The Effects Of Conflict Asvmmetry On Team Performance

Past conflict researches often rest on the assumption that all members of a team perceive the same amount of conflict, neglecting the importance and difference of conflict perception. Yet in fact, some scholars have noticed the phenomenon of conflict asymmetry in teams, that is, different individuals have different perceptions about the conflict that exists in the team and the extent of this difference will affect team performance significantly. However, there is a lack of in-depth analysis of its emergence and the interpretation of the mechanism of its influence on team performance, thus giving chance to this research to inquire into the above questions from view of conflict process model. Research methods such as literature review, case study, questionnaire survey and data statistics are used.The present research has the following main conclusions. First, conflict asymmetry generally exists in most kinds of teams and emerges from various kinds of reasons; second, conflict asymmetry significantly affects team performance and relationship conflict asymmetry has a bigger influence; third, team trust mediates the effect of conflict asymmetry on team performance and the mediation effect is more obvious concerning affective trust; fourth, in teams that have past temporal orientation, relationship conflict asymmetry will cause the decrease of team trust more significantly and in teams that don’t have past temporal orientation, task conflict asymmetry will cause the decrease of cognitive team trust more significantly.The theory contribution of this research is as follows:first, it widens the existing conflict asymmetry research by combining conflict process model with the interpretation of its emergence and effect on team performance, using case study and data statistics to conduct respective analysis; second, it provides a new angle for team research by emphasizing the perception of intragroup conflict as a new source of team diversity; third, it introduces the concept of temporal orientation into conflict research, discussing different mechanism under different orientations and providing new restrictive conditions and applicable situations of the existing theory. Besides, the present research also gives out new sight and methods for managers to control conflict and improve team building.