International Journal of Accounting & Business Management Vol. 5 (No.1), April, 2017 ISSN: 2289-4519 DOI:24924/ijabm/2017.04/v5.iss1/56.73 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
www.ftms.edu.my/journals/index.php/journals/ijabm
Research Paper
INFUENCE OF TEAM RELATED FACTORS ON EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE –A CASESTUDY ON MALAYSIAN CONTEXT Jeffta Peters MBA graduate Ashcroft International Business School Anglia Ruskin University, UK
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Abdul Basit Lecturer School of Accounting and Business Management FTMS College, Malaysia
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Zubair Hassan Senior Lecturer School of Accounting and Business Management FTMS College, Malaysia
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ABSTRACT The purpose of this research is to examine the effect of Team related factors on employee performance of Private organizations in Malaysia. This research was done by analyzing the impact of 5 independent variables; Leadership- Personality- Communication- Trust- Recognition & Reward, on the dependent variable – Employee performance. The methodology for this research adopted was explanatory research design. Quantitative analysis was carried out, where primary data was collected using a Likert-scale questionnaire from 200 respondents. Non-probability convenience sampling is used to choose respondents and Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software was used for data analysis such as reliability, normality, descriptive statistics and regression in this research. This research found that Leadership, personality and communication has an insignificant positive relationship on employee performance, therefore, it is concluded that these variables do not affect team performance in private organizations Malaysia. The research also found that Trust, reward and recognition has a significant positive effect on employee performance. This study recommended that managers and employers should focus more on the two variables and also enhance their working relationship with employees to stimulate the positivity of the other three variables within the Team.
Key Terms: Teamwork, Leadership, Personality, Communication, Team Trust, Recognition & Reward, Employee performance
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1.
INTRODUCTION
The purpose of this research is targeted towards identifying factors related to teamwork, and how these factors effect employee performance in private organizations, Malaysia. Private sector has a significant role in Malaysia economy growth. The private sector contributed 69.2% of GDP in 2015 (Ruban, 2016). Team work is the ability to work together towards a common vision. Teamwork signifies an unavoidable practice which should be adopted by every organization (Mulika, 2010) because it plays an important role in determining the growth and success of the organization (Bowers et al, 1994; Xyrichis & Ream, 2008). Without teamwork houses take long to build and companies are outshined by their competitors in the market. Poor team building and planning sessions bring disillusionment, and low morale which negatively affect employee performance and the organization at large. Hence, organizations should encourage teamwork in order to gain competitive advantage (Boakye, 2015). Bruce Tuckman who was the pioneer of teamwork states that in other for team to develop, overcome challenges, discover answers which will finally yield results, the team must to go through clear stages of development (tuckman, 1965). Other theories on teamwork also emerge to aid better understanding on teamwork; such as Korn/ferry T7 model which identified factors affecting team effectiveness, and Belbin (1993) model which introduce roles that motivate team success. Prior studies done on effect of teamwork towards employees performance has been carried out in Pakistan (Manzoor, et al, 2011; Rehman, et al, 2013), Jordan (Judeh 2011), and Indonesia (Abdullah, 2017). Empirical findings on teamwork has yielded mixed result. While some studies found positive effect of team work on employee performance (Agarwal & Adjirackor, 2016; Abdullah, 2017; Manzoor et. al, 2011) some found negative and no effect of teamwork on employee performance (Al Salman & Hassan, 2016; Yusuf & Anuar, 2014). The most adopted variables were leadership, Trust, reward and recognition, and employee performance. Research on teamwork in Malaysia has been carried out with focus to individual industries in (hotel, entertainment, transportation & education etc.) (Musa, et al., 2011; Chua, et al, 2014; Tajasom, 2016; Benrazavi & Silong, 2013). So this research widen its investigation towards the private organizations of Malaysia by adopting leadership, personality communication, trust and reward and recognition as suggested by scholars. Leadership and administrative failures, personality difference which result to team conflicts, communication problems, trust issues amongst teammates which hinders cooperation and coordination, and lack of adequate reward and recognition system is a major issue in organizations and proves detrimental to the success of any establishment, (Cannon & Edmondson, 2001; Nadolska, & Barkema, 2014; Thomas, et al. 1998; Lingard, er al., 2004). Since we are in the era of Fourth Industrial revolution, institutions and organizations are considered the backbone of any developing economy. Teamwork contributes greatly towards the success of such organizations, industries and institutions which could be achieved through good leadership style, understanding different personality, effective communication, team trust, and adequate recognition and reward system. This research aims to provide significant contributions to the body of knowledge and empirical research by explaining the full notion of teamwork and ways it effects performance of employees in private organizations of Malaysia. This will help teams and their leaders working in different organizations to recognize and evaluate the relationship existing between both groups. This study will also be of assistance to the experts in field of team management in finding a solution to the worrying issue surrounding teamwork and provide a synergic ISSN: 2289-4519
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strategy, and additionally assist future researchers of teamwork to design their conceptual framework with much ease and understanding of the topic. Research Objectives:
2.
