Effect of time pressure on informal advice relations across organizational units: Evidence from a study of collaboration within a Formula One racing team

IF 4.9 1区管理学 Q1 MANAGEMENT

Organization Studies Pub Date : 2024-06-12 DOI:10.1177/01708406241261448

Andrew Parker, A. Lomi, Paola Zappa

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Informal advice relations across units in an organization are beneficial for knowledge sharing and problem-solving. Prior research suggests that despite their benefits, there are costs to informal advice relations across units. However, the mechanisms by which these costs are mitigated remain unclear. We theorize that this lack of clarity is because work factors have not been sufficiently considered. We examine one such work factor, time pressure, and develop a cost-based explanation for how time pressure influences cross-unit advice relationships. We investigate two time-pressure levels. In the first, work is conducted under lower time pressure, and there is less likelihood of a negative outcome. In the second, work is conducted under higher time-pressure conditions, and there is a greater likelihood of a negative outcome. We theorize that under lower time-pressure conditions, the costs of advice relations across units are mitigated by reciprocal advice relationships. However, under higher time pressure, the cost of informal advice relations across units is higher owing to the need for quick coordination of advice, and these costs are mitigated by reciprocal advice relationships in conjunction with cross-unit formal workflow relationships. To test our hypotheses, we examine the informal advice network and formal workflow network in lower and higher time-pressure conditions among 118 members of the Information Technology and Systems division of a Formula One racing team. Our results indicate that under lower time-pressure conditions, reciprocal advice ties are sufficient to overcome costs. However, under higher time-pressure conditions, cross-unit advice ties are facilitated by reciprocal advice ties embedded in the workflow ties between units. Thus, our findings have implications for how knowledge is managed and how problems are solved in organizations.

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时间压力对跨组织单位非正式建议关系的影响：来自一级方程式赛车队内部合作研究的证据

组织内各单位之间的非正式咨询关系有利于知识共享和问题解决。先前的研究表明，尽管有好处，但跨单位的非正式咨询关系也有成本。然而，减轻这些成本的机制仍不明确。我们认为，之所以不清楚，是因为没有充分考虑工作因素。我们研究了其中一个工作因素--时间压力，并对时间压力如何影响跨单位咨询关系做出了基于成本的解释。我们研究了两种时间压力水平。在第一种情况下，工作在较低的时间压力下进行，出现负面结果的可能性较小。在第二种情况下，工作是在较高的时间压力条件下进行的，出现负面结果的可能性较大。我们的理论是，在较低的时间压力条件下，各单位之间的建议关系成本可通过互惠建议关系得到缓解。然而，在时间压力较大的情况下，由于需要快速协调建议，跨单位非正式建议关系的成本较高，而这些成本则通过互惠建议关系以及跨单位正式工作流程关系来减轻。为了验证我们的假设，我们研究了一支一级方程式赛车队信息技术和系统部门 118 名成员在较低和较高时间压力条件下的非正式建议网络和正式工作流程网络。我们的结果表明，在较低的时间压力条件下，互惠的建议关系足以克服成本。然而，在较高的时间压力条件下，单位间工作流程中的互惠建议关系会促进跨单位的建议关系。因此，我们的研究结果对组织中如何管理知识以及如何解决问题具有重要意义。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Organization Studies MANAGEMENT-

CiteScore

11.50

自引率

16.70%

发文量

期刊介绍： Organisation Studies (OS) aims to promote the understanding of organizations, organizing and the organized, and the social relevance of that understanding. It encourages the interplay between theorizing and empirical research, in the belief that they should be mutually informative. It is a multidisciplinary peer-reviewed journal which is open to contributions of high quality, from any perspective relevant to the field and from any country. Organization Studies is, in particular, a supranational journal which gives special attention to national and cultural similarities and differences worldwide. This is reflected by its international editorial board and publisher and its collaboration with EGOS, the European Group for Organizational Studies. OS publishes papers that fully or partly draw on empirical data to make their contribution to organization theory and practice. Thus, OS welcomes work that in any form draws on empirical work to make strong theoretical and empirical contributions. If your paper is not drawing on empirical data in any form, we advise you to submit your work to Organization Theory – another journal under the auspices of the European Group for Organizational Studies (EGOS) – instead.