Group Performance in Information Systems Project Groups: An Empirical Study

Most modern organizations require individuals to work in teams to perform their tasks. Information systems development teams, advertising teams, and new product development teams are only a few examples from the business community. The group work environment creates challenges for the group members that may affect the group’s performance. The relevance and importance of group performance and its antecedents has been addressed in other areas of research: in Social Cognitive Theory (Bandura, 1997), and group related research theories (Festinger, Schachter, & Back, 1950; Gibson, 1999; Salas, Rozell, Mullen, & Driskell, 1999; Woodman & Sherwood, 1980). The importance of group work is also recognized within IS practice (Gorla & Lam, 2004; Sawyer, 2004) and IS education (Ford & Morice 2003; Gackowski, 2003; Whatley, 2004) as organizations look for ways to improve group performance (Lee & Farh, 2004; Trimmer, 1997; Van Der Vyer & Lane, 2003). For example, organizations are looking for products, such as groupware software and web portals, that allow for online collaborative work, in turn helping them to think more quickly, to reduce production costs, and to get those products to the market sooner. Another example are IS projects that involve group work is Information Systems Development (ISD) which often involve systems analysts and designers working in a group setting, either face-to-face or through electronic collaboration. As a result, organizations need to have an in-depth understanding of what encourages groups to perform better (Phan, Vogel, & Nunamaker, 1995; Yang & Tang, 2004) regardless of the medium of communication. Moreover, Alavi, Wheeler, and Valacich (1995) suggest that this issue needs to be incorporated into IS and business education.