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The purpose of this paper is to examine team external learning, particularly focusing on: how leader external learning behavior affects team external learning; how team external learning influences employee creativity; and whether team internal learning is a moderator between the cross‐level relationship of external learning and employee creativity in Chinese R&D teams.

Survey questionnaire were administered to a sample of 80 R&D teams comprising 331 employees from three medium‐sized Chinese high‐tech companies. HLM was used to test cross‐level relationships.

The paper hypothesizes that: leader external learning positively influences team external learning; team external learning leads to employee creativity; and team internal learning moderates the relationship between team external learning and employee creativity. Results support hypotheses 2 and 3, but not hypothesis 1. In addition, leader external learning is found to positively influence employee creativity.

This study has implications for both team leaders and top management. Although the context of this study is in Chinese R&D teams, all those teams facing similar environment to R&D teams can also learn from this study. There are several interesting implications for scholars who are studying teams, creativity and innovation.

Combining fields of team learning, boundary spanning, creativity and leadership, the paper addresses the following four questions, and provides further insights to the area of team external learning: First, what is the cross level relationship between team external learning and employee creativity? Second, is internal learning a moderator on the relationship between team external learning and employee creativity in R&D project teams? Third, is leader external learning behavior one of antecedents of team external learning? Fourth, is there anything unique about team external learning in Chinese culture? The paper provides research evidence for each of these questions.

The effectiveness of using team learning to improve team performance has been well documented in the literature, and this notion makes intuitive sense. However, little empirical research has been dedicated to the relationship between team learning and team performance, probably owing to the lack of a widely acceptable instrument for assessing team learning. In this study, a psychometric (validity and reliability) examination of Edmondson’s Team Learning Survey (TLS) is undertaken. This instrument was then used to examine the effects of internal and external team learning on team performance. Implications and limitations of the study findings are discussed.

Despite a plethora of studies purporting that learning could occur at the individual, team and organizational levels, there is still a lack of reported empirical evidence on these linkages. Accordingly, these theoretical assumptions will be tested with empirical evidences in this study. Interestingly and contrary to the literature, individual learning was not significantly related to organizational learning. Internal team learning (learning within teams) was partially related to organizational learning, and external team learning (cross‐functional team learning) was significantly related to organizational learning. Organizational learning was conceptualized and tested as a three‐factor variable that consists of commitment to learning, shared vision, and open‐mindedness. A discussion of the results is provided.

This paper aims to understand the effects of team power asymmetry (hierarchy) on team learning.

Literature suggests that power asymmetry can hurt team learning due to unequal interactions. The authors integrate the situated focus theory of power and the theory of adversarial growth to propose that environmental hardship can moderate this relationship. Such that, under environmental hardship there is a shift in power relations within hierarchical teams, such that power asymmetry positively relates to team learning via increased team egalitarianism (interactional equality).

The study is presented in two parts. Part 1 reviews the literature and builds the theoretical arguments for the conceptual model, while Part 2 empirically examines the model on a sample of military teams. In Part 1, the authors propose a theoretically derived model and directions for future research in team power, dynamics and learning.

It provides directions to empirically validate a contingency-based model to resolve the dilemma of creating equality and high levels of team learning in hierarchical teams.

The conceptual model and hypotheses contribute to the team learning literature by theoretically clarifying the conditions under which power asymmetry is likely to improve team learning.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a greater understanding of the role of team learning by examining the link between team centrality and organisational learning.

This paper is a conceptual paper that examines a range of literature related to team learning. It is the first paper in a series of three. The final paper examines the propositions developed in this and a subsequent paper by exploring team learning in over 30 large companies across a range of industries. Team processes are all but defined by pre‐existing organisational processes. At one extreme, they are directive and driven. At another, they are dynamic and fluid and underlie a degree of self‐managed activity. Team processes accordingly are potentially dynamic or rather basic depending on the level of structured or unstructured activity. The paper suggests that potentially dynamic teams are those that display superior learning routines that are embodied within each team's processes. This paper contends that team learning is a centrally located variable within organisational learning processes.

To date, team characteristics, team building, and team structures have been the focus of much research, but team learning routines have been underplayed in the team's literature. Teams are central in the organisational learning process.

This paper establishes the theoretical underpinning for a final paper that will make significant recommendations. There are practical implications, however, of various links across the themes, particularly the centrality of the team in the learning process.

This paper is a highly valuable due to very little research being completed to date on this topic.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how different team learning activities relate to different types of team performance as rated by team members and managers.

