شواهدی از مهندسی مجدد فرایندهای تجاری (BPR)
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION
LITERATURE REVIEW
HYPOTHESES DEVELOPMENT
RESEARCH DESIGN
ANALYSES AND RESULTS
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION
REFERENCES
ABSTRACT
This study focuses on decision-making within operational teams. Grounding our argumentation on group decision-making literature, we argue that adverse behavior patterns may affect the way in which consensus is achieved within the team, and that team performance has an inverted U-shaped relationship with the level of consensus. Then, by relying on leadership literature, we pose the hypothesis that the level of shared leadership inside the group moderates this U-shaped relationship. To empirically test our literaturebased argumentation, we use longitudinal data collected in the years 2014 and 2015 from Business process reengineering projects, each lasting three months, conducted by 141 Master of Science Students grouped in 34 teams. We conclude by emphasizing that it is important to control for the occurrence of behaviors which lead to “fake” consensus within operational teams, by observing the individuals’ satisfaction with respect to the group decision as well as their active participation in the decision-making process.
INTRODUCTION
As long as organizations deal with increasing demands for efficiency and responsiveness, team-based work structures have become a pervasive organizational model to face such challenges (Boyett & Conn, 1992). Relying on effective and efficient groups at all organization’s levels is fundamental in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage. In fact, not just top management teams, but also operational teams play a crucial role in determining processes’ efficiency, customer satisfaction, and company success (Bamford & Griffin, 2008). The effectiveness of a group decision-making process may be, however, threatened by a few psychological behaviors which influence the way groups make the decision (Riccobono, Bruccoleri, & Großler, 2016; Swaab, Phillips, & Schaerer, ¨ 2016). Two organizational behavior theories exist underlining the potential pitfalls of a group decision-making process, but they explain two different phenomena: the “Abilene Paradox (AP)” (Harvey, 1974), and “Groupthink (GT)” (Janis & Mann, 1977). The extent to which such phenomena could be a real threat in an operational context has been described by Riccobono et al. (2016) and an example of how they lead groups to ineffective behaviors is reported by McAvoy and Butler (2009), in their empirical study on two software development teams trying to reach consensus on the way a software package must be developed. In one case, the group chose to adopt a prioritization method different from the one recommended by the Agile Software Development approach, and, even if it was proven to be ineffective, the group seeking for unanimous consensus persisted in adopting it. Here the authors identify GT behavior, where the team achieves consensus mostly because of their “seeking for unanimity” willingness. In the other case, the group, even though not all group members agreed, decided to follow standardized company procedures in the adoption of the Agile approach that were not fitting the specific project, and that finally led to the failure of the project. Here the authors recognize the presence of the AP behavior, where the group decision is made, even with little consensus, because of the team members’ “conforming to the others” inclination.