM specialists such as first-line managers or employees) as indications of the organisation’s intent, rather than attributed solely to the agents’ personal motive (Rhoades & Eisenberger, 2002). Within an HRM function setting, we define organisational support as the activities of and resources provided by HRM specialists that enable non-HRM specialists to execute HRM activities. Research confirms the importance of support services provided by HRM specialists as they increase line managers’ motivation to implement HRM activities (Bos-Nehles, & Meijerink, in press) and help to commit employees to the organisation (Gilbert, De Winne, & Sels, 2011; Kuvaas, Dysvik, & Buch, 2014). In the SMT context, it is not just the line manager who executes HRM activities and receives support services from HRM specialists. SMT members are also key nonHRM specialist actors, because they bear (at least partially) the formal responsibility to implement HRM practices (Banner, Kulisch, & Peery, 1992) such as the selection of new co-workers (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999), the provision of peer-feedback and training (Druskat & Wolff, 1999) and the design of jobs (Graen & Uhl-Bien, 1991). In SMT contexts, employees take over some of the responsibilities that were previously enacted by other HRM actors, which have implications for the organisation of the HRM function as the roles and responsibilities of the HRM actors involved change. Furthermore, as employees in SMTs increasingly adopt HRM responsibilities that are new to them, we may expect that they will be supported by HRM specialists who provide them with the necessary resources to execute the devolved HRM activities (Banner et al., 1992). It is against this backdrop that this chapter answers questions such as (1) how the involvement of self-managing employees/teams in HRM changes the organisation of the HRM function? (2) Which HRM responsibilities if any remain for HRM specialists? and (3) Whether HRM specialists adopt new HRM roles and responsibilities in providing organisational support to employees and other non-HRM specialists such as line managers?

Human Resource Management by Employees in Self-managing Teams Before describing the changes to the HRM function and organisational support provided by HRM specialists in the SMT context, it is vital to first detail the HRM

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responsibilities that employees have as this has implications for those enacted by other HRM function actors. In this respect, we see the development towards HRM conducted by employees in SMTs to be part of a broader development in theory and practice that describes the uptake of HRM responsibilities by employees. Here we think of developments related to job crafting (Tims, Bakker, & Derks, 2012; Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001), idiosyncratic deal negotiations (Rousseau, Ho, & Greenberg, 2006), employee self-service technologies (Marler, Fisher, & Ke, 2009), HRM shared services (Meijerink, Bondarouk, & Maatman, 2013) and HRM consumption by employees (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017). Although discussed in different academic disciplines and reflecting different types of involvement of employees in HRM, these developments unite in attributing an active role to employees in the design, implementation and evaluation of HRM practices. Rather than viewing employees as passive responders to the HRM practices provided, they conceptualise them as actors who are actively involved in changing job characteristics (i.e. job crafting), negotiating the provision of personalised HRM practices (i.e. idiosyncratic deals), operating HRM processes (i.e. self-services), controlling the efforts of HRM specialists (i.e. HRM shared services) and combining HRM practices with personal resources to ensure that desired benefits materialise (i.e. HRM consumption). At the same time, existing concepts like job crafting, I-deals and HRM consumption do not perfectly generalise to the SMT context because it is often the collective of employees that is responsible for conducting the HRM activities which are devolved to SMTs. Existing studies have mainly studied employees’ involvement in job crafting, I-deals negotiation, self-services and HRM consumption on the employee level to describe the role that individual employees play in performing HRM activities. To resolve this issue, we conceptualise the HRM function in SMTs as a multilevel phenomenon (Klein & Kozlowski, 2000; Renkema, Meijerink, & Bondarouk, 2017) which involves the (self-)management of human resources on the individual, team and organisational levels. In the remainder of this chapter, we discuss different HRM selfmanagement phenomena which have traditionally been studied on the individualemployee level, describe how these manifest on the SMT level and how this in turn impacts the roles of HRM specialists (e.g. HRM centres of expertise, HRM shared service centres and the corporate HRM department) that operate on the organisational level to provide organisational support to non-HRM specialists. Job Crafting in Self-managing Teams In the literature, job crafting has been defined as ‘the physical and cognitive changes individuals make in the task or relational boundaries of the work’ (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001, p. 179). Rather than reactively performing the tasks that have been assigned to them by management, employees who ‘craft’ their jobs seek to proactively change the characteristics of their job to improve their person-job fit (Bakker, Tims, & Derks, 2012; Tims, Derks, & Bakker, 2016). Research has shown that employees can and do proactively change a range of job characteristics, including adjusting the scope of activities executed at work and changing whom they work

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with (Berg, Wrzesniewski, & Dutton, 2010; Gordon, Demerouti, Le Blanc, & Bipp, 2015), reframing the meaning of their job (Wrzesniewski & Dutton, 2001), making changes to the knowledge and skills needed for their job (Lyons, 2008; Petrou, Demerouti, Peeters, Schaufeli, & Hetland, 2012), asking feedback from co-workers to improve job performance (Ma¨kikangas, Bakker, & Schaufeli, 2017; Tims, Bakker, & Derks, 2014) or avoiding interactions with unpleasant clients (Bakker et al., 2012; Tims et al., 2016). Therefore, in terms of describing the HRM activities conducted by employees, job crafting covers not only employee participation in job design, but also their involvement in training and development, feedback and the appraisal process. To bring more clarity to the job crafting concept, Tims et al. (2012) categorised the various ways in which employees proactively change their jobs into four categories: (1) increasing structural job resources, which refers to employees’ selfinitiated changes made to develop their knowledge, skills and abilities, and to improve their autonomy at work, (2) increasing social job resources, which involves the proactive efforts of employees to seek feedback and social support from others, (3) increasing challenging job demands, referring to employees’ self-initiated involvement in activities that they find energising, such as joining or starting projects and learning about new developments and (4) decreasing hindering job demands, which refers to the proactive reduction of activities or contacts with others which an employee finds emotionally, mentally or physically stressing. Since employees in SMTs are jointly responsible for conducting HRM activities, they also craft job characteristics together. In the literature, this has been referred to as team or collaborative crafting, which describes the concerted activity of a group of employees who jointly determine how to alter their job characteristics to meet shared objectives (Leana, Appelbaum, & Shevchuk, 2009; Ma¨kikangas et al., 2017). In SMTs, collaborative crafting is important and in some cases necessary, since team members are often interdependent in the execution of delegated (HR) managerial activities (Langfred, 2007). Therefore, it should not come as a surprise that the employees in SMTs engage in various types of collaborative crafting initiatives, which are described below. Collective Crafting of Job Demands: Which HRM activities are to be conducted by a SMT is to a degree determined by the top and line management, in particular when organisations are in the initial stage of working with SMTs (Stewart, Courtright, & Manz, 2011; Stoker, 2008). For example, managers decide whether teams are responsible for selecting new employees, scheduling shifts or workforce planning activities or whether this should be done by a line manager or an HRM specialist. At the same time, employees in SMTs engage in the crafting/increasing of challenging job demands as they themselves proactively select HRM activities they find interesting and energising, rather than being told what to do. In most cases, this happens collectively as team members jointly discuss the distribution of HRM responsibilities within the SMT. Specifically, they jointly divide (HR) responsibilities within the team depending on the interests and competences available in the

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team, to ensure that individuals can deploy their strengths and experience allocated HRM activities as energising. Collective Crafting of Structural Job Resources: We did not encounter many cases in which teams proactively adopted additional HRM responsibilities beyond those devolved to them. Such rare cases were instances when the members of a SMT proactively organised training themselves to increase structural job resources. We came across SMTs confronted with clients that needed a service which none of the team members had offered for a long while. Rather than waiting for HRM specialists to organise training, the team set up a workshop or expert presentation itself since its members felt responsible for developing and maintaining their competences. Furthermore, although the SMTs at Livio were not responsible for evaluating co-worker performance, we nevertheless heard team members noting that they proactively provided feedback within the team. This involved both individual employees who provided feedback on issues such as task performance and interpersonal communication to other individuals within their team, as well as collective feedback and performance appraisal meetings at which all team members get together to discuss team performance and how to improve it. This shows that, on a team level, increasing job resources not only involves individuals who proactively seek feedback as described by previous studies (Lyons, 2008; Tims et al., 2012; Tims et al., 2016), but also the proactive provision of feedback and performance appraisal practices. In most cases, however, SMTs felt that their current set of HRM responsibilities already took a significant amount of their time. Therefore, to avoid further increases in their workload, additional HRM responsibilities were not proactively adopted. Collective Crafting of Social Job Resources: Finally, we came across two types of collective crafting acts that are likely to occur frequently in recently established SMTs. The first is what Wrzesniewski and Dutton (2001) call cognitive crafting, which refers to employees’ proactive acts regarding how they view their jobs. Although this type of job crafting is mostly studied on the employee level, we came across instances when employees jointly and proactively changed how they view their job by framing themselves not just as workers, but as professionals who now bear the responsibility to ensure effective teamwork. SMT members as well as HRM specialists reported that employees initiated meetings to make sense of what their role looked like, because they felt that the adoption of self-management had changed their jobs and required collective sense-making of what their new roles now involved. This is what De Leede, Nijhof, and Fisscher (1999) refer to as the development of a collective mind in SMTs. Second, SMTs also proactively search for support from line managers and HRM specialists. This happened, for example, in cases when team members experienced within-team conflict which they could not solve themselves. SMT members reported that in most cases they try to solve such issues themselves first, but refer the matter to their supervisor or an HRM specialist when it remains unsolved (Manz & Sims, 1987).

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Idiosyncratic Deals in Self-managing Teams Idiosyncratic deals (I-deals) are the non-standard employment conditions that an individual employee negotiates with the employer (Rousseau et al., 2006). I-deals can include a variety of non-standard HRM practices, such as additional training possibilities (Anand, Vidyarthi, Liden, & Rousseau, 2010), different job tasks and work flexibility (Bal, De Jong, Jansen, & Bakker, 2012), extra salary (Rosen, Slater, Chang, & Johnson, 2013) or promotion opportunities (Ng & Feldman, 2010), which are negotiated by and offered to an individual employee, but not to other coworkers. Research has shown that the negotiation and provision of I-deals is dependent on both team-level and individual-level antecedents, with I-deals being more likely to be negotiated and offered in small as well as heterogeneous teams, and to employees who show personal initiative, that is, the self-starting and persistent pursuit of personal goals (Hornung, Rousseau, & Glaser, 2008, 2009; Lee, Bachrach, & Rousseau, 2015). According to Hornung et al. (2009), I-deals can be broken down into at least three categories: (1) developmental I-deals, which refer to personalised opportunities to develop individual skills and competences, (2) flexibility I-deals, which customise the scheduling of work and working hours and (3) reduced workload I-deals, which refer to agreements that offer an individual an adjusted workload in terms of quality (e.g. less strenuous tasks) and/or quantity (e.g. shorter working days). Although I-deals are usually granted to individual employees, in the SMT context, they are also negotiated by teams, meaning that teams are provided with non-standard employment conditions that are not necessarily granted to other teams. For example, SMTs can negotiate developmental I-deals to request a higher training budget from their line manager to spend on workshops that the team could not afford otherwise. SMTs also negotiate workload I-deals with a line manager or an HRM specialist. This occurs when a team’s productivity has decreased, and they cannot bear all the HRM responsibilities devolved to them. To make up for this shortage, they either negotiate a higher budget to appoint a new colleague or temporarily shirk a number of HRM responsibilities. Although I-deals are usually negotiated between an individual employee and a manager (Hornung et al., 2009), employees in SMTs can also negotiate I-deals with their co-workers since the devolution of HRM responsibilities to employees takes away the authority of managers to grant I-deals (Barker, 1993). This occurs, for example, with the negotiation of flexibility I-deals, which employees request from co-workers to temporarily work fewer hours to make their schedule fit their private planning or responsibilities at home (e.g. taking care of parents or children). This is also enabled by the availability of online tools and technologies which allow teams to personalise working schedules (see the section ‘HRM Self-service Technologies’). As these examples show, in SMTs, I-deals are not necessarily negotiated between an individual employee and a manager, but instead by individuals with their team members or by the entire team with a manager.

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HRM Self-service Technologies in Self-managing Teams For many years, HRM responsibilities have been devolved to front-line employees and managers through the adoption of online self-services. Self-services are a class of web-based technologies that allow employees and managers to conduct their own data management and transaction processing without the direct involvement of HRM specialists (Marler et al., 2009; Strohmeier, 2007). Research has shown that employees can make use of a range of self-service possibilities, making them responsible for managing administrative HRM processes related to leave registration, expense declarations, performance appraisal and updating personnel data (Bondarouk, Harms, & Lepak, 2017; Farndale, Paauwe, & Hoeksema, 2009; Hawking, Stein, & Foster, 2004; Meijerink et al., 2013). In most cases, self-service technologies enable employees to initiate an HRM process by starting a transaction (e.g. declare a travel expense or summarising a performance appraisal), which in turn is forwarded to a management self-service system which allows a supervisor to alter/approve the request made by the employee and to effectuate the transaction (automatically) (e.g. paying the declaration or filing the appraisal report in the employees’ personnel file) (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013). With the advent of SMTs, the management self-service technologies is opened up to employees as they take over some of the HRM responsibilities that managers used to have. This is not to say that employee self-services are abolished in SMTs. Instead, employee-members continue utilising employee self-service applications, while managerial self-service responsibilities are distributed among the individual team members (De Jong, De Ruyter, & Lemmink, 2003). Scheduling Self-services: We came across several management self-services which are utilised by employees to operate HRM processes. The one that we heard employees talk about frequently involved the self-service technologies used for selfscheduling shift work. In line with the notion that workforce planning and the scheduling of work are devolved to SMTs, this means that all employees in a team are jointly responsible for ensuring that shifts are appropriately scheduled and sufficiently resourced. This team-based self-scheduling is supported by an employee self-service application and is supervised by an employee who is responsible for coordinating the self-scheduling process. This employee-coordinator relies on a management self-service application to coordinate the team-based self-scheduling process, which usually takes place in three rounds (Hijmans et al., 2015; Rosenbloom & Goertzen, 1987). During the first round, employees use the online system to indicate which shifts they prefer to work. This is followed by a round in which all employees can check which shifts are not yet ‘filled’ or whether too many employees want to work during a selected shift. In both cases, the team members discuss how to resolve such scheduling problems. If these problems cannot be resolved, the employee-coordinator steps in to make a final decision by using the management self-service system to assign the remaining shifts to selected team members. During the final round, the employee-coordinator finalises the schedule and communicates this to his/her co-workers using the online self-service system.

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Performance Management Self-services: SMTs also rely on self-services for performance management and workforce planning purposes. Specifically, one or two employee-members in each team are responsible for tracking productivity levels. Within Livio, all team members need to spend at least 80% of their time on operational functions/the primary processes (i.e. delivery of care services to patients), while 20% may be spent on regulatory responsibilities such as self-management activities, travel to patients’ homes or team meetings. To assess whether these productivity goals are realised, each team member operates an employee self-service application to administer the time taken to conduct selected tasks. Two employees are responsible for checking whether employees are correctly administering their working hours and for approving these records on a weekly basis. These employees can do so by operating an online management self-service dashboard which provides an overview of the allocation of working hours within their team. The performance of these activities is important as salaries are contingent on the number of hours employees work and which shifts they have worked. The productivity overviews are also used for workforce planning purposes. The team relies on the management information generated by the self-service applications to assess whether employees are working overtime, identify labour surplus or shortages, and seek possibilities for improving labour productivity. As these examples show, employees in SMTs are responsible for operating both employee and management self-services. Almost all employees are responsible for engaging in administrative HRM activities, while the use of management selfservices is devolved to a restricted number of SMT members. HRM Shared Services in Self-managing Teams HRM shared services represent another way by which employees are involved in HRM activities. The HRM shared services model is equivalent to the internal outsourcing of HRM services such as payroll and personnel administration, staffing and training to an HRM shared services centre (Farndale et al., 2009; Knol, Janssen, & Sol, 2014; Maatman et al., 2010; Meijerink et al., 2013). In most cases, when establishing the HRM shared services model, the organisation concentrates the delivery of HRM services and the resources (e.g. HRM specialists, information technologies, databases, etc.) needed to provide HRM services in a central location such as an HRM shared service centre or centres of HRM expertise (Cooke, 2006; McCracken & McIvor, 2013; Ulrich et al., 2008). In most cases, these HRM services used to be performed by the individual business units, which transferred their delivery and accompanying resources to the HRM shared service centre or centre of HRM expertise which all business units rely on for HRM support (McIvor, McCracken, & McHugh, 2011; Reilly & Williams, 2003). Other organisations opt for a structure in which HRM specialists are neither affiliated with the shared service centre nor with a selected business unit, but rotate among a selected number of business units as their help is needed (Redman, Snape, Wass, & Hamilton, 2007).

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Although an HRM shared service centre provides HRM services from a central location, it does not equate to a centralisation model in which a corporate entity controls HRM decision-making and delivery (Janssen & Joha, 2006; Ulrich, 1995). Instead, the HRM shared service model combines centralisation and decentralisation models as the HRM services that are concentrated in the HRM shared service centre are controlled by the local business units (Maatman et al., 2010; Maatman & Meijerink, 2017; Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013; Ulrich, 1995). In most cases, the local business units are represented by a local HRM specialist (e.g. an HRM business partner or the HR manager/director of the business unit) who controls the HRM shared service centre on behalf of a selected business unit (Maatman & Meijerink, 2017; Meijerink et al., 2013). The business unit representatives rely on both formal control mechanisms, such as contracts and service level agreements, as well as informal controls such as user boards, trust and shared language development (Farndale et al., 2010; Maatman & Meijerink, 2017; Richter & Bru¨hl, 2017). To some extent, employees have the possibility to influence and control the HRM shared service centre’s operations by joining user boards, filling out evaluation surveys or relying on process control mechanisms embedded in the employee selfservice technologies that are maintained by the HRM shared service centre (Farndale et al., 2010; Knol et al., 2014; Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013). An HRM shared services model refers to a hybrid organisational model that bundles resources an HRM service centre which offers HRM services that are controlled by the local business units and their employees. Organisations that work with SMTs seem to make little use of the HRM shared services model, which is surprising since they devolve decision-making authority to the individual teams (Cohen, Chang, & Ledford, 1997; Langfred, 2004). Within Livio, the SMTs did make use of HRM services that were provided from a central location, that is, the central HRM department which provided support in terms of recruiting new employees, offering training workshops or running payroll administration. This did not equate to HRM delivery by means of a shared services model, since the central HRM department was strongly governed by the top management team, instead of granting control and decision-making power to the SMTs. We also heard that the individual SMTs did not share HRM resources across the different teams, despite the fact that opportunities and/or a need for doing so was present. For instance, we came across a SMT faced with staff shortages, which another team, with a staff surplus, could solve by temporarily transferring a team member to the under-resourced team. This rarely happened, however, since the different teams felt that this would result in a loss of resources and thus control, or team members were too committed to their team and therefore did not want to move to another team (Barker, 1993; Elston & MacCarthaigh, 2016; Kirkman & Rosen, 1999; Redman et al., 2007). What the SMTs did seem to share, and wished to exercise control over, was the coach-manager. With the advent of SMTs, the role of the supervisor/manager seems to change towards one of offering shared services. While previously managers used to manage and be dedicated to a single team, at Livio the line managers became responsible for coaching multiple teams. In practice, this meant that teams turned

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to the coach-manager for support services such as joining job interviews, handling grievance issues or solving intra-team conflicts (Stewart et al., 2011; Stoker, 2008). Some of the SMTs reported that the coach-manager had to support too many teams. Research has shown that this may cause competition among the different SMTs (Knol et al., 2014; Redman et al., 2007), which might ultimately stifle collaboration across teams, with lower levels of shared service quality and higher costs as a result (Elston & MacCarthaigh, 2016; Hofman & Meijerink, 2015). In conclusion, although the implementation of SMTs might offer fertile ground for implementing HRM shared services, we did not come across many examples of this actually happening. If services are shared across and controlled by the different SMTs, then this seems to involve the sharing of non-HRM specialist support by coach-managers rather than HRM specialists, which is often the case in organisations that adopt the HRM shared services model. HRM Consumption by Employees in Self-managing Teams The final perspective to be discussed that considers the active involvement of employees in HRM is the one that regards employees as active consumers of HRM practices (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017; Meijerink, Bondarouk, & Lepak, 2016; Paauwe, 2009). The idea of employees as HRM consumers responds to repeated calls for research examining how employees themselves affect desired HRM outcomes such as employee need satisfaction, commitment or work engagement (Janssens & Steyaert, 2009; Lepak & Boswell, 2012). Rather than viewing these HRM outcomes as following from the mere provision of HRM practices, this stream of research looks into how employees engage with HRM practices to ensure that they provide desired benefits to them (Meijerink, 2014). One of the key HRM outcomes considered to be affected by employees is HRM service value, which refers to a trade-off between the quality versus costs of HRM practices to an employee (Lepak, Smith, & Taylor, 2007; Maatman & Bondarouk, 2014; Meijerink et al., 2016). The notion that employees affect HRM service value follows from insights generated by marketing scholars, who noted that it is the recipient of a service that creates value at the moment of consumption (Gro¨nroos, 2011; Gummesson, 1998; Vargo & Lusch, 2008, 2016). As remarked by Gummesson (1998, p. 247), ‘value creation is only possible when a good or service is consumed. An unsold good has no value’. The idea here is that the value of a service can only be realised once a recipient applies a provided good or service to meet his/her needs. Marketing researchers argue that recipients create value-in-use to indicate that the value of a product or service depends on how well the recipient uses it (Gro¨nroos, 2011; Vargo & Lusch, 2016). This requires the presence of complementary resources the knowledge, skills and abilities of recipients in particular as this allows recipients to make effective use of a good or service. In support of these claims, research has shown that the knowledge, skills and abilities of service recipients relate positively to their perceptions of service value (McKee, Simmers, & Licata, 2006; Van Beuningen, De Ruyter, Wetzels, & Streukens, 2009).

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Since employees are the recipients of HRM practices (Paauwe, 2009), researchers extended this marketing logic to argue that the value of HRM practices depends on how employees utilise them (Meijerink, 2014; Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017; Meijerink et al., 2016). Although employees do not have full discretion over how HRM practices are applied, they can affect HRM outcomes by how they engage with the HRM practices provided. In fact, HRM practices can provide different benefits to individual employees when they apply these HRM practices differently. For example, training workshops can offer new skills to an employee-participant, but can also help to improve a social network as the employee builds relationships with other training participants (Meijerink et al., 2016). According to Meijerink and Bos-Nehles (2017), similar HRM practices can meet a different employee need, i.e. the need for autonomy, competence or relatedness, depending on which complementary resources an employee draws on (e.g. knowledge and skills, co-worker support or supervisor support) when utilising the HRM practice. In support of these claims, research has indeed shown that the outcomes of HRM practices are contingent on employees’ complementary resources and their knowledge and skills in particular (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018; Meijerink et al., 2016; Van Beurden, Van Veldhoven, & Van de Voorde, 2017). In a SMT context, employees are also HRM consumers since they are provided with a range of HRM practices (see the chapter ‘Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams’). At the same time, the SMT members are also responsible for implementing HRM practices such as the selection of new co-workers (Kirkman & Rosen, 1999) or the provision of peer-feedback and training (Druskat & Wolff, 1999). Therefore, employees in SMTs are not mere recipients of HRM, but instead are what Ritzer and Jurgenson (2010) refer to as ‘prosumers’. In the economic literature, prosumers are defined as individuals who both produce and consume goods and/or services. As such, the prosumer concept serves to describe the phenomenon that the role of producers and consumers is blurring. In SMTs, employees are the prosumers of HRM practices since they are both recipients who are provided with and thus consume HRM practices, and producers of HRM practices as they are responsible for implementing selected HRM practices. In what follows, we further clarify the producer role of employees by describing which HRM practices are implemented by employees in SMTs. Workforce Planning: Employees in SMTs are responsible for workforce planning (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001). As described in the section on ‘HRM Self-service Technologies in SMTs’, this involves the use of online tools by SMTs (De Jong et al., 2003) for scheduling shift work and making a planning/prediction of how many full-time equivalent (FTE) workers are needed in the long run (Hijmans et al., 2015). At Livio, this is often a rather complex and time-consuming process, since it is not necessarily the number of clients served by a SMT that determines the number of FTE employees that can be appointed. The clients of Livio require different home and residential care services, meaning that the financial compensation differs per client. Furthermore, the financial compensation can fluctuate when clients are entitled to receive fewer or more services, or when a client passes away.