To examine the influence of leadership on employee performance To examine the Influence of personality on employee performance To examine the Influence of communication on employee performance To examine the Influence of team trust on employee performance To examine the Influence of recognition and reward on employee performance
LITERATURE REVIEW
Parker and Wall, (1998) in their research defined teamwork to be a combination of reliable employees who supportively target to achieve teamwork results or face the consequences together, they further stated that reliable teamwork when formed can enhance the motive of members and build their work habit to put more effort to whatever kind of job so as to obtain good result and also build employee’s performance. Harris and Harris, (1996) also defined teamwork as a collective agreement or the determination to set a target whereby teams can competitively grow and work with a common mind set to accomplish the expected group target. Keller (2001) viewed team work as section of people who gather together interdependently, working with one accord to solve issues. Employee performance is clearly said to be the extent to which teams attain established quality and flexibility purposes through its set goal (Hoegl & Parboteeah, 2003). Employee performance constitutes a high level of relevance both for establishments and individuals. Displaying high performance when tasks are accomplished, results in organizational satisfaction and some satisfaction of self-efficacy for the employees (Bandura, 1997; Kanfer, & Kantrowitz, 2002). Leadership represents a process used to influences a group of persons towards achieving a common target (Northouse, 2017). Personality points to those features of a person which account for constant patterns of thinking, behaving and feeling. (Pervin, et al, 2005). Communication is defined as a process of conveying information to create common understanding from one individual to another (Keyton, 2011; Kurtz, 2016). Fukuyama (1995) defines trust as the arising expectations of truthful and cooperative attitude. Recognition & reward is organization’s acknowledgment method shown to employees when they achieve specific objectives or meet certain targets, and other things of merit (Spence, et al, 2002). Tuckman’s theory over times has emerged the most prominent theory for team work development. Bruce tuckman model also known as tuckman stages was first published in 1965. His model acknowledge four different stages through which a group should grow from the stage of forming to the stage of high performance. This stages are forming, norming, storming and performing. However, this model was refined in 1975 as the fifth stage was added and was called “Adjourning” which is also referred to as Deforming and Mourning. The Adjourning phase is certainly very relevant to the people in the group and their wellbeing, but not to the main task of managing and developing a team, which is clearly central to the original four stages. The Tuckman's fifth stage “Adjourning” describes that when a task fulfilled, every member can sail on for new things, having made good achievement. The model is said to be the well-designed method of team development and because of its flexibility it fit into different settings (Nash & Bolin 2003; Robbins & Finley 2000). But the model lacks the ability to illustrate unresolved issues and explain how groups can accomplish goals in performing their task (Miller, 2003). The literature review fails to present a sample
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that represents situations where smaller team developments could likely be formed (Tuckman, 1965). Another theory of teamwork is Belbin’s model which was first published by Dr. R.M Belbin (1993). According to his definition, team role is a tendency to perform, contribute and interconnect with others through a particular manner. Belbin introduced nine team roles that motivate team success. (Belbin, 2012; Yeh, et al, 2006). These nine roles are divided into three major groups: Action Oriented, Thought Oriented and People Oriented. According to Belbin, among the team roles proposed, “shapers” are regarded to be the most potentially disruptive role within the group. Belbin also pointed out that Team shapers remain very essential to any effective team as they possess excellent work rates and are quick to explore different approach and avenue (Aritzeta, et al, 2007; Belbin, 2012). Belbin theory is used to identify how Team Roles and style of leadership influence teams, and acts as a diagnostic tool for teams and individuals targeting better teamwork (Belbin, 2010). But the model is created and only limited to be experimented within a work environment only examines a person team’s behavior’s, and not personality which is not enough in concluding or evaluating a person (Batenburg, 2013). The Korn/Ferry T7 Model theory identified factors which affects team effectiveness. The model identified five major internal and two other external factors, each of the factors starting with the letter, "T," reasons for the name T7 model, (Lencioni, 2002). The identified internal factors include; Thrust or common determination, Trust within teammates, Teaming skills or efficiency as a team, Talent or shared skills, Test skills which equals on how to get the job done (Kazmi, et al, 2017). The models external factors are; Team leader who is fit or a team leader who always satisfies the team needs, Team backing from their organization or that of the organizational culture empowers the team. The Korn/Ferry T7 has been supported, validated and accepted as the most productive as the T7 model provides most of all-inclusive evaluation regarding team success (DeMeuse, 2007; De Meuse, et. al, 2009). The model also helps identify the importance of work being carried out by more than one individual rather than by a single individual performing single job units (DeMeuse, 2012).
