The mediating effect of team trust on shared leadership and team performance

Purpose

As team members temporarily assume the role of leader, a system of shared leadership emerges. This study had three purposes: (a) to test the underlying three dimensions of shared leadership behaviors, (b) to examine the relationship between shared leadership behaviors and team performance, and (c) to examine the mediating effect of trust between team members’ perceptions of shared leadership and performance.

Design/methodology/approach

We used the sub-dimensions of shared leadership: relation-oriented shared leadership (ROSL), task-oriented shared leadership (TOSL), and creativity-oriented shared leadership (COSL). We collected survey data from college student teams at two different time points.

Findings

This study’s factor analysis results supported a second-order factor model that explains shared leadership with TOSL, ROSL, and a new COSL construct. Additionally, we discovered that shared leadership behaviors predicted team performance both directly and indirectly through team trust.

Originality/value

This study confirms the role of the new sub-dimension of COSL originally discovered by video analysis of project teams (Leight et al., 2018), thereby adding value to shared leadership research. This quantitative study supports the COSL with TOSL and ROSL in a second-order model where each component contributes unique input into the team dynamics. Our findings underscore the significance of shared leadership in elevating team trust, ultimately resulting in improved team performance. This insight holds particular relevance for educational management and leadership, offering a framework for understanding how shared leadership practices can positively influence team dynamics within academic contexts.