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1 TEAM BOUNDARY SPANNING AND TEAM PERFORMANCE

Master Thesis, Human Resources Management

The University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business

June 16, 2019 EVANTHIA GRIVA Student number: S3566439 Moesstraat 18, 9717 JW Groningen tel.: +306944639208 e-mail: E.Griva@student.rug.nl

Supervisor: Dr. Thomas A. de Vries

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2

Table of Contents

ABSTRACT ... 3 INTRODUCTION ... 4 THEORY... 6 METHOD ... 12

Participants and Design ... 12

Measures ... 14 Control Variable ... 16 RESULTS ... 17 Data analysis ... 17 Descriptive statistics ... 18 Hypothesis Testing ... 19 DISCUSSION ... 23 Theoretical contributions ... 24

Limitations and future research directions ... 26

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ABSTRACT

Team boundary spanning has become crucial for organizations operating in dynamic environments. Team members must span their boundaries in order to acquire the necessary information and resources to achieve their goals. Prior research depicts boundary spanning ac-tivities to be closely related to team performance. This study examines how boundary spanning activities have a direct effect on resource acquisition and consequently to team performance. More specifically, resource acquisition mediates the boundary spanning-team performance re-lationship, since boundary spanning activities facilitate resource acquisition. Furthermore, the way of working adopted by teams, either centralized or decentralized represents the moderating variable. It was expected that teams adopting a centralized way of working would acquire fewer resources than teams with decentralized activities, and consequently will have lower perfor-mance. A quantitative survey was conducted in a sample of 34 teams to test the hypotheses. However, the results did not confirm the expectations. Finally, elaboration based on the out-come is presented, as well as limitations and recommendations for future research.

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4

INTRODUCTION

Boundary spanning activities have become essential for teams that aim to manage in-teractions with their environment and increase their team effectiveness. These inin-teractions can be divided into two categories: interactions with parties external to the team itself and interac-tions among members of the same team (Marrone, 2010).

Through such "boundary spanning activities," teams create links with their external environment inside and outside their organization (e.g. other teams, other organizations). These activities may include coordinating task activities, seeking information from outside experts and acquiring critical sources of information (Ancona, 1990). One example of critical infor-mation is a situation where teams depend on the progress of other teams in order to schedule their activities. In these cases, the acquisition of resources and information is the primary aspi-ration of team members who perform boundary spanning activities. In order to have access to these valuable resources, boundary spanners build relationships with stakeholders from their external environment (Marrone, Tesluk & Carson, 2007).

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5 Furthermore, the various boundary spanning activities can be undertaken by one mem-ber in a team or more (Ancona & Caldwell, 1988). However, research suggests that team lead-ers often operate boundary spanning activities, which are usually embedded in their duties (Marrone, 2010; Tushman & Scanlan, 1981). This ‘centralization’ of boundary spanning activ-ities, where there is only one individual who performs these activities in a team, around leaders might often be due to the fact that team members are not willing to engage in these taxing activities unless they consider them part of their officially designated duties (Marrone, Tesluk, Carson, 2007). Prior research showed that when teams relying on their supervisor to perform boundary spanning activities performed less well overall, in contrast with a team where these activities distributed among all team members.

Therefore, the reasons for the positive influence of ‘decentralization', which occurs when boundary spanning activities are distributed among team members, on team performance may are due to the fact that: i) every team member can share the responsibilities and workload ii) when more team members engage in boundary spanning activities, it is more possible to gather more diverse resources. Accordingly, when more team members take part in boundary spanning activities, it is possible to acquire more resources, which in turn, will have positive effects on team performance.

Early results explain what makes team members engage or not in boundary spanning activities (e.g. Tushman, 1977). For instance, tenure and functional background can influence boundary spanning behaviour (Joshi, Pandey & Han, 2009). Nevertheless, few studies have been conducted regarding the moderating role of centralization of boundary spanning on the relation between boundary spanning and team performance. In the present study, it is assumed that a team with centralized boundary spanning activities will have lower performance, in con-trast with a team which shares boundary spanning responsibilities across all members.

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6 Marrone, 2010; Ancona, 1990). For instance, in his study, Keller (2001) found that external communication had a negative effect on team cohesiveness, which yields a negative effect on team performance. On the other hand, Ancona & Bresman (2007) argued that the interactions with the external environment are substantial for team effectiveness as effective teams use var-ious strategies in order to manage their relationships and consequently shape opinions and get information.