2.2. Recent Empirical Studies Al Salman and Hassan, (2016) in their research on the impact of Teamwork towards employee performance in the entertainment industry in Malaysia employed Effective communication, Team Cohesiveness, Accountability, Interpersonal skills, Leadership and Level of trust, as the independent variables, while the dependent variable was employee performance. A descriptive and explanatory research design method was adopted, using a cross sectional survey method through some survey questionnaires using 107 employee’s samples applying simple random probability sampling technique. Collected data was analyses using descriptive method and regression through SPSS.20. Finding indicates that all the selected factors have significant relationship with teamwork. The survey finds Level of trust, Efficient Communication, Leadership and Accountability has a positive and significant impact on employee performance. While they have found insignificant influence of Intrapersonal skills and Cohesiveness on Employees Performance in Malaysia. Yusuf and Anuar (2014) did a research on the effects of conflict handling in teamwork of hotel industry in northern region in Malaysia, using Conflict handling, Leadership, Employee satisfaction, Behavior, Personality, and Role of gender as their variables. The study applied the quantitative research methodology, involving random distribution of questionnaires to two-hundred (200) respondents from the subject areas. Five
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(5) hypotheses were pre-established and tested by using a multiple regression analysis methodology. The results of the study revealed that two (2) hypotheses, the behavior/personality and the roles of gender, supported and influenced conflicts handling in the teamwork. The remaining three (3) other hypotheses, including leadership effectiveness, employee satisfaction and communications, showed negative correlations to conflicts handling in the teamwork. Manzoor et al (2011) did a survey on effect of teamwork towards employee performance in Pakistan. Variables utilized were: Teamwork, Team Trust, sprit de Corps and Rewards & recognition. 200 Respondents was the total sample size used. Data was analyzed using SPSS Software. The researcher carried out descriptive statistics, Correlation and regression test in his report. The result shows an important positive impact by analysts towards the response towards the variables. The study recommends that teamwork and its activities should be adopted for reasons of enhancing employee performance. The report also suggests further future research areas. Abdullah (2017) in his study analyzes the effect of teamwork, esprit de corps, and team trust on employee performance of the staff members of Royalindo Expoduta Jakarta Indonesia. The research study uses regression and correlation techniques in order to analyze the relationship between Teamwork, esprit de corps and team trust on Employee Performance. Method of data collection was through the use of questionnaire which was distributed to 100 respondents of PT Royalindo Jakarta with simple random sampling technique. Findings indicate that that there is a significant positive impact teamwork on employee performance. While there is not a significant effect esprit de corps on employee performance and positive effect team trust on performance employee, but from team work, esprit de corps, and team trust as together significant effect on employee performance. Table 1: Summary of most cited variables Variables Effective communication, team cohesiveness, accountability, interpersonal skills, leadership and level of trust. Empowerment, teamwork, training, and employee productivity Relationship with supervisor, recognition and reward, working conditions, teamwork and cooperation. Empowerment, transformational leadership, teamwork and work environment. Teamwork, spirit de corps, team trust, reward and recognition. Teamwork, spirit de corps, team trust, employee performance. Teamwork, spirit de corps, team trust, reward and recognition, organizational productivity. Training, performance
Source Al-Salman and Hassan (2016) Hanaysha (2016) Abdullah et al (2012) Hee et al (2014) Manzoor et al (2011) Abdullah (2017) Agarwal and Adjirackor (2016) Nassazi (2013)
The five variables employed in this research are; leadership, personality, communication, recognition & reward team trust and employee performance which were adopted from different scholars to make up the conceptual framework. According to the summary table above the variables has been adopted by most of the authors as they talked about the impact of effective teamwork on employee performance. Leadership represents one of the few important variables by which a team leader can directly influence team members toward better goal achievement. Leadership behavior continually plays an important role in team effectiveness and productivity (Amos & Klimoski, 2014) because Leaders help the team breach boundaries to build relationships and support one another, scouting for the necessary information to accomplish objectives and achieve success (Murphy & Ensher, 2008). Some scholars specified that features of the