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This is why some teams particularly those that already employ employees with a full-time contract (close to) decide only to appoint flex workers. Aside from these long-term activities, the SMTs are also responsible for solving short-term workforce planning issues. In most cases, this involves making up for the sudden sick leave of a colleague, with team members jointly seeking a solution by rescheduling shift work, redistributing clients across team members or hiring a temp worker (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001). Selection: The SMTs are also responsible for implementing selection practices. At Livio, this is often the responsibility of two team members who jointly coordinate the recruitment and selection of new co-workers. In most cases, the SMT members initiate the staffing process themselves by formulating a job description and job advertisement text. This is then forwarded to an HRM specialist who co-writes and edits the text before publishing the job advertisement. The SMTs also attract job seekers themselves by publishing job advertisements on social media, in local newspapers or through word-of-mouth communication. The selection of new co-workers is almost entirely in the hands of the SMT, meaning that HRM specialists do not make any selections when forwarding the job seekers to the SMT. Instead, the two SMT team members who are responsible for staffing engage in checking the CVs of the job candidates and conducting job interviews. When invited, the coach-manager and/or an HRM specialist joins the job interviews to support the SMT members. The insights gained from the job interviews are shared with the team members, who discuss the job candidates and jointly decide who will be hired. The selection process is concluded with an employment conditions interview between the job candidate and an HRM specialist or coach-manager. Performance Management: The SMTs are also responsible (partially) for performance management activities. This mainly involves the setting of team goals by the SMT members and joint reflection on whether these goals are realised (Jong, Ruyter, & Lemmink, 2005). These goals can be related to safety issues, quality of care and productivity levels. To assess whether these team goals are actually realised, the team members conduct surveys to measure client satisfaction or report safety incidents that occurred (e.g. a client got the wrong medication). The results of these performance assessments are discussed during team meetings to discuss how safety issues can be prevented in the future or how service quality can be improved. At the same time, individual goal setting and the annual performance evaluation of individuals have not been devolved to the SMT, but remain the responsibility of the coach-manager. Only a few employees noted that they had an annual appraisal talk with their coach-manager on a regular basis. Instead, in some of the teams, one or two employees, mostly the better-educated ones, were appointed to have an appraisal talk if an individual is underperforming. The SMTs decided not to adopt a team-based appraisal system in which an underperforming individual is assessed by the entire team, as this was perceived to be too confronting for the individual team member concerned. In cases when an underperforming

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individual did not show any progress or was unwilling to improve his/her performance, the matter is referred to the coach-manager. Training and Development: We came across instances in which the employees themselves were responsible for implementing training and development practices. At Livio, one of the primary responsibilities that employees bear is the assessment of their competences and updating these competences when necessary. This is common practice in the healthcare sector as employees are required to obtain accreditation points to show that they have mastered their competences (Batalden, Leach, Swing, Dreyfus, & Dreyfus, 2002). At Livio, employees need to show that their competences are up-to-date by performing online tests that are developed and maintained by HRM specialists. The actual development of employee competences is devolved to the SMTs as well, at least partially. For example, we came across training and development practices that are implemented by the SMT team members, such as on-the-job training for new co-workers, coaching of colleagues, the supervision of interns and organising workshops. In most cases, however, the training and development were done at the request of the SMT by individuals from outside the SMT, such as HRM specialists, medical specialists or pharmacists (see also the section on job crafting in SMTs). As these examples show, employees in SMTs are not just consumers, but ‘prosumers’ of HRM as they both implement and produce HRM practices for themselves and other team members.

Organisational Support by HRM Specialists: Towards HRM-as-a-Service In SMTs, employees are responsible for implementing a variety of HRM practices. This is not to say that HRM specialists are redundant in organisations that work with SMTs, since employees as prosumers of HRM need HRM specialist support (Banner et al., 1992; De Jong, De Ruyter, & Wetzels, 2005). This HRM specialist support may involve the provision of training that employees proactively seek (Lyons, 2008), negotiating idiosyncratic deals with newcomers on behalf of the SMT (Rousseau et al., 2006), the development and maintenance of employee and management self-service technologies (Farndale et al., 2009; Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013), the provision of HRM shared services (Cooke, 2006; McCracken & McIvor, 2013; Reilly & Williams, 2003) and/or providing advice to employees on how to produce/consume HRM practices (Meijerink et al., 2016). Similar to employees, HRM specialists experience changes in their roles as a result of the advent of SMTs. We heard HRM specialists noting that they experience role ambiguity, i.e. a lack of clarity about what responsibilities they now have as HRM specialists in supporting SMTs. Role ambiguity is not new to HRM specialists and not necessarily associated only with SMTs (Caldwell, 2003; Legge, 1995; Ulrich, 1995). What the HRM specialists at Livio were mainly struggling with was

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the degree to which they should adopt a reactive role or be more proactive in supporting employees. Most HRM specialists noted that they became more reactive as this fitted the SMT paradigm in which employees are supposed to take the lead in HRM processes. Accordingly, the HRM specialists reported that they did not impose HRM instruments upon the SMTs, but waited with acting until a SMT requested their help, and then they supported the SMTs with finding solutions rather than solving the issues for the SMT. In this respect, the HRM specialists we interviewed described themselves as internal service providers who step in once their internal customers (i.e. the SMTs and/or their members) call for their specialist support. HRM-as-a-Service To better understand the role of HRM specialists in SMTs and more generally, in contexts in which employees are strongly and proactively involved in HRM processes, we propose viewing HRM-as-a-Service. According to Vargo and Lusch (2004, p. 2), services represent ‘the application of specialized competences (knowledge and skills) through deeds, processes and performances for the benefit of another entity or the entity itself’. Various researchers have conceptualised HRM as the provision of specialised competences and, thus, the delivery of services. By drawing on conservation of resources theory, Boon and Kalshoven (2014) argue that HRM practices such as training, feedback and job design can be seen as embedding resources such as knowledge, insights or information that are provided to employees. In support of this claim, several studies have indeed shown that HRM practices relate positively to knowledge resources such as employees’ human capital (Liao, Toya, Lepak, & Hong, 2009; Takeuchi, Lepak, Wang, & Takeuchi, 2007) and organisational capital (Yang & Lin, 2009; Youndt & Snell, 2004). In the literature, the efforts of HRM specialists are implicitly conceptualised as the application of competences for the benefit of another party (Meijerink et al., 2016). This is supported by studies that examine the degree to which employee satisfaction with HRM practices is affected by the knowledge and skills of HRM specialists, such as their HRM competences (Boselie & Paauwe, 2005), HRM capabilities (Maatman et al., 2010) or intellectual capital (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018). In line with these views, we define HRM-as-a-Service as the application of specialised HRM competences through HRM activities that benefit another entity or the entity itself. This definition allows us to view both the employees in SMTs as well as HRM specialists as service-providing entities that engage in HRM-as-a-Service to benefit themselves or others (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017). Employees in SMTs are equivalent to an HRM-as-a-Service provider as they engage in HRM activities that may benefit the entire team. Within Livio as well as in other organisations, employees in a SMT specialise in executing a selected HRM activity on behalf of their coworkers (Barker, 1993; Molleman, 2000). In doing so, these employees apply their knowledge and skills, e.g. in (1) conducting job interviews so the entire team can benefit from having a new colleague that fits the team, (2) performing workforce

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planning activities so other team members are not overloaded with tasks or experience workload that is too high or (3) providing development feedback to improve the competences and performance of the team and its members. In this respect, we can view SMTs as a household (Priem, 2007) in which its employee-members specialise in offering HRM-as-a-Service from which all other household members benefit. HRM specialists also engage in HRM-as-a-Service as they apply their specialised competences for the benefit of employees (Boselie & Paauwe, 2005; Maatman et al., 2010). For example, HRM service centres or central HRM departments apply their specialised knowledge and skills to maintain online self-services for scheduling or performance management (Maatman & Bondarouk, 2014), local HRM business partners support employees in SMTs or line managers to develop the competences they rely on when offering HRM-as-a-Service to and for other team members (Bos-Nehles et al., 2013; Trullen et al., 2016), or centres of expertise leverage their knowledge and skills to recruit new employees (Ulrich et al., 2008). Conceptualising the Competences for HRM-as-a-Service To gain a better understanding of what the specialised competences in HRM-as-aService include, we provide an overview in Table 1 that lists the competences involved in the delivery of HRM practices, such as recruitment, selection, training, performance management and job design. The examples provided in Table 1 illustrate the idea that the application of specialised competences involves not only HRM-as-a-Service delivery from human to human (e.g. an HRM specialist who supports a team in recruiting a new employee), but also the delivery of competences that are codified and embedded in tangibles or goods (such as self-service technologies, protocols, handbooks, etc.). The latter follows from the notion that goods are distribution mechanisms for service provision (Vargo & Lusch, 2008, 2016). Here the idea is that the producers of goods apply their specialised competences to product design, manufacturing and delivery through activities such as prototyping, assembling or innovating products. This implies that knowledge and skills are not only transferred directly through education or training, but also indirectly by embedding them in objects (Vargo & Lusch, 2008). To capture these ideas and outline the specialised competences involved in HRM-as-a-Service, we rely on the intellectual capital concept (Youndt, Subramaniam, & Snell, 2004) as it reflects the notion that knowledge can be transferred directly through relationships and indirectly through codifying knowledge. In the literature, intellectual capital has been defined as the sum of all knowledge an organisation is able to leverage in the process of conducting business (Youndt et al., 2004, p. 337). For HRM-as-a-Service, we translate this definition into one which emphasises that intellectual capital represents the sum of specialised competences (knowledge and skills) that a SMT (member) or HRM specialist is able to leverage to conduct HRM activities that benefit themselves or other entities. This definition implies that the benefits of HRM do not follow from the mere possession of knowledge (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018). Instead, and in line with the notion

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Table 1: Examples of Specialised Competences for HRM-as-a-service. HRM Activity Recruitment

Human Capital (Shared as Social Capital)

Organisational Capital

Knowledge of employer brand Writing skills

Recruitment websites Social media

Knowledge of labour market

Job descriptions Job advertisements Recruitment protocols

Selection

Training

Job interview skills Job interview templates Knowledge of selection techniques Personality tests

Job-related knowledge

Assessment centre protocols e-Learning modules

Coaching skills

Self-assessment regimes

Career skills

Training syllabi Course overviews

Performance management

Knowledge of goal setting (e.g. SMART principle) Ability to give feedback

Performance data

Workforce planning

Budgeting skills Knowledge of labour laws

Self-scheduling applications Productivity overviews

Job design

Knowledge of tasks to complete

Strength/talent finders

Job analysis skills

Job descriptions Job analysis techniques

Productivity overviews

of HRM-as-a-Service, knowledge only creates desired benefits when it is used/ applied through deeds, processes or performances (Vargo & Lusch, 2008). As such, knowledge can only be considered intellectual capital when it is actually utilised. In line with the idea that knowledge can be possessed and used by individuals, transferred through relationships and interaction, and codified in knowledge containers, we follow others (Reed, Lubatkin, & Srinivasan, 2006; Ruta, 2009; Youndt et al., 2004) in conceptualising intellectual capital and thus specialised competences for HRM-as-a-Service into three dimensions: human capital, social capital and organisational capital. Human Capital: Human capital is the knowledge, skills and abilities of individuals (Liao et al., 2009; Reed et al., 2006). As shown in Table 1, this may involve the

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knowledge of selection techniques, ability to provide feedback, communication skills, ability to write job advertisements or formulate SMART performance goals. These types of human capital can be possessed and used by employees to conduct HRM activities and/or by HRM specialists to support employees in doing so. Social Capital: Social capital describes the transfer of knowledge and skills. Although it has also been conceptualised as relational (e.g. trust, reciprocity) and structural (e.g. tie strength, structural holes) network characteristics, as a dimension of intellectual capital, social capital refers to the knowledge that is mobilised by means of social relationships (Nahapiet & Ghoshal, 1998). In an HRM context, this implies that social capital is the knowledge that is shared among employees and HRM specialists in order to offer HRM-as-a-Service. The difference between human capital and social capital is that the former is not necessarily shared. HRM specialists might rely on their knowledge, skills and abilities to support a SMT, yet without directly sharing them with the SMT. This happens, for example, when an HRM specialist recruits a new employee on behalf of and without the involvement of the SMT, so no knowledge is transferred to the SMT. The social capital concept reflects instances when an HRM professional shares his/her knowledge, skills and abilities (e.g. through training or instruction) with a SMT to ensure that the team can perform the selected HRM activity later by itself. Human capital can directly contribute to HRM-as-a-Service when used by an HRM specialist to perform an HRM activity on behalf of a SMT, or indirectly, when shared with the SMT in the form of social capital. Organisational Capital: Organisational capital refers to knowledge which is codified, embedded or stored in knowledge containers such as information systems, databases and manuals (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018; Youndt et al., 2004). Examples of organisational capital used for HRM-as-a-Service are online employee and management self-service technologies (Ruta, 2009), policies and procedures (Bos-Nehles et al., 2013), or databases containing information that employees rely on to conduct their HRM activities (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013). In most cases, these types of organisational capital are developed, offered and maintained by HRM specialists (Maatman & Bondarouk, 2014; Trullen et al., 2016). Since these HRM specialists rely on their individual knowledge, skills and abilities to develop these knowledge containers (Meijerink, Bondarouk, & Looise, 2013; Ruta, 2009), we can say that organisational capital serves as a mean to share human capital indirectly through embedding it in knowledge containers. In support of these claims, research has indeed shown that the human capital of service providers impacts the benefits for recipients through the mediating role of organisational capital (Yang & Lin, 2009). Human capital, social capital and organisational capital are interdependent in bringing about desired benefits for employees (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018). To realise HRM-as-a-Service, the three intellectual capital domains and thus specialised competences are integrated for application.

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HRM-as-a-Service by HRM Specialists Although the support provided by HRM specialists to employees in SMTs can be seen as HRM-as-a-Service, we have not yet discussed the activities that HRM specialists engage in when leveraging these intellectual capital dimensions for the benefit of employees and SMTs. To describe and understand these activities, we rely on the service-dominant (S-D) logic since it conceptualises the delivery of services as the application of knowledge and skills (Vargo & Lusch, 2004) and, therefore, enables us to describe the role of HRM specialists in HRM-as-a-Service. The S-D logic originates from service marketing research and is a meta-theory on economic and social exchange. Specifically, it is founded on 11 foundational premises (FPs) which jointly advance the idea that the utility of products and services follows from a process of resource integration and service exchanges which take place in networks of economic actors, including customers. Due to its metatheoretical nature, the S-D logic does not provide an overview of service provider activities (Breidbach & Maglio, 2016), let alone the role of HRM specialists in HRM-as-a-Service. Therefore, we translate some of the S-D logic’s foundational premises in proposing four activities that HRM specialists engage in when providing HRM-as-a-Service in SMT contexts: development, motivation, offering value propositions and coordination. Development: HRM specialists who engage in development activities apply their competences to support employees in developing their knowledge and skills to implement and consume HRM practices. Given that employees in SMTs are prosumers of HRM practices, it is important that HRM professionals help to develop employees’ specialised competences as this effectively implements HRM practices. Indeed, research has shown that HRM practices are more effectively implemented and perceived to provide benefits to their recipients when the individual responsible for implementing them has high-level HRM competences (Bos-Nehles et al., 2013; Gilbert, De Winne, & Sels, 2015; Trullen et al., 2016). Research has also shown that employees are more likely to engage in job crafting in terms of developing new knowledge and skills and are more effective in I-deal negotiation processes when relying on high-level competences (Meijerink, 2014; Rousseau et al., 2006; Tims et al., 2014; Tims et al., 2016). On this basis, we propose that HRM specialists can support the effective involvement of employees in executing HRM activities by developing employees’ HRM competences. Furthermore, in their role as consumers/recipients of HRM practices, employees need to have high-level HRM competences to ensure that the HRM practices provided bring value and benefits to them (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018; Meijerink et al., 2016). This follows from the S-D logic’s foundational premise that value is always uniquely and phenomenologically determined by the beneficiary (Vargo & Lusch, 2016). According to S-D logic researchers, value is not embedded or added to services but created ‘in use’ by their recipients. Put differently, the benefits of a service emerge from the actions of recipients, which is also referred to as value-inuse (Vargo & Lusch, 2004). The value-in-use notion holds that a similar good or

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service can result in different types and levels of benefits realised by a recipient, depending on how s/he applies and makes use of a provided service. Researchers have found that the knowledge, skills and abilities of employees as recipients of HRM practices support them in reaping the benefits of HRM. For instance, Meijerink et al. (2016) showed that employees’ HRM competences related positively to their perceptions of HRM service value. Another study confirmed that employees benefit even more from having well-developed HRM competences when selected HRM practices are provided by an HRM service provider that restricts investment in its human capital or organisational capital (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018). On this basis, we propose that HRM specialists can add to HRM processes in SMTs by developing the HRM competences of employees as this supports both the implementation and consumption of HRM practices by employees. We came across several approaches that HRM specialists initiated to develop employees’ HRM competences. First, we heard both HRM specialists and employees stating that HRM specialists organised training workshops for employees. During such workshops, employees were offered knowledge and skills on HRM activities such as workforce planning (e.g. how to balance the ratio between the number of core/permanent staff members and number of temporary/flex workers in the SMT), performance management (e.g. what are useful feedback provision techniques and how to provide peer-feedback) and scheduling (e.g. how to coordinate self-scheduling processes in the SMT and how to operate the management selfservice system). In offering these support services, HRM professionals are leveraging their human capital by directly sharing their knowledge and skills with the SMTs and their employee-members. In line with the notion that the SMTs operate as a household in which its members specialise in conducting an HRM activity, the development workshops and, thus, human capital of HRM professionals were often provided to one or two individuals per SMT, rather than to all SMT members. Second, HRM specialists organised roundtable meetings for employees from different SMTs. During these roundtable meetings, the representatives from the various SMTs discussed difficulties they encountered with e.g. workforce planning, scheduling, feedback provision or staffing, and shared experiences on how they managed to resolve such issues. These discussions were led by an HRM specialist who helped the participating employees to reflect on their HRM activities and provided suggestions on how to prevent/deal with problems that might occur in the future. Thus, the HRM specialists relied on their human capital to build social capital among the SMTs to ensure that employees shared their knowledge and experiences. Finally, the HRM specialists developed employees’ HRM competences more indirectly through training coach-managers. This approach is based on what might be called ‘train-the-trainer’ principle, by which coach-managers are trained in how to develop employees’ HRM competences. In most cases, this involved an HRM specialist training coach-managers on how to coach the employees in the SMTs to enact HRM responsibilities, rather than taking away the autonomy granted to teams. Therefore, the HRM professionals relied on their human capital

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to stimulate social capital in terms of knowledge exchange between coach-managers and the SMTs. Motivation: Besides needing the competences to conduct HRM activities, employees must be motivated to do so. This is in line with the S-D logic’s foundational premises that the recipient is always a co-producer (Vargo & Lusch, 2004) and that value is co-created by multiple actors, always including the beneficiary (Vargo & Lusch, 2016). In the literature, co-production refers to the involvement of service recipients in the design and delivery of the service offering (Skaggs & Youndt, 2004). The involvement of service recipients is important since without their active participation in service design and delivery, no service can be offered. This also goes for the involvement of employees in HRM processes, as the delivery of HRM services cannot take place without the participation of employees. For example, employees need to actively participate in workshops or on-the-job-training (by asking questions, taking tests, paying attention) to ensure the implementation of training and development practices, engage in appraisal talks to receive feedback, suggest job seekers for recruitment purposes or be involved in assessment centres to help implement selection practices. In SMTs the involvement of employees as the recipients of HRM services in the design and delivery of HRM activities is evident. For example, job crafting acts in which employees proactively seek HRM support such as training and development or feedback, the negotiation of idiosyncratic HRM services, the use of online HRM self-service technologies by employees, or employees’ involvement in the presumption (i.e. the implementation and consumption) of HRM services. Employees need to have the motivation to engage in the co-production to ensure the effective implementation of HRM. Research has shown that motivation is positively related to the degree to which HRM practices are actually implemented on the work floor and perceived to be present by organisational stakeholders (Bos-Nehles, & Meijerink, in press). The use of HRM services by employees is positively associated with the value of HRM services to them (Bondarouk et al., 2017), since this helps to improve employees’ HRM competences to make effective use of HRM services (Meijerink et al., 2016). On this basis, we argue that it is important for HRM specialists to motivate employees’ participation in the design, delivery and use of HRM practices. In SMTs, this active participation of employees in HRM does not come automatically, since employees are not always willing to take on additional HRM responsibilities. Employees may feel that their day-to-day responsibilities are already taking too much of their time, since they do not find performing HRM activities interesting or perceive self-management to be a management fad that offers limited value to them. We came across HRM specialists who engaged in activities to motivate employees to implement HRM practices and become involved in HRM processes. Previous research has shown that HRM specialists can influence the motivation of non-HRM specialists to implement HRM practices by framing HRM activities in an appealing way, recognising the efforts of those who implement HRM, or providing them with helpful tools, policies and guidelines

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(Bos-Nehles, & Meijerink, in press; Trullen et al., 2016). At Livio, the HRM specialists mainly tried to motivate employees through the provision of what they call a talent motivation analysis (TMA) tool to employees. This TMA is what Meyers and van Woerkom (2014) refer to as a strength-based approach to talent management that helps employees to identify their strengths so they can place themselves in positions that allow them to play to their strengths. By offering the TMA tool, HRM specialists anticipated that when employees’ competences and interests fit the selected HRM responsibility they need to enact, they would become more motivated to do so. Essentially, what the HRM professionals are doing to motivate employees’ involvement in HRM processes is leveraging organisational capital since the TMA tool embeds insights that employees can apply to match their interests and strengths with selected HRM activities. Offering Value Propositions: We came across various examples in which HRM specialists relied on their specialised competences to offer value propositions to SMTs. This is in line with the S-D logic’s foundational premise that the enterprise cannot deliver value, but only offer value propositions (Vargo & Lusch, 2008). A value proposition refers to a promise of potential value that is realised when customers utilise a provided product/service (Ballantyne, Frow, Varey, & Payne, 2011; Vargo & Lusch, 2008). In an HRM environment, HRM services are equivalent to a value proposition since employees as service recipients create value-in-use when applying a provided HRM service (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017; Meijerink et al., 2016). Therefore, HRM specialists cannot create value for employees or add value to the services they provide, which means that the support services they provide are not value-laden. Instead, HRM specialists can be viewed as providing the opportunity for employees to create value-in-use, which is realised when employees actually make use of the HRM support services provided (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017; Meijerink et al., 2016). HRM specialists rely on their intellectual capital to offer value propositions, such as advice (i.e. human capital) or self-service systems (i.e. organisational capital), that employees may apply in order to meet their needs. Employees will not be able to create value-in-use if HRM specialists do not rely on and share welldeveloped intellectual capital with them. Put differently, the intellectual capital of the HRM service provider needs to be well-developed and thus represents a necessary condition since otherwise value propositions are unlikely to be of high quality nor turned into value by workers. In support of this claim, Meijerink and Bondarouk (2018) indeed showed that well-developed intellectual capital of HRM specialists is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for employees to experience high-level HRM service value. Research has shown that developing value propositions involves developing services that help relieve recipients’ ‘pain’ as well as providing ‘gains’ (Osterwalder, Pigneur, Bernarda, & Smith, 2014). In an HRM setting, the pain involves annoyances that employees experience in conducting their HRM responsibilities or negative outcomes that they try to avoid, such as role overload (Caldwell, 2003), stress (De Leede et al., 1999) or hindering job demands (Tims et al., 2012). Employee