The 624 respondents, working in 88 teams in seven different organizations indicate their perceptions of team learning and their performance ratings of the team. Moreover, managers in the organization are asked to evaluate the team performance.

Team member ratings of effectiveness are positively related to the boundedness and stability of the team and information processing and negatively related to information acquisition. Manager ratings of effectiveness are positively related to boundedness and stability, information processing and information storage and retrieval. Team member ratings of efficiency are positively related to information processing and negatively related to information acquisition. Manager ratings of efficiency are positively related to boundedness and stability and information storage and retrieval. Team member ratings of innovativeness are positively related to information processing, while no predictors are found for manager ratings of innovativeness.

Since the data are cross‐sectional, the authors cannot draw conclusion about the causality between the variables. Longitudinal designs that study the sequence of team learning and team performance are called for. Furthermore, future studies might include more objective performance measures.

As team learning proved to have predictive value for diverse team performance indicators, rated by team members and managers, team should carefully organise their learning process in order to enhance their performance.

Although some studies have proven the significance of team learning for team performance, none have investigated which team learning activities are related to which types of performance ratings.

The purpose of this paper is an examination of the literature on team boundary activity to trace how team boundary activity has evolved as a construct and examine the dimensions of team boundary activity and their relationships. It highlights the need for a deeper examination of the dimensions of buffering and reinforcement, and why buffering and reinforcement are required. It presents the case of why it is important to study this topic and maps out areas for future research.

The paper reviews conceptual and empirical papers published on team boundary activity in reputed journals between the years 1984 and 2016.

The focus of research in team boundary activity has been on external interactions of the team (boundary spanning), and very few papers have studied the activities through which the team defines and defends its borders (boundary strengthening). These boundary-strengthening activities can be equally important for innovation and learning in externally dependent teams. Further, there is a need to clearly distinguish these constructs from other variables like team identification. Another area that has here-to not been researched is the relationships between the dimensions of team boundary activity. Last, there is a need to consider a wider range of antecedents, outcomes and moderators of team boundary activity.

This paper is based on past empirical and conceptual papers, identified using search terms such as team boundary activity, team boundary spanning and external communication. Other related areas can also be explored for identifying variables of interest.

As opposed to previous reviews which focused mainly on team boundary spanning, this paper considers all dimensions of team boundary activity, with special focus on buffering and reinforcement. It proposes a 2 × 2 framework to explain the effect of boundary-spanning and boundary-strengthening activities on the achievement of team objectives. It examines the cyclical nature of relationship between team boundary activity and team performance. It highlights measurement issues in the area of team boundary activity.

By relying on social learning theory, the authors aim to evaluate how team characteristics as evaluated by a team coach impact participation in leadership development program activities. Specifically, the authors hypothesize that teams with high levels of competence and social support would participate more team and program-wide training activities.

The authors examine 41 teams (266 participants) in a leadership development program and develop a two-by-two matrix to categorize teams based on their underlying characteristics for the purpose of identifying participation differences.

The mixed results indicate how team social support is a key driver for participation in team activities and how team competence is associated with less participation in program-wide activities in a leadership development program.

The results point to the importance of team characteristics when using teams for education and training programs such as leadership development programs. Team characteristics such as team competence and team social support should be considered when building teams and for team facilitation needs during education and training programs that implore teams to enhance learning.

Although the use of teams as an organizing strategy is popular, very little research has examined the effectiveness of this strategy by taking a deeper look at team characteristics and how these impact participation in a leadership development program.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of team learning processes (information acquisition, information processing and information storage and retrieval) on team performance in software development projects and to assess the effect of ethical leadership and its influence on these processes.

The authors examined 354 software development project teams in Thailand. A quantitative study was conducted through a Web-based survey, with structural equation modelling used to test the hypotheses.

The results of this study revealed that ethical leadership is positively correlated with the team learning processes of information acquisition, information processing and information storage and retrieval. However, only information processing and information storage and retrieval are positively related to team performance. The results indicate that ethical leadership has a positive direct effect on team performance. The results also show that the positive relationship between ethical leadership and team performance is partially mediated by team learning processes, namely, information processing and information storage and retrieval.

This study highlights the importance of ethical leadership and guides managers towards considering the characteristics of both ethical leadership and team learning processes for enhancing team performance in software development projects.

This is the first study to the best of authors’ knowledge to examine the role of team learning processes in mediating the relationship between ethical leadership and team performance, particularly concerning software development projects. The present research contributes to the literature on team performance management, emphasising the manner in which ethical leadership can result in team learning and team performance. The findings of this study can be used to encourage organisations to develop ethical leadership behaviours and team learning processes in software development projects.