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leadership style affect team performance (Bish & Kabanoff, 2014; Geoghegan & Dulewicz, 2008). H1-Leadership has a positive significant effect on employee performance Personality is the internal/primary dimension of diversity mostly outside our control but strongly influence our attitudes and our expectations and assumptions about others, thus influencing our behavior and relationship as a team (Kinicki, 2008). Personality of employee in a performance team has been well elaborated using the Big Five personality traits; Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Neuroticism, agreeable and Openness. Bell (2007) found each of the Big Five traits to significantly predict team effectiveness. Extending these findings to the team level is needed as organizations are increasingly turning to teamwork in an effort to stay competitive in the global market place (O'Neill, et al, 2011; Morgeson, et al. 2005). H2: Personality has a positive significant effect on employee performance. According to a study carried out in Poland, (Winska, 2010) it was observed that communication acts in control of team members’ behavior, it motivates and supports team through clarification of what is needed and how workers should do it Communication is essential to effective team performance and communication for any organization is like blood flowing in the human body. Therefore, any organization that understands the importance of communication uses it in their organizational environment (Klopping & McKinney, 2004). H3: Communication has a positive significant effect on employee performance. A researcher wrote that it takes trust amongst the team to grow the exceptional services and harmonization of each person (Erdem, et al, 2003). Trust creates teamwork basic attitudes, which results in synergy within the organizational and better performance of an employee. A team were trust exist, seeks to fulfill policies, ethical codes, organizational goals, vision and laws. As stated by Manz et al, (2002) extreme performance teams in society exist only when common collaboration and harmony is practiced between team members. H4: Trust has a positive significant effect on employee performance. Dzuaranin, (2012) advices that companies should adopt monetary rewards and none monetary in recognizing their employees and increase the motivational level of their employees since many people prefer the former over the latter, these includes social events and practices which stimulates and influence the people to action. The best and only way that employees will fulfil the expected employers dream is to willingly share in their dream (Murphy, 2015). Reward systems have been traced to be the mechanisms that make this possible. H5: Recognition & Reward has a positive significant effect on employee performance.
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Figure 1: Conceptual Framework Source: Authors own development based on various readings
3.
RESEARCH METHODS
3.1. Research Design Explanatory research design was used in this research to examine the effect of teamwork on employee’s performance in private organizations. Explanatory approach was consider more suitable for this research as it identifies cause and effect relationship between variables (Poordad, et al, 2013). This research is a cross-sectional study considering its suitability against time series (Honaker & King, 2010). For this research it was important to identify evidence from an employee perspective on the effect of teamwork on employee performance. For this reason the quantitative approach was selected for this research in order to analyze large population of IT employees (Bermingham, 2013). The choice for quantitative approach is, it enables collection of numerical data from different respondents that are analyzed using mathematically based method accomplish at an excellent rate of accuracy and reliability (Creswell, 1994; Neuman, 2002). 3.2. Research Instrument This research collected primary data as it is appropriate for intensive investigations, provides satisfactory results and offers the researcher overall control over the research. After studying the various data collection methods for quantitative research, questionnaires were chosen as the method of data collection in this study. Likert-scale was used as the instrument for administering questionnaires in order to avoid any bias by respondents, and allow collection of large volume of data with ease. The Likert-scale uses five ordered response levels were respondents are requested to indicate their degree of agreement in the format of; (1) strongly disagree, (2) Disagree, (3) neither Disagree, (4) agree, (5) Strongly Agree. The questionnaires in this research have been developed in consideration of the 5 variables namely, Leadership, Personality, Communication, Trust, Recognition and reward and employee performance. Table 2: below demonstrate the sources that the researcher refers to develop the research questionnaire. There were 30 questions based on the 4 independent variables; Leadership, Personality, Communication, Trust, Recognition and reward and employee performance as the dependent variable.
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Table 2: list of variables included in Questionnaire VARIABLE
SUB-VARIABLES
SOURCE
LEADERSDHIP
Inspiration & Motivation, Intellectual stimulation, Criticism, Shared Leadership, Idealized influence
(Pielstick, 2000) (Rafferty & Griffin, 2004; Stordeur, et al. 2001; Northhouse, 2015)
PERSONALITY
Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Assessment
(Cattell & Mead, 2008; Kamdar, & Van Dyne, 2007)
COMMUNICATION
Barriers, attention, listening, Selfassessment, assessment.
