The interacting effects of distributed work arrangements and individual dispositions on willingness to engage in sensemaking behaviors

Abstract

Faced with highly competitive and dynamic environments, organizations are increasingly investing in technologies that provide them with new options for structuring work. At the same time, firms are increasingly dependent on employees' willingness and ability to make sense of novel tasks, problems, and rapidly changing situations. Yet, in spite of its importance, the impact of technology‐enabled distributed work arrangements on sensemaking behavior is largely unknown. Sensemaking remains something that is perceived by many to be an idiosyncratic behavior that is, at best, loosely related to sociotechnical context and culture. Drawing on previous studies of cognitive dispositions (need for cognition, tendency for decisiveness, intolerance for ambiguity, and close‐mindedness) and research on how technology‐enabled distributed work arrangements affect interpersonal interaction, we theorize how workgroup geographic distribution interacts with individual cognitive differences to affect employees' willingness to engage in the core sociocognitive activities of sensemaking. Our results show that the consequences of individual tendencies can vary under different work arrangements, suggesting that managers seeking to facilitate sensemaking activities must make careful choices about the composition of distributed work groups, as well as how collaboration technologies can be used to encourage sensemaking behaviors.

An integrated model of team resilience: exploring the roles of team sensemaking, team bricolage and task interdependence

“…Social cognition was then divided into three subdimensions: confirmatory encoding, representation shifting and team situation models. Items to measure each subdimension were adapted from the existing literature (Akg€ un et al, 2012;Gray et al, 2015;Neill et al, 2007;Oertel and Antoni, 2015). A 5-point Likert scale was used, where a value of 1 denoted "strongly disagree", and a value of 5 was equal to "strongly agree".…”

“…Reflection refers to the critical examination of a process such that it can be updated according to the new information received over time (Edmondson, 2002). Social cognition is further divided into three subdimensions: (1) confirmatory encoding, a process whereby individuals organize task information within an existing cognitive representation (Gray et al, 2015); (2) representation shifting, a process of organizing information by modifying the cognitive categories, either by creating new ones or by splitting and merging the existing ones (Gray et al, 2015) and ( 3) team situation models, which represent a shared understanding of a particular team including its environment, its tasks and holistic view of its team dynamics (Van der Haar et al, 2015).…”

“…Confirmatory encoding (Gray et al, 2015) (1) Team members often draw on other team members to fill small gaps in their knowledge.…”

“…Representation shifting (Gray et al, 2015) (1) Team members often consult other team members in order to see a problem or issue from a completely different perspective.…”