Performance Management
How the Sharing of Information Affects Team Performance
Organizations increasingly utilize teams as a basis for structuring work and decision-making. A central reason for utilizing a multi-person format for making decisions is for reaching decisions of higher quality than possible by a single individual. A key ingredient to successful team-based decision-making is the sharing of information among members. How, and what, information is shared between members greatly impacts the team’s decision-making ability. Information shared among members of a team can be classified on two dimensions: uniqueness and openness.Information uniqueness
The extent to which team members make use of each other’s distinct sets of knowledge can greatly benefit the team. The more unique the information and knowledge possessed by each team member, the greater amount of information shared among the team, resulting in greater team decision-making performance.Open sharing of information
The more open members are in sharing information with each other, the greater the opportunity for stronger trust and cohesion between members, leading to increased opportunities for members to interact. The more interaction between members, the more familiar they become with each other, thus more open information sharing.Effectively utilizing uniqueness and openness
Some important elements for effective team-based decision-making include:- Create a structure for team discussion.
- Compose teams appropriately.
- Create a cooperative environment
Kathleen Melcher
DeGarmo
This was a summary of the research and practice implications from: Mesmer-Magnus, J.R., & DeChurch, L.A. (2009). Information Sharing and Team Performance: A Meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 94(2), 535-546.