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‘gains’ refer to criteria against which employees measure whether their HRM activities are successful and bring positive outcomes that employees try to achieve, such as autonomy and support from co-workers (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017), new competences (Bakker et al., 2012) or a meaningful and engaging job (Tims et al., 2016). HRM specialists engage in several value proposition activities that aim at reducing the pain and allow SMTs to reap the gains of their HRM activities. First, they support employees’ prosumption of staffing practices. Although the employees are responsible for selecting job seekers, HRM specialists did engage in staffing processes to ensure that employees reaped the gains/benefits of the selection activities they performed. For instance, the HRM specialists supported the SMTs by taking care of the recruitment processes to ensure that SMTs are provided with a substantial pool of job seekers. The HRM specialists were also in a good position to engage in recruitment processes that benefit SMTs since their knowledge of the labour market is better than that of the employees in the SMT. To ensure that the support services provided actually enable SMTs to perform their staffing responsibilities well, the HRM specialists seek feedback from the SMT, e.g. by asking whether suggested job candidates meet the SMT’s expectations. The HRM specialists also shared their human capital on how to perform job interviews effectively with the SMTs, either directly or indirectly by creating documents, tools or guidelines (i.e. organisational capital) that captured this expertise. Second, HRM specialists also helped employees to experience as little ‘pain’ as possible during staffing processes. Both the HRM specialists and employees recognised that the administration associated with hiring new workers can be rather cumbersome. Therefore, after employees concluded the job interviews and selected a new co-worker, the HRM specialists finalised the staffing process by performing the employment conditions interview, drafting a contract, and making sure that the new co-workers are officially employed. Finally, we came across instances in which HRM specialists offered their organisational capital to relieve some of the pain associated with workforce planning and scheduling. This involved HRM specialists developing the online self-service technologies that enabled the SMTs to schedule their shifts. This selfservice technology overcomes some of the annoyances that employees experience in scheduling their work, such as communicating and registering the scheduling needs and wishes of all SMT members, or managing complex schedules that involve many employees and different types of shifts. The HRM specialists also provided relevant management information that was generated on the basis of data provided by the employees. This concerned, for example, information on the productivity levels which the SMTs could use for workforce planning activities. The SMTs used this information to signal whether individual team members were running the risk of being overloaded with work or to determine whether and how many additional FTEs would be needed to cope with increases in labour demand. Coordination: Finally, HRM specialists provide support by coordinating the efforts of the various actors involved in HRM activities, including SMTs and

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their employee-members. The S-D logic helps to conceptualise this support act of HRM specialists in HRM-as-a-Service. It proposes that value is co-created by multiple actors, always including the beneficiary and that all social and economic actors are resource integrators (Vargo & Lusch, 2016). These foundational premises build on the idea that service recipients create value-in-use. To realise the benefits of a provided good or service, service recipients rely on complementary resources that allow them to put it to effective use. This involves not only the knowledge and skills that an individual recipient has, but also the knowledge resources provided by others that service recipients integrate and apply during value-in-use creation processes (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2018; Priem, 2007; Vargo & Lusch, 2008). Therefore, multiple actors jointly co-create value with the service recipient by offering complementary resources that add to the value-in-use creation. In an HRM context, employees as prosumers of HRM rely on complementary resources coming from others to create value-in-use of HRM practices (Meijerink & Bos-Nehles, 2017). Complementary resources can include the autonomy granted by co-workers which allows employees to put to use the knowledge and skills which they gained during training (Chiaburu & Harrison, 2008), call centre support on how to make use of online HRM self-services (Cooke, 2006) or a high-quality relationship with a manager who offers additional HRM practices (Bos-Nehles, & Meijerink, in press). In fact, in SMTs, employees also need support from their co-workers in order to effectively conduct HRM activities. For example, co-workers need to share information about safety issues, quality of care and productivity levels to enable the colleague who is responsible for performance management to develop performance indicators, or share their experiences with job candidates to enable the employee who is responsible for staffing to select the right one. To ensure an effective functioning of this collective of actors involved in HRM processes, HRM specialists engage in coordination to safeguard the interests of the multiple actors involved (see also the chapter ‘Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams’). Specifically, they help coordinate the efforts of employee-members within SMTs as well as between SMTs. In the former case, HRM specialists helped to resolve conflicts among employees in a SMT. In line with the notion that HRM specialists take a reactive approach in the SMT context, they only provided this support when requested to do so by a SMT (member). If requested, HRM specialists help SMTs with resolving withinteam conflicts by acting as a mediator that shows team members how to give feedback, to understand the perspective and interests of another team member, and to build a shared understanding among team members. In this role, HRM specialists mostly rely on their human capital such as their knowledge and skills to resolve conflicts within SMTs. The HRM specialists also coordinate the HRM activities taking place across the different SMTs. As an example, since HRM specialists are responsible for job candidates, they also get to decide which candidates are forwarded to which teams. When there is a shortage of workers on the job market, this coordinating role

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becomes important to avoid some teams being left with few or no job candidates. This also puts HRM specialists in a powerful position. HRM specialists exercised this power by referring job candidates to another team when the team to which a candidate was initially referred did not contact the job candidate quickly. The HRM specialists did so to uphold Livio’s good reputation of being an employer that reacts quickly to job applications and thus to ensure that the scarce number of job seekers keep applying. The HRM specialists experienced tension between the top-down control of the HRM activities conducted by the SMTs (for a detailed discussion, see the chapter ‘Governance Mechanisms and HRM Activities in Self-managing Teams’), while providing them with the autonomy to make HR-related decisions themselves. This not only occurred in recruitment processes, as described above. Although the HRM specialists felt that they should be reactive in supporting the SMTs, they reported cases in which they were in fact controlling the selection, workforce planning, job design and performance management of SMTs. For example, during the selection of job candidates, HRM specialists attended job interviews to check whether employees were upholding the organisation’s employer brand. When HRM specialists felt that job candidates who had been selected and offered a job by a SMT had a poor person-job fit or poor person-team fit, they monitored the performance of those workers during their probation period. HRM specialists also reported cases in which they decided, against the will of the SMT, to transfer a team member to another SMT. According to the HRM specialists interviewed, this was necessary when team members were too dominant, assumed too many HRM responsibilities and, therefore, restricted the development of other team members to conduct HRM activities. The decision of which HRM responsibilities to delegate to the SMT in the first place was also made by the HRM specialists and top management. The HRM specialists tried to influence the distribution of HRM responsibility. For example, they implemented a rule that required employees to change HRM responsibilities each year. They felt that this was necessary to prevent employees developing too high levels of ownership of a selected HRM activity. As a result of these initiatives, the HRM specialists experienced a paradox (Keegan et al., in press) since they felt they were intervening in teams that supposedly should be self-managing. In coordinating the HRM activities across and within SMTs, HRM specialists seem to need the competences to balance between empowering teams on the one hand, while avoiding controlling and determining the conduct of HRM activities in those teams in a top-down manner on the other.

Conclusion In SMT contexts, HRM functions change since employees, either individually or as a team, become increasingly involved in conducting HRM activities. Here, one can think of the collective crafting of job resources and job demands, the negotiation of

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idiosyncratic deals, the use of management self-service technologies and the prosumption of HRM practices such as staffing, workforce planning, training and development, job design and performance management. As a result, the role of HRM specialists becomes more reactive and more that of a service provider. Put differently, HRM specialists engage in HRM-as-a-Service in terms of leveraging their human capital, social capital and organisational capital to benefit and support SMTs in conducting HRM activities. In so doing, they provide services supporting the development of employees’ competences and motivation to conduct HRM activities, offering value propositions to SMTs and coordinating HRM activities within and across SMTs.

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Discussion and Future Outlook

At the end of this book, after having provided an outlook of the history of selfmanaging teams (SMTs), shared the relevant literature and our knowledge about self-management and SMTs, and applied out theoretical understanding of SMTs to a case study in the healthcare sector, we feel we can now provide the reader with some practical recommendations for the implementation of SMTs in organisations. At this stage, it is also logical to look ahead and to ask the question what happens after the implementation of SMTs. How will SMTs develop in the future? How far can they get in their self-management? What does it take to let SMTs progress towards higher levels of maturity? It is against this backdrop that this final chapter discusses practical recommendations for the implementation of SMTs, common misconceptions about SMTs and a future outlook on the maturity of SMTs and role of line managers and Human Resource Management (HRM) specialists. Before doing so however, we first discuss some common misconceptions about SMTs as these likely impact the successful implementation of SMTs.

Common Misconceptions about Self-managing Teams Misconception One

‘SMTs Do Not Need Leaders’

As far as the word ‘self-managing’ invokes a leaderless group, organisations may mistakenly assume that leaders and managers are no longer necessary in a transfer to such teams. Our empirical research has shown that there is a definite need in good leadership (a coach, a facilitator), who is assigned or born bottom-up within a group to support and develop a team. The role of leaders may change substantially and may differ per team, but they will stay and have a part to play. Misconception Two

‘Leaders Lose Power in the Transition to SMTs’

It is quite common to think about power as a zero-equation game: if employees get more power through SMTs, then the managers have to have less. We learnt a great Organisational Roadmap Towards Teal Organisations Advanced Series in Management, Volume 19, 179 195 Copyright r 2018 by Emerald Publishing Limited All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1877-6361/doi:10.1108/S1877-636120180000019008

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deal how good leaders managed to re-direct their power, from inward-oriented control and coordination, towards outward and using power to break down external barriers to let teams perform better. Leaders should be able to exercise their convincing and lobbying ability to help teams through influencing suppliers, customers and partnering organisations. We are convinced that leaders do not lose power but should use it as a flexible and elastic resource. Misconception Three

‘Newly Formed SMTs Are Automatically Self-managing’

Newly formed SMTs will need some time to accept responsibilities for the empowerment and autonomy. Not everyone will be equally happy with effects of empowerment. The literature analysis (see chapter ‘Literature Review of Successful Self-managing Teams’) has shown that about 20 25% of employees will not welcome ideas and practice of empowerment. Simply they will not want to accept more responsibilities than they already have. Groups must go through several developmental stages to begin to function as self-managing teams. To begin with, they need to be trained in such areas of group dynamics as goal setting, conflict resolution or problem solving. Misconception Four

‘SMTs Do Not Need Staff Support’

Of course, many SMTs are independent to take decisions. However, although SMTs are authorised to perform all kind of tasks that used to be done by staff (such as financial and administrative tasks, marketing, sales and purchasing tasks as well as HRM tasks), it does not imply that they do not need any staff support. Reliant on the degree of empowerment (see the maturity model), the operational tasks could be transferred to the SMTs, while the specialised tasks are still in the hand of staff functions. A close co-operation is needed between SMTs and support functions (see Chapter ‘The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams’). Teal organisations are keen on choosing what type of support is provided by the organisation to the teams, and what type of responsibilities is transferred to the teams.

Recommendations for the Implementation of SMTs Based on our conceptual and empirical inquiries into SMTs, we provide guidelines for those managers who decide to take upon the challenge and transfer their organisation towards SMTs. In line with the work of Renkema, Bondarouk, and BosNehles (2018), we argue that the decision to implement SMTs means a shift in responsibilities for organisational actors at various levels in the organisation. This means that not only work floor professionals adopt a new role, but a major shift in responsibilities is expected from line managers, professionals and support departments. By working autonomously, teams need to execute their professional tasks by

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organising their own work and making decisions about their work environment. An important question is how to facilitate this implementation process? And how can line managers and HRM professionals best support these teams? Thus, we provide recommendations for different HRM stakeholders, including organisational decision-makers, line managers, the HRM department and teams themselves. Organisational Stakeholders Manage Expectations! For organisational members it is important to understand the reasons for transforming organisations to self-managing organisations. Just following a trend is surely not a valid reason to implement SMTs and organisational members aim to understand how this decision fits to the strategic goals of the organisation and which approach the organisation chooses to implement SMTs. SMTs and line managers are supported most by communicating clearly. A very important part of this communication is managing expectations about the timing of the implementation process for example Livio piloted the introduction of SMTs in two teams and adopted the process based on these expectations, the offered support mechanisms how can teams get supported in the transition process, and of course explain all relevant stakeholders, but mainly teams and line managers, what the organisation expects of them. The organisation should be as clear as possible about their expectations: what is expected of professionals and leaders in their new roles? To perform well, teams need on-time, reliable and error-free information. Without these information, teams cannot take decisions independently, they still stay dependent on the providers of the required information. Organisations should therefore focus on managing information and dashboards to support the teams. However, it is important not to overload the teams with too much information and be transparent but selective in publishing information on a dashboard. To do this, organisations can establish useful and easy-to-use communication channels. In order to perform well, teams need indicators showing how they perform. These performance indicators can function as boundary conditions that can help teams to orient the performance outcomes. Organisations should keep track of any performance issues by identifying teams that perform outside the boundary conditions to prevent serious incidents. However, they need to provide them with enough space through making performance indicators rather broad. Most importantly, they should use outcome-based assessment methods. Delegate Responsibilities and Authority! As an organisation, it is important to take courage and delegate performance responsibilities to teams, while ensuring not to identify individuals in the team as being more responsible than others. Instead, the organisation should show trust: the professional is able to decide best what works for the client and for the team. However, what they need to do proactively is to adapt systems and rules before implementing SMTs. This means that they need to authorise responsibilities. Without authorisation and decision-making power teams cannot function effectively and secure good performance.

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Enjoy Diversity! It is up to the team how they work, as long as their performance stays within the critical boundary conditions such as quality of healthcare and long-term budgets. Organisations should allow differences to arise between teams. All teams need to become self-managing, but some teams may be granted more time to adapt than others. Especially teams with existing problems might need more time to adjust and get used to more responsibilities. And these teams can learn from front-runners, who in turn should be encouraged to share their knowledge. This means that the organisation needs to make sure that supporting other teams should count as ‘productive hours’. Managerial Stakeholders Become a Coach! Line managers need to be able to let their teams make their own decisions. This means that they need to offer multiple solutions when teams ask for help. The main pitfall for employees who formerly had a management role is to remain the decision-maker. The role of the line manager transforms through different stages towards coach. Only during the first phases of the SMT implementation process, line managers need to have a directive, managerial role and helping teams to learn how to deal with their new responsibilities. However, this role changes in the transition period: line managers should coach teams instead of making decisions. Most important for line managers is that they ask teams what they need and help them by providing and interpreting the right information. To do this properly, line managers should keep connected with their teams and know about current developments. Therefore, line managers should regularly visit teams to learn about their issues. However, teams have to solve their own challenges first, and line managers can create a feeling of ownership and responsibility of their teams. The most frequent description of the expected behaviour of the line manager of SMTs is: ‘manage where you have to and coach where you can’. HRM Stakeholders Become a Service Provider! HRM professionals should help teams with HRMrelated issues such as recruiting and selecting new colleagues and developing a feedback culture. This means that they need to transform the HRM department into a service department, which is available to provide help with performing HRM tasks. The HRM department should become more strategic. This means they should facilitate top management with HRM information during the SMT implementation process in the organisation. To do this, they need to provide insights about the development and enactment of HRM-related tasks by teams and to monitor labour markets and developments in laws and regulations. We believe that HRM is wellpositioned to keep become a service provider for the organisation by keeping track of HRM responsibilities, tasks, rules and regulations within teams and keeping an

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eye on potential negative side-effects such as groupthink (failure to be critical, to achieve conformity), unethical behaviour and unlawful behaviour. Offer HRM Intelligence! HRM professionals should develop HR intelligence, such as tools, instruments and data for SMTs to use to manage themselves. These could be for example e-HRM systems, dashboard and team development tools. Making use of the specific skills and competences of HRM professionals, tailored instruments can be developed to support the transition towards SMTs. Especially they should develop relevant training and development policies for teams to use and give team members the opportunity to suggest new training courses that they think are relevant. Team Stakeholders Become a Dream Team! The performance of SMTs depends on how selfmanaging employees within SMTs work together. To guarantee the performance of the team, employees need to be aware and control social processes within their teams. Because of the relative distance of line managers, employees need to provide and receive timely feedback within their teams. This proofs to be one of the most difficult aspects of the SMT implementation. Therefore, team members should take time for discussion and decision-making. To do this, they need to plan regular team meetings during which progress and issues are discussed and decisions are made. They could consider to train team members to organise these meetings efficiently. Further, they need to learn about other new responsibilities, given that many employees will have no experience in being responsible for issues such as scheduling. This means they need to put quality systems in place to warrant the quality of care. A very important aspect of team processes is trust. Team members need to trust that colleagues are capable of knowing what is best for the client, the team and the organisation. This might mean that they need to let them make mistakes, but prevent blunders. Make sure that all team members know about their (new) responsibilities and take care to give everyone the authority and tools to execute their work properly. Team boundaries and margins should be as clear as possible, and team members have to monitor them actively. Lastly, help other teams with lessons learned and reach out for support from the coach, HRM department or managers before processes take a halt or incidents happen.

On the Maturity of SMTs and Beyond To understand where SMTs are headed in the future, it is important to understand where they come from and why organisations want to establish them. Concepts such as SMTs are easily copied by organisations, simply because others are also introducing them. In fact, the SMT concept can be considered a management

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fashion (Abrahamson, 1996) in such a way that (1) there is a promise of a significant productivity increase, (2) there are well-known examples within or outside the sector (e.g. Buurtzorg in the Netherlands) (Laloux, 2014), (3) the concept has a universal applicability and (4) there is interpretive viability that is leaving room for more interpretations. Besides the mimicking of others, in practice, we see four additional drivers or approaches of organisations to choose for a roadmap with self-management (see Figure 1). The first approach organisations use for the implementation of SMTs is efficiency-driven. Due to budget cuts, the organisation wants to reduce management levels, staff functions and administrative procedures. Almost as a consequence, SMTs have to perform these tasks themselves and thus they are called selfmanaging. The second approach is flexibility and client driven. Here, the main focus is on creating an awareness on team level of ownership of clients. The teams are empowered to act for meeting client needs. As a consequence, the teams show highly flexible behaviours to accommodate the client needs. The third approach is innovation-driven. Here, the main focus is on sharing knowledge and expertise in order to offer better products and services. The use of the knowledge of the team members, in collaboration with other teams, leads towards continuous improvement and innovation. The fourth approach is driven by intrinsic value. Organisations start to implement SMTs because top management is convinced that self-management is a good thing as such. Teams are empowered, just because it is a

Figure 1:

Four Approaches to the Introduction of SMTs.

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recognition of their expertise, knowledge and professional pride. In such cases, SMTs are simply reflecting the core values of the organisation. The Implementation of Self-management To understand how teams grow towards maturity in reaping the benefits associated with each of these four approaches, it is important to realise that implementation of SMTs is a process that consists of various phases (see Chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’). We have presented a four-phase SMT implementation process that distinguishes the following phases: Initiation, Adoption & Adaptation, Use and Incorporation of SMTs in organisations. Implementing SMTs is not necessarily a linear process in which SMTs start initiating SMTs and end with the incorporation of SMTs. Instead, this process should be seen as dynamic (Van Mierlo, Bondarouk, & Sanders, 2018) in which SMTs start the implementation process at each of the phases and may go up or down the process based on their needs. SMTs may decide to start the implementation by designing new teams, slowly devolving tasks and responsibilities from line managers to employees and teaching teams to carry out the responsibilities and then to follow to the next phases until SMTs have incorporated self-management ideas and use them on a daily basis. Following these four phases from initiation to incorporation entails a slow implementation process in which line managers increasingly let go of their tasks and responsibilities and SMTs take them on in a gradual way until they are rather autonomous. However, depending on which of the four (efficiency, flexibility, innovation or intrinsic values) approaches adopted, organisations may also decide to implement SMTs much faster by deciding to empower employees quickly and asking them to manage themselves through learning-by-doing. In such cases, organisations may follow a kind of reversed implementation process when they simply start using and working with SMTs before adapting the SMT concept to their unique situation. In each phase, there is the opportunity to evolve in the process in both directions, in the direction of more independence or back to more dependence on management. Situations that lead SMTs to evolve back may be changes in the team for example team members leaving the team that need to be replaced with new team members who may not have any self-management experience and thus require the team to restructure tasks and responsibilities, changes outside the team for example a new coach replacing the previous one by monitoring and controlling team processes although the team was used to monitor itself, or unexpected events, such as new laws or regulations that influence the daily work of SMTs. However, evolving towards higher levels of dependency on management does not mean that SMTs can never become independent. Evolutions in both directions are part of the process. We even want to go a step further and suggest that SMTs are never stabilised or complete. However, they may be temporarily stable, in a ‘stabilized-fornow’ status (Orlikowski, 2000, p. 411), but will continue to evolve and modify

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Table 1: The Context of the Organisation.

Sharing of resources low Sharing of resources high

Brownfield

Greenfield

Livio Home Care Livio Residential Care

Buurtzorg Semco

through its users (SMTs), designers (management) and regulators (management or external actors). SMTs will learn from each evolution and will adopt their selfmanaging practices accordingly. The implementation process of SMTs might also be dependent on the context of the organisation (see Table 1). This context might be different in two respects (see Table 1). The first aspect is the degree to which teams share resources. Reflecting on our case study of Livio, we observed many differences between the teams in the home hare and those within the residential care. Within residential care, the teams share a lot more resources, such as equipment, building facilities and infrastructure. The teams here also work together on one location. Within home care, the SMTs are more independent and share less resources with other teams. Teams that are working independently without sharing resources and associated risks may have a lot more opportunities to develop into SMTs. The second aspect is the difference between a brownfield or a greenfield situation. Livio as such is an existing organisation who turned their organisation around into SMTs, typically a brownfield context. The transformation of an existing organisation into a self-managing team-based organisation is a significant change process. As our case study has shown, many steps have to be taken as the implementation process involves many stakeholders. Another famous example of an SMT organisation Buurtzorg Netherlands (see Laloux, 2014) is a greenfield context because Buurtzorg was founded using the self-management concept and has worked with SMTs from the start. That makes many things different: one can build up the organisation from scratch with SMTs in mind. Each of the four scenario’s or archetypes presented in Table 1 differ in the degree of complexity associated with the implementation of SMTs. The ‘least complex’ scenario is one when a greenfield organisation established SMTs that do not share many resources. These greenfield organisations are independent enough to develop as a self-managing team and they are able to select employees and managers that fit the SMT concept. The most complex scenario is one in which an existing organisation installs SMTs that share many resources. In this case, the SMTs are interdependent and have to rely on other persons and teams to create value. That might be an explanation why the teams within Livio Residential Care are on average less developed and less empowered in comparision to the teams within Livio Home Care.

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A Maturity Model of SMTs Similar to the implementation process of the SMTs, the teams themselves also evolve and may grow more mature through time. To capture the notion that SMTs themselves also progress and evolve, we present a team maturity model that extends the traditional team development models. Various existing studies have presented different team development models. For example, the team development models of Tuckman and Jensen (1977) and Wheelan (2005) are stage models, in which teams develop from initial stages to more mature stages. Gersick (1988) and other researchers like Orlikowski (2000) remarked rightly that the development does not follow a straightforward model as teams might fall back in earlier stages. That is why Laloux (2014) takes an evolutionary approach, a fundamentally developmental perspective, in which individuals, teams and organisations develop through levels of development, lines of development, states of consciousness and types. Here we only want to add one question: what is next? What is the next level beyond Selfmanaging Teams? Can we think of mini-companies? Teams that have developed and are so independently from the ‘mother organisation’ that they are selfcontaining, with no structural linkages anymore with the mother organisation or other teams. And what if we add the new world of work (De Leede, 2017) into the discussion, especially the aspect of the employment relationship. Globally, a rise in self-employed people can be observed. What would be the effect of these new employment relations within the context of self-managing teams? In our view, the maturity of SMTs can be described along three dimensions: (1) the level of empowerment, (2) the degree of organisational independency and (3) the level of team dynamics and interpersonal relations. The level of empowerment refers to the authority dimension (Hollenbeck, Beersma, & Schouten, 2012) and the team autonomy (Hackman, 1987). This dimensions describes to what extent the teams are autonomous, what is their level of involvement in decision-making and on which issues employees may decide. The degree of organisational independency refers to the issue of sharing resources and the inclusion of self-employed workers within the teams. The less teams are sharing expensive equipment, facilities or technical infrastructure, the more they can develop independently. The level of team dynamics and interpersonal relations refer to the team development processes as proposed by Wheelan (2005) and many others. Trust and team cohesion are important elements in the team development. Together, these three dimensions describe the possible maturity of SMTs (see Figure 2). We acknowledge the risks that such a model can be viewed as just another team development model using stages or phases. However, it is not our intention to propose a stage model, we fully recognise the different lines of development, stages, types and states and the associated redesigns, fall backs, disappointments, bypasses and political processes. Nevertheless, this maturity model may serve for researchers as a means to distinguish different types of teams and show practitioners how to evolve their path of organisational transformation towards SMTs. The fourth level in our model is called ‘mini-companies’. It is an old metaphor, but still alive. SMTs resemble much aspects of companies, they can be easily understood as teams with their own

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Figure 2:

The Team Maturity Model.

mission, customers, suppliers, investors and employees, whether these employees are members of their team or as self-employed people participate in some of the mini-company processes.