Nonetheless, by including resource acquisition as a mediator and centralization of boundary spanning activities as a moderator, we can further explain when and why the bound-ary spanning/team performance relationship is positive or negative. Besides that, because mod-erators between boundary spanning and team performance relationship have not received enough empirical attention (Marrone, 2010), the goal of this study is to enrich the current lit-erature by proposing a moderator in boundary spanning/team performance relationship. Lastly, this study attempts to give some insight into the question if boundary spanning is a role for only a single member or a critical mass comparing team effectiveness for each category (Mar-rone, 2010).

THEORY

The relationship between boundary spanning and team performance

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7 of a favourable image to outsiders enhances the access to critical resources (van Osch & Stein-field, 2016), which are essential to complete their tasks.

Moreover, getting involved in scouting activities, more information and/or resources insert into the team which are necessary for group functioning (Ancona & Caldwell, 1988). This process is crucial for team performance because members gain work-related expertise and an understanding of opportunities and threats of the external environment.

Finally, coordination activities are vital for team performance as they include the align-ing, negotiating and monitoring of the efforts of the individuals in order to achieve performance goals (van Osch & Steinfield, 2016). Additionally, through task coordinator activities, a team can gain access to diverse information that will, in turn, enhance team performance (Joshi, Pandey & Han, 2009).

Therefore, unsurprisingly, Ancona and Caldwell (1988) found that effective teams have ‘ambassadors', ‘scouts' and ‘task coordinators', which operate to acquire the necessary re-sources in order to carry out the task at hand. Druskat and Wheeler (2003), in a study of self-managed teams in a manufacturing plant, showed that undertaking boundary spanning activi-ties positively affects team performance.

Taking all the above into account, it is to be expected that boundary spanning activities will have a positive impact on team performance.

Hypothesis1: There is a positive linear relationship between boundary spanning and team performance.

The relationship between boundary spanning and resource acquisition

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8 defined resources as "all assets, capabilities, organizational processes, firm attributes, infor-mation, knowledge, etc."

Since teams cannot generate all needed resources from within, they have to span their boundaries to reach these missing resources (Drach-Zahavy, 2011). Many researchers have mentioned the benefits that reside from the procuring of information and resources that result from crossing team boundaries (Faraj & Yan, 2009). By spanning their boundaries, team mem-bers establish essential connections with external parties, such as suppliers and upper manage-ment, who can provide the team with the needed resources (Marrone et al., 2007).

Qualitative data suggest that high levels of boundary spanning activities may offer greater access to a team in more high valued resources such as information, feedback on pro-gress and support from key external parties needed for completion of tasks (Marrone, 2010, Ancona, 1990). Thus, team boundary spanning activities play a key role in acquiring resources (Faraj & Yan, 2009) both tangible and intangible. Tangible resources include, i.e. equipment, technology, money, while intangible resources may include, information, feedback or support from outsiders. Both kinds of resources help teams to accomplish their tasks (Ancona, 1990). Therefore, it is to be expected that teams that are actively taking part in boundary spanning activities will be more successful at resource acquisition.

Hypothesis 2: There is a positive relationship between boundary spanning and resource acquisition.

The relationship between resource acquisition and team performance

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9 from others and subsequently to provide these inputs to others in order to be successful. The accomplishment of this exchange will greatly influence team performance. For instance, suc-cessful product teams must be able to acquire information and resources from others, to process and use these inputs in order to create a viable product (Ancona & Caldwell, 1987). Their success is thus dependent, firstly, in the acquisition of resources and then how they will use them.

Similarly, Zahra and Bogner (2000) believe that acquiring resources from outside can have an effect on performance. By acquiring resources that are rare and valuable are essential in creating competitive advantage and achieving superior long team performance. For instance, collecting external knowledge can provide different opportunities for the teams because exter-nal knowledge can generate new knowledge and innovative ideas inside a unit (Tsai, 2001). Consequently, this will enhance a unit’s performance. Therefore, gaining useful resources from others can enable teams to meet their performance goals (Marrone, 2010). This allows as to formulate hypothesis 3, as follows.

Hypothesis 3: There is a positive relation between resource acquisition and team per-formance.

A Mediation Model

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10 The mediating role of resource acquisition between boundary spanning and team per-formance is consistent with the theoretical assumption that on the one hand, the aspiration of boundary spanners is to acquire the missing resources and on the other hand that these missing resources are necessary for the team to accomplish its tasks.

In this study, we test the mediating role of resource acquisition by testing the following hypothesis.

