Positive faultlines: an unconventional perspective on team compositional dynamics

Purpose

Faultline literature has been extensively examined for its effect on various outcomes. Barring a few exceptions, this research has primarily inferred the adverse impact of such splits. The purpose of this theoretical paper is to assert that these divisions can also be formed based on positive psychological capacities, which will cause a divide, but eventually help increase performance.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper offers a conceptual model that links employee psychological capital with the faultline literature and suggests its impact on team performance. It also explores the positive moderating effect of time and team goal orientation.

Findings

The study asserts that there will be an initial divide, but the positive faultlines will improve team performance. Several propositions are formulated that provide the opportunity for further examination.

Originality

This paper makes a contemporary and important conceptual contribution to the faultline literature by proposing a new notion: “positive faultlines.” To view the effect of faultlines from a positive perspective, a pioneering endeavor is made to explore the impact of employees’ psychological capital in teams. By integrating the faultline literature with positive organizational behavior, this study offers an alternative line of thinking on team compositional dynamics.

Top management team faultlines and corporate industrial diversification: The mediating role of strategic attentional breadth

Introduction

Integrating faultline theory and the attention-based view, this paper explores the impact and process mechanisms of two types of faultlines (i.e., task-related faultlines and relationship-related faultlines) within top management teams (TMTs), specifically on corporate industrial diversification.

Methods

Based on the unbalanced panel data of Chinese A-share non-financial listed firms from 2008-2021, this study uses the fixed-effects model for hypothesis testing.

Results

First, task-related TMT faultlines promote corporate industrial diversification, while conversely, relationship-related TMT faultlines inhibit corporate industrial diversification. Second, task-related TMT faultlines promote firms' strategic attentional breadth, while conversely, relationship-related TMT faultlines inhibit firms' strategic attentional breadth. Third, strategic attentional breadth plays a partially-mediating role in the relationship between both types of TMT faultlines and firms' industrial diversification.

Discussion

This study extends the research related to corporate industrial diversification based on micro-level explanatory mechanisms, and also provides implications and guidance for the rational allocation of TMT and firms' industrial diversification management practices.

The consequences of social category faultlines in high- and low-context cultures: A comparative study of Brazil and Germany

The present study sheds light on how differences between high- and low-context cultures influence the consequences of social category faultlines. To develop our theoretical arguments, we integrate ideas from faultline theory and Hall's theory on cultural contexts. We test our hypotheses using survey data from 54 teams in the banking industry in Germany, a nation with a low-context culture, and in Brazil, a country with a high-context culture. In line with our theorizing, the study results reveal that whether social category faultline strength stimulates task conflict and is thus detrimental to team performance depends on the societal culture in which teams operate. Specifically, we observe that social category faultlines stimulate task conflict and thus have a negative indirect effect on team performance in Germany's low-context culture, while we find no such effects in the high-context culture of Brazil. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our study and close with some suggestions for future research.