A Mechanism Study On The Influence Of Conflict Management Approaches On Team-member Exchange

With the rapid economic development and global competition among enterprises, teamsgrow more and more popular in organizations as a working form. Teams have outstandingperformances in fulfilling complex tasks and coping with the fierce external competition, andthey have become an important performance units and learning units increasingly in manyorganizations. In order for the teams to progress smoothly and perform the tasks with highquality and efficiency, they need to be managed effectively. The quality of the relationshipsbetween the team and its members has a significant influence on many outcome variables ofboth the team level and individual level.Team-member exchange(TMX) indicates the quality of the relationship between thewhole team and the single member, and the degree of identity of each other’s abilities andcharacters, as well as the team identification. However, conflicts always exist in the team’soperation process, and what influences conflicts between members will have depends on theconflict management approaches that members take, i.e. how to deal with conflicts.Appropriate conflict management approaches can not only solve the conflicts, but alsopromote the relationships between team members, and the process concludes the informationsharing intention. The purpose of this study is deducing and analyzing the productionmechanism of TMX, and investigating the influence of conflict management approaches onTMX. This study uses the empirical research method, and takes the employees in teams as therespondents.300questionnaires were issued to the Yangtze River delta area, and267validquestionnaires were recovered. The collected date was statistical analyzed by using mathematical statistics analysis tools SPSS18.0and LISREL8.80.Research findings show that the cooperative conflict management approach has apositive significant influence on TMX and information sharing intention, while thecompetitive conflict management approach has no significant influence on TMX andinformation sharing intention. Information sharing intention has a positive significantinfluence on TMX and a mediation effect in the process of the cooperative conflictmanagement approach influencing TMX.Based on the study conclusions, the team manager could lead the team members to adoptthe cooperative conflict management approach to confront conflicts from both teaminstitution and culture, and encourage the members to integrate one’s own goals into team’sgoals and work hard for team’s goals. Team members could have targeted training for theabove situations. Besides, the team manager should establish relaxed and positive teamatmosphere to create environment in favor of information sharing intention, and encouragethe communication between members with corresponding configuration. In the end, themanager could organize some collective activities or practical courses for the members tofoster the sense of identity and expectation to team. Also, the manager’s justice and equity,and fairness in meting out rewards or punishment could make the members feel the trust fromteam, which is to the benefit of both TMX’s production and team’s development andimprovement.