Hypothesis 4: Resource acquisition mediates the positive indirect relationship between bound-ary spanning and team performance

The moderating role of centralized or decentralized boundary spanning activities

Centralization reflects the extent to which interactions are concentrated in a small num-ber of individuals rather than distributed equally among all memnum-bers (Leenders, van Engelen & Kratzer, 2003). On the other hand, in decentralized structures interactions are distributed among members. The current study takes the centralization of boundary spanning activities as a moderator, in an attempt to investigate which strategy –centralized or decentralized- will en-sure the acquisition of more resources and subsequently, better performance outcomes.

Previous results suggest that the centralization of boundary spanning activities could result in low levels of resource acquisition, utilization and diffusion (Marrone, 2010). This is the case because high centrality can impede the ability of the rest of the team members to acquire and identify external resources. For instance, Allen & Nochure (1992) investigated a big company that had designated a small number of team members to acquire the new technol-ogies from the research centre and diffuse them to the other team members. The results showed that the nominated boundary spanners were more likely to adopt the new technologies than the rest of the team and that they were not successful in transferring the resources to the other team members.

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11 spanners are dependent on the individuals who enjoy brokerage authority, they may experience a lack of autonomy, power and control (Zhao & Anand, 2013). Subsequently, this will reduce their commitment to their goals and will undermine the overall team performance. Besides that, boundary spanning activities require considerable effort and time (Aldrich & Herker, 1976; Marrone et al., 2007). The central individual when have too many responsibilities namely, to obtain the information and resources that the team needs or identify external stakeholders that can provide these inputs to the team have to decide which activities to do first and which to delay. This can result in undermining other meaningful external relationships due to lack of time. Consequently, this situation could be overburdening, leading to suboptimal outcomes for the team.

One example of a negative outcome are hindrances in the flow of work (Troster et al., 2014). This happens because giving the central person the responsibility to perform all the boundary spanning activities, will become impaired in effective gathering and dissemination of the requisite resources due to role overload and time delay. This, in turn, can have negative consequences to team performance.

In contrast with these negative effects of centralization, Marrone et al. (2007) found that when teams as a whole engaged in boundary-spanning activities, instead of relying on a limited number of boundary spanners, they were able to attain considerably more resources in a timely manner, which in turn helped them to accomplish their goals. Similarly, Ancona and Caldwell (1990) propose that if a team increase its boundary spanning roles will be able to obtain more resources. Especially when the resources become scarce, there is a considerable effort from teams to reach these missing resources, and therefore, they tend to increase bound-ary spanning roles (Tushman, 1977). In that way teams will be able to acquire greater amounts of resources when as a whole span the boundaries. Also, they will have access to more diverse resources which can further enhance team performance.

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12 focus on other activities towards performance goals. Hence, this reasoning implies that decen-tralized boundary spanning activities will lead to better team resource acquisition and subse-quently, better team performance.

For these reasons, it is hypothesized that teams, which adopt a centralized way of work-ing will acquire fewer resources and will have lower performance in comparison to teams adopting a more decentralized way of working.

Hypothesis 5: Boundary spanning activities and centralization of boundary spanning interact such that the positive effect of boundary spanning on resource acquisition is stronger when centralization of boundary spanning is low, and weaker when

centralization is high

Hypothesis 6: The positive relationship between boundary spanning and team performance as mediated by resource acquisition is stronger when there is decentralization of boundary spanning activities and weaker when centralization takes place

Figure 1 represents the conceptual model which follows from the above argumentation, Figure 1

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METHOD

Participants and Design

In order to investigate the hypotheses stated above, an online questionnaire was de-signed and distributed to participants. Participants were approached individually, asking if both they and their supervisor would be willing to participate in an academic study on team bound-ary spanning in the workplace. After their agreement, each supervisor and his/her subordinates received a particular questionnaire through email, to be completed in an online environment in either English or Greek language. To ensure confidentiality, the survey was anonymous, and participation was voluntary. The estimated maximum completion time for the questionnaire was approximately 9 minutes.

The data collection phase lasted approximately six weeks. During that time, a total of 161 responses were collected, of which 116 represented the responses of team members and 45 the responses of team leaders. In order to consider a response as valid, every team member of each team had to take part and answer the questionnaire. In case the questionnaire was not completed by the whole team, the participating team was excluded from the data sample. The final number of valid responses was 143, consisting of 34 responses from group leaders and 109 from team members. The vast majority of the 143 participants were of Greek nationality (85.5%). Additionally, 56.3% of the participants were female, and 43.4% were male.

