Attack, Damage and Carry: Role Familiarity and Team Performance in League of Legends

2018 ◽  
Vol 62 (1) ◽  
pp. 130-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua A. Eaton ◽  
David J. Mendonça ◽  
Matthew-Donald D. Sangster
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Positive Impact ◽  
Social Constructs ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Gaming Environment ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Impact ◽  
League Of Legends

Objective: This research studies the impact of role familiarity on team performance by examining performance of the “Carry” role in the Multi-player Online Battle Arena gaming environment, League of Legends™. Background: Roles are typically defined as stable patterns of expectations, relationships, and behaviors. As social constructs, roles therefore include notions of status, relationships with additional social actors, and of defined sets of behaviors tied to the assigned role. We hypothesize that the importance of role familiarity in teams is mediated by the nature and extent of team members’ experience working together in defined roles. Methods: The data set used for this study is from League of Legends’ Application Program Interface and consists of ranked match play from 2011–2016. Results: ANOVA and visualization techniques are used to explore match-level data in order to address the proposed research questions. The proportion of time the same team member is assigned to the “Carry” role (role familiarity) has a direct and positive impact on team performance. Conclusions: This study shows how objective, detailed data on teamwork may be used to provide insights into questions of the composition and performance of teams. Additionally, the results illustrate the importance of role familiarity in the performance of teams. Application: This research highlights the value and feasibility of studying virtual teams for new insights into team performance.

The Impact of Trust on Virtual Team Effectiveness

2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yasser A. El-Kassrawy
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Team Effectiveness ◽  
Virtual Team ◽  
Structural Equations ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Competitive Environments ◽  
Team Satisfaction ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Impact

Given the important role of information technology, virtuality has become crucial issue in contemporary organizations. Virtual teams are comprised of members who are located in more than one physical location. They need to be effectively collaborating to harness their full performance capabilities in order to compete in the highly competitive environments. However, virtual team effectiveness is affected by determinants of trust which include three types; personality, cognitive and institutional-based trust. Therefore, this paper examines the impact of trust determinants on virtual team effectiveness represented in virtual team satisfaction and performance. Through a survey of 125 virtual team members who had experienced at least two years in this field, the results indicated that determinants of trust positively influence virtual team satisfaction and virtual team performance. The authors' structural equations modeling findings also support our hypothetical predictions that personality- based trust, cognitive- based trust and institutional- based trust have a dramatic impact on both of virtual team satisfaction and virtual team performance. Moreover, institutional- based trust is the uppermost driver of virtual team effectiveness. This study provides novel insights into virtual team behaviours, managerial and research implications for effective virtual team.

Dispersion beyond miles: configuration and performance in virtual teams

2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 186-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ambika Prasad ◽  
Darleen DeRosa ◽  
Michael Beyerlein
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Electronic Communication ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Spatial Distance ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Content Type ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to understand different aspects of structural dispersion in virtual teams (VTs). The study measures five types of dispersion, their impact on VT performance and the moderating effect of electronic communication. Design/methodology/approach The authors collected data from 44 globally distributed VTs representing 403 members. The authors used details of the members’ locations to measure five elements of dispersion for each team: spatial, time-zone, number of locations, extent of numerical balance across locations and extent of isolated members for a team. The authors used two items to assess effective electronic communication and measured team performance on four items from three sources – members, leaders and third-party stakeholders. Findings Using regression, the authors found that the number of sites, degree of team balance and isolation had a negative impact on team performance. Spatial and temporal dispersion did not impact performance. Effective electronic communication moderated the relationship of team performance with team balance and the number of sites. Research limitations/implications Study presents novel findings on the role of team configuration in VTs. Limitations: the study provides pointers to the likelihood of a non-linear relationship between spatial distance and performance; however, the scope of the paper does not permit an examination of this model. Future research can study this relationship. Second, the study does not examine how team configuration impacts the team processes that discount performance. Finally, the study treats each index of dispersion as independent of the others. The analysis does not study the interplay between and among the indices. Practical implications The findings provide clear indicators for managers and researchers of VTs on the issues associated with the location and configuration of the teams. Managers, while designing and managing dispersed members are now informed of the impact of the number of sites and the sub-group dynamics. The study underscores the importance of effective electronic communication in managing dispersion. Social implications The study presents how faultiness based on location of VT sub-groups (as represented in the configuration of a team) can hamper performance. Literature suggests that this faultiness can also extend to social identities (based on gender, culture, etc.). The indicators provided by this study in this respect provide a topical focus for research because diverse dispersed teams are becoming more prevalent. Originality/value The study is the first empirical exploration of dispersion in VTs beyond the traditionally acknowledged dimensions of spatial distance and time-zones. It is a timely response to the recent trends in literature. Additionally, the study derives data from a unique data set of global VTs, thus making findings easily generalizable.

