Effects of Individual Differences on the Performance of Hierarchical Decision-Making Teams: Much More Than g

The authors propose (a) that team members' general cognitive ability ( g ) and conscientiousness are key resources for hierarchical decision-making teams with distributed expertise; (b) that a conjunctive model is most appropriate for capturing staff members' standing on these attributes; and (c) that in addition to main effects, staff attributes interact with those of the leader to determine team performance. Results from a study of 51 four-person teams performing a computerized decision-making task show that decision accuracy was highest when both the leader and staff (defined conjunctively) were high on g and conscientiousness. Post hoc analyses suggest reactions to the weakest member differed depending on whether the member was low in g or conscientiousness. Low- g members were helped, whereas low-conscientiousness members were ignored.