the social dynamics of organizational behavior€¦ · interdependencies, and timing on individual...

Dr. Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock VU University Amsterdam Department of Social & Organizational Psychology

May 28, 2015

THE SOCIAL DYNAMICS OF ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR: MEETINGS AS A GATEWAY

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

WHAT IS DYNAMIC ABOUT ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR?

Organizational behavior = “the study of human behavior in organizational settings, the interface between human behavior and the organization, and the organization itself” (Moorhead & Griffin, 1995, p. 4)

2 Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock | Social dynamics at work: Meetings as a gateway


RESEARCHING TEAM DYNAMICS

“In order for members to achieve the collaboration and interdependence that make them a group rather than co-present individuals, they must interact.“ (Bonito & Sanders, 2011, p.343)

Team researchers should examine behavioral data the visible interactional conduct of team members Baumeister, Vohs, & Funder, D. C. (2007). Psychology as the sciene of self-reports and finger movements: Whatever happened to actual behavior? Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2, 396–403.

But: Most team studies take a static view of organizational behavior, failing to account for dynamic aspects (for an overview, see Cronin, Weingart, & Tedorova, 2011)

Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock | Social dynamics at work: Meetings as a gateway 3


NEED FOR BEHAVIORAL INTERACTION ANALYSIS

Self-reports are limited: What employees say they do is often not equal to what they actually do (e.g., Chiu & Lehmann-Willenbrock, 2012)

Understanding the impact of social context, interdependencies, and timing on individual organizational behavior requires studying behavioral processes and real interactions rather than relying on questionnaires (e.g., Cronin et al., 2011)

Soccer teams know this, too



A SPECIAL CASE OF TEAM DYNAMICS: WORKPLACE MEETINGS

Why study meetings?

• Team meetings are ubiquitous in contemporary organizations (for an overview, see Allen, Lehmann-Willenbrock, & Rogelberg, 2015)

• Managers spend up to 80% of their working time in meetings (Romano & Nunamaker, 2001)

• Average employee: At least 3 meetings per week, but meeting quality evaluated as poor in 41.9% of the cases (Schell, 2010)



CODING MEETING INTERACTION



Problem-focused statements

Procedural statements

Socio-emotional statements

Action-oriented statements

Problem Describing a problem Connections with problems Defining the objective Solution Describing a solution Problem with a solution Arguing for a solution Organizational knowledge Knowing who Question

Positive: Goal orientation Clarifying Procedural suggestion Procedural question Prioritizing Time management Task distribution Visualization Summarizing Negative: Losing the train of thought (running off topic)

Positive: Encouraging participation Providing support Active listening Reasoned disagreement Giving feedback Humor Separating opinions from facts Expressing feelings Offering praise

Proactive: Positivity Taking responsibility Action planning Counterproductive: No interest in change Complaining Seeking someone to blame Denying responsibility Empty talk Ending the discussion early

Negative: Criticizing/backbiting Interrupting Side conversations Self-promotion

MEETING BEHAVIORS CODING SCHEME

Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock | Social dynamics at work: Meetings as a gateway

Inter-rater reliability: κ=.81

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MEETING BEHAVIOR AND TEAM EFFECTIVENESS

Field study on 92 teams from 20 medium-sized organizations:

Frequency of functional interaction behaviors (e.g., problem-solving, action planning) were linked to improved meeting satisfaction, productivity, and even organizational success 2.5 years later

Dysfunctional communication, such as criticizing others or complaining, had significant negative effects on team and organizational outcomes

“Bad is stronger than good” phenomenon (Baumeister, Bratlavsky, Finkenauer, & Vohs,

2001) Kauffeld & Lehmann-Willenbrock (2012)



HUMOR DURING TEAM INTERACTIONS

• Humor and laughter have likely evolved as group behaviors because they promote group cohesion (Gervais & Wilson, 2005; Van Vugt & Kameda, 2013)

• Workplace humor is particularly context-bound, such that jokes among co-workers are often obscure to outsiders (Holmes & Marra, 2002)

• However: Previous research has neglected the context in which humor is produced and reacted to (Westwood & Johnston, 2013)

• Humor decreases tensions and facilitates communication (e.g.,Duncan, Smeltzer, & Leap, 1990; Holmes & Marra, 2002; Meyer, 2000)

• Previous theorizing suggests team performance benefits of humor (Romero & Pescosolido, 2008)



OBSERVED HUMOR DURING TEAM INTERACTIONS

Humor and laughter coded during 54 regular team meetings (N = 352 employees) using the act4teams coding scheme, κ = .81


Behavioral unit

Speaker (team member)

Talk act4teams code

25 A Well, that [machine] keeps breaking down on us.

Problem

26 B Uh-huh. Agree

27 C That evil thing! Humor

28 All (Laughing) Laughter


EMERGENT HUMOR PATTERNS

Significant lag1 patterns:

humor-laughter (z = 77.83), laughter-humor (z = 26.87), and humor-humor (z = 17.58; p < .01, respectively).


