A PREDICTIVE MODEL OF SELF-MANAGING WORK TEAM EFFECTIVENESS

This paper tests a theoretically-driven model of self-managing work te am effectiveness. Self-managing work team effectiveness is defined as both high performance and employee quality of work life. Drawing on di fferent theoretical perspectives including work design, self-leadershi p, sociotechnical, and participative management, four categories of va riables are theorized to predict self-managing work team effectiveness : group task design, encouraging supervisor behaviors, group character istics, and employee involvement context. Data is collected from both a set of self-managing and traditionally managed teams from a large te lephone company, and the model is tested with structural equations mod eling. Support is found for hypotheses concerning group task design, g roup characteristics, and employee involvement context, but not encour aging supervisory behaviors.