Promoting the Emergence of Team Flow in Organizations

Abstract

An important question in the field of team research is how teams can optimize their collaboration to maximize their performance. When team members who are collaborating towards a common purpose experience flow together, the team, as a performing unit, improves its performance and delivers individual happiness to its members. From a practical point of view, it is relevant to know how team flow experiences arise within professional organizations. The aim of this study is therefore to get more insight into the how the elements of team flow emerge. We conducted interviews with team members, business leaders, and team experts, and in addition a survey with team members. The results provide confirmation of the existing research on team dynamics, flow, group and team flow and indicate that a collective ambition, professional autonomy, and open communication must be deliberately and carefully cultivated to set the stage for the other team flow prerequisites and thence for team flow to emerge.

A Scoping Review of Flow Research

“…In their conceptualization of team flow, they differentiate individual experiences of flow while being part of a team dynamic, with experiences of flow at the team level, where the team dynamic (or team process) itself, as a coherent unit, is flowing . When all members that are part of the team dynamic are experiencing flow while executing their personal tasks/roles for the team, and the collective itself is flowing a unique experience emerges, which they refer to as full team flow , that is originated by seven prerequisites and four experiential characteristics ( van den Hout et al, 2019 ; van den Hout and Davis, 2021 ).…”

Perspectives on group flow: Existing theoretical approaches and the development of the integrative group flow theory.

“…As outlined by Sawyer (2003), Pels et al (2018), and van den Hout et al (2018), the construct of group flow stems from Csikszentmihalyi's (1975Csikszentmihalyi's ( , 1985Csikszentmihalyi's ( , 2000 concept of flow. Briefly defined "flow is a state in which an individual is completely immersed in [an] activity without reflective self-consciousness but with a deep sense of control" (Engeser & Schiepe-Tiska, 2012, p. 1).…”

“…Conceptualization of Team Flow. The conceptualization of team flow (van den Hout et al, 2018Hout et al, , 2019 defines group flow (i.e., team flow as termed by van den Hout et al, 2018) as "a shared experience of flow derived from an optimized team dynamic during the execution of interdependent personal tasks" (van den Hout et al, 2018, p. 400). This conceptualization assumes that in group flow, all individual group members experience "[individual] flow simultaneously and collectively while executing their personal tasks for the [group's] purpose" (van den Hout et al, 2018, p. 400).…”

“…(1) The group flow prerequisites comprise the so-called group dynamics. In particular, the authors list (a) collective ambition, (b) common goal, (c) aligned personal goals, (d) high skill integration, (e) open communication, (f) safe environment, and (g) mutual commitment (van den Hout et al, 2018). These prerequisites need to be established in order to allow for (2) group flow characteristics to occur: (a) sense of unity, (b) sense of joint progress, (c) mutual trust, and (d) holistic focus (van den Hout et al, 2018).…”

“…In particular, the authors list (a) collective ambition, (b) common goal, (c) aligned personal goals, (d) high skill integration, (e) open communication, (f) safe environment, and (g) mutual commitment (van den Hout et al, 2018). These prerequisites need to be established in order to allow for (2) group flow characteristics to occur: (a) sense of unity, (b) sense of joint progress, (c) mutual trust, and (d) holistic focus (van den Hout et al, 2018). The group flow characteristics stabilize, in turn, the group flow prerequisites and lead to positive outcomes (e.g., higher performance and positive mood of every individual and the group).…”