Developing effective self-managing work teams in service organizations

A large body of research has emerged on the effective implementation of sel f-managing work teams (SMWTs). However, virtually all of the research has b een conducted in manufacturing settings. This article draws upon the author s' research on SMWTs in two service organizations: an insurance operation a nd a telecommunications company. The authors focused on two research questi ons: First, they examined the relationships among different dimensions of S MWT effectiveness. Second, the authors explored the key success factors for SMWTs in a service context. They found that the different dimensions of SM WTs' effectiveness do not reinforce one another and are largely unrelated, and that creating an employee involvement (EI) context, work design, and te am characteristics were important predictors of SMWT effectiveness. Surpris ingly, team leadership was not important for SMWT effectiveness; in fact, s ometimes, team leadership was negatively related to effectiveness.