The data were collected from a group of different organizations operating in Europe, more specifically in Greece, the Netherlands, Bulgaria and England. The participants were asked to answer questions regarding boundary spanning activities, team performance, and the acquisition of valuable resources. The overall performance of each team was evaluated only by its team leader in order to keep the data as objective as possible. Lastly, I requested participants to choose if they are leaders or members and write their initials or their leader's initials, respec-tively. In this way, I was able to group the participants in teams.

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14 Table 1

Sample characteristics

Industry % Nationality

Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing and Hunting

3.5 Greek

Government and Public Admin-istration

3.5 Greek

Wholesale 4.2 Greek/British/Hungarian

Scientific and Technical Services 6.3 Dutch/Hungarian/South African

Software 7.0 Dutch/Bulgarian

Healthcare and Social Assistance 3.5 Greek

Hotel and Food Services 21.0 Greek/Dutch/Albanian

Legal Services 8.4 Greek

Other Manufacturing 4.9 Greek

Retail 3.5 Greek

Telecommunications 5.6 Greek

Finance and Insurance 5.6 Greek

Other Industry 17.5 Greek/Indian/Dutch

Measures

The questionnaire included questions about team leaders' and team members' boundary spanning behaviour and the resources that they acquire and the level of inter-team interdependence. Finally, the team leader was asked to assess the team performance and innovation of his/her team. For each individual (both leaders and members), all measurements categories that are presented below were combined in order to form Team scores. An exception was team performance, as it was only answered by the team leaders.

Boundary spanning

Seven items were used to measure boundary spanning activities of team members,

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15 they perceive the items as part of their responsibility in dealing with other people (Ancona & Caldwell, 1992). Examples of items are: 1) Resolve problems with external groups, 2) Coordinate activities with external groups. Finally, the data were aggregated to form a variable-score that measures of team boundary spanning activity. The Cronbach's alpha was calculated to be .84. Finally, I aggregated the data to develop a measure of team boundary spanning activity. To justify aggregation I calculated interrater reliability (ICC[1]= .21 ICC[2]= .52).

Centralization of boundary spanning

In the absence of previous research measuring this variable, the scores of boundary spanning activities were used to investigate which teams have a centralized or decentralized boundary spanning working style. The degree of centralization was calculated as follows: 1) the scores of boundary spanning (a mean of 7 items) were calculated for each individual 2) the biggest score that an individual had inside the team was chosen 3) from the above score, all other scores of individuals from the same team were subtracted, so that the ‘distance' (in the sense of graph theory) between them and the person who used boundary spanning the most was measured. The result also divided by 5 (the number of possible answers on the Likert scale) 4) the final step was the calculation of the average distance between the members of each team, which was the final centralization score for each team. With the above method, when the aver-age distance is higher, it means that certain individuals took part in more boundary spanning activities than the rest, thus measuring centralization. When centralization score is close to zero, all individuals of a team took part in boundary spanning activities equally.

The above consideration for calculating the centralization of boundary spanning activities was based on Freeman’s et al., (1991) formula of centrality, which is given as follows, where C(p*)

is the highest score that an individual had in a team on boundary spanning activities and C(pi)

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16

Resource acquisition

Based on Jiang, Fey & Liu, (2018), resource acquisition was measured based on a five-point Likert scale ranging from 1, "Not at all" to 5, "To a very great extent". It assessed the extent to which both team leaders and team members had acquired different types of resources in the fields of (1) Advanced technologies (2) Financial resources (3) Managerial expertise (4) Human capital (5) Key information. Then I aggregated the data to develop a measure of team resource acquisition. The Cronbach’s alpha was .80, (ICC[1]=.17, ICC[2]=.47).

Team performance

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Control Variable

Task interdependence was used as a control variable as previous research found that this variable correlates with boundary spanning activities (Choi, 2002). Task interdependence can be divided into two categories: within team interdependence and between team interde-pendence. Task interdependence within the team is the degree to which team members have to interact with each other to complete their tasks (Langfred, 2000). Between team, ence is the degree to which team members have to interact with other teams. Task interdepend-ence was measured using the scale by Bishop and Scott (2000). The items were rated on a 5-point agree-disagree scale 1 (= strongly disagree) to 5 (=strongly agree). The four items were: “I frequently must coordinate my efforts with other teams” “For the team to perform well members must communicate well with members of other teams" "To achieve high performance it is important to work with members of other teams."