The Future of Line Managers in SMTs Based on the maturity model, we distinguish two developments in SMTs that may have implications for the future of line managers. Either SMTs remain attached to the organisation and thus continue to be supported by line managers and the HRM function but maybe also be restricted by hierarchical systems, bureaucratic policies and perceived dependence on other teams and the entire organisation, or they separate from the organisation and become completely independent as a separate, independent greenfield organisation. In this section, we describe how the future of line mangers is affected by these two developments. Developments of SMTs as Part of Existing (Brownfield) Organisations Implementing SMTs in an existing organisation that used to know a traditional hierarchical situation or staying within an existing organisation after SMTs have matured towards independence both require coordination of a leader or line managers. This means that SMTs will never be completely self-managing and independent of managerial control and coordination. We have learnt from Druskat and Wheeler (2004), however, that SMTs require a specific kind of leadership. Line managers are expected to fulfil the role of external leader. They stress that:

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…even a team that is autonomous in terms of its activities and decision making must still continually receive direction from higher levels in the organisation. And it also must report to that hierarchy through a person who is ultimately held accountable for the group’s performance. (Druskat & Wheeler, 2004, p. 65)

Research has shown that even when teams are structurally empowered, line managers are critical for team success (Arnold, Arad, Rhoades, & Drasgow, 2000; Druskat & Wheeler, 2003; Sims & Manz, 1984). They seem to help to foster an empowered state within a team (Maynard, Mathieu, Gilson, O’Boyle, & Cigularov, 2013) and task-focused and people-focused leadership behaviours led to higher perceived team effectiveness and team productivities (Burke et al., 2006). Stoker (2008) explored the behaviour of line managers for teams of short and long team tenures and exposed that both teams still required external leadership. However, team members with a short team tenure performed better when the line manager demonstrated directive behaviours and that team members with longer team tenure performed better when line managers exhibited coaching styles behaviours. Based on interviews with managers, external leaders and self-managing team members, Druskat and Wheeler (2003, p. 446) could display that line managers of SMTs still continually ‘moved back and forth’ between their teams and the organisation, showing their active engagement in the management of SMTs. Based on our analysis in the chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Selfmanaging Teams’, we summarise that although SMTs act quite autonomously and require limited to no supervision, line managers stay important to (1) coach SMTs (Morgeson, 2005; Stoker, 2008; Wageman, 2001), (2) oversee various teams (Druskat & Wheeler, 2004; Luciano, Mathieu, & Ruddy, 2014) and thus coordinate work between them, (3) deal with unforeseen disruptive events for SMTs to focus on the daily business, such as complaints or new regulations (Morgeson, 2005; Stewart, Courtright, & Manz, 2011), (4) manage the team’s boundaries by building relationships between the team and the broader inner and outer organisation (Druskat & Wheeler, 2003; Yang & Shao, 1996; Yazid, 2015), (5) restructuring and monitoring the team in situations of underperformance (Morgeson, 2005), (6) solving team conflicts (Langfred, 2007) and (7) shirking responsibilities. However, compared with traditional, more hierarchical designs, the focus of the line manager shifts from managing daily activities to facilitating and supporting team functioning (Druskat & Wheeler, 2003; Mathieu, Gilson, & Ruddy, 2006; Wageman, 2001). In such a role, they would focus on for example ‘promoting teamwork, facilitating task work, aligning team efforts with broader organisational goals, and exhibiting consideration for members’ (Luciano et al., 2014, p. 323) or on preparing and coaching the team (Morgeson, 2005). Developments of SMTs as Independent (Greenfield) Organisations If SMTs would want complete independence of organisational control and coordination, they could decide to separate from the current organisation they were part of and continue as an independent organisation. In such a situation, self-managing

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teams would become self-managing organisations that would operate independently of their former line manager and other organisational managers, but also of support mechanisms that they dependent on. As will be explained in the next part of this chapter, these greenfield organisations might struggle with economies of scale and a lack of specialised competences. Due to the average size of SMTs, these organisations would be categorised as small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) or as a micro organisation. However, these organisations are usually led by a CEO or owner-leader of the enterprise who would take strategic decisions and manage the employees in the organisation. What kind of leadership positions managers of SME greenfield organisations would use to manage employees in their organisations would need to be further explored in future research studies, but we would definitely expect that leadership and management functions are needed to effectively manage these independent organisations. Thus, the future of line managers in SMEs is bright. They will be needed in any kind of matured SMT, whether it is a brownfield or a greenfield site. However, they would need to provide more supportive and coaching leadership styles in which line managers help team members take their own decisions by facilitating them along the way. We conclude here with a recent quote from People Management about managing without managers: ‘SMTs will always need managers. They just need a different sort of leader at the helm’ (Bos-Nehles, 2018).

The Future of HRM Specialists in SMTs Since SMTs are here to stay and likely progress towards higher levels of maturity, the question is what the future holds for HRM specialists. One may argue that HRM specialists are not needed in the future when more HRM responsibilities are devolved to SMTs. We do not agree and instead argue that the relevance of and need for HRM specialists in SMTs is contingent on a range of conditions. We discuss some of these conditions to describe scenario’s where HRM specialists will remain relevant for SMTs. Possibilities for Economies of Scale HRM specialists will likely remain relevant for SMTs when opportunities for economies of scale in HRM activities are present. Namely, organisations may run the risk of devolving too many HRM responsibilities to SMTs, such that operating costs increase when multiple SMTs reinvent the wheel and duplicate resources. Transaction cost theory predicts that HRM activities, which are idiosyncratic to the organisation, should not be outsourced but retained and performed by organisational members to avoid the risk of opportunistic behaviour and thus, high transaction costs (Klaas, McClendon, & Gainey, 1999; Williamson, 1979). On the contrary, HRM activities which are generic and replicable across organisations can better be outsourced to reap the benefits of economies of scale (Lepak, Bartol, & Erhardt, 2005).

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The same would go for SMTs which can better outsource HRM activities that are similar across teams. In so doing, SMTs can delegate HRM responsibilities to an external outsourcing vendor, but also to a retained HRM specialist that serves and is shared by multiple teams. HRM activities which may be shared across self-managing teams include payroll activities, employer branding or HRM self-service technologies as these are likely to be similar across SMTs. In such cases, having an HRM specialist that is shared by multiple SMT is more efficient. In support of this claim, research shows that HRM practices, which are generic and for which their users have homogenous needs, provide greater benefits when shared across teams and/or organisations than when retained within individual units (Hofman & Meijerink, 2015; Klaas et al., 1999). On this basis, we expect that HRM specialists remain ‘in business’ when SMTs and their members see the need to delegate HRM responsibilities to HRM specialists when HRM activities are similar across teams. The delegation of homogenous HRM activities to HRM specialists is even more likely to occur when these activities are performed infrequently by a SMT. Because performing HRM activities requires initial investments that may be substantial, it is more attractive for an organisation to rely on some external party to incur these costs (Lepak et al., 2005; Williamson, 1979). This would also hold for SMTs who can better ‘outsource’ HRM activities which are infrequently execute to an HRM specialist who can perform these HRM activities on a more regular basis when serving multiple SMTs. Examples of HRM activities that are performed infrequently by individual SMTs may include handling grievance issues, negotiating employment conditions or recruiting a new worker. Particularly within a SMT, these activities are executed infrequently since most SMTs include a limited number of members (Wageman, 1995), and therefore do not need to recruit, select or sanction workers very often. On this basis we predict that HRM specialists likely remain relevant when SMTs are dependent on HRM activities which are performed infrequently. It is possible that SMTs do not need the support from an HRM specialist when they perform selected HRM activities on a recurring basis. Here, one can think of HRM activities such as scheduling. According to Lepak et al. (2005), frequently performed HRM activities are most likely to remain within an organisational unit when these activities are of strategic importance. These types of HRM activities will likely be executed by a SMT since this offers the SMT the possibility to reap economies of scale as well as to stay in control over HRM activities that allow them to realise their goals. Particularly SMTs that include a larger number of employees have the possibility to retain strategically important HRM activities that are frequently performed, as these teams have many members that can specialise a selected HRM activity. Smaller teams that are dependent on HRM activities that are performed infrequently may even decide to delegate these activities to a big(ger) team as this helps to reap economies of scale as well (Meijerink & Bondarouk, 2013; Redman, Snape, Wass, & Hamilton, 2007; Strikwerda, 2004). As such, HRM specialists are less likely needed in cases where SMTs include a large number of employees and frequently perform HRM activities themselves (or on behalf of other teams).

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The Need for Specialised HRM Competences HRM specialists will likely remain relevant for SMTs when the need for specialised HRM competences requested by SMTs remains (see Chapter ‘The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams’). In line with transaction cost economics, it would make little sense for the members of SMTs to specialise in HRM activities which are performed infrequently (Lepak et al., 2005). In such cases, a more viable option is to rely on the specialised competences of an HRM specialist, rather than developing these competences within the SMT. Furthermore, since various operational and regulatory functions may be delegated to self-managing teams, employees have to set priorities which competences to develop themselves and which ones to outsource to others. This may mean that employees turn to the specialised competences of HRM specialists when lacking the time to execute selected HRM activities themselves. HRM specialists may also remain needed when SMTs and their members do have the time and opportunities to execute HRM activities, but lack the competences to do so. As discussed in the chapter ‘The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams’, one important role of HRM specialists is to develop the competences of employees to presume HRM services. This is needed since implementing HRM practices, which are recently devolved to employees, may be new to SMTs and their members, who therefore need to be trained on how to execute HRM activities. Here we see a similar pattern with the first phase of devolution where HRM responsibilities are devolved from HRM specialists to line managers (see Chapter ‘The Relevance of Line Managers in Self-managing Teams’). Although HRM specialists saw some of their responsibilities being taken away from them, they nevertheless remain(ed) relevant as they needed to train and develop line managers’ HRM competences (Bos-Nehles, Van Riemsdijk, & Looise, 2013; Trullen, Stirpe, Bonache, & Valverde, 2016). We expect that a similar pattern occurs during the second phase of devolution where HRM responsibilities are devolved to SMTs. As long as SMTs do not reach a level of maturity where they are self-reliant in executing HRM activities, we expect that HRM specialists remain needed to leverage their specialised competences for training SMTs and their members in adopting HRM responsibilities. Dependence and Power Finally, the future of HRM specialists in SMTs is also dependent on the willingness of SMTs and their members to be dependent on the specialised competences of HRM specialists. In line with resource dependence theory (Pfeffer & Salancik, 1978), these specialised competences are a basis of power which make SMTs dependent on HRM specialists when a SMT needs these competences, but did not develop them itself. HRM specialists might us this power to act opportunistically by not meeting the needs of the SMTs that are dependent on them. In such cases, SMTs likely want to develop specialised HRM competences themselves to reduce

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their dependence on HRM specialists (Pfeffer & Salancik, 1978). In some cases, this can be done by letting SMTs specialise in different HRM activities and sharing the specialised competences across teams when needed (Knol, Janssen, & Sol, 2014; Strikwerda, 2004). To remain relevant and retain their power-base, HRM specialists therefore need to develop trusting relationships with the SMT as this signals to the teams that HRM specialists will not misuse their power to harm the interest of the SMTs (Farndale, Paauwe, & Boselie, 2010; Maatman & Meijerink, 2017). To ensure that HRM specialists meet the needs and interests of SMTs, it is important that they leverage their specialised competences to develop high-quality value propositions. As noted in the chapter ‘The Role of Organisational Support and HRM Function in Self-managing Teams’, this involves developing HRM support services that relief the ‘pains’ or annoyances that SMTs experience in executing their HRM responsibilities and/or offer ‘gains’ which ensure that employees reap the benefits of HRM practices they implement or receive. HRM specialists need to show that their specialised competences make a difference in creating value for SMTs. This is important since SMTs can make use of a variety of service providers such as outsourcing vendors and information technologies who might take over the role of HRM specialists that traditionally used to support SMTs. Therefore, the future of HRM specialists is dependent on whether SMTs are willing to make use of and be dependent on the specialised competences of HRM specialists.

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Appendices

Definition SMT

Caudron (1993)

Cohen and Ledford (1994)

Group Task Design

Variety, identity and autonomy of the SMT

Groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Cross-trained teams. Teams should be interdependent

Employee Involvement Context SMTs should have autonomy, training in several skills, rewards fitting the SMT structure and the resources necessary to make it work

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

HR support systems in place since the beginning of the implementation. Before implementation HR should educate management about benefits, costs and risk of SMTs

Illustrative case studies San Diego Zoo and Kodak Park. Interviews consultants

Members of SMTs higher levels of job satisfaction, SMTs did not lose growth needs satisfaction, social money based on needs satisfaction higher and group absenteeism but at the same time, satisfaction SMTs with did not decrease escape behaviour supervisors tended to be less effective than those without

Field quasiexperiment on 84 SMTs of a telecommunications company. Team level analysis

Safety and health were not better in SMTs

Appendices

Study

198

Appendix 1: Summary of the Articles (61 Studies Are Categorised by Research Method and Level of Analysis, Presented in the Chronological Order, Adopted from Ten Vregelaar, 2017).

Liebowitz (1995)

Team leader’s role is important for the transition to SMTs since they can pass on knowledge

Teams vary in size from 10 to 25 persons. Teams normally have 40 members SMTs consist of members, leaders, trainers and supporters

Give feedback to other employees. Team-based pay raise system is in place

The maturity of an SMT largely stems from constant training, research and benchmarking against other excellent organisations

Capital expenditure varies since some departments need minor changes and others major ones

Workers often receive pay raises commensurate with their new To successfully implement SMTs responsibility, skill training should be and knowledge more frequent especially in the first year of implementation

Descriptive secondary data on groupthink in SMTs. Team level of analysis

Two illustrative case studies on Motorola and Corning

Appendices

Natural groups of workers from the same department who work together on a permanent basis and make many of the operational decisions previously made by their foreman or supervisor

To be able to neglect the consequences of groupthink on SMTs, team think is introduced. Collective thinking is then used for positive instead of negative group Team performance may outcomes, such as be enhanced if the bad decisionmaking group’s dialogue is examined and social pressure is limited Group mental imagery could be used to form a common vision To foster team think in SMTs members should identify and confront the team’s dysfunctional beliefs and replace those

Group cohesiveness, shared beliefs, team self-talk, thought patterns could lead to too much cohesion which might lead to groupthink

Neck and Teams usually Manz (1994) perform relatively whole tasks and contain members who possess a variety of work skills, and are responsible for many traditional management tasks

199

Study

Definition SMT

Group Task Design

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Employee Involvement Context

SMTs can be less effective in making decisions if groupthink is in place because SMTs tend to be cohesive. Analysis of beliefs and assumptions, internal dialogues and mental images of the team are important

SMTs empower employees to have increased control over decisions and their own behaviour. Teams usually perform relatively complete tasks and include members who possess a variety of skills. Teams are responsible for many traditional management functions

Rogers et al. Relatively (1995) autonomous work groups in which the responsibilities and duties traditionally maintained by management have been transferred to the teams

Group Characteristics

SMTs make compensation, selection and termination decisions. They handle performance appraisals and individual performance problems

Operational manager and area manager get a facilitative role as coach or trainer

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Awareness and alteration of teams existing assumptions and beliefs. Identification and development of internal team dialogue

Groupthink might enable teams to make effective decisions while avoiding the pitfalls of groupthink

Descriptive theory based on secondary results discussing groupthink in SMTs. Team level of analysis

Self-management is not created overnight

Descriptive results questionnaire of drive-through fast food restaurant employees. Team level of analysis

Analysis and modification of team’s mental imagery. Change dysfunctional team thinking to functional. Maintain the newly acquired skills Extensive training before the transition to SMTs. SMTs have autonomy, resources and information

Management should help SMTs to work effectively during transitions periods. Feedback is found to be especially important Important to the conversion of existing work groups to SMTs

All teams are not created equal

Appendices

Manz and Neck (1995)

200

Continued.

is the unlearning of traditional work methods as well as learning self-managing strategies Cohen et al. (1996)

Elmuti (1997)

Groups of interdependent individuals who can self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks

Groups of employees with all the technical skills and authority needed to direct and manage themselves

Group task variety, identity, significance, autonomy and feedback

Each unit makes own job assignment, plans own work, performs equipment maintenance, keeps records, obtains suppliers and makes selection decisions

Supervisors encourage SMTs to selfobservation/ evaluation, selfgoal setting, selfreinforcement, self-criticism, selfexpectation, and rehearsal

Group expertise, size adequacy, stability. Group beliefs: group norms, selfefficacy. Group process: group coordination, innovation

Design elements: power, information, rewards, training and resources. The more elements in place the more SMTs are enhanced

The employee involvement context is found to have the most profound effect on both quality of work life and manager ratings of performance

Multiple predictor categories are needed to change the overall level of effectiveness of SMTs since no one category can predict all effectiveness

Descriptive results of questionnaire and interviews at a telecommunications company. Team level of analysis

Trust is found to be a major component in the implementation process

Description of testimonials from managers and consultants who have implement SMTs

SMTs without supervisors performed better Employees in SMTs received training and resources

Key factors for the choice of SMTs are the current management style, the type of industry the company is in, technical capabilities

Appendices

Higher managers are still needed to provide answers to questions and assist in difficult situations

Reengineering the organisational structure and strategies are important to the successful implementation of SMTs

201

Study

202

Continued. Definition SMT

Janz, Wetherbe et al. (1997)

Groups of collocated workers who self-regulate work on interdependent tasks

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Process behaviours: sharing ideas and information, helping each other learn

Teams need clear and achievable goals and information transmission

SMTs have interdependent goals, teach each other the needed skills, periodically evaluate. Autonomy over scheduling work methods, hiring and firing assignment of members to tasks.

Face-to-face promotive interaction, group process, positive interdependence, group self-efficacy

Employee Involvement Context Teams require information streams. Teams need frequent feedback

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Moderated multiple regression on a survey of 27 teams, team level of analysis

Factors such as goal quality and information transmission can increase the positive relationship between team process and team effectiveness. Managers can increase maturity by facilitating mission clarity, organisation, and cohesiveness leading to higher job motivation Providing more autonomy is coincident with improved quality of work life and performance. The people-related autonomy may cause performancehampering anxiety and should, therefore, be introduced in later stages of empowerment

Research Method and Level of Analysis

It is important to aid adequate time for teams to develop into mature, highfunctioning teams. Team formation and increased autonomy and creating a ‘learning organisation’ may provide improvements in both QWL and work processes

Descriptive Survey statistics of 27 SMTs of 13 organisations in the US and Canada and stakeholder surveys. Team level of analysis

Appendices

Janz, Colquitt et al. (1997)

Group Task Design

Fostering a cooperative learning environment may allow groups to develop more quickly SMTs consist primarily of two components, the process of selfmanagement and collaborative team work

Task interdependence may affect the ability of individuals to influence other team members

Wageman (1997)

SMTs take responsibility for their work, monitor their own performance and alter their performance strategies as needed to solve problems and adapt to changing conditions

SMTs take responsibility for work outcomes, monitor own work performance, actively seeking data about how well they are performing and alter strategies as needed

Team size: as teams grow there is less interaction between members and thus lower quality of interaction

The role of the supervisor should change from directing and controlling to coaching the team as it decides how best to get the work done

Managers could reduce resistance to SMWTs by selecting individuals whose values show a close fit with the requirements of the SMWT within each country in which they implement SMTs. They also need to pay attention to cultural values regarding how they implement the SMTs

Literature review on the impact of cultural values on employee resistance to change

The quality of a team’s design had a larger effect on team selfmanagement that coaching. Teams with many critical design features became more selfmanaging when leaders provided effective coaching. Poorly designed

This study might be taken to imply that leaders do not matter much. The emphasis on dayto-day coaching is misplaced. Leaders are however needed to design teams in the first place and to ensure that the team has the right

Descriptive results based on interviews of 43 self-managing teams, team member surveys and line manager interviews at Xerox. Company and team level of analysis

203

High or low levels in the cultural values determine the level of resistance to both self-management and teams

Appendices

Kirkman and Shapiro (1997)

Study

Barrick et al. (1998)

Definition SMT

SMTs make decisions about their own processes as well as complete tasks. They have the autonomy to make traditional management decisions and manage their internal coordination

Group Task Design

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

teams hardly responded to good coaching

resources and leadership functions. Organisation-wide changes are necessary to put the success factors in place

Team efficacy: do teams believe that they are effective as a team?

Getting team members to believe their goals will result in open-minded discussion and more effective group decisionmaking. Disagreeing can be used to strengthen team work. Feelings of confidence induce task productivity also on the group level

When team members feel cooperatively interdependent, discuss their opposing views constructively, they are more confident that their team can work together effectively

Descriptive analysis based on a survey of 69 US manufacturing SMTs. Team level of analysis

Intra-group processes: interactions that take place within a group. Team composition: group member personality and

Conscientious teams and high cognitive ability teams perform better. Teams that are more agreeable and more emotionally

Composing teams with members who develop positive social interactions and thereby experience synergistic cohesion thus

Quantitative analysis of 22 maintenance teams. Team level of analysis

Appendices

Alper et al. (1998)

204

Continued.

enhance workstable perform team performance better. Teams without introverted or disagreeable members were higher performing

general mental ability

SMTs consist of 4 12 members with shared responsibilities for completing relatively whole tasks

Task assignment, decision-making responsibility, task-based cohesion

Janz (1999)

Groups of collocated workers who selfregulate work on interdependent tasks

The more autonomy an individual or group possesses the more responsible they will feel for the outcome

SMTs less dependent on outside individuals since they are trained in all job duties. Leader being too influential in decision-making processes

Skill requirements and group cohesion: shared commitment to the task, group shared norms, homogeneity of the group, team efficacy

Positive interdependence, face-to-face promotive interaction, group process

Reward systems, information and power are moved to SMTs

Competent selfleading teams tend to more openly voice their viewpoints and concerns which help the team to avoid groupthink

Descriptive results of secondary data on a framework regarding SMTs and groupthink

Positive relationship between autonomy and work outcomes suggests that autonomy in SMTW improves satisfaction and worker motivation. Cooperative

A long-term commitment is necessary if teams are to attain the level of maturity and comfort necessary to exercise the autonomy given to them

Descriptive statistics of 28 teams of 13 organisations across the US and Canada, two surveys to members of SMTs, third survey to stakeholders. Team level of analysis

205

SMTs should utilise basic group decision-making practices. Team leader must develop an open participative style to avoid groupthink. Increase team interaction with environment by rotation. Technical and self-leadership training helps to avoid groupthink and enhances group potency

Appendices

Moorhead et al. (1998)

Study

206

Continued. Definition SMT

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Findings support the importance of the organisational context in creating team empowerment experiences

Descriptive statistics of a field study on work teams, conducted in four organisations in the US. Team level analysis

Team composition is important and selection requires attention since personality can predict team performance

Task-based job analysis of 316 HRM representatives at local stores across the US. Individual

learning found important in SMTs for improved effectiveness. Team development is found important Kirkman and Rosen (1999)

Neuman and Wright (1999)

SMTs set production schedules and standards, monitor customer feedback, develop and train for quality improvement practices and assume ownership for the completion of work tasks

Team-based HR: team-based rewards, receiving or delivering cross-training, making staffing decisions

Job-specific skills in the team

Leaders have a supervisory role and are not part of the team

Social structure: belonging to a network increases interdependence and personal sense of power

Highly empowered teams are more effective than less empowered ones Highly effective teams should be autonomous and experience potency, meaningfulness and impact Team-based HR is an integral driver of empowerment and team effectiveness Personality measures should be included in team selection systems. Agreeableness and

Appendices

Group Task Design

Spreitzer et al. (1999)

Bishop and Scott (2000)

Groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate their behaviour on relatively whole tasks

Task interdependence. Satisfaction with co-workers: sharing tasks, regulating behaviour to accomplish goals, being collectively responsible

Leaders must take on the role of coach, business analyser, barrier buster, facilitator, customer advocate and living example. Learn the team to manage itself

Leadership, leaders function as supervisors or facilitators in SMTs

Group coordination, stability, norms, expertise and innovation

Power, information, rewards tied to performance, training and resources

beyond skills and cognitive ability

and group level of analysis

A supportive organisational context is a success factor for SMTs. No relationship between employees QWL and customer satisfaction

