The roles of R&D team leaders in Korea: a contingent approach

Abstract

This study empirically examines the relationship between the role of R&D project leaders and their team performance using data from 87 project teams in 6 R&D organizations in Korea. The results reveal that: (1) R&D project leaders played five different roles in performing their jobs – strategic planner, team builder, gatekeeper, technical expert, and champion; (2) All but the champion role of a leader is positively related with project team performance; (3) However, this relationship between the role of leader and project team performance varies according to the characteristics of R&D project teams and their tasks. Specifically, it becomes important for a leader to focus less on the team building role as the team gets older. The team building role of a leader, however, is more important for higher performance of relatively certain R&D projects, while for uncertain R&D projects, the strategic planning role appears to be more crucial. Based on these results, this study discusses several managerial and theoretical issues related to the role of a leader in R&D project teams.

<img src="http://openjournals.net/files/pics/CEU.gif"/> Exploring the development of an organisational culture of control and dependency from a systems psychodynamic perspective

“…However, this composition could also have resulted in groupthink and a negative impact on performance in situations requiring innovativeness such as in a changing environment (Bottom & Baloff, 1994;Dirks, 1999;Earley, 1999;Elron, 1997;Keck, 1997;Kim, Min & Cha, 1999;Knight et al, 1999;McCauley, 1998;Shaw & Barrett-Power, 1998;Sohoran, 1993;Watson, Johnson & Merritt, 1998;West & Anderson, 1996). At a dynamic level, a system deals with the fears associated with change by creating safety within (Bar-Lev Elieli, 2001).…”

Effectiveness of innovation leadership styles: a manager's influence on ecological innovation in construction projects

“…• Structuring innovation processes: The leader creates organizational systems and processes that produce innovative products and services (McDonough and Leifer, 1986;Barczak and Wilemon, 1989;Nadler and Tushman, 1990;Sillince, 1994;Kim et al, 1999;Norrgren and Schaller, 1999;Stoker et al, 2001); • (McDonough and Leifer, 1986;Barczak and Wilemon, 1989;Nadler and Tushman, 1990;Sillince, 1994;Eisenbach et al, 1999;Kim et al, 1999); • Rewarding innovators: The leader gratifies persons who contribute to the innovative organizational systems and processes (Nadler and Tushman, 1990;Sillince, 1994;Eisenbach et al, 1999).…”

“…The innovation management literature presents leadership as a role to be performed by managers but also by employees (Chakrabarti, 1974;Roberts and Fusfeld, 1981;Kim et al, 1999;Hauschildt and Kirchmann, 2001). It typifies and defines leadership roles such as: 1) inventor: the leader promotes the technological know-how that is translated into innovative products and services (Chakrabarti, 1974;Maidique, 1980;Lawless and Price, 1992;Shane et al, 1994;Hauschildt and Kirchmann, 2001); 2) champion: the leader promotes the organizational adoption of innovations (Chakrabarti, 1974;Maidique, 1980;Markham et al, 1991;Hauschildt and Kirchmann, 2001); 3) entrepreneur: the leader initiates, drives and controls the innovation strategies and processes in the organization (Schumpeter, 1934;Quinn, 1979;Roberts and Fusfeld, 1981;McDonough and Leifer, 1986;Nam and Tatum, 1997); 4) gatekeeper: the leader gathers and processes information about changes in the organization and its environment (Chakrabarti, 1974;Roberts and Fusfeld, 1981;Barczak and Wilemon, 1989;Kim et al, 1999); 5) sponsor: the leader promotes innovation with his/her hierarchical position (Maidique, 1980;Roberts and Fusfeld, 1981;Hauschildt and Kirchmann, 2001).…”

“…Managers with a strong influence on innovation processes in organizations have substantial leadership competence (Roberts and Fusfeld, 1981;Galbraith, 1982;Barczak and Wilemon, 1989;Tatum, 1989;Nam and Tatum, 1989;McDonough and Barczak, 1991;Clark and Wheelwright, 1992;Burpitt and Bigoness, 1997;Winch, 1998;Kim et al, 1999;Norrgren and Schaller, 1999;Gann, 2000;Hauschildt and Kirchmann, 2001;Stoker et al, 2001;Jung et al, 2003;Bossink, 2004). Leadership in innovative construction projects is often seen as an important management function, based on human capabilities like: entrepreneurship, championship and strategic vision (Tatum, 1989;Nam and Tatum, 1989;Winch, 1998;Gann, 2000;Bossink, 2002cBossink, , 2004.…”

R&D managers' adaptation of firms' HRM practices

“…Furthermore, we would like to avoid possible similarities in HRM practices due to the fact that the firms follow similar strategies (Lepak et al, 2007) or are dominated by similar coalitions (Ocasio, 1999). For this purpose, we looked for firms in different economic sectors, geographical (Greenberg, 1996;Folger and Cropanzano, 1998;Wiesenfeld et al, 2007) Delegation and managerial support (Amabile, 1996;Kim et al, 1999;Christensen, 2000;Pe´rez and Quevedo, 2006) Delegation of decisions, department's project selection process, establishment of the mission and strategy; development of team leadership and allocation of resources to help support and work out ideas Networks and multidisciplinary teams (Chatterji and Thomas, 1993;Sen and Engelhoff, 2000;Sundgren et al, 2005) The presence of collaborative networks: internal (through the creation of multidisciplinary teams) and external (working with clients, suppliers or universities) in the job organization of department workers Psychological arguments about social comparison (Wood, 1989;Taylor et al, 1990;Ployhart et al, 2006) Recruitment policy (Coombs and Rosse, 1992;Saura and Go´mez Mejı´a, 1997) Policies and instruments used to attract the desired workers Job rotation (McGill et al, 1992;Go´mez Mejı´a et al, 2001) The allocation of different tasks or jobs maintaining the same job position or pay Political arguments (Schneider, 1987;Ocasio, 1999;Lepak and Snell, 2002) Remuneration (Saura and Go´mez Mejı´a, 1997;Manolopoulos, 2006) Pay systems. Variable versus fixed pay Career development (Kim and Cha, 2000;Klarsfeld et al, 2003) Career support: Measurement and development of abilities, training, development.…”