Items for within team interdependence were: “I frequently must coordinate my efforts with my colleagues inside my team” “Jobs performed by team members are related to one another” “For the team to perform well members must communicate well with each other” “To achieve high performance it is important to rely on each other”. Lastly, I aggregated the data in order to develop a measure for team interdependence on team level (a= .71, ICC[1]= .37, ICC[2]= .71).

RESULTS

Data analysis

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18 conducted with varimax rotation. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure verified the sampling ade-quacy for the analysis (KMO>0.5). According to Field (2005), values greater than 0.5 are ac-ceptable. Thus, the results showed that the constructs were reliable and unidimensional.

Furthermore, to justify the aggregation of individuals' responses to the team level, the first step was to calculate the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) to assess the level of inter-rater reliability (IRR) and consistency among ratings. The intraclass correlation coefficient is a descriptive statistic that can be used when quantitative measurements are used. It can deter-mine how units resemble each other. Table 2 depicts the ICC values and Cronbach's Alpha for each variable. Where it was necessary, the variables were reverse coded. Cronbach's Alpha of the variable innovation showed a satisfying level (a= .75), but I identified that if I remove the item 2 I will have a higher level (a= .78), thus, it was omitted.

Firstly, to test the first Hypothesis, the Pearson correlation significance test was used between the variables boundary spanning and team performance. Secondly, to test the second Hypothesis, the Pearson and Spearman correlation tests were performed between the variables boundary spanning and resource acquisition. The last tests were between the variables resource acquisition and team performance. Besides that, a linear regression analysis was run for each of the three hypotheses to describe how an independent variable is numerically related to the dependent variable. Finally, this study made use of the PROCESS macro developed by Hayes (2013) using model 1. Model number 1 executes simple moderation, and it calculates the sig-nificance of the interaction between two variables and whether this interaction improves the model.

Table 2

ICC values and Cronbach’s Alpha

Variables ICCI ICC2 Cronbach’s Alpha

Central/decentral BS N/A N/A N/A

Performance N/A N/A 0.79

Innovation N/A N/A 0.78

Boundary spanning 0.21 0.52 0.84

Resource acquisition 0.17 0.47 0.80

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19

Descriptive statistics

The descriptive statistics and correlations, Pearson correlation bivariate, means and standard deviations (SD) of all measured variables are reported in Table 3. The table shows that the strongest correlation was found between boundary spanning activities and resource acquisition (r=.45, p<.01) and a moderately significant positive correlation with task interde-pendence (r=.35, p<.05) among employees. No significant correlations were found for perfor-mance and centralization of boundary spanning activities.

Table 3

Means, Standard Deviations and Correlations

Variables Mean SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 1. Performance 3.82 0.62 1 2. Boundary spanning 3.34 0.50 0.00 1 3. Central/decentral BS 0.14 0.07 0.09 -0.27 1 4. Resource acquisition 3.42 0.50 0.06 0.45** -0.16 1 5. Task interdependence 4.21 0.37 -0.41 0.35* 0.10 0.32 1 N = 34 *p<0.05 **p<0.01 (two-tailed significance) Hypothesis Testing

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20 of the test that there is no linear correlation is accepted, which means that the first hypothesis of this study that there is a positive linear relationship between boundary spanning and team performance is rejected. Also, the results after running regression analysis showed that the first hypothesis is rejected (B=0.00, SE=0.19, n.s)

For the second hypothesis of this study, a test of significance for the Pearson and Spear-man correlation was conducted, since linearity is not specified from the hypothesis. The Pear-son correlation coefficient was measured at 0.45 and the Spearman coefficient at 0.40. The p-values for these coefficients being different from zero was 0.008 and 0.018, respectively, so the results are statistically significant. Therefore it is concluded that there is a positive relationship between boundary spanning and resource acquisition. Additionally, the results from regression analysis confirmed the positive relationship (B=0.45, SE=0.16, p<0.05)

Similarly with the previous hypothesis, for the third hypothesis, the Pearson and Spear-man correlations will be tested for statistical significance. The Pearson and SpearSpear-man coeffi-cients were found to be 0.06 and -0.02, and the p-values were 0.731 and 0.911, respectively. Hence, the original hypothesis of the test that there is no correlation is accepted, and the third hypothesis of this study is rejected, which means there is no correlation between resource ac-quisition and team performance. Lastly, the results from the regression analysis confirm that there is no significant relationship between resource acquisition and team performance (B=0.06, SE=0.20, n.s).