SMTs are not the solution for all organisational problems. Tradeoffs are common

Descriptive statistics on two service companies, data on company management, archives and SMWTs. Surveys and interviews. Team level of analysis

Team coaching may be overrated and did not influence team performance positively Information: clear overall direction and clear expectations leading to better performance of the team

Organisational commitment positively related to satisfaction with supervision and negatively to resource-related conflict. Team commitment positively related to satisfaction with co-workers and negatively to intersender conflict

Descriptive statistics on US apparel manufacturing SMTs. 485 employees took part in a survey. Individual level of analysis

Appendices

Self-directed work teams share functionally interrelated task, share responsibility, individual team members have a variety of skills, employees receive feedback and evaluations on team performance

Group task variety, group task identity, group task significance, group task autonomy

conscientiousness are predictive of work team performance

207

Study

208

Continued. Definition SMT

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Kirkman et al. (2000)

SMTs typically manage themselves, assign jobs plan and schedule work, make production or service-related decisions, and act on problems

Many SMTrelated concerns of employees are about fairness. Managers should address these concerns by clarifying new roles and expectations when transitioning to SMTs

Cultural values might lead to resistance or might not lead to resistance

Descriptive analysis of a secondary data set of 370 employees surveys. Individual level of analysis

Kirkman and Shapiro (2001)

SMTs are teams whose members do the following: manage themselves, assign jobs, plan and schedule work, make production or service-related decisions and act on problems

Cultural values do influence employees’ resistance to SMTs but the resistance varies by country

Focus not solely on the cultural values of any country but on the extent to which employees resist SMTs because of their cultural value

Exploratory factor analysis of two USbased multinationals. 461 employees took part in a questionnaire. Individual level of analysis

Wageman (2001)

An SMT has authority and accountability for executing and managing work, but within a structure and towards purposes set by others

Only team design predicts team performance. The quality of group process is predicted by selfmanagement, coaching does not. Quality of team design is equally important

The effects of leaders’ coaching behaviours depend on how well they designed their teams. Effective coaching helps well-designed teams more than poorly designed teams. Ineffective

Descriptive statistics of 34 SMTs of Xerox, using interviews and surveys and manager interviews. Team level of analysis

Clear direction, optimal skill diversity, task interdependence, challenging task goals. Core strategy norms

Two leader activities: first design selfmanaging teams and second to provide hands-on coaching that helps SMTs to manage themselves

Group stability, appropriate team size

Group reward system, available information, available education and material resources

Appendices

Group Task Design

Druskat and Pescosolido (2002)

Shared mental models are antecedents of team behaviours and processes Sense of ownership results in teams taking responsibility to fulfil tasks and therefore engage in learning activities

coaching undermines poorly designed teams more than welldesigned ones

Developing mental models only works with contextual support. To reduce turnover time is needed to give new members information on team expectations and teamwork models

Effective teamwork mental models in SMWTs emphasise ownership, learning and heedful interrelating

Literature review on mental models in SMTs and four illustrative case studies on the development of ownership, learning and heedful interrelating in different fields

In staffing teams, managers should hire people who get along well with others. Conscientiousness is an important variable to consider for SMT members

Descriptive statistics and multiple regression on data of the US hospital’s SMTs and graduate seniors using surveys. Individual level of analysis

Reduction of orientation sessions and new member training contributed to downfall of SMTs. Better team performance when overlap in mental models is great Personality, Big Five personality dimensions, and attitude, might explain why some people resist working in SMTs or do not perform as well as others

Appendices

Thoms et al. SMTs are (2002) responsible for their own work and for monitoring and managing their own performance

Continuous learning required in the early stages and later when the SMTs are working

for teams, regardless of the level of selfmanagement

209

Study

Brewer and Mendelson (2003)

Definition SMT

SMTs are fully responsible for executing their work and for monitoring and managing their own process

Group Task Design

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Behavioural abilities: group task coordination, supporting developing others

Informal leadership, emergent in SMTs. Cognitive skills and emotional intelligence skills might predict leader behaviour in SMTs

Multidisciplinary: cross functionality, diverse teams, creative, and productive

Group Characteristics

Integrated and compatible teams who collaborate

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Empathy serves as foundation for cognitions and behaviours supporting leader emergence. Supporting or developing others indirectly supports being chosen as informal leader. The cognitive skill, perspective taking, also related to being chosen as informal leader

Emotional intelligence, especially empathy, play a role in leadership emergence in SMTs. The emergence of informal leaders in teams is important for their success

Literature review and descriptive statistics of 48 SMTs based on critical incident interviews and a questionnaire. Team level of analysis

Conflicts among SMT members inhibit creativity. Clear and open communication necessary to unleash creativity. Effective teams are multidisciplinary, diverse in gender/ ethnicity/thinking, motivation and integrated by supportive

The outcomes of effectiveness were creativity, team collaboration and productivity. Teams need to be both integrated and diverse

Descriptive statistics of graduate engineering and business students in teams using surveys. Team level of analysis

Appendices

Wolff et al. (2002)

210

Continued.

coaching in teambuilding, communication and innovation Jong and De SMTs are based Ruyter on the notion that (2004) employees share the collective responsibility for their work, for monitoring their own performance and adapting work routines in response to a variety of circumstances

Intra-team support: the willingness of a team to support each other and reach common group goals

Jong et al. (2004)

Intra-team support Flexibility of team members

Multi-level regression analysis of SMTs of a Dutch bank using selfreport questionnaires and customer questionnaires. Team and individual level of analysis

Team member cooperation necessary to effectively adapt work routines after failures or to anticipate the need for change. Intra-team process influential in determining team effectiveness. SMTs with high average age are more likely to display proactive behaviour. Higher degrees of adaptive behaviour result in improvements in service recovery satisfaction Important to create a context that is supportive to selfmanagement

Descriptive statistics on 100 SMTs of a Dutch bank using surveys and 957 customer surveys. Also, in-depth interviews with frontline employees. Team and individual level of analysis

211

Employees service climate perceptions influence by tolerance for selfmanagement, flexibility, and inter- and intrateam support. Beliefs and perception of any team member

Appendices

Groups of interdependent employees that have collective authority and responsibility to manage and perform relatively whole tasks. Members are typically crosstrained in various

Higher levels of empowerment, facilitative organisational conditions regarding customer complaints

212

Study

Langfred (2004)

Definition SMT

Group Task Design

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

skills including developing work routines, planning and monitoring performance

influenced by attitude and behaviour of other members

Groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate on relatively whole tasks

Under some conditions, too much trust can be harmful. High levels of individual autonomy can be a liability in SMTs when the level of trust is high and monitoring low, performance then suffers

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

If teams have high levels of individual autonomy, some monitoring of individual team members needs to be in place if process loss and coordination errors are to be avoided

Descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis of MBA graduates in 76 SMTs using surveys and performance measures rated by experts. Team level of analysis

Service climate perceptions have a positive impact on customer perceive service quality. Trade-off between customer parameters and productivity parameters

Appendices

Continued.

Creativity: teams that try different things, look to improve the way work gets done

Teams that operate less standardised and encourage creativity exhibit the highest performance. Standardised teams yield higher customer satisfaction. Trade-off between standardisation and creativity

Jong et al. (2005)

Team goal setting, groups develop their own goals. Motivation is highest when teams need to establish their own set goals

Team norms, standards that are shared by group members, could have a considerable impact on team performance

Collective involvement with service quality results in higher customer ratings. SMT service climate has no impact on service productivity. Involvement is created when selfmanagement is tolerated and a service climate in place

Inter-team support, cooperative interaction and information sharing with other teams, makes employees feel more confident about their joint

Group potency: work groups could be distinguished based on jointly held belief that the team could effect changes and take control, resulting in more

De Jong et al. (2005)

Groups of interdependent employees who have the collective authority and responsibility of managing and performing relatively whole tasks

Management support entails three major aspects, rewards, education/ coaching, information. Providing specific performance information, training and

Group potency perceptions have a positive impact on customerperceived service quality. The negative influence of group potency on service profitability

Descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis on 156 Canadian customer service technician’s teams, using surveys. Team level of analysis

Both individual and aggregate factors should be considered when promoting the SMT service climate

A multi-level analysis of 26 aftersales service SMTs. Data were collected via employee and customer surveys. Team level of analysis

A multi-level analysis of 60 SMTs and customer surveys of a Dutch bank. Team level of analysis

213

Standardisation: following standardised work procedures from data-driven analyses should enhance team performance

Appendices

Gilson et al. (2005)

Study

214

Continued. Definition SMT

competence to deliver excellent customer service Functional diversity in teams because of many tasks and services. Teams with diverse functional backgrounds and values are more effective in performing organisational tasks Muthusamy et al. (2005)

SMTs are responsible for their work as well as for monitoring their performance. These teams are responsible for gathering information, making decisions and meeting organisational goals

High levels of inter-team communication enhance the opportunity to engage in unconventional and innovative thoughts and behaviours

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

effective functioning Team tenure, members’ attitudes, and behaviours become more similar over time, leading to less discussion or alteration of work

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

rewards strengthen and encourages employees’ confidence in the teams’ ability to perform well

Management, inter-team support, and diversity directly positively impact individual perceptions of group potency. On group level, teams with a higher level of social consensus are less impacted by group design and contextual characteristics

Self-management and autonomy lead to freethinking exchanged of information and enhance latitude to explore and examine new ways of handling problems

More selfleadership in teams is related to communication, commitment and variety in teams. Trust, design and composition of teams and the aspect of control are key factors for a higher functioning degree of selfleadership

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Descriptive analysis of secondary data on enhancing innovation within SMTs. Team level of analysis

Appendices

Group Task Design

Hiller et al. (2006)

De Jong et al. (2006)

Teams with efficacy are more focused on task demands, less distracted by offtask cognitions, and better able to properly use information. Group potency beliefs likely have a positive impact on service revenues and service quality over time Effective external leadership has been shown to be an important driver in the success of empowered

A supportive organisational is a necessary condition for team effectiveness. Providing teams

Task-specific employee beliefs important predictors of performance

Descriptive statistics of 51 service SMTs of a Dutch Bank by means of two surveys. Team level of analysis

Team empowerment is significantly influenced by the organisational environment. Organisational

Empowering work designs are correlated with enhanced team effectiveness. A larger supportive organisational

Descriptive statistics of 121 empowered Canadian customer service engineers’ teams by means of a survey. Team level of analysis

215

The design of work (delegation of authority and responsibility for certain HR functions) will enhance

Group efficacy on performance is higher when collectivism is high and team members work interdependently. Past performance outcomes tend to influence service employees’ confidence beliefs significantly

Appendices

Mathieu et al. (2006)

Descriptive statistics and hierarchical regression analyses of 277 individuals from winter road teams. Team level of analysis

Collective leadership not related to power distance. Leadership need not be solely the domain of one person, but can be enacted collectively and informally by all members and is positively related to team effectiveness

Collective leadership presumes that leadership can be embedded in the dynamics of a social system and might enhance team effectiveness

Study

216

Continued. Definition SMT

employees’ psychological empowerment and thereby yield benefits in terms of increased effectiveness

Stewart (2006)

Task meaningfulness, team-level of autonomy and intra-team coordination as a construct within the category of task design

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

support and team-based HR practices influence team empowerment Training teams is positively beyond the influence of a critical work design component of team performance features. Structural empowerment efforts are beneficial because of the psychological impact but do also enhance team effectiveness by shifting the decision-making to the teams with a welldeveloped social structure and socio-political support

organisations. ‘Leading others to lead themselves’

Group characteristics, heterogeneity and size as category for reviewing design features associated with group composition

Perceptions of support from the leader can be nearly synonymous with perceptions of support from the organisation. Leadership, therefore, serves as category for organisational context

Personality, cognitive ability and expertise do influence team performance. Team performance is improved if members have high cognitive ability, desirable personality traits and relevant expertise.

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

context is needed and optimal levels of empowerment will be reached if they are complemented by support mechanisms such as a facilitative organisational climate and teambased HR practices

Teams can be designed for higher performance, group composition, task design and organisational context are important design factors

Quantitative, metaanalytic literature review on team design features and team performance

Appendices

Group Task Design

Heterogeneity less important in teams than abovementioned characteristics Langfred (2007)

Maynard et al. (2007)

Central defining characteristic of an SMT is its freedom and discretion and ability to organise its internal work and structure to best accomplish goals

Trust, will be negatively influenced by both task conflict and relationship conflict. Thus, team structure will be affected leading to lowered autonomy and task interdependence

Higher levels of conflict in teams are associated with lower task interdependence and individual autonomy which can be a dysfunctional design.

Effective conflict management is important for teams to manage themselves effectively

Regression analyses of 33 MBA student SMTs based on survey questionnaires. Team and individual level of analysis

Adverse effects of resistance to empowerment could be mitigated by influencing team processed and addressing the impact of resistance climate on team processes

Descriptive statistics, multiple regression analysis and cross-level mediation analysis on 121 empowered teams from a multinational company. Data were collected via a survey. Team and individual level of analysis

SMTs make changes in structures and design of the team in response to internal team processes such as conflict and trust

Appendices

Significant negative relationship between individual-level resistance to empowerment and employee satisfaction when working in empowered settings

217

Study

Definition SMT

Groups of interdependent employees who have the collective authority and responsibility of managing and performing relatively whole tasks

Leadership behaviour is related to the individual performance of team members. Coaching leadership behaviour is defined as a day-

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

A range of knowledge, skills, abilities and other characteristics are needed for workers to perform their roles. Job knowledge and technical skills, self-management skill, cognitive ability, task experience, proactive personality, need for achievement

The social and contextual characteristics are as follows: social support, feedback, interdependence, interaction outside the organisation, physical demands, work conditions, ergonomics, equipment use, boundary spanning, organisational support, virtuality of work, consequence of failure, physical ability, propensity to trust, organisational experience

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Literature review on job and team design

Key outcomes of work design are grouped: attitudinal, behavioural, cognitive, wellbeing and organisational

Effectiveness of SMTs is related to both leadership styles. Initiating structure is important for effective leadership. There is a relationship between

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Both initiating structure and coaching leadership styles are important for SMTs and their effectiveness depends on the amount of time an

Descriptive statistics of 21 SMTs of a Dutch bank. Data were collected by means of a questionnaire. The individual level of analysis

Appendices

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

The following tasks are all part of the broader category work characteristics. Autonomy most influential work characteristic, skill variety, task identity, task significance, feedback from the job, task variety, job complexity, information processing, specialisation, problem-solving

Morgeson and Humphrey (2008)

Stoker (2008)

Group Task Design

218

Continued.

to-day, hands-on process of helping employees to recognise opportunities and improve performance and capabilities Kuipers and Stoker (2009)

Groups of interdependent individuals that can self-regulate their behaviour concerning relatively whole tasks

Intra-group processes lead to self-reported group effectiveness Task management and thus job-related aspects have always been connected to quality of work life

External relations and improvement affect both business performance and quality of work life leading to high performance

individual has spent in a team

Three team processes: internal relations, task management and external relations and improvement. Team development important for long-term team performance. Internal relations relate negatively to long-term absenteeism. Task management positively related to product quality. External relations and improvement positively related to product quality and negatively to frequent sick leave

Various team processes occur simultaneously as teams develop. For different aspects of performance different accents in team development are required

Three sets of questionnaires were collected with oneyear intervals among 150 SMTs at Volvo Trucks. Team level of analysis

Appendices

individual effectiveness and leadership. Leadership is most effective when it fits individual team tenure

219

Study

220

Continued. Definition SMT

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Lambe et al. SMTs to a large (2009) degree control their own work, monitor their own performance and alter their performance strategies as needed to solve problems and adapt to changing conditions

Teams that selfcontrol sales performance, sales activities and selling skills through teamgenerated information and reinforcement will enhance team performance

The control of the sales management on the team will exert a significant positive impact on the degree to which a team engages in desired selfmanagement behaviours

Somech et al. (2009)

Task interdependence ask for intensive interactions among members and might, therefore, result in conflict

Group Characteristics

Team identity has a moderating effect on the relationship between task interdependence and team effectiveness

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

Team selfmanaging behaviours have a positively strong influence on team performance. Empowerment leads to desired team selfmanagement behaviour. Use of control can increase the degree to which teams exhibit advantageous team selfmanagement behaviours. Right kind of management intervention and control leads to advantageous self-managing behaviours

Descriptive statistics of survey data of 150 sales reps from a large global pharmaceutical company. Team level of analysis

Work team’s social context important to the dynamics of conflict management in teams. Teams differ in their

Descriptive statistics and regression analysis of 77 R&D teams from high technology companies. Each leader was interviewed.

Appendices

Group Task Design

Members and leader filled in a questionnaire. Team level of analysis

general tendencies of handling intrateam conflicts. Team performance is promoted using the cooperative conflict management style. Team identity fosters a constructive team conflict management style which promotes team performance. Only when members adopt a form of team identity will they prefer to solve conflicts cooperatively Tekleab et al. (2009)

High level of conflict management minimises the negative consequences of relationship conflict and hence increases team cohesion, leading to higher perceived team performance, viability and satisfaction

Factor analysis and hierarchical regression on data of 53 mid-Atlantic student teams. Data were gathered using group discussion or consensus approach. Team level of analysis

221

When teams experience high levels of relationship conflict, future levels of cohesiveness depend on the team’s ability to more direct and open in addressing disagreements. Team cohesion is

Appendices

Overcoming conflict important step in long-term development of team cohesion. Teams who address conflict directly are better able to develop an open, healthy and constructive atmosphere over the long run. Teams who are

Study

222

Continued. Definition SMT

Millikin et al. (2010)

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

SMTs may exercise discretion over decisions related to task accomplishment, such as assigning work to each

Lower levels of task routineness may strengthen the relationship between team self-managing

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

more cohesive are likely to believe that they are performing better

positively related to team performance. Team cohesion has a positive effect on team viability and satisfaction

Self-efficacy beliefs can evolve in collective confidence resulting in team motivation

Intrinsic motivation via self-initiated task redesign can enhance collective effectiveness. Team participants who self-manage too independently can jeopardise collective performance under conditions of team disunity and lack of cohesion

Multiple regression analysis on data of 97 empowered teams from a domestic plant owned by an American multinational. Data were collected via a member survey. Team level of analysis

Team selfmanaging behaviour positively influences team performance, viability and team

Factor analysis and multiple regression analysis on data of 97 work teams from a Canadian public safety organisation. Data were collected

Cohesion impacts SMTs and team performance. Attraction among members reinforces motivational benefits of selfinfluence whereas disunity can undermine those effects Rousseau and Aube´ (2010)

Employee Involvement Context

Team performance is widely used to assess team effectiveness. Team selfmanaging

Appendices

Group Task Design

Van der Vegt et al. (2010)

Atanasova and Senn (2011)

behaviour and performance

SMT has the authority to determine how members’ efforts will be organised, monitored, and managed to accomplish the team’s work

Effectiveness in self-managing teams requires social integration, team learning behaviour and task flexibility

Team turnover might be the result of internal group process but might as well not be related to the group

Categories important for team design: goal and role clarity, customer coverage, empowerment, adequate skills, collaboration, communication and proactivity

Categories important for design and performance

via a questionnaire. Team level of analysis

processes. TSMB helps to improve team processes not matter the extent to which tasks are routine

behaviour is expected to foster effective team performance Team selfmanaging behaviour fosters team process improvement

Team turnover has a negative effect on performance of SMTs. The negative effect is due in large part to the disruptive effect of team turnover on the key interactions that enable successful selfmanagement, namely, learning behaviour and task flexibility Categories important for design and performance: support, rewards and incentives, training

Regression analysis on data of 55 SMTs of a Volvo manufacturing plant in Sweden. Data were collected via a member and supervisor survey. Team level of analysis

Literature review on global customer team design Exploratory factor analysis based on 15 interviews with managers of various industries and surveys of 113 teams. Team level of analysis

223

Global Customer Team design (GCT) encompasses six dimensions: role and goal clarity, customer coverage, empowerment, heterogeneity, adequate skills and leadership.

Organisations adopting SMTs should commit maintaining stable membership where possible

Appendices

member, scheduling work activities and monitoring own performance

Study

224

Continued. Definition SMT

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

These dimensions influence team performance through communication, collaboration, conflict management and proactiveness Hu and Liden (2011)

Goal setting suggests that clear goals lead to improved team performance Goal and process clarity often contribute towards the sharing of information and experience

Shaw et al. (2011)

Servant leadership, a type of leadership with strong ethics components, promotes organisational functioning through high levels of employee trust in management

Team potency serves as a bridge linking goal and process clarity to team effectiveness

Goal and process clarity, as well as team servant leadership, serve as important antecedents of team potency and subsequent team effectiveness

Factor and hierarchical multilevel analysis on data of 95 teams and 80 upper-level managers of 5 banks in China. Data were collected via surveys. Team level of analysis

Team member satisfaction, performance and task conflict are moderated by relationship conflict

The relationship between task conflict and team effectiveness outcomes varies as a function of the level of relationship conflict in a team. Task-conflict team performance results are clear

Descriptive statistics and linear modelling of data of 87 work teams in 7 Taiwanese organisations. Data were collected via a survey filled in by both employees and supervisors. Organisation, team

Appendices

Group Task Design

Cheng et al. (2012)

Cohesion has been linked to greater coordination during team tasks as well as improved satisfaction,

Performance of self-managing multi-cultural teams can be enhanced by appropriate combination of cultural value orientations. At the initial stages, teams with a lower level of uncertainty avoidance performed better. At later stages, teams’ uncertainty avoidance ceased to exert any effect on performance

Descriptive statistics of 67 MBA student SMTs from the US. Data collected via two exercises. Team level of analysis

Diversity of values had a significant effect on team process variables. Greater diversity negatively related to process outcomes.

Descriptive statistics of 60 undergraduate college student teams in the US. Data collected via team-based exercise. Team level of analysis

225

and individual level of analysis

Appendices

Woehr et al. (2013)

when relationship conflict is high, they are negative. Negative relationship between task conflict and team member satisfaction

Study

226

Continued. Definition SMT

Encouraging Supervisory Behaviours

Group Characteristics

Employee Involvement Context

Team efficacy is also related to team effectiveness

Rapp et al. (2016)

SMTs are responsible for a complete product or service, or a major part of a production process. They control member behaviour and make decisions about task assignment and work methods Teams that are more interdependent, act cooperatively and depend on each other for information, materials and inputs, yield higher levels of empowerment Team processes, managing goals, working

External team leadership positively influences team empowerment To the extent that team coaches exhibit teamoriented behaviours aimed at supporting, encouraging and promoting, higher levels of

Findings/ Conclusion

Research Method and Level of Analysis

A long period of intensive teamwork gives teams the possibility of creating a maturity level in their process relations

Case study: 20 years with selfmanagement, company that produces parts for the automotive industry

Diversity results in lower team cohesion, team efficacy and more conflict

productivity and group interactions

Rolfsen and Johansen (2014)

Success of SMT’s/ Outcomes

A supportive organisational context provides an enabling structure that facilitates team empowerment, processes and performance Feedback and training are key factors in empowerment settings. Thus,

Team coaches’ team-oriented behaviours positively influence team empowerment. Team-oriented behaviours displayed by external leaders did not significantly influence team empowerment. HR and

Descriptive statistics of 70 empowered customer service engineer’s teams using surveys. Team level of analysis

Appendices

Group Task Design

cooperatively, managing conflict, are said to be positively related to team performance and empowerment

team psychological empowerment should ensue

teams that receive high-quality HR support will exhibit higher levels of empowerment

organisational support continue to support empowerment even after the first year of initiation, organisational support is an essential ingredient for team effectiveness. The direct effect of work design features relates positively to team performance. Team interdependence did not significantly influence team empowerment

Appendices 227

Williams, Parker, and Turner (2010)

Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

• External leader

Proactive teams:

• Transformational leaders motivate teams by transforming values and priorities of team members and inspiring them to perform beyond expectations • Encourage followers to question assumptions, think about new ways of doing tasks • Focus on team leaders who are ‘hands-on’ within the team • Transformational leaders encourage team selfmanagement, support individual development, inspire individuals to want to engage in more challenging tasks, promote greater collective selfmanagement; have effect on interpersonal norms; affect team performance through influencing shared vision and increased team reflexivity, positive group atmosphere, facilitate ‘high-care’ atmosphere within-teams

• Self-starting, future-focused action that aims to change the external situation or the team itself; plan how they meet their goals, monitor goal achievement and external conditions, coordinate interdependent activities • Collective responsibility for the day-to-day operations of the team • Experience greater variety, feedback, task significance, task identity, great collective autonomy that individuals have over their activities • Allowing team members the control to manage their demands • Importance of group norms and climate → individuals weigh up the likely benefits and risks before deciding whether to take charge at work (need to appraise the interpersonal norms as favourable so they are willing to speak out, challenging status quo, prepared to put forward suggestions and ideas for improvement) • Proactive and passive members affect interpersonal norms → diversity in job satisfaction of team members has been found to be associated with reduced cohesion and less social integration, while diversity in values has been found to be related to increased conflict

Most Important Findings

Direct relationship between transformational leadership and team proactive performance: • The more proactive members in a team, the greater its innovation and taking charge behaviour • Transformational leadership also predicts team proactive performance. Transformational leadership is therefore a homologous predictor of proactivity • The study suggests transformational team leadership results in favourable interpersonal norms within the team rather than affecting the level of team self-management per se • As hands-on team members, team leaders can influence teams to behave in positive and constructive ways through their role modelling and coaching. However, encouraging the team to be more self-managing might be more difficult because, as team leaders, they might feel responsible for taking on the management role themselves

Appendices

Article Author (year)

228

Appendix 2: Literature Review of Leadership in Self-managing Teams (Adopted from Mestrovic, 2017).