Humor Laughter Humor

lag1 lag1


EMERGENT HUMOR PATTERNS

Significant lag1 patterns:

humor-laughter (z = 77.83), laughter-humor (z = 26.87), and humor-humor (z = 17.58; p < .01, respectively).

Significant lag2 pattern:

humor-…-humor (z = 23.39, p < .01)


Humor Laughter Humor

lag2


COMMUNICATION TRIGGERED BY HUMOR PATTERNS


Lag0 Lag1 Lag2

Idea generation:

Procedural statements: Procedural statements:

Socioemotional statements:

Humor pattern

Encouraging participation

Offering praise

Procedural suggestion

Goal orientation

Summarizing

z = 3.66

z = 3.66

z = 4.53

z = 2.71

z = 4.60

Goal orientation z = 3.71

New solution z = 3.18

z = 3.71 Distributing tasks

z = 2.66 Question


HUMOR PATTERNS AND TEAM PERFORMANCE

Overall frequency of individual humor behaviors per meeting no effect


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Frequency of humor patterns

at t1 Team

performance t2

β = .31*

Team performance t1 β = .32*

*p < .05; R2 = .10

Lehmann-Willenbrock & Allen (2014)


MEETINGS AS A WINDOW INTO AFFECTICE CONVERGENCE PROCESSES IN TEAMS

Emotional contagion: one person’s mood can fleetingly determine the mood of others (e.g., Barsade, 2002)

How does this work during dynamic team interactions? Nale Lehmann-Willenbrock | Social dynamics at work: Meetings as a gateway 15


COMPLAINING VS. ACTION PATTERNS


Lehmann-Willenbrock, Meyers, Kauffeld, Neininger, & Henschel (2011)

Statement Code And nothing has ever changed. Complaining Nothing’s ever changed, that’s right. Agreement Always the same old story. Complaining …

Well, we have to look to ourselves and practice what we preach. Taking responsibility Yup. Agreement And that’s really not so bad. That won’t hurt at all. Positivity

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INTERACTION PATTERNS AND EMERGENT GROUP MOOD: FINDINGS


Proactive patterns

Complaining patterns

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Lehmann-Willenbrock et al. (2011)


SUMMING UP…

Meetings take up a substantial amount of employees‘ work time

Behaviors and emergent behavioral patterns in meetings are meaningfully linked to team and organizational outcomes

Meetings can serve as a gateway to Behavioral dynamics in teams Emergent interaction patterns Emotional contagion processes

Interaction analysis provides a magnifying lens for understanding these dynamic team processes


THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION.

Email: [email protected] Personal Website with links to fulltext papers

mailto:[email protected]�

http://www.goo.gl/IN52U6�


REFERENCES

Allen, J. A., Lehmann-Willenbrock, N., & Rogelberg, S. G. (2015). The science of meetings at work: The Cambridge handbook of meeting science. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

Kauffeld, S., & Lehmann-Willenbrock, N. (2012). Meetings matter: Effects of team meeting communication on team and organizational success. Small Group Research, 43, 128-156. doi: 10.1177/1046496411429599

Lehmann-Willenbrock, N., & Allen, J. A. (2014). How fun are your meetings? Investigating the relationship between humor patterns in team interactions and team performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 99, 1278-1287. doi: 10.1037/a0038083

Lehmann-Willenbrock, N., & Kauffeld, S. (2010). The downside of communication: Complaining cycles in group discussions. In S. Schuman (Ed.), The handbook for working with difficult groups: How they are difficult, why they are difficult, what you can do (pp. 33-54). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass/Wiley.

Lehmann-Willenbrock, N., Meyers, R. A., Kauffeld, S., Neininger, A., & Henschel, A. (2011). Verbal interaction sequences and group mood: Exploring the role of planning communication. Small Group Research, 42, 639-668. doi: 10.1177/1046496411398397

Meinecke, A. L., & Lehmann-Willenbrock, N. (2015). Social dynamics at work: Meetings as a gateway. In J. A. Allen, N. Lehmann-Willenbrock & S. G. Rogelberg (Eds.), The Cambridge handbook of meeting science (pp. 325-356). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.


the social dynamics of organizational behavior€¦ · interdependencies, and timing on individual...

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