AbstractsPsychology

One important research topic in team research concerns how team composition (i.e., the configuration of team member attributes such as personality factors) affects team effectiveness. To date, researchers have almost exclusively focused on the role of team members' attributes (e.g., extraversion) without considering team members' status in the team. Yet, according to social network theory, a team member who occupies a central position in a team network (e.g., has numerous social ties to others) will have a greater impact on the team than other members who occupy peripheral positions. As a result, the effects of team composition on team effectiveness are not influenced exclusively by an attribute, but also determined by who possesses the attribute. To remedy this limitation and account for member "centrality" effects on personality in teams, I conceptualize team composition in the form of personality from a social network perspective. Using 584 team members of 84 teams in China, I test the effects of various operationalizations of team personality traits on team processes and performance. Specifically, the results indicate that team overall personality traits fail to display superior predictive validity over team mean personality traits in predicting team processes. However, I report that the most central member's conscientiousness and agreeableness have meaningful impacts on team processes. Finally, team maximum extraversion and openness interact with team member centrality in predicting team processes such that the personality traits have stronger effects on team processes when the traits are possessed by central members. In doing so, I help to clarify the construct of team composition and gain a better understanding of how team composition affects team outcomes.