The Structure and Function of Team Conflict State Profiles

Abstract

Team conflict types include task conflict, relationship conflict, and process conflict. Whereas differences in views about the task (task conflict) are often argued to be beneficial, incompatibilities involving personal issues (relationship conflict) and execution issues (process conflict) are often argued to be harmful. However, previous empirical research has tended to treat team conflict types as independent from each other despite their natural coexistence in teams. In two separate studies and one replication study, we identified latent patterns of team conflict, in the form of conflict profiles, that were defined by distinct levels of task conflict, relationship conflict, and process conflict. In Study 1, we investigated whether the conflict profiles had implications for team conflict management and team potency. In Study 2, we examined the generalizability of the conflict profiles to teams with longer life cycles, and we investigated the implications of conflict profiles for team performance. Findings indicated that teams can be reliably assigned to particular profiles of team conflict and that these profiles replicate well. The results also indicate that the implications of a particular type of conflict depend on the pattern of the team’s conflict profile as a whole. Drawing from information processing theory, we found that teams with high task conflict and low relationship and process conflict tend to have more effective interactions and achieve superior outcomes. This “team-centric” approach appears to provide promising new avenues for advancing current theories of conflict in organizational work teams.