The impact of peer evaluation on team effort, productivity, motivation and performance in global virtual teams

2019 ◽  
Vol 25 (5/6) ◽  
pp. 334-347
Author(s):  
Ernesto Tavoletti ◽  
Robert D. Stephens ◽  
Longzhu Dong
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Performance Outcomes ◽  
Peer Evaluation ◽  
Global Virtual Teams ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Peer Evaluations ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Impact

Purpose This study aims to assess the effect of peer evaluations on team-level effort, productivity, motivation and overall team performance. Design/methodology/approach This study explores the impact of a peer evaluation system on 895 multicultural and transnational global virtual teams (GVTs) composed of 5,852 university students from 130 different countries. The study uses a quasi-experiment in which the group project is implemented under two conditions over two sequential iterations. In the first condition, team members do not receive peer evaluation feedback during the project. In the second condition, participants completed detailed peer evaluations of their team members and received feedback weekly for eight consecutive weeks. Findings Results suggest that when peer evaluations are used in GVTs during the project, teams show: higher levels of group effort; lower levels of average productivity and motivation; and no clear evidence of improved team performance. Results cast doubts on the benefits of peer evaluation within GVTs as the practice fails to reach its main objective of improving team performance and generates some negative internal dynamics. Practical implications The major implication of the study for managers and educators using GVTs is that the use of peer evaluations during the course of a project does not appear to improve objective team performance and reduces team motivation and perception of productivity despite increases in teams’ perceptions of effort and performance. Originality/value This study contributes to the scanty literature regarding the impact of peer evaluation systems on group-level dynamics and performance outcomes.

Only As Strong As the Strongest Link: The Impact of Individual Team Member Proficiency in Configuration Design

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ethan Brownell ◽  
Jonathan Cagan ◽  
Kenneth Kotovsky
Keyword(s):  
Team Performance ◽  
Team Member ◽  
Positive Impact ◽  
Individual Characteristics ◽  
Configuration Design ◽  
Design Team ◽  
Markov Modeling ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Hidden Markov Modeling ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Prior research has demonstrated how the average characteristics of a team impact team performance. Individual characteristics of team members and individual team member behavior have been largely ignored, especially in the context of engineering design. In this work, a behavioral study was conducted to uncover whether the most or least proficient member of a configuration design team had a larger impact on overall performance. It was found that a configuration design team is most dependent on the proficiency of its most proficient member and results suggest that replacing the most proficient member with an even more proficient member can be expected to have a more positive impact than replacing any other member with a higher proficiency member of the same change in proficiency. The most proficient member had a significant positive effect on how quickly the team reached performance thresholds and that the other members of the team were not found to have the same positive impact throughout the design study. Behavioral heuristics were found using hidden Markov modeling to capture the differences in behavior and design strategy between different proficiency members. Results show that high proficiency and low proficiency team members exhibit different behavior, with the most proficient member’s behavior leading to topologically simpler designs and other members adopting their designs, leading to the most proficient member driving the team design and team performance.

scholarly journals The Impact of Operational Capabilities on Corporate Performance: Evidence from Listed Companies in the Agriculture, Forestry, Livestock Farming, Fishery Industry

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 56
Author(s):  
Maoguo Wu ◽  
Daimin Lu
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Performance ◽  
Positive Impact ◽  
Listed Companies ◽  
Fixed Effect Model ◽  
Livestock Farming ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Operational Capabilities ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Impact

In China, the agriculture, forestry, livestock farming, fishery (AFLF) industry is the basis of all industries. However, the overall development and performance level of listed companies in the AFLF industry is lower than the overall market level. According to previous literature, there is generally a positive impact of operational capabilities on the corporate performance of listed companies, but the impact on listed companies in the AFLF industry has not been investigated. This study attempts to fill in the gap by empirically analyzing the impact of operational capabilities on the corporate performance of listed companies in the AFLF industry in China. Based on a panel data set of 43 listed companies, this study performs regressions using a fixed effect model and a threshold panel model. The results show that there is a positive correlation between the operational capabilities and the corporate performance of listed companies in the AFLF industry, but different indicators that represent operational capabilities have different impacts on corporate performance. Based on the empirical results, this study puts forward corresponding suggestions for listed companies in the AFLF industry and policy makers.

