Duality of Workload in Teams: A Daily Investigation of Team Workload and Team Functioning

While workload has been traditionally studied as a type of challenge stressor with motivational benefits for employees, recent research suggests that the nature of workload is more complex and nuanced than merely eliciting positive reactions. Although this perspective has emerged in the study of workload at the individual level, research on collective workload in teams and the associated team-based mechanisms remains underexplored. Particularly, team-based work arrangements come with both enhanced capabilities to meet task goals and heightened expectations for team members; encountering and handling collective workload can motivate team members’ engagement in collective actions (i.e., team processes) and at the same time drive their appraisals of teamwork experience as depleting. To examine this dual account, we draw from job demands–resources theory to elucidate how and when team workload impacts team effectiveness via both positive and negative pathways. Using daily diary and objective record data collected from 610 employees working in 99 bank branches (i.e., teams) for five workdays, we found daily team workload enhanced daily team processes, which in turn benefited team member satisfaction at the end of each workday and team performance during the study period. We also found daily team workload elevated daily team member depletion, which hindered end-of-work team member satisfaction. Further, we found team members’ perceived task significance and positive affect at the beginning of each workday strengthened and buffered, respectively, the positive association between daily team workload and daily team processes or daily team member depletion. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.