Team-member exchange (TMX) examines a team member's willingness to exchange ideas, feedback, advice, and support with his or her teammates and the team's willingness to reciprocally provide help and recognition to this individual. I adopt a multi-level motivational perspective on team-based exchanges and examine the motivational antecedents and outcomes of exchanges at both the individual and team levels. I propose that prosocial motivation is an antecedent of team-based exchanges. More specifically, I contend that prosocial motivation in the form of psychological collectivism positively influences TMX and team-level collectivism positively influences TMX-team, and I further contend that a training to improve prosocial competencies within the team provides trait-activating cues that positively moderate these relationships. Further, I contend that prosocial competency training has a positive direct relationship with TMX-team and a negative direct relationship with TMX differentiation. With regards to outcomes, I propose that exchanges have an empowering effect on teams and their members, however this relationship is contingent on TMX differentiation. Using social comparison theory as a conceptual base, I contend that differentiation is indicative of the comparisons that occur in teams. At the individual level, I propose that differentiation allows for comparisons amongst team members with regards to TMX levels and that these comparisons emphasize individual TMX levels; correspondingly, I propose that differentiation positively influences the relationship between TMX and psychological empowerment. At the team level, I propose that differentiation represents a team that isn’t functioning optimally because of the variability in exchange quality, thus I contend that differentiation diminishes the empowering effect of TMX-team. Finally, I argue that empowerment provides a motivational mechanism linking TMX to individual success (task performance and viability) and linking TMX-team to team success (task performance and viability) that is contingent upon the differentiation within the team. I examine my hypotheses through utilizing the Harvard Business Publishing simulation titled "Everest V2" (Roberto & Edmondson, 2011). This teamwork simulation consists of a team of five hikers that are attempting to summit Mount Everest. Using a sample of 295 students who composed 59 teams, I find varied levels of support for my hypotheses. I find that psychological collectivism and team mean collectivism positively influence TMX and TMX-team respectively, however prosocial competency training did not moderate these relationships as proposed. Prosocial competency training surprisingly increased rather than decreased TMX differentiation. With regards to outcomes, TMX promoted peer-rated performance and individual viability through psychological empowerment as predicted, however TMX differentiation did not significantly influence these relationships. At the team-level, TMX-team similarly promoted performance and viability through team empowerment, and TMX differentiation did have a significant influence on these relationships. However, differentiation affected these relationships in the opposite direction than proposed such that the effects were strengthened as differentiation increased. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.Ph.D., Business Administration -- Drexel University, 201
