Determinants of partially distributed team performance: A path analysis of socio-emotional and behavioral factors

Distributed teams and their variant, globally distributed teams, are an increasingly common means of accomplishing work. A common team configuration is the partially distributed team (PDT), which has a hybrid structure consisting of two or more subgroups of geographically separated team members. Using partial least squares, we test a path model of the relationships among determinants of between-subgroup perceptions of PDT performance. The data are from a series of quasi-experimental field studies involving nearly 700 students working in PDTs that varied in distance between two subgroups separated by a few hundred miles to international distances that spanned cultures and multiple time zones. The factors examined in the model were shared identity, trust, competence, and conflict; the overall model explains 34% of the variance in perceived team performance.