The fourth hypothesis that originated from the theoretical part of this thesis cannot be answered. The reason is that the first assumption of mediation analysis is violated, as a result of not having a statistically significant relationship between the Independent variable (bound-ary spanning) and the dependent variable (team performance).

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21 that was chosen on the PROCESS was Model 1 (Simple Moderation). The linear model that was tested was found to be statistically significant, with a p-value of 0.0197. The final results of the moderation effect are presented in Table 4. The p-value for the Interaction effect was found to be 0.1154 that is not statistically significant. Still, since the p-value means there is a better than average chance there is an effect (89.46%) a scatterplot-graph was constructed to locate where that effect is present.

Table 4

Regression analysis for Resource acquisition, Moderating effect

DV Resource acquisition 95% Confidence Interval

B SE t p LLCI ULCI Main effect Boundary spanning 0.88 0.37 2.36 0.03 0.12 1.64 Centralization 10.42 6.93 1.50 0.14 -3.74 24.58 Interaction effect Boundary spanning* -3.35 2.07 -1.62 0.12 -7.58 0.87 Centralization Control Task Interdependence 0.22 0.23 0.97 0.34 -0.24 0.69 Note: N=34 R2=0.2995 F=3.099 p-value = 0.307

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22 Graph 1: Scatterplot of Boundary spanning and Resource acquisition based on Centralization

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23 interaction effect of centralization of boundary spanning activities on boundary spanning and team performance.

Table 5

Regression analysis for Team performance, Moderating effect

DV Team Performance 95% Confidence Interval

B SE t p LLCI ULCI Main effect Boundary spanning 0.34 0.51 0.66 0.51 -0.71 1.39 Central/decentral BS 7.40 9.91 0.75 0.46 -12.85 27.66 Interaction effect Boundary spanning* -2.00 2.98 -0.67 0.51 -8.08 4.08 Central/decentral BS Note: N=34 R2=0.151 F=0.2321

DISCUSSION

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24 as a mediator and centralization of boundary spanning activities in a team as moderator.

No significant results were found for the relationship between team boundary spanning and team performance. Also, no evidence found that resource acquisition mediates the team boundary spanning-team performance relationship. However, a significant relationship be-tween team boundary spanning and resource acquisition was found.

Moreover, significant correlations were found between team boundary spanning and team interdependence. This implies that teams which are highly interdependent on other teams are more likely to engage in boundary spanning activities.

Finally, the centralization of boundary activities in a team was used as moderator, ex-pecting that teams which adopt a centralized type of work will be able to acquire fewer re-sources and information from their external environment. In contrast, teams which distribute boundary spanning activities across all team members would be able to acquire more resources and consequently affect team performance positively. However, the results did not support these hypotheses.

Theoretical contributions

This study provides evidence for the positive relationship between team boundary span-ning and resource acquisition. No evidence was found for the other proposed hypotheses. How-ever, it offers interesting implications for research in the relationship between team boundary spanning and team performance.

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25 Furthermore, as alluded to the theory section prior research suggests that boundary spanning activities are strongly related to team performance either positively or negatively (Keller, 2001; Faraj & Yan, 2009; Ancona, 1990). However, the current study found that bound-ary spanning activities did not affect team performance. If this assumption holds, this is a very interesting finding, because it shows that under certain circumstances, boundary spanning ac-tivities do not affect team performance or specific types of team performance. For instance, in this study, a more broad type of overall team performance was measured. However, it is possi-ble that the effects of boundary spanning on team performance would be different if perfor-mance were measured in terms of creativity or financial results. Thus, the effect of boundary spanning activities on team performance, it is possible to depend on how performance is de-fined and recognized in the team's environment as successful (Harvey, Peterson & Anand, 2014). For instance, Gladstein (1984) defines group performance as a component of team ef-fectiveness, together with team members' satisfaction and team viability. Besides that, in the current study, the impact of boundary spanning activities on team performance might be very small and based on the small sample size, the impact might not be visible.

Additionally, team performance was also not affected by obtaining resources. It was expected that the acquisition of the necessary resources could result in better performance out-comes. One possible explanation is that it not only matters when acquiring the resources that the team needs, but there is also relevance when the transmission of the resulting resources are transferred back to the team.

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26 unless the diffusion of these resources is taken into account.

