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Exploring m-leader affordances: team leaders and mobile technologies

Curt Gilstrap (Department of Accounting and Finance, University of Southern Indiana, Evansville, Indiana, USA)

Team Performance Management

ISSN: 1352-7592

Article publication date: 11 October 2018

Issue publication date: 7 March 2019

616

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to examine how mobile technologies impact virtual team leaders and provides insight into how mobile technologies afford leaders varied capacity to accomplish their team work.

Design/methodology/approach

The author addresses the research questions by assessing a large, qualitative data set drawn from surveyed mobile team leaders, analyzing the data using Leximancer software to explore naturally emerging concepts and then interpreting the data thematics using axial coding.

Findings

In addition to demonstrating that virtual team leaders are well aware they use mobile technologies regularly, this paper also suggests e-leaders be known as m-leaders, clarifies the entanglements of mobility and leadership practices and offers insight into the m-leader affordance dimensions of multimediality, multimodality, multichronicity and multimotility.

Originality/value

This paper is among the first to investigate team leaders relative to mobile technology as well as what such technology offers m-leaders and mobile teams. Additionally, the size of the data set provides unique insight into m-leaders’ experiences across myriad sectors.

Keywords

Citation

Gilstrap, C. (2019), "Exploring m-leader affordances: team leaders and mobile technologies", Team Performance Management, Vol. 25 No. 1/2, pp. 84-99. https://doi.org/10.1108/TPM-02-2018-0014

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited

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