The objective of this research project is to examine how the effectiveness of cross functional teams (CFTs) can be influenced by their relationships to organizational members outside of the team, and by relationships between these outside organizational members. These external members fall into three categories: 1) functional managers (e.g., marketing, manufacturing, engineering) to whom team members normally report; 2) functional peers from the team members' departments, and 3) the `principal in charge` who has ultimate responsibility for the project and to whom the team leader reports. Despite the large body of literature on team performance, the relationships among team members and their immediate functional peers and supervisors have received little attention. Even less well understood are the relationships between functional parties that are outside of the team who may have an important influence on team performance. The study is motivated by the central premise that the success of a team depends not only on the effectiveness of the team members in dealing with each other, but also on their ability to obtain collaboration from organizational members outside of the team. These external relationships often are complicated by re-definition of roles and decision-making authority, pre-existing structural barriers to team functioning, differences in objectives, physical separation, and change in career tracks and advancement potential which frequently accompany the placement of individuals in highly visible CFT assignments. The aim of the study is to better understand how the management of these external influences on team members affect the support, conflict, and performance of CFTs. This study also will assess the impact that the degree of technical complexity can have on the nature and significance of the linkages described above. Technical complexity often increases the number of activities to be undertaken, uncertainty associated with tasks, the number of interfaces which need to be managed, the likelihood of conflict, and the degree of interdependence between subunits. The research effort will conduct surveys of at least one hundred CFTs. A four-stage approach will be employed: 1) development of the survey; 2) administration of the survey to members of CFTs and identification of relevant functional department managers, peers and principals in charge who will then be surveyed, 3) in-depth interviews with representative respondents associated with approximately fifteen of the projects, and 4) data analysis and interpretation. Cross-functional projects characterized by tasks of differing degrees of technical complexity will be selected to understand the demands associated with technology. In addition, arrangements that encompass varying degrees of commitment of members to team assignments (100% or less) will be studied to understand their impact on the establishment and management of key external relationships for the team.