Carrying the Team: The Importance of One Player’s Survival for Team Success in League of Legends

2017 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 272-276 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua A. Eaton ◽  
Matthew-Donald D. Sangster ◽  
Molly Renaud ◽  
David J. Mendonca ◽  
Wayne D. Gray
Keyword(s):  
Team Performance ◽  
Team Member ◽  
Online Game ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Team Success ◽  
The World ◽  
Gaming Environment ◽  
Visualization Techniques ◽  
Team Familiarity ◽  
League Of Legends

Objective: This research investigates the effect of “critical” team members and team familiarity on team performance in the Multi-player Online Battle Arena gaming environment, League of Legends™. Background: A critical team member is any member of a team whose presence (or absence) can have a dramatic impact on the team’s ability to reach their objective, while team familiarity can be viewed as the knowledge team members have about one another and the knowledge team members have about the tasks that must be accomplished. Methods: Data visualization techniques and logistic regression is used to explore team data collected from publicly accessible sources for the online game League of Legends, which is one of the most popular games in the world. Results: The proportion of time a team’s “Carry” is incapacitated (the “critical” team member) during a given match has a direct impact on how the team performs. Conclusions: The results show that critical team positions exist on teams, and can have a significant effect on achieving the team’s goals. In addition, there is a need for the development of tools, techniques and measures to bring “Big Data” to bear in the study of teamwork. Application: This research illustrates the feasibility of exploring online gaming data for new insights into team performance.

Self Organising and Virtual Teams

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed Salama ◽  
Maria Mataj
Keyword(s):  
Emotional Intelligence ◽  
Project Management ◽  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Management Practice ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Sixth Edition ◽  
High Performing ◽  
Talented People ◽  
And Performance

Amid the shift towards digital economies in the context of globalisation, project team members are required to work together remotely, utilising the current highly accessible technology (Han and Beyerlein, 2016). Virtual teams are growing rapidly in today’s world as companies are being involved in a constant fight for existence, due to the very vibrant and continuous competition which makes organizations emerge in different countries. Being a global organisation involves synchronization among people situated in diverse geographical areas, thus there arises the necessity for managing global virtual teams, assigned to resolve issues at a global level (Paul et al., 2016). The existence of a variety of technologies allows companies to have access to a large pool of talented people located all over the world, as it reduces costs and facilitates cooperation among different locations and time zones (Paul et al., 2016). According to Hertel et al. (2005), the allocation of work among employees has become more efficient due to the evolvement of technology. Consequently, for international companies to collaborate with each other and to have high performing virtual teams, there has been a need to consider the impact of cultural diversity on virtual teams’ practices and performance (Han and Beyerlein, 2016). This discussion should also include self-organising teams in the context of agile methodologies and beyond. In addition, studies have been focusing on how emotional intelligence impacts teams and groups (Wolff et al., 2001). However, limited research has been conducted on how culture and emotional intelligence impact virtual team performance in the context of project management. This chapter aims to discuss the critical area of managing project teams with emphasis on the relationship between culture, communication, emotional intelligence and trust in self-organising and virtual teams, and how the interaction between these factors impact team performance. This attempts to answer the call by the sixth edition of the PMI PMBOK that emphasised the importance of developing the soft skills of project managers in the pursuit of enhancing project management practice amid the growing interest in sustainability in general. In addition, this endorses and further justifies the suggested paradigm shift that the authors advocate, in pursuit of sustainable project management.

