Who Speaks Up More Matters for Team Performance: A Status Perspective on Voice Distribution

Drawing upon expectation states theory, the present research examined the influence of two status characteristics (age and tenure with leader) on individual voice behavior (individual level) and more importantly, the implications of status-voice (mis)match for team performance (team level). We also proposed that team task conflict moderates the relationship between status-voice (mis)match and team performance. Multi-source data from 634 team members nested in 139 teams, which further nested in 49 firms was collected to test our model. Hierarchical Linear Modeling analysis demonstrated that at the individual level, team members who are older and with longer tenure with leader tend to speak up more than those who are younger and with shorter tenure with leader; at the team level, when team members’ voice distribution was aligned with their status hierarchy (older and longer tenure members voice more), team performance is improved. This positive effect is particularly likely to occur when team task conflict is high. We discussed theoretical and practical implications of our findings.