July 30, 2009 Vol. 2, Issue 7

Performance pressure can be a critical barrier to a team’s effective use of knowledge, according to a working paper by Heidi K. Gardner of Harvard Business School.

When the pressure is on, groups look to high status members and don’t utilize other members who may have more involvement, knowledge, or familiarity with the customer. The result, Gardner says in “Feeling the Heat: Effects of Performance Pressure on Team’s Knowledge Use and Performance,” (PDF) is a paradox: “the more important the project, the less effective the team.”

Gardner studied four teams from a global management consulting firm and two from a Big 4 accounting firm. She then surveyed 600 individuals representing 104 teams in the consulting and accounting firms. Her research led her to the conclusion that teams “interpret performance pressure as having potentially negative consequences, leading them to reduce cognitive processing and rely on their default processes.” This finding was consistent with existing “threat rigidity” theory, which posits that teams undergo a constriction of control when they fear a negative outcome.