The impact of commitment and climate strength on the relationship between trust and performance in cross-functional project teams

2016 ◽  
Vol 22 (3/4) ◽  
pp. 114-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marte Pettersen Buvik ◽  
Sturle Danielsen Tvedt
Keyword(s):  
Team Performance ◽  
Project Teams ◽  
Complex Relationship ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Climate Strength ◽  
Multilevel Studies ◽  
And Performance ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

Purpose The purpose of this study is to shed more light on the complex relationship between trust and performance in the context of cross-functional project teams. This study presents a moderated mediation model that investigates the impact of team trust on team performance mediated by project commitment and moderated by climate strength (the consensus among team members on the level of trust). Design/methodology/approach To test the proposed model, data were collected from 179 project team members in 31 Norwegian construction project teams. Findings Results indicated that project commitment fully mediates the relationship between propensity and trustworthiness and team performance, while it partially mediates the relationship between cooperation and team performance. For monitoring, there results showed no mediation. The results yielded no support for the moderation effects of climate strength, suggesting that the mean-level approach to studying trust at the team level still is important. Research limitations/implications Cross-sectional survey data suffer from being unable to test causality and samples are relatively small. Future research should test the models on other samples and in combination with data other than self-report. Longitudinal and multilevel studies are also warranted. Practical implications The results suggest that trust has an impact on project commitment and both directly and indirectly on team performance. Interventions to develop a high trust climate in project teams can thus contribute to improved project performance. Originality/value This study offers new insight into the complex relationship between trust and performance and improves our understanding of trust in cross-functional project teams.

scholarly journals Testing an Integrated Team Effectiveness Framework in League of Legends

2019 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 240-246
Author(s):  
Joshua A. Eaton ◽  
David J. Mendonça
Keyword(s):  
Path Analysis ◽  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Team Effectiveness ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Large Data ◽  
Data Sets ◽  
Government Data ◽  
Gaming Environment ◽  
League Of Legends

Objective: This paper investigates factors impacting team performance in the Multi-player Online Battle Arena gaming environment, League of Legends™, by testing an integrated Input Mediator-Outcome team effectiveness framework. Background: Secondary data and Naturally Occurring Data Sets (NODS) are data that have been collected from respondents without research interests in mind and can occur naturally in the environment. There are numerous sources of secondary data, including government data, financial databases, industry association groups, and Application Programming Interfaces, which this research utilizes to study the performance of teams. Methods: Path Analysis and Partial Least Squares Discriminant Analysis (PLS-DA) are analytical methods that are well suited for large data sets and sample sizes, confirmatory in nature, and can test a theoretical model. This research utilizes both in order to study factors impacting team performance. Results: A total of 5,927 matches from 742 teams are sampled and analyzed. Six team performance measures are used to discriminate between winning and losing teams, including role familiarity, team familiarity, team effectiveness, team efficiency, and the Kills, Deaths, Assist (KDA) ratio. Using path analysis and supervised PLS-DA, the models led to the successful prediction of 89.4% of the matches. The error rate for the PLS-DA model is 0.106 (Q2 = 0.523; R2 = 0.551). Conclusions: This work shows how objective, detailed data on teamwork may be used to provide insights into questions of the performance of teams. Additionally, the results demonstrate the value of using path analysis and PLS-DA to test an integrated framework. Application: This research highlights the value and feasibility of studying virtual teams for new insights into team performance.

Gender and Anonymity in Virtual Teams

2011 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Koh ◽  
Na Liu ◽  
John Lim
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Teams ◽  
Team Performance ◽  
Virtual Team ◽  
Process Variables ◽  
Team Collaboration ◽  
Team Members ◽  
Study Approach ◽  
Research Fields ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Collaboration Process

With the advancement of information and communication technology, virtual teams are becoming more popular as geographical constraints in collaboration have become a non-issue. Features of the technology and characteristics of the group influence interaction processes and outcomes. Two elements are the focus of this paper. The first is anonymity, which has been made feasible by technology. The other concerns gender. Gender is an important research target, and its role in groupwork must not be overlooked. Both elements have aroused much interest across multiple research fields. The existing literature shows their potential in influencing team collaboration processes, satisfaction, and performance. In this paper, the authors present a process-based interpretation of virtual team collaboration, incorporating the anonymity of technology and the gender difference of team members. Using a multiple case study approach, the paper identifies a key set of process variables that shape team performance. The study also examines the interdependencies among the processes. Task-related activity that occurred during team discussion was affected by gender anonymity, and this influenced group performance and members’ satisfaction toward the collaboration process. Group dynamics, including member awareness, leader emergence, and member’s conformity, are salient process variables that affect the virtual team performance as well.

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