From member creativity to team creativity? Team information elaboration as moderator of the additive and disjunctive models

Abstract

One of the most fundamental questions in team creativity research is the relationship between individual member creativity and team creativity. The two answers that team creativity research has advanced–teams are more creative when their average member creativity is higher (the additive model) and teams are more creative when their most creative member is more creative (the disjunctive model) are straightforward. Surprising, however, is that neither the additive model nor the disjunctive model is consistently supported, begging the question of what moderates the predictive power of these models. We address this question by integrating individual-to-team creativity models with team process research. We propose that team information elaboration is a key moderating variable, such that average member creativity is more positively related to team creativity with higher information elaboration, and the highest member creativity is more positively related to team creativity with lower information elaboration. A multi-source study of 60 sales teams (483 employees) in a Chinese bakery chain supported these hypotheses. In addition, the study did not support the prediction that the most creative member’s outgoing advice ties (as a conduit for the dissemination of ideas) would further moderate the joint effect of the highest individual creativity and team information elaboration on team creativity.