Wageman (2001)

• External leader • 1. One type of leader activity is to establish those features (to design the team) in a way that fosters self-management and performance effectiveness • 2. Potentially leader activity is to provide handson coaching that helps a team manage itself and its work well Hands-on coaching

• 1. They do not have the authority to set or alter their purposes, structures or organisational contexts • 2. They do have the authority to monitor and manage, as well as to execute, their work

• Findings show that how leaders design their teams and quality of their hands-on coaching both influence team self-management, the quality of member relationships and member satisfaction, but only leaders’ design activities affect team task performance • Design and coaching interact, so that welldesigned teams are helped more by effective coaching than are poorly designed teams • Two types of coaching (proving cues and informal rewards for self-managing behaviours, and problem-solving consultation) contributed positively and significantly to self-management, whereas two other types of coaching (identifying team problems, and leader task intervention) contributed negatively to self-management Hypothesis 1 = supported Hypothesis 2 = supported • Positive coaching has a stronger positive effect on process quality in well-designed groups than in poorly designed groups, and ineffective coaching undermines the interpersonal processes of poorly designed teams more than those of well-designed teams → the effects of leaders’ coaching behaviours depend substantially on how well they have designed their teams • Well-designed teams = coaches tend to have more positive influence on team processes • Well-designed teams = appeared more robust (ineffective coaching behaviour did not undermine them nearly as much as it undermined teams with flawed designs) → impact of leaders’ coaching on their teams is conditioned by the way in which they set the team up in the first place

Appendices 229

• Direct interaction with the team that is intended to shape team processes to produce good performance • Leader coaching behaviours can directly affect team members’ engagement with their task, their ability to work through interpersonal problems that may be impeding progress, the degree to which members accept collective responsibility for performance outcomes • Can improve both quality of group processes and level of member satisfaction • One study: coaches attempted to affect team performance through positive reinforcement of coordinating behaviour failed to find any relationship between such coaching and performance outcomes • ‘encouraging behaviour’ from supervisors war negatively associated with team performance (selfmanaging teams that had no coaches significantly outperformed those that did) → Leaders’ coaching in some circumstances fosters team self-management, quality of members’ interpersonal relationships, member satisfaction within the team and its work. But coaching alone may make little or even a negative difference in how well a team actually performs • Hackman (1987): leader’s influence comes mainly from his/her design choices, with his/her coaching activities making a difference only at the margins through small adjustments in what is an already

• Self-managed teams have authority and accountability for executing and managing the work but within a structure and toward purposes set by others

230

Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings

Self-managed project teams (SMPT), widely adapted in project-based organisations due to flexibility and freedom in work processes given to team members; leadership is where group members share responsibilities which results in more effective leadership; independence of this type of teams on conducting their tasks eliminates the importance of having a formal leader within the team

• Changes in responsibility → more time for team to focus on their work and not to be blamed for any mistakes and leader was fully responsible for solving any conflict

Appendices

Article Author (year)

well-determined trajectory → leaders have the opportunity to coach a team to higher levels of self-management and superior performance only when the team is relatively well designed • Look at the behaviour categories used in the analysis → providing informal rewards and other cues that the group-as-a-whole is responsible for managing itself; broadening group’s repertoire of problem-solving skills through appropriate problem-solving consultation; dealing with interpersonal problems in the team through team process consultation; signalling that individuals are mainly responsible for managing the team’s work; intervening the task; identifying team’s problems → strong resemblance with literature on self-management (e.g. Manz & Sims, 1987) Yazid (2015)

• External leader • Interference by the external leader is said to interrupt the process of the teams which is able to manage themselves • Several researcher have discussed how leaders have been identified as one of the main reason for the failure of self-managing team development • However, the existence of a team leader is still required especially for the purpose of guiding the team activities → team leader required special set of skills to assist self-managed teams • Role is that of a coordinator • Build close relationships between team leader members and the top management by acting as a bridge connecting the two parties, also known as the boundary spanner • Might be responsible for team’s performance but they do not get involved closely with the team in

• Cohen et al. (1996) → best way to lead selfmanaging teams is to have no leader at all • Teams always work in a dynamic and compact environment → this increased needs of team members to coordinate their actions specifically in improving their work performance towards achieving team’s objective • Team members also need to be proactive in predicting any changes in terms of the work

• Team: first conflict management strategy then conflict avoidance (not willing to get further involved in the conflict) → being highly dependent on external leader as leader was no responsible for solving conflict as well as being responsible for the decision-making process

the daily operational activities and decisionmaking processes • External leader is asking questions (aim to improve team performance by getting info needed and encouraging team members towards achieving their goals) • Team needs assistance when they need to overcome difficulties or faced conflicts (team has a high diversity) • West (1994): main tasks of leader → setting clear shared objectives; changing roles of team members; developing individual tasks; evaluating individual contribution; providing feedback on team performance, as well as reviewing team strategies and objectives; also: responsible for managing personnel resources as well as material resources

Project D • Team members have regular meetings; their discussions are among them • They show responsibility for their end product (outcome of their work) • Facing difficulties if members are not achieving required work outcome → unhappy → want to solve issues immediately → meeting = team members are able to voice out and confront each other → comparing each other’s work → comment and critique each other → help each other → nevertheless same problems are arising → becoming desperate → team realises they are in need of assistance from external leader

Project D

Project E

• When team seeks assistance external leader gets involved and tries to solve the problem

• Regular team meetings → discussions about upgrades, problems, solving issues among each other without involving team leader • Facing conflicts, no agreement, unhappy, bad working environment → need management

Project E • When team has problems to find agreements, management has to step in → makes sure that the objective of the session is achieved → External leader is responsible as a mediator between team and the organisations and is passively involved with the team activities Team leader (vertical/traditional leader) Leadership = diffused rather than centralised

• Team-members need to affect managerial decisions for achieving benefits of a self-managed team • When team and team leaders share leadership, leadership is rotated to the person with the key knowledge, skills, and abilities for the particular issues facing the team at any given moment • Team is given significant authority and responsibility for many aspects of their work

• Leadership should be rotated to the person with the key knowledge, skills, abilities for the particular issues facing the team at any given moment • Team should be manned with the right people • Team leader should be responsible for designing team, and also managing boundaries of team • Transformational leadership is required → leadership is about empowering subordinates to participate of transforming the organisation

231

• Agile development favours a leader- and collaboration style of management where the traditional Project manager’s role is replaced with the role of a facilitator or coach • Does not organise the team; works to remove impediments of the process, runs and makes decisions in the daily meetings and validates them with the management

Self-organising/self-managed team

Appendices

Moe, Dingsyr, and Kvangardsnes (2009)

environment and their assigned tasks; they also need to respond to changes

232

Continued.

Yang and Shao (1996)

Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

• Although team is largely on its own → needs to be controlled → management should establish enough checkpoints to prevent instability, ambiguity, and tension from turning into chaos • Should avoid rigid control that impairs creativity and spontaneity • Team leader should be responsible for designing team (clarifying purpose, securing resources, articulating vision, selecting members and defining team processes) Manage boundaries of team; responsibilities should be assigned; select team members based on their technical, teamwork, leadership skills (right people must be on team, team must be small); articulate how team will approach task and function as a team; articulate trust and confidence in team • Training and development is required

(planning, scheduling, assigning tasks to members, making decisions team is accorded full authority to do whatever it decided is necessary to achieve the goal) • Increased emotional attachment to organisation → greater commitment, motivation to perform and desire for responsibility → employees care more about their work → greater creativity, helping behaviour, higher productivity, service quality • Influence team effectiveness (brings decisionmaking authority to the level of operational problems and uncertainties, increase speed and accuracy of problem solving • Premises for succeeding with innovative projects • If project reflects largely external demands, team is less likely to identify with the project • Training and development is required

• Leadership exists within the team (leadership and responsibility have shifted from upper management to team members themselves)

Self-managed teams

• They need traditional leadership role to plan, control and schedule their work processes • They need someone to take a social role in order to reduce conflicts and increase morale, as well as a boundary-spanning role to communicate with other departments and acquire resources • Trait and behavioural approaches → one best style of leadership: a high concern for both subordinates and production (but this is just an approach for leadership by one person) = not helpful for self-managed teams where leadership is taken care off by all team members → requires multiple types of leadership

• Typically consists out of 5 30 members working together on an on-going, day-to-day basis • Empowered to produce an entire product or service with little or no supervision • Multi-skilled, must learn variety of tasks and rotate from job to job • Job responsibility and managing themselves • Usually do not require permission of higher management to implement solutions or make decisions • Responsible for managerial activities (budgeting, planning, training team members, setting work schedules) For effective team functioning, team members need to be continually trained and developed

Most Important Findings

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• Study supports aspect of the competing values framework theory which hold that opposing leadership roles should coexist but not necessarily receive equal emphasis • Role priority changes depending on stages of team development • Training if required is managers hope to have all eight roles in their self-managed teams • Team members may not have all the required skills for being successful team leaders, top management in the organisation should consider developing kind of training programmes that team will need in order to operate the eight roles effectively • Managers who should promote the eight role in their self-managed teams for success

233

Those two roles are in conflict with each other The eight roles of the supervisor

Appendices

Team members are skilled in all the eight leadership • All self-managed teams should guide their team • Situational theories → no ‘one best style’ of members towards development of these leadership; the most effective leaders must identify roles managerial skills the behaviours each situation requires and then adapt their styles to meet the needs of a given situation; variables include: nature of task, subordinates’ characteristics, group structure and organisational factors → Effective leaders should play different roles and change their styles to match demand of given situation → However, theories presume that leadership qualities exist in one person, power struggles could result when applying the person-centred approaches to the study of shared team leadership • Substitutes for leadership → leadership is not always essential to the effective functioning of group (sometimes unnecessary or redundant); selfmanaged teams require less task leadership, since members are trained and multi-skilled • Distributed leadership model → suitable for study of self-manged teams; members should possess different leadership qualities and multiple leadership styles coexist and complement one another; match between leadership styles and four phases in a team’s life (each requires certain leadership style): envisioning, organising, spanning and social (mutually exclusive but complementary) → Leaders expected to direct work-related activities, but also to negotiate with other groups → Mode overlooks fact that teams require ‘mentor’ role to facilitate development of human resource • Competing values framework → effective managers must perform contradictory roles in order to fulfil many competing expectations Supervisor must focus on goal attainment and task orientation Concern for employees and people orientation

234

Continued.

Douglas (2002)

Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

External leader

Self-directed work teams (SDWT)

• Traditional temptation to stay in control → considerable adjustments by managers • More like advisors, leading where they do not have command and control authority → Need to use fewer power-based influence tactics, employ transformational leadership, develop more high LMX relationships with team members, provide team members greater access to organisational info → Also important: manager’s self-monitoring level; high self-monitors will readily adjust to the changing environment and assume the necessary influence behaviours • Utilise influence tactics that will generate team member empowerment, encourage team learning, portray themselves as being supportive to team activities → Use of rational tactics and soft tactics (see paper for understanding) = communicate respect for subordinates’ ability to understand managerial objectives, recognition of subordinates technical task knowledge and a desire to strengthen relational ties → Manager’s ability to influence, based on soft influence tactics, must replace the former controlling function, based on hard influence tactics • Effective leadership = leader and followers are able to develop mature relationships, characterised by high degrees of mutual trust, respect and obligation • Manager must transcend to encourage interdependence among team members while serving as an advisor or coach to team activities

• Need unrestricted access to info (= vital for team success) • Given considerable responsibility and authority for daily operations, in a manner consistent with leadership exchange

Most Important Findings

Training efforts should be centred on providing mangers with a realistic preview of the forthcoming changes, which should include a comparison of manager’s role before and after the transition • Existing managers must accept the concept of team members interacting with employees and managers outside of the current manager’s span of control

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• Important characteristics of leadership: social perceptiveness (ability to recognise change) and behavioural flexibility (ability to adjust leader behaviours to match changing situation) → enable managers to adapt in changing situations = provide better leadership = high self-monitors Luciano, Mathieu, and Ruddy (2014)

• Implications of whether external leaders allocate their efforts differently across the teams that they manage → they do! And such differentiation had significant influences on team empowerment and thereby on team effectiveness

Empowered teams

• In many instances, leaders oversee multiple teams Prior research has demonstrated that effective external leadership is still critical for the team’s success → Focus shifts from managing day-to-day activities to facilitating team functioning • Average external leadership Reflects the general or average level of team facilitating behaviours that an external leader exhibits across teams → higher levels of this construct = more managerial support Leadership entails helping team to function as autonomous units. By providing opportunities for self-determination, responsibility, decisionmaking, leader expect that members will learn from those challenges and be better able to function autonomously External leaders who consistently promote team functioning and facilitate task work foster a stake of empowerment. Passive or absent leaders are like to leave a void in the team and create a sense of uncertainty and insecurity among team members due to a lack of guidance and support Meta-analysis by Burke et al. (2006): team leadership behaviours that were more task oriented (e.g. initiating structure, boundary spanning) and more person oriented (e.g. empowerment, consideration, motivation) both were significantly positively related to team effectiveness and productivity

• Teams that receive relatively more facilitative leadership behaviours likely feel greater support and are more efficacious, compared with teams who receive relatively less of the leader’s attention • Teams that received relatively greater amounts of • Teams that receive relatively less external leader their attention reported greater empowerment support are unlikely to identify with or be willing • At the same time, the significant direct effects of to take responsibility for the team average external leadership highlight the • Greater levels of support available to employees in importance of reporting to a leader who generally high-quality exchanges may create a positive engages in more leadership behaviours environment for members and enhance • Results reaffirm the importance of external satisfaction with the job (study based on leadership and confirm that external leaders can individual level) both differentiate their behaviour towards • Leader’s attention = relates positively to member different teams as well as adopt a general style job satisfaction, team performance and team empowerment • Team empowerment: increase team outcomes by increasing team members’ sense of ownership and level of initiative • Teams were collectively responsible for determining the division of work, allocation of resources, budget expenditures, work strategy development, performance assessment and recruitment and development of new members Have formally designated external leader but did not have a formally designated within-team leader

Appendices

• External leader

235

236

Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings

Appendices

Article Author (year)

External leaders who exhibit behaviours that facilitate team functioning would promote team effectiveness • Relative external leadership Relative support or facilitating behaviours that a team receives from the external leader, in comparison with the other teams reporting to the same external leader. → Leaders play an important role in shaping the employees’ experiences at work = differentiated treatment received by teams is likely to create differences in team experiences and team functioning Cohen, Chang, and Ledford (1997)

• Self-managing teams (autonomous, selfregulating) • Most self-managing groups have a formal leader • Interdependent, work on group tasks that are high who is located above the group in the in autonomy and identity, have considerable organisational hierarchy authority to make decisions concerning personnel • Key contingency variable explaining the success or and other matters of the group failure of self-managing teams • Self-management authority is not absolute, and • Manz and Sims (1987): identified six leadership the term does not imply the absence of direct behaviours → self-expectation, rehearsal, self-goal management setting, self-criticism, self-reinforcement, self• Teams are responsible for regulating the collective observation/evaluation → see paper for behaviour of their members towards productive explanation of these behaviours (7th factor: ends ‘uninterpretable’) → positive correlation between • Groups are responsible for regulating their self-managing leadership behaviours and performance by setting their goals, obtaining perceived leadership effectiveness performance feedback, making evaluations and → Limitations: study has not been replicated in developing necessary corrections other organisations; no comparison to traditional • Self-managing work teams are more effective than teams; the questionnaire was made and filled out traditionally managed groups by the same sample External leadership

• Respondents perceive slightly more self-management leadership behaviours in the self-managing than the traditional work teams • Respondents evaluate self-managing work teams as more effective than traditional ones, and this difference is moderate in size • Self-managing leadership behaviours are positively associated with QWL (mainly employee satisfaction) and self-rated effectiveness for both self-managing and traditional teams • Employees experience greater satisfaction with their work and may perform better when supervisors encourage self-direction, irrespective of whether employees are in self-managing teams

• Leader’s role in a self-management situation lies in facilitating the development of self-controls by employees so that they can successfully manage their work activities with fewer organisational controls • External leaders of self-managing teams encourage and facilitate their employees to use these six behavioural strategies, providing empirical support for the development of the SMLQ Morgeson (2005)

• Results indicated that leader preparation and supportive coaching were positively related to • Large amount of autonomy and control over their • Make key team decisions → e.g. hiring/firing, team perceptions of leader effectiveness, with immediate work environment dealing with customers, purchasing equipment preparation becoming more strongly related to • Some activities external leaders are ideally situated • Teams can manage most of their own activities, effectiveness as even novelty increased. More need for leaders, who are not members of team is to perform, such as encouraging the team; active leader intervention activities (active reduced managing the team’s boundaries; dealing with coaching and sense making) were negatively • Reasons for external leadership unexpected problems or events that can occur related to satisfaction with leadership yet were 1. Teams are rarely delegated full decision-making • They are frequently found in team-based settings positively related to effectiveness as events became authority → left to external leader to make key and can positively impact team functioning more disruptive team decisions • Basic principle of the functional perspective is that • Leaders intervene in Specific ways when events 2. See leadership characteristics the main job of a team leader is: ‘…to do, or get occur and that the interventions strategies are • Because internal team leaders are involved into done, whatever is not being adequately handled differentially related to effectiveness and day-to-day task performance, their ability to for group needs’. → functional perspective satisfaction with leadership monitor the team and environment is limited suggests that external team leadership is centred Teams can be categorised into distinct types on the on helping teams solve the problems they basis of these tasks encounter on a day-to-day basis • Leaders satisfy team needs → leaders attend to • Production and service teams → produce internal and external work environment for events standardised products or provide a delimited and other info that may have implications for range of services to internal or external customers; team functioning → includes monitoring or employees on such team commonly work together collecting info about the absolute level of team on a full-time basis over extended periods with performance, gathering info about goals and task considerable self-management; such teams use requirements, obtaining info about events that specific technologies where work processes are might influence the team, interpreting used repeatedly performance conditions and environment changes, → Team encounters same events again and again forecasting future conditions in order to ascertain = develop routines that specify precise, wellwhat negative or positive events may be about to understood and well-known actions occur External leadership

Self-managed teams

Appendices 237

238

Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

→ When problems or disruptive events occur, • Basis of an understanding of the team and the teams are forced out of their routines and must context within which it operates → the leader respond in a more effortful and controlled manner intervenes or otherwise implements solutions to • Self-managing teams have a great deal of latitude maintain or improve team functioning → to develop and enact their own version of reality, supporting a team’s self-management, providing in effect interpreting the meaning of events performance feedback, communicating with the occurring in their context as they see fit team, coaching the team It is important to clarify when a leader needs to interfere and when not → When such interruptions occur (problems or disruptive events), external team leaders are ideally positioned to intervene in the team and help the team adapt to the event and resume the performance episode (they contribute to team performance by acting as a potentially critical resource to help team adaption) Active forms of intervention will be most effective when disruptive events occur External team leadership and novel performance environments • Leaders can intervene by preparing, coaching, or helping the team make sense of uncertain events → Preparing Monitor work environment for potentially disruptive events and to prepare team to manage or otherwise be ready for problems prior to their occurrence; build team capabilities (before problematic events occur) 1. The most effective external team leaders will choose to prepare their teams only when the situation warrants it; leaders contribute the most to team functioning when they see novel events on the horizon that teams may not have encountered in the past

Most Important Findings

Appendices

Article Author (year)

→ Coaching the team ‘direct interaction with the team that is intended to shape team processes to produce good performance’ Wageman (2001): positive coaching (providing cues and informal rewards for self-managing behaviours and problem-solving consultation) was positively related to team self-management and quality of group process, and negative coaching (identifying team problems and leader task intervention) was negatively related to team self-management and work satisfaction Provide rewards and reinforcement for selfmanagement behaviours on the part of the team → serve to increase team’s self-confidence and is in keeping with the spirit of self-managing teams → leader sense making Interpret or ‘make sense’ of uncertain organisational events for the team: identifying important environmental events, interpreting these events given the team’s performance situation and offering this interpretation to the team 2. Presence of shared mental models of environmental events is viewed as essential for effective team functioning → Can run counter to principles of team selfmanagement Hallmark of self-management is the transfer of control from the leader to the team External leadership

239

• Receiving conflicting signals regarding how to go about it • Role is highly ambiguous in nature • Companies hold leaders responsible for their team’s performance. If the quality or productivity of a team is substandard, its external leader is taken to task

• Best external leaders were not necessarily the ones who had adopted a hands-off approach nor were • Even a team that is autonomous in terms of its they simply focused on encouraging team activities and decision-making must still members in various ways. Instead, the external continually receive direction through a person leaders who had contributed most to their team’s who is ultimately held accountable for the group’s success excelled at one skill: managing the performance boundary between the team and the larger • Teams tend to have well-defined job functions and organisation → required behaviours can be are responsible for monitoring their own Self-managing team, autonomous groups

Appendices

Druskat and Wheeler (2004)

240

Continued. Leadership Characteristics • Typical external leader is in charge of several selfmanaging teams at any one time • Leader absolutely must avoid any heavy-handed attempts at managing • Leaders find themselves caught in the middle: their teams criticise them for being too controlling, while their own managers complain they are being too lax leadership activities and behaviours • Relating Leader moves back and forth between team and broader organisation to build relationships: requires three behaviours: being socially and politically aware; building team trust and caring for team members Explanation of the three behaviours see paper! Average leaders tend to see team members’ personal problems as impediments, whereas superior leaders view them as opportunities to build relationships • Scouting Demonstrate three behaviours: seeking information from managers, peers and specialists; diagnosing member behaviour; and investigating problems systematically Explanation of the three behaviours see paper! • Persuading Requires two behaviours: obtaining external support and influencing the teams Explanation of the two behaviours see paper! • Empowering Demonstrating three behaviours: delegating authority; exercising flexibility regarding team decisions and coaching Explanations of the three behaviours see paper!