Thus, the aforementioned rationales imply that an important mechanism between re-source acquisition and team performance is how the diffusion of the rere-sources takes place in-side the team.

Furthermore, taking the centralization of boundary spanning activities as a moderator of the current study attempts to further explain whether the working type adopted by teams could affect the relationship between boundary spanning and resource acquisition, and subse-quently team performance. The consideration of centralization of boundary spanning activities as a moderator was based on the assumption that through decentralization, more members in-teract with the external environment and can garner more resources for work-related issues. Still, no supporting evidence was established for the moderating role of centralization of boundary spanning activities. Although the results did not confirm this expectation, it is essen-tial to be cautious in concluding that the working style adopted by teams does not affect the relationship between boundary spanning and resource acquisition based exclusively on this study. This is especially true because there are no prior studies, to the best of our knowledge, that examine this precise relationship.

However, a possible explanation could be found in the diverse set of teams examined. Firstly, adopting the rule that teams are composed by a team leader and at least two team mem-bers is perhaps not sufficiently adequate to provide significant results based on the small aver-age of teams. Besides that is interesting to mention that the graph (1) showed that low central-ization can result in more resources. This is in line with what was hypothesized in theory sec-tion, but due to insignificant results this reasoning cannot be confirmed from the current study.

Limitations and future research directions

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27 the reliability of the results because it leads to higher variability, which may result in bias. Thus, future research could replicate this study using a larger sample.

Another limitation of the current work is that the sample is composed of various indus-tries worldwide. On the one hand, this might be seen as a strength because the results can be generalized. On the other hand, each organization has its own culture, philosophy, policies and way of working. Consequently, this might influence the critical constructs of the study. There-fore, future research could replicate this study within one organization.

Moreover, the measurement of team performance consisted of statements about the team performance of teams based on the perception of team leaders'. In combination with the fact that the variable data was collected at one point in time, the assessment of team perfor-mance may be not representative. For instance, de Vries, Walter & van de Vergt (2014) in order to measure team performance, used the data of the organizations' official performance appraisal system. Therefore, future research could employ more representative information surrounding teams' performance.

Furthermore, the way that boundary spanning activities were measured may contain bias because the measurement was based on individuals’ perceptions. Probably by interviewing the individuals’ could provide better and more reliable insights. For instance, Ancona and Cald-well (1992) also measured boundary spanning activities by interviewing the employees. Thus, future research could replicate this study by also interviewing employees.

In addition to measure the moderator, we relied on a process of aggregating individual-level perceptions to infer group-individual-level structures. However, future research could build upon this study by utilising a network-based approach. That preserves data on the ordered arrange-ment of the workflow relations among individuals. There are various conceptualizations for the notion of centrality; therefore, the measure one uses must fit the theoretical claims that put forth.

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28 or decentralized boundary spanner. However, additional variables could have been included in order to obtain a better overview. For instance, research determined that large teams have greater access to resources than small teams (Hare, 1952; Kozlowski, 2011). Apart from that, because our sample did not have equal sizes of teams, this may have affected the team outcome (Troster et al., 2014). Finally, the survey was also translated in the Greek language, which means that the translated statements may not accurately represent precisely the meaning of each sentence.

Practical implications

Boundary spanning phenomenon has gained considerable attention from the business world. Through these activities, they can enhance team performance and therefore, organiza-tional performance in general. However, organizations that seek to improve or increase their team effectiveness should take into the specific factors that can impact boundary spanning-team performance relationships based on their operating environment. They have to select a boundary spanning structure that matches their needs based on their team characteristics and the environment they operate in. Finally, organizations which lack resources, creativity or in-novation should promote these activities as through boundary spanning team members can reach external resources, which in turn, can improve organizational learning, innovation and effectiveness.

Conclusion

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REFERENCES

Aldrich, H., & Herker, D. (1977). Boundary spanning roles and organization structure Academy of management review, 2(2), 217-230.

Ancona, D. G. (1990). Outward bound: strategic for team survival in an organization. Academy of Management Journal, 33(2), 334-365.

Ancona, D. G., & Caldwell, D. (1990). Beyond boundary spanning: Managing external dependence in product development teams. The Journal of High Technology

Management Research, 1(2), 119-135.

Ancona, D. G., & Caldwell, D. F. (1988). Beyond task and maintenance: Defining external functions in groups. Group & Organization Studies, 13(4), 468-494.

Ancona, D. G., & Caldwell, D. F. (1992). Bridging the boundary: External activity and performance in organizational teams. Administrative science quarterly, 37(4).

