Study of Composition & Performance of Global IT Project Teams : An Analysis of Cross-Sectional, Longitudinal & Exceptional Performances

Abstract

Virtual project teams, with their members distributed across onshore-nearshore-offshore locations, have been primary units of delivery for Global IT industry. While the industry has increasingly evolved towards increased standardization & process-driven methodologies, team composition continues to be a significant factor impacting team performance. Rich composition is widely accepted among industry practitioners as a key risk mitigation for various contingencies e.g. high requirements volatility & technology complexity, need for innovation & co-creation. Given the challenges of ever increasing cost of talent acquisition & retention, non-availability of timely talent, and pressures to lower cost of delivery, it becomes imperative for project managers to arrive at an optimal tradeoff. The wide spectrum of elements related to team composition (esp. demographic & experience profiles) along with influencing factors (esp. business cadence & landscape construct) makes it difficult to estimate & control their impact on team performance. However, the comprehensive study of impact of team composition on the performance of virtual project teams remains under explored in literature – esp. in the context of Global IT industry. The challenges and gaps are: (a) current empirical studies are based on smaller sample sizes, (b) the limited studies available only focus on smaller subset of team composition variables, thereby do not capture its impact in entirety, and (c) their focus is primary focus cross-sectional dimensions or high performance teams (HPTs), significantly neglecting the impact in longitudinal & low performance scenarios. This thesis addresses these research gaps by addressing the overarching research objective to understand the impact of team composition on the performance of global IT project teams. In this pursuit, the study (a) develops a conceptual framework by rigorous statistical analysis of hard-measures of performance, (b) builds an integrative view of impact in cross-sectional vs longitudinal and high vs low performance scenarios, (c) scrutinizes the moderating impact of control variables on performance, and (d) creates guidelines for managers and policy makers in Global IT industry for effective management of virtual team performance. This research makes three significant contributions to literature: (a) A unique conceptual framework is developed that comprehensively covers the impact of team composition (with focus on demographic & experience profiles) on the performance of virtual project teams, (b) This study is first of its kind to empirically establish this impact, using a large-sized cross-functional sample, in the context of Global IT industry including the influence of elements of business cadence & landscape construct as control variables, (c) The research provides an integrative view of the impact of team composition on the performance of virtual project teams – spanning across cross-sectional, longitudinal, low & high performance scenarios.