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams performance. Instead of managers telling them what to do, these teams gather and synthesise information, make important decisions and take collective responsibility for meeting their goals • Teams depend on external leaders for help in acquiring resources

Most Important Findings

grouped into four basic functions: relating, scouting, persuading and empowering

Appendices

Article Author (year)

Superior leaders develop strong relationships inside the teams and across the organisation; average leaders tend to relate well to one of those parties but not to both Social and political awareness of the broader organisation provides access to the individuals and groups that can help the leader best meet team’s needs Strong relationships allow leaders access to information in the teams and the organisation, which aids leader in making sense of the needs of both parties Good information enables leader to encourage and persuade team to behave in was that facilitate the organisation’s effectiveness Sense of control afforded by that influence allows the leader to empower the team more fully, resulting in greater team effectiveness Druskat, and Wheeler (2003)

External leadership See Druskat and Wheeler ‘How to lead a selfmanaging team’ (2004)

• Effective external leaders move back and forth across boundaries to build relationships, scout necessary information, persuade their teams and outside constituents to support one another and empower their teams to achieve access

High performance work teams (HPWT)

• Hypothesis 1 confirmed (positive relationship between the level of coaching expertise exhibited by team leader and the team learning outcomes that result from a project) • Hypothesis 2 confirmed (positive relationship between team leader’s exhibition of team empowerment within the team context, and the team learning outcomes that result from a project) • Hypothesis 3 confirmed (positive relationship between project difficulty of an HPWT project, and the team learning outcomes that result from that project)

‘Managing from the boundary: the effective leadership of self-managing work teams’ provides more detailed information about the aforementioned text Hagen and Aguilar (2012)

• Managerial coaching • Improve learning processes within organisations, and thus improving competitive advantage; improve employee-manager relationship • Improve performance via the exhibition of conscious behaviours, such as questioning, guiding, advising and challenging in an attempt to develop more empowered, informed and motivated employees • Coaching = process by which a manager, through guided discussion and activity, helps a member of his/her staff to solve a problem or carry out a task more efficiently and/or effectively

• Given that HPWTs are often created to work on highly complex and ambiguous tasks for which individual team members and the leader often have challenging roles, and the learning that takes place within organisations is essential to the teams’ ability to search for various solutions to problems and results in improved business capabilities and competencies • HPWT = team that is able to perform at the highest level for extended periods of time, so as to reach complex and difficult goals

Appendices

Self-managing work teams

241

242

Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

• Coaching, while used to improve the performance of the individual worker, has the potential to improve the performance of the organisation overall → done through guidance, encouragement and support of the learner • Delegation has been found to be essential to the development of an HPWT • Unique set of skills and approaches is required when leading HPWTs within an organisation, including flexibility, the ability to provide positive interactions and the facilitation of communication → This is due to the complexity and ambiguity of the tasks, roles and responsibilities of both individual team members and team leaders

Antoni (2005)

Supervisor

Most Important Findings

• Team leaders are provided with rigorous training and development in coaching as well as team empowerment • The implementation of both challenging tasks and challenging goals, as suggested by goal-setting theory (Latham & Locke, 1979; Locke, 1968) will help to improve the learning that takes place. By implementing projects that are more difficult and selecting team leaders who employ managerial coaching techniques, organisations may improve the learning processes that take place within at team, via improved feedback, empowerment and developmental opportunities • Independent variable project difficulty explained the most variance in team learning outcomes for team leaders whereas coaching expertise and team empowerment explained the most variance in team learning outcomes for team members Self-regulating teams

• Small groups striving for a common goal, • Self-regulatory tasks have to be delegated by the integrating primary and secondary tasks, such as supervisor quality control and production planning, and → He or she is supposed to support the group but organising themselves on issues such as work not to interfere in group processes assignment, job rotation, working time and vacation planning • Supervisors must be able to lead teams with goals • No distinction is made between the terms ‘team’ and feedback and to support them if necessary and ‘group’ in this paper • They can be perceived as a form of collective work redesign, integrating job enrichment and job rotation at a group level • Teams must be able to use goals and feedback systems and to regulate their action collectively to obtain common goals

• Results support the proposition that MBO systems can be an effective tool to improve group effectiveness in respect to both group productivity and job satisfaction.

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• Task or workflow interdependence is defined as the extent to which group members must actually work together to perform the task and influence each other’s performance. Task interdependence is supposed to influence the extent to which group members use collective planning to improve group coordination • Higher group goals lead to higher group effort, direct group behaviour towards group goals, influence the kind of planning, cooperation and communication in the group Muethel and Hoegl (2013)

All team members sharing leadership responsibilities Independent professional teams • High levels of expertise and experience • They do not have a formal project leader • Being independent-minded, they evaluate other parties’ contributions in a collaborative project team and are likely to reject influence attempts by other team members, if they do not perceive it to be beneficial for their own work in the project • Team members evaluate the potential benefit of adhering to the advice given and then simply demonstrating compliance • Team members are continuously considering not only their own sphere of work, but also how the entire project unfolds • They exert effort to understand task interrelationships and take initiative to influence team to ensure that project objectives are met • It does not focus on project leader only, but on the whole team as a source of leadership behaviour → Team members jointly take responsibility for successful team task accomplishment • Independent professional teams most often work on highly interdependent tasks Hypothesis 1: independent professionals’ perceived responsibility for team outcomes is positively related to influence attempts

Appendices

• Shared leadership: dynamic, interactive influence process among peers in which the objective is to lead one another to the achievement of group goals • Although independent professionals focus on their own positive outcomes, they regularly depend on the collaboration and coordination with the other team members • For independent professional teams, the area of influence is determined by one team member’s possible contribution to another’s task accomplishment • Shared leadership to be enacted through individual team members influencing the team in an effort to support goal directed collective team behaviour • It included team members’ anticipation of other team members’ info needs, consideration of task interdependencies and the initiation and facilitation of info flows as well as decisionmaking and implementation processes • Clear distinction between teamwork and shared leadership • Only if an influence attempt by one party is perceived as a favour by the other party, perceived obligation to reciprocate the favour develop

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Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

• Since the independent professionals are on the • Social exchange is achieved to the degree that same level hierarchically, team members largely team members provide one or more of the team lack the power to coerce other team members into members with benefits by performing shared compliance → members who want to influence leadership and, eventually, receiving benefits due others need to largely depend on others’ to the whole team accomplishing the team task willingness to follow better • Team-member exchange: agreeing with Carson et al. (2007) that valuable exchangers are also possible through active influence • Argue that each team member can demonstrate leadership behaviour and thus temporarily take an influencing (leader) role towards another team members that is influenced (follower) • Shared leadership effectiveness depends on the coincidence of influence attempt and influence acceptance • The continuous exertion of leader and follower behaviour, for example each team member can be a leader in one situation and a follower in another, points to a particular exchange relationship between leaders and followers • Shared leadership includes team members engaging in influence attempts Influence attempts include proactive suggestions of one independent professional towards other independent professionals targeting at their sphere of work. →Single independent professionals wish to influence the outcomes of other independent professionals’ work packages → however, as they have no decision autonomy in the sphere of other independent professionals, shared leadership initiatives target at influencing others but do not necessarily achieve in doing so

Most Important Findings

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• Usually staffed flexibly from project to project, regularly collaborating with other I.P. they did not meet before → thus they might primarily be interested in achieving their own work goals and less interested in the achievement of other independent professionals Erez, LePine, and Elms (2002)

Rotated leadership and peer evaluation

Self-managed or empowered team

• First design (peer evaluation) Team members’ performance is evaluated and rewarded in the absence of an individual internal to the team (e.g. leader, supervisor, manager) whose responsibility it is to perform this function →Peer evaluations are not well accepted in organisations because it is assumed that they are inconsistent with the goal of promoting a cooperative team climate →However, use of peer evaluations should promote team functioning and effectiveness • Second design (rotated leadership) Nature of team leadership →Designating a leader may help ensure that the critical team management functions are accomplished (see text for functions) and that members have a sense of their place on the team →If the leadership responsibilities are rotated among members, a climate of shared leadership may be fostered and this should promote the overall capacity of the team to function and perform effectively

• In self-managed teams decision-making authority concerning the specific means of accomplishing the team’s work is left up to the individuals who compose the team • Although self-management reflects the capability to determine how team goals are achieved, selfmanaged teams can be designed differently, and decisions regarding team designs have implications with respect to team functioning and effectiveness

Workload sharing

• Rotated leadership → among members had higher levels of voice cooperation and performance Hypothesis 1: is supported Hypothesis 2: not supported Hypothesis 3: is supported • Peer evaluations or rotated leadership promoted team effectiveness as indexed by team performance and member satisfaction → these effects appeared to be at least partially mediated by three team processes: workload sharing, voice, and cooperation • Effects of peer ratings for evaluation and reward purposed • We found that peer evaluations promoted workload sharing, voice, and cooperation, and that these effects translated into higher levels of performance and member satisfaction • Although some have mentioned rotated leadership as a means of promoting a team’s ability to function effectively, this ideas had not to our knowledge, been assessed • Although teams with rotated leadership did not appear to have higher levels of workload sharing or member satisfaction, these teams did have higher levels of voice and cooperation, and these relationships did appear to translate into higher levels of team performance

Appendices 245

• Extent to which members of a team do a fair share of the team’s work • Because of doing a fair share of the team’s work maintains equity norms, social responsibility norms, and norms of reciprocity, team members’ satisfaction should be higher in team where workload sharing is high

• Peer evaluations → higher levels of workload sharing, voice, cooperation, performance and member satisfaction

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Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Voice • Extent to which people speak up and offer constructive suggestions for change Cooperation • Quality of interaction among members of team • Cooperation promotes team performance (because cooperation promotes integration of members’ task focused inputs) Peer evaluations • Drawbacks Organisations resist peer evaluations because peers are thought to be uncomfortable in the role of the rater when there are material consequences. Peer raters are believed to be unwilling to differentiate among members for fear of damaging interpersonal relationships and team’s social climate • Benefits(workload sharing) peer evaluations for reward purposes can promote functioning of a team relative to situations where an external manager provided the evaluations → individuals tend to put forth less effort when working on a group task than when working on an individual task → this ‘social loafing’, increase workload sharing is a team design that increases members’ perceptions that their behaviour is being monitored and that there are consequences for their behaviour — Drawbacks of external leader: evaluations from external managers, who may only have limited contact with the team, evaluations from peers would seem to be well suited to promote these perceptions

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings • We are not suggesting that rotated leadership is universally preferable to emergent leadership or to a single designated leader, but we are suggesting that rotated leadership may be a viable team design option

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• Benefits (voice) peer evaluations are a form of communication that requires members to think about and assess other members’ contributions → may cue thoughts about alternative ways of going about the team’s task → voice should be promoted • Benefits (cooperation) peer evaluations make members accountable to one another and may have material consequences, team members should be less likely to want to appear to be disagreeable or unsupportive → peers will want to be perceived as team players → interactions will be more likely to reflect type of courtesy and thoughtfulness that are characteristic of cooperative teams Rotated leadership Design can take several forms

Appendices 247

• Self-managed teams could rely on a member or members to step forward and carry out leadership functions … appropriate because: • Benefits Possible that leader who eventually emerges through some natural selection process will be the most qualified to lead and carry out leadership functions Possible that the members who are actually doing the work are in the best position to determine who should carry out leadership responsibilities (rotated leadership had benefits in terms of promoting team functioning over teams that rely on leader emergence) • Drawbacks Non-emergent leader may feel less responsible for team outcomes Non-leader members may come to rely on the emergent leader to carry out many responsibilities that members themselves could otherwise accomplish

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Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings

Appendices

Article Author (year)

Emergent leader may feel less responsible → leadership status is unofficial and unrecognised — Feelings of reduced responsibility translate into reductions in effort towards the accomplishment of team outcomes But rotated leadership among team members over the life of a team may ameliorate this tendency → all members are involved in team outcomes; each member plays important part in determining team effectiveness → positive on workload sharing Increase the overall level of voice in a team Members experience in leadership role should increase: Their overall knowledge of team and its task → greater ability to generate suggestions for change Their self-efficacy for expressing themselves → greater motivation to express suggestions and ideas Cooperation Rotated leadership should clarify who is responsible for performing behaviours associated with specific roles → Better sense of which types of behaviour to enact → fewer misunderstandings and overall, smoother system of interpersonal interaction Shared experience of difficulties associated with leadership role → shared experiences breed empathy Taggar, Hackett, and Saha (1999)

Leaderless teams

emergent team leaders?

• Leaders differ from other team members in that they are ‘more likely to direct other group members’ activities’ (De Souza & Klein, 1995, p. 475)

Autonomous work team • Taking responsibility for completion of a variety of tasks, including team maintenance functions (e.g. conflict resolution and team and individual performance feedback), work allocation and

• Leadership emergence was associated most strongly with cognitive ability, followed by conscientiousness, extraversion and emotional stability • Teams performed best when both team leader and staff were high in leadership

identifying and solving ill-defined or poorly structured problems • The role assumed by an individual depends on his/her abilities and interests, the needs of other group members and the team task to be completed • Roles that people assume are flexible and dynamic; low role differentiation • Person may emerge as a leader in one team but not in another • We may all exhibit leadership behaviour at one time or another, but some people are more likely to exhibit behaviour attributed to leadership more often than others. Hence, although we operationalised the ‘emerged’ team leader as the team member who had the highest leadership ratings among all team members, all team members may exhibit leadership behaviour and therefore leadership may emerge from a number of different people Five Factor Model (FFM) • Conscientiousness → factors especially important in autonomous work teams were the team takes responsibility for task completion & team decision accuracy was contingent on leader conscientiousness

• An effective team leader does not ameliorate the negative effects of a staff low in leadership • Beta weights showed that g (H6) contributed most to explaining team member leadership, followed by Conscientiousness (H1) and Extraversion (H2), and lastly, Neuroticism (H5). H3 (Openness to Experience) and H4 (Agreeableness) were not supported • The team leader (team member with the highest leadership score) did not significantly impact team performance over and above other team member (H7) • It is evident that a high leadership score on the part of both the team leader and staff (additive) yielded high on team performance. A low staff leadership score neutralised the effect of a high team leader. Similarly, emergent team leaders with low leadership scores relative to other team leaders, neutralise the effects of a staff high in leadership → team leader is a facilitator of team performance rather than being the dominant contributor to team performance • High leadership scores on the part of both leader and staff are necessary for achieving high team performance • Each team member must perform at minimal acceptable levels for the team to succeed and therefore must possess the required resources. The results indicate that each team member makes a unique contribution to team effectiveness and the failure of one member to exhibit leadership behaviour is detrimental to team performance • Once a person has assumed the team leadership role in an initially leaderless team, that person may function in much the same way as a designated leader. Although the emerged team leader may have no formal authority, he/she may

Appendices

• The leadership role in teams largely involves facilitating team process initiating or formulating goals, encouraging interaction between all team members, finding necessary resources to get the job done, encouraging diverse points of view, acting as coach, clarifying team member responses and organising the group’s thinking • Schneider and Goktepe (1983) defined emergent leaders as group members who exert significant influence over other members of the group although no formal authority has been vested in them • Emergent team leaders (individuals rated highest on perceived leadership by their peers) were more adapt than other team members at perceiving team requirements and selecting appropriate behaviour to these demands • More than one team member exhibiting leadership (as reflected in a set of behaviour that team members attribute to leadership • If the team leader is most likely to exhibit high amounts of facilitating behaviour (e.g. coordinating, directing and evaluating and synthesising solutions), then his or her actions may have the most impact on team performance → Hypothesis 7: the leadership score of the team leader (the person with the highest leadership score in the team) will be positively related to team performance • Although the main purpose of leadership is to organise and direct group towards the attainment of mutual goals on a particular task, it appears that a team performs best when such behaviour is the responsibility of staff members as well as team leader

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Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings

have informal authority granted from the role negotiation process • Results suggest that human resource practitioners should seek to maximise number of people in a team who exhibit leadership behaviour, such as performance management, goal setting and synthesis of ideas • Also: although one individual may clearly exhibit leadership behaviour more than his/her peers may, this individual cannot compensate for lack of leadership behaviour in other team members. A team needs many acts of leadership, contributed from all members of a team Nicolaides et al. (2014)

Shared leadership of teams vs vertical leadership Two streams of research on leadership in teams

Team-based structures

• They provide faster and more flexible action, as well as increased informational processing • Application of traditional theories of leadership: capability than more rigid and centralised single individual that is designated to lead the organisational structures team, and on the relationships that individual • Shared leadership → ‘a dynamic, interactive leader has with his/her followers → vertical influence process among individuals in groups for leadership which the objective is to lead one another to the • Leadership is seen as emanating not only from a achievement of group or organisational goals or designated leader, but also from team members both’ → reduced distinction between leader and themselves → shared leadership follower, because team members may fill either of • Vertical leaders may lack the full range of human these roles at any given time → set of interactive capital or the temporal resources necessary to help influence processes in which team leadership their teams accomplish their goals → shared functions are voluntarily shared among internal leadership can provide support to vertical team members in the pursuit of team goals leadership efforts • Shared leadership: participation, information • Hypothesis 1b: Shared leadership contributes sharing, and positive tone among team incremental variance in team performance, members = team functioning and effectiveness beyond vertical leadership • Engagement in shared leadership behaviours and • Task interdependence increases demands for satisfaction of team needs (e.g. setting realistic leadership behaviours that foster more effective goals for one another and helping the team member coordination

• Hypothesis 1b: supported • Research question 1: does team size moderate the shared leadership-team performance relationship? → not supported (no interaction between team size and shared leadership) • Longer tenured team may suffer from power struggles and power inequalities, which breed tension, conflict and anger within the group → disrupting team processes and performance → finding lends support to the idea that the positive effects of shared leadership can be difficult to sustain over time • Research questions 3: does team type moderate the shared leadership-team performance relationship? → no, team type did not interact with shared leadership in the prediction of team performance • Shared leadership is particularly effective when interdependence is high; high interdependence required team members to work closely with one another, coordinate, and integrate actions

Appendices

Article Author (year)

→ Coordination and embeddedness in a highquality relational environment were critical for the emergence and influence of shared leadership

Stoker (2008)

Directive vs coaching (leadership) behaviour

• Team members with a short team tenure reported higher levels of individual performance when their • Way of improving the performance and well-being team leader demonstrated directive behaviour of employees • ‘groups of interdependent employees who have the • Lower levels of individual performance and experienced greater emotional exhaustion when collective authority and responsibility of their team leader adopted coaching behaviour; for managing and performing relatively whole tasks’ team members with longer team tenure, however, • SMTs can contribute to burnout because it individual performance was greater and emotional required team members to have more intense and exhaustion less when their team leader exhibited a more frequent interactions with each other (Elloy coaching style of behaviour et al., 2001). Work overload appears to increase Self-managing teams (SMT)

Appendices 251

• Directive leadership (task-oriented leadership or ‘initiating structure’) Reflects situation, in which leader defines, directs and structures the roles and activities of subordinates towards the attainment of team’s goals Leader who scores highly for directive leadership or ‘initiating structure’ is one who tells employees what to do, and how to do it

• Results indicate that as a team tenure increases, generate solutions to overcome obstacles) should shared leadership validities decrease increase the confidence team members have that • Confirmed findings regarding shared leadership collectively they can produce efficient team and performance, the incremental validity of functioning that leads to team success shared leadership over vertical leadership and the • As members share team leadership functions, they moderating effects (or lack thereof) of several gain more voice in team direction and in the methodological moderators management of team processes, which in turn should foster a shared commitment to team action → stronger and more positive sense of team’s ability to succeed • Team size can be both an asset and a liability for teams → Larger teams have greater decision-making and information processing capabilities than smaller teams → Larger teams also introduce proximity barriers and reduce coordination and communication effectiveness = can hinder mutual influence processes Research question 1: does team size moderate the shared leadership-team performance relationship? • Longer tenured team may suffer from power struggles and power inequalities, which breed tension, conflict and anger within the group → disrupting team processes and performance • Research questions 3: does team type moderate the shared leadership-team performance relationship?

Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings

Initiating structure is related to performance → Two different views on effectiveness: 1. Team leaders should distance themselves from the team and focus on asking questions, rather than being directive and task-oriented = otherwise frustrates the self-management potential of a team, and will ultimately decrease performance; 2. Can help to reduce uncertainty and ambiguity, which may be beneficial for SMT member performance • Coaching leadership behaviour Defined as a day-to-day, hands-on process of helping employees to recognise opportunities to improve their own performance and capabilities Refers to a process of giving guidance, encouragement and support to the team members →View on effectiveness: 1. many articles in popular literature encourage leaders of SMTs to adopt a supportive and coaching style rather than to impose initiating structure; coaching behaviour of work teams is related to team psychological safety and team performance

the frequency of burnout (Maslach and Jackson, 1986)

• Practical implications: by adapting their leadership styles to suit the characteristics of individual team members, leaders may be able to increase the effectiveness of the individual team members • Direction relationship between leadership and performance that is statistically significant: coaching behaviour is negatively related to perceived individual performance • Hypothesis 1a: confirmed → there is a significant interaction effect between initiating structure and team tenure on perceived individual performance • Hypothesis 1b: not supported → the interaction between team tenure and initiating structure does not influence emotional exhaustion • Hypothesis 2a and 2b: both confirmed → the interaction on both perceived individual performance and emotional exhaustion • The positive results for the effectiveness of initiating structure show that SMTs can benefit from this style in the same way as teams that are more conventional → contention that initiating structure is important for effective leadership • Effect of each leadership style would be influenced by the team tenure of the individual team members • Both initiating structure and coaching leadership styles are important for SMTs • Leadership is most effective when it fits with the team tenure of each individual team member

• Hypothesis 1a: Team tenure moderates the relationship between initiating structure and perceived individual performance, such that initiating structure is positively related to a perception of high individual performance by team members with short team tenures, and negatively related to the individual performance perceptions of team members with longer team tenure • Hypothesis 1b: Team tenure moderates the relationship between initiating structure and emotional exhaustion, such that initiating structure is more positively related to emotional exhaustion for team members with short team tenures than for team members with longer team tenure • Hypothesis 2a: Team tenure moderates the relationship between coaching behaviour and perceived individual performance, such that coaching behaviour is negatively related to perceived individual performance for team members with short team tenures, and positively related to perceived individual performance by team members with lengthy tenures • Hypothesis 2b: Team tenures moderate the relationship between coaching behaviour and emotional exhaustion, such that coaching behaviour is positively related to high emotional

Appendices

Article Author (year)

252

Continued.

exhaustion for team members with low team tenure, and negatively related to emotional exhaustion for team members with high team tenure

→ Both initiating structure and coaching behaviour can indeed be either beneficial or harmful depending on the length of time an individual has spent in the team • Practical implications: ‘team leaders should realize that individuals within the team matter’ → adopting different leadership behaviours towards individual team members would seem to be more effective than using a single approach Both leadership styles can be (in)effective → need for a team leader who is flexible in adopting different leadership styles and is able to use both initiating and coaching behaviour

Stewart, Courtright, and Manz (2011)

Self-leadership team level no external leader, leadership is shared among team members

Self-managing/self-leading teams

• Effective self-leadership requires contributions from external leaders, albeit conditions that are very different than those traditionally associated with a command and control perspective of leadership → the external leader role moves away from director and boss towards acting as a coach and a catalysing support

253

• Particularly leadership roles, require a high degree of assertiveness and energy, which are ideally suited to extraverts • It is important that conflict in teams be prevented or resolved effectively because meta-analytic evidence suggests that across teams with varying degrees of self-leadership, task and relationship conflict are very often negatively related to team member satisfaction and team performance. Effective conflict management is particularly important for teams with a high degree of internal control because conflict is resolved by team members themselves rather than by a traditional supervisor • Transactive memory systems are particularly important for self-leadership at the team level because knowledge and information must be coordinated within the team rather than by a Self-leadership Team level formal hierarchical leader — Perhaps have a look at Table 2: Internal Forces • Teams exhibit self-leadership when they apply of Team-Level Self-Leadership self-control to production management activities;

• External leadership is particularly important, as self-leadership is not a complete substitute for external leadership but rather an influence process that can be complementary to and facilitated by external leadership

Appendices

Even though behaviour is often supported by external forces such as a leader, actions are ultimately controlled by internal rather than external forces Self-leadership is a concept that spans organisational levels and ties together research at individual and group level of analysis Individual self-management = self-observation, self-management of cues, self-goal setting, selfrewards/criticism and rehearsal; enhanced selfknowledge can provide info about behaviours that need to be strengthened, eliminated or changed Self-managing teams are given authority over work processes and are allowed to regulate their own behaviour: authority to select and terminate workers, set their own work schedules, determine budgets, order materials needed for production and monitor product quality

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Continued. Leadership Characteristics • A shared mental model should be particularly important for teams composed of self-leading individuals. Having a common purpose and clear understanding of who has what responsibilities is likely necessary for coordinating team member efforts when there is no formal leader → selfleading individuals need to integrate their own goals with the goals and objectives of the larger collective, making a shared mental model a likely prerequisite for a truly self-leading team External forces • Scholar generally agree that the success of selfleading teams depends on the actions of an external team leader, that is, the leader to whom the team reports • Primary role of external supervisor is to (a) support the team’s success by facilitating the team’s self-leadership and (b) help the team to interact effectively with the environment • Also note that leaders usually emerge in groups when no formal leadership role is prescribed, suggesting an individual filling a leadership role does indeed influence team self-leadership, even when that person lacks formal positional power • (Manz & Simon, 1987) first role of an external supervisor: ‘leading workers to lead themselves’ → effective external leaders provide support for internal control by encouraging their teams to be self-observing, self-evaluating, and self-reinforcing • (Wageman, 2001) found that teams had higher levels of self-leadership when leaders provide rewards for self-leadership behaviours, signal to team members that they are primarily responsible for managing the team’s work, and provide problem-solving consultation