(Wittenberg-Lyles, et al, 2008)(Grosse, 2002) (Hinds & Mortensen, 2005) (Erdem & Ozen, 2003)
TRUST
Reliability, Creditability, Believe, Civilized Disagreement, Assessment.
(Mach, et al, 2010) (Erdem & Ozen, 2003) (Costa, 2003)
Recognition & reward.
Formal recognition, Informal recognition, Equality, Incentives, Assessment.
(Sarin & Mahajan, 2001) (Pielstick, 2000)
Employee performance
Leadership, Communication, Trust, Reward & Recognition
(Pielstick, 2000) (Cattell & Mead, 2008) (Wittenberg-Lyles, et al, 2008) (Mach, M. et al, 2010) (Sarin & Mahajan, 2001)
3.3. Subjects In this study, a target population of 500 people were selected from IT employees covering both male and female working in private organizations. The criteria for eligibility in selecting the respondents is limited to participants who are employees working in IT teams. This research used a convenient sampling technique to distribute 220 questionnaires to the IT employees, after the filtration process, 200 questionnaire were used while 20 questionnaires were disqualified. This means a response rate of 90.9 percent was achieved. This means the sample used in this study is 200 respondents. The sampling technique used in this study was convenient sampling due to the flexibility and to avoid difficulty in accessing the employees. The demographic aspects of the subjects are illustrated below: Table 3: Demographic Attributes of Respondents PROFILE GENDER
AGE
EDUCATIONAL QUALIFICATION
Category Male Female Total 19-30 30-40 31-30 31-40 41-50 Total DEGREE DIPLOMA MASTERS Total
Frequency
Percent
Valid Percent
139 61 200 95 4 1 83 17 200 121 74 5 200
69.5 30.5 100.0 47.5 2.0 .5 41.5 8.5 100.0 60.5 37.0 2.5 100.0
69.5 30.5 100.0 47.5 2.0 .5 41.5 8.5 100.0 60.5 37.0 2.5 100.0
Cumulative Percent 100.5 30.5 47.5 49.5 50.0 91.5 100.0 60.5 97.5 100.0
Almost 70 percent respondents are male and 30 percent are females. 41.5 percent of the employees (respondents) are aged between 31 to 40 years. 47.5 percent respondents were aged between 19 to 30 years. This means 90 percent of respondents were young adults who completed their undergraduate and diploma were working in these teams. It was also found ISSN: 2289-4519
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that 60.5 percent respondents were holding an undergraduate degree, while 37 percent were holding a diploma. A cumulative percent of 97.5 percent respondents were holding only a diploma and undergraduate degree. 3.4. Procedure The researchers independently contacted the respondents using convenient sampling methods from the selected companies. In the chosen companies (500 staff was working currently). Samples of 200 respondents were chosen for this study. Additionally, permission from the company was obtained to meet the respondents in the companies. Respondents were met mostly while they were doing their work after obtaining their permission. A time period of 12 hours were spent for three weeks to collect data. The completed questionnaires were collected by the researchers and a follow up were made on the following week. 3.5. Measures Normality: In a descriptive statistical manner normality is tested by skewness and kurtosis. Kurtosis is defined as the statistical measure regarding the peak of a distribution. skewness is the average deviation from the cubed mean/standard deviation cubed. As per the thumb rule of skewness, if skewness is less that -1 or greater than +1 then the distributions regarded as highly skewed, but if skewness is between -1 and -0.005 and -1, then we conclude the distribution is moderately skewed. It is important to make sure the result is keep within -0.1 and 0.01 (Imna &Hassan, 2015). We found both skewness and kurtosis values lie between the normality rules of -2 to +2 (Dufour, et al, 2003). Total values of skewness fall within this range which indicates the normality of skewness. In kurtosis, Employee performance-EP: EP3 = 2.192 and EP4 = 2.251 was discovered to have slight deviation from the rule. This however is considered to be insignificant when compared to the whole data set. In view of this, the dataset is measured normal, further reliability measurement is thus conducted. Reliability: Reliability test for this research is measured using Cronbach’s Alpha value which measures the consistency of questionnaire (Likert scale). Rules of thumb for Cronbach’s Alpha are as follows: if Cronbach’s alpha > 0.90= very high reliability, 0.70 to 0.90= high reliability, 0.50 to 0.70= quiet low reliability, 0.50= very low reliability. If Cronbach’s alpha > 0.60 the questionnaire is very reliability if