Ancona, D., & Caldwell, D. (1987). Management issues facing new product teams in high technology companies. Advances in industrial and labour relations, 4(191.221). Ancona, D., Ancona, D. G., & Bresman, H. (2007). X-teams: How to build teams that lead,

innovate, and succeed. Harvard Business Press.

Barney, J. (1991). Firm resources and sustained competitive advantage. Journal of management, 17(1), 99-120.

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31 Dreu, C. K. D. (2002). Team innovation and team effectiveness: The importance of minority

dissent and reflexivity. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 11(3), 285-298.

Druskat, V., & Wheeler, J. (2003). Managing from the boundary: The effective leadership of self-managing work teams. The Academy of Management Journal, 46(4), 435-457.

Faraj, S., & Yan, A. (2009). Boundary work in knowledge teams. The Journal of Applied Psychology, 94(3), 604-17.

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Harvey, S., Peterson, R. S., & Anand, N. (2014). The process of team boundary spanning in multi-organizational contexts. Small Group Research, 45(5), 506-538.

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34

APPENDIX

Dear participant,

Thank you for participating in this study organized by the University of Groningen, Faculty of Economics and Business. My name is Evanthia Griv, and I am attending a Master in Human Resource Management.

This survey aims to examine how frequently team members engage in team boundary spanning activities. More specifically, how frequently team members interact with their internal and ex-ternal environment in order to acquire valuable resources and how this behaviour influences team effectiveness. Hence, I kindly request you to complete the following survey.

The information you provide will be saved anonymously and will not be shared, in any way, with anyone outside of the research team. This study takes approximately 8 minutes to com-plete.

If you have any questions or feedback, please do not hesitate to contact me. At the end of the survey, youcano leave a message, or you can reach me via e-mail at: E.Griva@student.rug.nl.

Thank you!

1) What is your current role in the team? a) Team Leader

b) Team Member

2) Please note the initials of your team leader (e.g., if your leader's name is John Do, please note "J.D."). If you are the team leader yourself, please note your own initials.

a) [open question ] If the answer is Team Leader:

3) How would you rate the performance of your team in terms of: a) Efficiency

b) Quality

c) Work Excellence

d) Adherence to schedules/deadlines

4) How would you rate the innovation of your team in terms of:

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35 b) This team gives little consideration to new and alternative methods and procedures

for doing their work

c) Team members often produce new services, methods, or procedures d) This is an innovative team

If the answer is either leader or team members

5) Please rate the following statements concerning the extent to which you engage in ac-tions and interacac-tions with others. How often do you...

a) Resolve problems with external groups

b) Coordinate external activities with external groups

c) Procure things which the team needs from other groups or individuals in the com-pany

d) Negotiate with others for delivery deadlines

e) Collect information/ideas from individuals outside of the team

f) Scan the environment inside or outside the organization for ideas/expertise g) Acquire resources (e.g., money, new members, equipment) for the team

6) Please indicate the extent to which you agree or disagree in the following statements as far as the workload is concerned:

a. I am given enough time to do what is expected of me on my job b. It often seems like I have too much work for one person to do c. The performance standards on my job are too high

d. Please indicate the extent to which you are dependent on other team members of your team:

e. I frequently must coordinate my efforts with my colleagues inside my team f. Jobs performed by team members are related to one another

g. For the team to perform well members must communicate well with each other h. To achieve high performance it is important to rely on each other

7) Please indicate the extent to which you are dependent on members of other teams: a) I frequently must coordinate my efforts with members of other teams

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36 c) To achieve high performance it is important to work with members of other

teams

8) Please indicate the extent to which you acquire the following sources for your team: a) Advanced technologies

b) Financial resources c) Managerial expertise d) Human capital e) Key information

Which of the following categories best describes the industry you primarily work in: a) Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing and Hunting

b) Computer and Electronics Manufacturing c) Wholesale

d) Transportation and Warehousing e) Software

f) Real Estate, Rental and Leasing g) Health Care and Social Assistance h) Hotel and Food Services

i) Legal Services j) Mining k) Construction l) Other Manufacturing m) Retail n) Telecommunications o) Finance and Insurance

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37 s) Military

t) Other Industry

9) In which country are you currently working? a) [open question]

10) What is your nationality? a) [open question] 11) What is your gender?

a) Male b) Female

c) I would rather not to answer

12) Thank you for participating in my survey. If you have any question or suggestion please leave a message:

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