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams also encompasses the application of self-control principles to coordinate interpersonal interactions • Self-leading teams perform human resource activities • Table 1: Literature Review on outcomes of selfleadership behaviour at team levels → Productivity/quality +, Ø → Creativity + → Self-efficacy + → Psychological empowerment + → Job satisfaction +, Ø, → Organisational Commitment +, Ø, → Absenteeism +, Ø, → Turnover +, → Stress/anxiety +, → Career success n/a — Mixed results (outcomes of self-leadership behaviour for teams suggest that it may not have an universally positive effect on productivity

Most Important Findings

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• (Morgeson, 2005) active, hands-on coaching by external leaders is necessary in some situations → disruptive events in team’s environment; but under other conditions active coaching interventions can hinder long-term self-leadership by creating dependence on the leader rather than requiring team themselves to own and resolve problems through internal processes (e.g. conflict management) • (Druskat and Wheeler, 2003) uses qualitative data taken from 300 self-directed production teams and their external leaders to develop a boundaryspanning model where effective external leaders serve as linking pin with other groups both inside and outside the organisation → effective leaders use their positions to the advantage of their teams by building social and political capital with outside parties and scouting info necessary for them to self-lead • Have a look at Table 3: External Forces of TeamLevel Self-leadership Eseryel and Eseryel (2013)

Transformational leadership, emergent leaders

Self-managing global information systems development teams • Groups of independent individuals who have the collective authority and responsibility of managing and performing relatively whole tasks to achieve group goals • These novel teams would require newer types of leadership that challenge traditional organisational assumptions • IS development teams are cross-functional, their members bring multi-disciplinary knowledge, their work is characterised by time pressure, and their outcomes must be adaptive to changing stakeholder expectations, business and technology conditions

• Individuals emerge as leaders through their consistently noteworthy contributions to their team over extended periods of time and through the inspiration they provide other team members → action-embedded transformational leadership → Three important characteristics of actionembedded leadership identified in Apache OSS teams:

255

(1) Actions of these perceived leaders help convey and put in place strongly held beliefs and values (2) Their actions stimulate innovative problem solving (3) Perceived leaders’ actions generate high degrees of follower confidence in that the leaders protect the team →Signposts of transformational leadership

Appendices

• Transformational leaders generate awareness and acceptance among followers towards group goals • Transformational leadership exists when leaders move their followers to go beyond their own selfinterests for the good of the group • It enables information systems (IS) development for competitive advantage by generating an innovative IS climate and by contributing to business-IS alignment thus increasing organisational performance • Transformational leaders influence followers with communication, through which they set a vision and high standards and increase team cohesion, achieve team success, reduce social loafing and increase member performance • Key findings show how formal external leaders design their teams, empower teams, define the

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Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

• Findings: data show that SMG-ISDT transformational leaders, similar to their hierarchical counterparts is IS and organisational teams, exhibit a clear understanding of the group’s future, create high follower confidence, invite trust and admiration, inspire others, lead by example and are considerate of the feelings of others • SMG-ISDT transformational leadership differs from hierarchical IS leadership as follows: it’s emergent and thus fluid in that individuals gain or lose leadership through their actions over time; they do not start off by communicating grand visions, they accomplish vision by working towards it and setting an example to other to join in; motivate others to join in on establishing the same vision and working towards the same goals • Results of this study provided empirical evidence to the IS transformational leader behaviours, such as inspiring others, leading by example and being considerate of others’ feelings

quality of their coaching and influence selfmanagement and success • Transformational leadership and emergent leadership = emergent transformational leaders would be defined as group members who, without formal authority, exert significant influence over other members of the group and move them to perform above expectations. One or more such leaders emerge within a group • Emergent leaders are the most frequent communicators

Solansky (2008)

Most Important Findings

Shared leadership vs single leadership

Self-managed teams

• (Zaccaro et al., 2001) Leadership processes influence team cognitive, motivational and affective processes; (Ensley, Pearson & Pearce, 2003) leadership process affects the attitudes, beliefs and behaviours of team members → leadership processes and team processes are closely linked • The necessity of leadership processes does not disappear because a team is self-managed → (Barry, 1991) self-managed teams need more leadership than conventional teams; ‘in addition to needing task-based leadership (such as project definition, scheduling, and resource gathering),

• Have the autonomy to make important decisions concerning their team processes →Key process = leadership • Self-managed teams need more leadership than conventional teams around both task-related issues and team development issues (Barry, 1991) • Organisations have clearly found teams to be effective; the combination of skills, expertise and resources of team members enable the team to potentially optimise the speed and efficiency in which complex tasks can be completed • Work teams are allowed to self-manage their team processes, that is, the team has the authority and

• Findings suggest that teams with shared leadership have motivational and cognitive advantages over teams that took the traditional approach of relying on a single leader • Hypothesis 1: supported (collective efficacy is higher for shared leadership) • Hypothesis 2: is not supported (differences in scores is not significant, however, shared leadership did have lower averages (less relational conflict) than nonshared leadership teams) • Hypothesis 3: supported • The traditional approach to leadership essentially sees the leaser as a focal point, a central processing node where responsibility ultimately

Appendices

Article Author (year)

responsibility to manage how their team functions; typically self-managed teams have no formal leader designated by the authority that creates the team → rather, the team is allowed to designate its own leader

resides. The centrality of a single leader helps clarify role boundaries, procedures and hierarchical arrangements. The centrality of a single leader provides a singular source for defining direction and enabling climate, motivation and identity • Shared leadership makes the team environment more complex, and so the team’s cohesiveness and ability to communicate become more important than if a single individual were the leader. Moreover, the attempt to share leadership within a work team could turn into a protracted power struggle. But, a single leader, no matter how gifted, cannot be right all the time, so as a practical matter, combining the talents and interests of several individuals likely to increases a work team’s long-term success simply because greater resources are being devoted to the leadership function

Appendices

self-managed teams require leadership around group development processes (developing cohesiveness, establishing effective communication patterns and so forth)’ • Shared leadership is proposed to beneficial to team processes in part because there are more ‘heads’ and ‘hands’ (i.e. leaders) to attend to the team’s developmental and functioning needs, particularly the motivational, social and cognitive processes needed for the team’s performance • Hypothesis 1: Teams that establish shared leadership will have higher collective efficacy scores than those without shared leadership — Collective efficacy is likely to be more powerful when several team members are pursuing it rather than single individual. That is, when leadership is shared, team members are motivating each other, creating a team climate of interdependent reinforcement • Hypothesis 2: Team that establish shared leadership will have lower relational conflict scores than those without shared leadership — O’Toole et al. (2002) suggested that individuals involved in shared leadership systems are more willing to adhere to the values and be committed to their teams and thus demonstrate less relational conflict • Hypothesis 3: Teams that establish shared leadership will have higher transactive memory system scores than those without shared leadership — Although a single leader may be able to enable the development of the team’s transactive memory, it seems more likely that broader participation among team members will allow a more comprehensive understanding of their potential and understanding of team

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Continued. Leadership Characteristics

Characteristics of Self-managed/autonomous/etc. Teams

Most Important Findings

capabilities to complete tasks (Vroom & Yetton, 1973); thus shared leadership may be more effective in diagnosing and solving problems (Zaccaro et al., 2001) because there are multiple people attending to the awareness of team member skills Elloy (2005)

Superleadership • As self-managed teams develop and mature, the formal leader becomes less involved in the day-today work activities of the team → more often, we are seeing the leadership for some team functions is generally being rotated among some or all of the team members over time → so as individuals in self-managed work teams accept more responsibility for their work, they also become more involved in leading their teams • Individuals who manage employees in selfmanaged teams therefore need a different set of skills from those used by managers in traditional organisations • The most appropriate leadership in empowered organisations is ‘one who can lead other to lead themselves’ (Manz & Sims, 1991) instead of traditional model of leadership of one person commanding other to do something → for leaders to be successful, they need to become coaches and facilitators, and help individuals in work team to lead themselves thereby unleashing their abilities and potential • Superleader behaviours would also encourage the group to self-regulate its activities by allowing team members to control technical variances within the boundaries of the group (Cummings, 1978)

• Results indicated that teams that were led by a supervisor who exhibited the characteristics of a • Relatively small groups that take complete superleader had higher levels of organisation responsibility for making a product or delivering a commitment, job satisfaction, and organisation service, performing a variety of tasks and utilising self-esteem a number of skills which the group as a whole • Transferring ownership of work to those who processes perform the work, the leader provides the • Have a high degree of autonomy (control over information and support, while the team members their workplace, allocation of tasks within the take ownership and autonomy for resolving work team, and participate in the selection, recruitment problems and implementing work-related and training of work team members) solutions → enhances involvement they experience • Operate without a visible manager and assume in their job, as well as the amount of influence many primary responsibilities of management they experience in performing the duties • They are hypothesised to be effective, contribute associated with their job; they also have higher to employee quality of work life and produce identity with the job → contributes to higher levels outcomes such as increased employee satisfaction, of satisfaction, commitment and organisation selfthe opportunity for increased socialisation in the esteem workplace, increased autonomy, opportunity to learn new skills and other aspects such as reduced • For organisations it would be appropriate to train individuals to develop superleader behaviour skills absenteeism, turnover and increased performance and provide support and recognition to those and motivation. Overall, the research on selfindividuals that exhibit those behaviours managing work teams indicates clear benefits both in performance and in attitudes Self-managed work teams

Appendices

Article Author (year)

• Superleader behaviours encourage team members to monitor their own activities and performance and make the corresponding improvements where required → enhanced task feedback • Hypothesis 1: Groups with high superleader initiated behaviours will have higher levels of satisfaction and commitment → see paper for hypothesis explanation • Hypothesis 2: Groups with superleader behaviours will have higher levels of organisation self-esteem → see paper for hypothesis explanation

Appendices 259

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Index

Ability, motivation and opportunity (AMO), 71, 79 Adoption and Adaptation, 83 84 phase application to Livio, 84 86 Agency theory, 121 122 Agent, 122 Algemene Wet Bijzondere Zaken (AWBZ), 55 Ambiguity, 81, 91, 96 role, 159 Australian variant approach, 16 Autonomy, 1, 7 9, 15, 19, 21, 23, 25, 32, 65, 80, 91, 117, 130, 150, 157, 165, 168, 170, 180 related to QWL outcomes, 32 team, 103 104 Work Group, 22 Behaviours and leadership styles, 89 94 Boundary spanner, 67, 69 Business management responsibility, 67 Business Process Reengineering approach (BPR approach), 18 Business unit representatives, 155 Buurtzorg, 4, 57, 72, 184, 186 Care provision, 57, 58, 75 Central HRM departments, 155, 161 Centralisation model, 155 Challenging job demands, 150 Classic self-managing team approach (Classic SMT approach), 14 Co-production, 166

Coach-managers, 53, 58 59, 61, 86, 109, 111 112, 127, 129 130, 156, 165 166 Coal mining methods, 14 Cognitive crafting, 151 Collaboration techniques, 20 Collaborative crafting, 150 Communication skills, 20, 163 Complementary resources, 156 157, 169 Conclusion validity, 31 Configurational perspective, 119 Construct validity, 31 Contemporary SMTs approach, 18 20 Contextual performance, 107 Control mechanisms, 123 Control mechanisms (see Governance mechanisms) Coordination, 168 170 ‘Counter dependency and fight’ period, 24 Cultural values, 38, 42 Customer service delivery, 39 Decentralisation of healthcare to municipalities, 55 56 Decision making processes, 20 Decision-making power, 72 communication, 75 compensation and rewards, 74 financial power, 75 knowledge, 75 79 performance assessment, 73 74

262

Index

recruitment and selection, 73 task distribution and organising schedules, 75 training and development, 74 Demographic changes, 55 Dependency and inclusion, 24 Developmental I-deals, 152 Devolution of people management responsibilities, 70 decision-making power, 72 79 task implementation, 72 Diversity, 182 Dutch healthcare system, 55 Dutch service SMTs, 36 Dutch variant of modern STS, 16 17 e-Learning system, 109, 125 126 Economies of scale, possibilities for, 190 191 Efficiency-driven approach, 184 Embedding resources, 160 Employees, 159, 166 employee-coordinator, 153 gains, 167 168 involvement context, 15 16, 37 in SMTs, 156 161 Empowerment level, 187 of SMTs, 102 104 teams, 13 Evidence evaluation, 30 Evidence-based approach, 29 Evidence-based literature review methodology, 29 30 Evolutionary approach, 13 Expertise promotion, 126 External validity, 31 Financial power, 75 Financial responsibility, 67 First-line managers, 66 Five factor model (FFM), 15, 249 Flexibility and client driven approach, 184 Flexibility I-deals, 152

Formal control mechanisms, 122, 155 Formal governance mechanisms, 122 124, 129 130, 139 Foundational premises (FPs), 164, 169 Four-phase SMT implementation process model, 79 Full-time equivalent (FTE), 157 General Act on Special Affairs (see Algemene Wet Bijzondere Zaken (AWBZ)) Global customer team design (GCT), 223 Governance mechanisms, 119, 128, 138 141 and alignment between HRM activities, 138 141 formal and informal governance mechanisms, 122 123 horizontal and vertical alignment, 119 120 horizontal governance mechanisms in SMTs, 129 138 SMTs and, 120 122 vertical governance mechanisms for SMTs, 123 129 Grand theories, 13 Greenfield organizations, 186, 190 Group beliefs, 15, 35 36 Group characteristics, 15, 34 37, 41 Group composition, 15, 34 35 Group potency, 36 Group process, 15, 36 37 Group task design, 15, 31 33 Health insurance act (see Zvw) Healthcare organisations, 55, 72 Healthcare teams in long-term and elderly care development projects, 60 61 external and internal developments, 55 60 history of Livio’s choice to SMTs, 61, 62 information sources, 61 63 organisation, 54 55

Index High performance work teams (HPWT), 241 High-involvement philosophy, 105 High-involvement work systems (HIWS), 18 High-performance teams, 24 High-performing work systems (HPWS), 18, 105 106 Hindering job demands, 150 Hollenbeck taxonomy, 23 Horizontal alignment, 119 120 Horizontal governance mechanisms (see also Vertical governance mechanisms), 129 formal governance mechanisms, 129 130 informal governance mechanisms, 130 131 job design, 134 136 performance management, appraisal and feedback, 132 134 recruitment and selection, 131 132 training and development, 132 workforce planning and scheduling, 136 138 HR managers, 70 HRM activities, 105 106, 150, 191 governance mechanisms and alignment between, 138 141 job design, 113 116 performance management, appraisal and feedback, 110 112 recruitment and selection, 106 108 salary and rewards, 112 113 within self-managing teams, 106 training and development, 108 110 workforce planning and scheduling, 116 118 HRM specialists, 148 149, 151, 154, 192 193 conceptualising competences for HRM-as-a-Service, 161 163 future in SMTs, 190 193 HRM-as-a-service by, 164 170 organisational support by, 159

263

HRM-as-a-Service, 159, 164 conceptualising competences for, 161 163 coordination, 168 170 development, 164 166 motivation, 166 167 offering value propositions, 167 168 Human capital, 162 163 Human resource management (HRM), 1, 18, 32, 53, 66, 101, 107, 119, 147, 182 consumption by employees, 156 159 devolution literature, 78 79 by employees in STMs, 148 159 environment, 167 formal and informal governance mechanisms, 122 123 function, 6, 147 horizontal and vertical alignment, 119 120 horizontal governance mechanisms in SMTs, 129 138 HRM-related functions, 102 HRM-related tasks, 101 102 intelligence, 183 outcomes, 156 practices, 148, 157, 160, 191 192 professionals, 165 166, 182 183 responsibilities, 148 149, 153 self-service technologies, 153 154 services, 156, 161, 167 shared services, 154 156 SMTs and governance mechanisms, 120 122 specialized HRM competences, 192 supply chain, 102, 120 121 vertical governance mechanisms for SMTs, 123 129 Hybrid organisational model, 155 Idiosyncratic deals (I-deals), 152 Incorporation, 86 89 phase application to Livio, 89 Individual business units, 154 Individual level, 42 43

264

Index

Job characteristics model (JCM), 14, 113 114 Job crafting, 149, 166 collective crafting of job demands, 150 151 collective crafting of social job resources, 151 collective crafting of structural job resources, 151 Job demands, collective crafting of, 150 151 Job design, 113 116, 127, 134 136 Judge-adviser system, 23

categorisation by methodological approach, 30 31 components to framework, 37 39 critical evaluation of evidence, 30 employee involvement context, 37 encouraging supervisory behaviour, 33 34 evidence-based literature review methodology, 29 30 group characteristics, 34 37 group task design, 31 33 Livio (see Livio Academy) Livio Academy, 53, 109, 125 Adoption and Adaptation application phase to, 84 86 choice to SMTs, 61 62 development projects, 60 61 employees, 55 external developments, 55 57 incorporation phase application to, 89 initiation phase application at, 82 83 internal developments, 57 60 organisation, 54 55 use phase application to, 86 Local business units, 155 Long-term Care Act (see Wet Langdurig Zorg (Wlz))

‘Laissez-faire’ style, 91 Leader-member exchange (LMX), 83 Leadership, 33, 41, 129 styles, 89 94 Line management roles, 89 94 Line managers, 188 devolution of people management responsibilities, 70 79 discussion, 95 96 role in SMTs, 66 69 SMT developments, 188 190 SMT implementation in organisations, 79 94 Literature review of SMTs

Management self-service system, 153 Managerial stakeholders, 182 becoming service provider, 182 183 offering HRM intelligence, 183 Maturity model of SMTs, 187 188 Methodological approach, categorisation by, 30 31 MijnPlan (see MyPlan) Mini-companies, 17, 187 Modern SMT approach, 14 18 Modern STS design, 16 Monitoring quality, 67, 68 Motivational job characteristics, 114 MyPlan, 57 58

Industrial longwall method, 14 Informal control mechanism, 122, 155 Informal governance mechanisms, 122 123, 128 129, 130 131, 139 Innovation-driven approach, 184 Institutional pressures, 56 57 Integrated Model of Group Development model (IMGD model), 24 Integrative synthesis, 39 Intellectual capital, 161 Inter-team support, 42 Internal validity, 31 Intrinsic value approach, 184

Index Non-HRM specialists, 147 Non-standard HRM practices, 152 North American variant approach, 16 Online self-service system, 153, 168 Online system, 153 Open systems approach, 16 Operational functions, 104 105, 127 Organisational independency, degree of, 187 Organisational stakeholders, 181 delegate responsibilities and authority, 181 enjoying diversity, 182 manage expectations, 181 Organisational/organisations, 17, 155, 181, 184, 190 capital, 163, 168 climate, 38 context, 15 16 design elements, 16 level, 40 41 scope, 25 support, 38, 148, 159 170 Participation discussion, 56 Participative design approach (see Australian variant approach) Peer evaluation, 88, 92 Peer feedback, 132 133 People management responsibilities, 6 devolution of, 70 72 Performance appraisal, 110 112, 132 134 assessment, 73 74 indicators, 181 management, 110 113, 126, 132 134, 158 159, 165 management self-services, 154 metrics, 140 paradox, 36 performance-oriented supervision, 67 68 Pilot teams, 59 Potential teams, 24

265

Power-influence continuum, 25 Primary work group control, 16 Primary work groups, 17 Proactive behaviour, 37 Problem solving techniques, 20 Productivity overviews, 154 Professionally organised teamwork, 60 Prosumers, 157, 159, 164, 169 Pseudo teams, 24 Psychological empowerment, 102, 103 Psychology discipline, 13 Quality of work life (QWL), 15, 32 Real teams, 24 Recruitment processes, 168 Regulatory functions, 104 105, 127 Reward management, 112 113 Role ambiguity, 159 Salary, 112 113 Sample-systematic search, 30 Scandinavian variant of STS, 16 Scheduling task-owners, 118 Scope of autonomy, 25 Search protocol, 30 Search terms, 30 Self-appraisal, 112 Self-directed work teams (SDWT), 234 Self-leadership, 15 Self-managed project teams (SMPT), 230 Self-management, 7 9, 32, 179, 184 implementation, 185 186 organisations, 19 Self-managing teams (SMTs), 7 9, 13, 29, 40, 53, 65, 101, 147, 179 classic SMTs approach, 14 contemporary self-managing team approach, 18 20 developments, 188 190 empowerment, 102 104 future of HRM specialists in, 190 193 future of line managers in, 188 190

266

Index

governance mechanisms, 119 141 hiring process, 108 history of Livio’s choice to, 61, 62 HRM activities, 105 118 HRM governance model in organisations, 139 implementation in organisations, 79 94 implementation of self-management, 185 186 informal leadership in, 34 initiation of, 80 and leaders, 179 180 line managers role in SMTs, 66 69 literature, 67, 79 literature review of leadership, 228 259 managerial stakeholders, 182 on maturity, 183 188 maturity model of, 187 188 misconceptions about, 179 180 modern SMTs approach, 14 18 newly forming, 180 organisational stakeholders, 181 182 outcomes of, 43 recommendations for implementation, 180 183 service climate, 39 staff support, 180 team stakeholders, 183 in three waves, 13 transformation towards, 104 105 types, 21 25 Self-services performance management, 154 scheduling, 153 Semco, 20 Service provider, becoming, 182 183 Service-dominant logic (S-D logic), 164, 169 foundational premise, 164 165 Shared service centres (SSCs), 122 Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), 190

Social capital, 163 Social control mechanisms, 122 Social job resources collective crafting of, 151 increasing, 150 Social support act (see Wet Maatschappelijke Ondersteuning (WMO)) Socio-technical systems (STS), 13, 15, 17 18, 114 Solution-oriented interactive method (SIM), 109 110 Structural empowerment, 102, 103 Structural job resources collective crafting of, 151 increasing, 150 Supervisory behaviour, encouraging, 33 34 Supervisory behaviour encouragement, 15 Taiwanese work teams, 36 Talent motivation analysis (TMA), 109 110, 127 tool, 167 Task distribution and organising schedules, 75 division, 127 flexibility, 34 implementation, 72 interdependence, 36 Teal organisations, 1, 4, 19 20, 180 Team composition, 23 crafting, 150 development models, 187 diagnostic survey, 109 110 dynamics, 137, 187 effectiveness, 32, 36 empowerment, 32, 103 interpersonal relations, 187 leader’s role, 33 learning behaviour, 34, 42 level, 41 42

Index maturity, 23, 25 process, 32, 36 psychological empowerment, 103 Team development instrument (TDI), 109 110 Team performance indicators (TPIs), 111, 113 Team stakeholders, 183 becoming dream team, 183 Team-based appraisal system, 158 Team-based HRM, 32, 101, 108 109 Team-based rewards, 112 113 Team-based self-scheduling process, 153 Team-tasks, 127 owners, 127 Technical and administrative dichotomy, 21, 23 ‘Train-the-trainer’ principle, 165 Training, 108 110 and development, 159 and transformation programme, 58 59 workshops, 157 Transaction cost theory, 190 Transformational/emergent leader, 92 Transition trajectory, 60 Translating strategy into operations, 67 68 Trust, 38, 111, 123 ‘Trust and structure’, 24 Value creation, 156 Value propositions, 167 168 Value-in-use notion, 164 165, 167 Variance control analysis, 16

267

Vertical alignment, 119 120 Vertical governance mechanisms (see also Horizontal governance mechanisms), 123 formal governance mechanisms, 123 124 informal governance mechanisms, 128 129 job design and task division, 127 performance management, 126 recruitment and selection, 124 125 training and development, 125 126 workforce planning and scheduling, 127 128 Vertical governance mechanisms for SMTs, 123 129 Web-based technologies, 153 Wet Langdurig Zorg (Wlz), 56 Wet Maatschappelijke Ondersteuning (WMO), 55 56 Work design, 14, 15, 41, 103, 107 and productivity, 24 Work group autonomy, 21 Workforce planning, 116 118, 127 128, 136 138, 157 158, 165 Workforce scheduling, 116 118, 127 128, 136 138 Working groups, 24 Workload I-deals, 152 Zero-equation game, 179 Zvw, 56