Increased adoption and efficiency of self-managed teams,through the fulfilment of basic psychological needs (autonomy,competence and relatedness

Abstract

Organisational agility is growing more prominent within the banking sector. Performance of self-managed teams is specified as a component critical to better organisational agility. The contributing factors, which make self-managed teams, perform so well, are still not clearly understood. The high rate of failures in organisational change, brought on by employee resistance to change can also deter the adoption of these teams. The main objective of this research was to determine whether fulfilling the intrinsic motivators of autonomy, competence and relatedness described in self-determination theory, increased the overall willingness to adopt change and a desire to be part of a selfmanaged team. To a lesser extent, this study sought to determine whether age, gender and ethnicity could alter the perceived fulfilment of these basic psychological needs. This research contributes to the academic understanding of self-managed teams and provides insight into future research in this field. Using quantitative data, a descriptive research design was followed, with the data collected through the use of a questionnaire administered in a survey format. The questionnaire was put to a sample of banking employees in the process of adopting selfmanaged teams within their organisation. The results revealed that the more a person perceives that a self-managed team fulfils his or her need for autonomy, competence and relatedness; the increased desire to be part of these teams exists, and more openness to adopt the change to a self-managed team. Further insight drawn from the research shows that age, gender and ethnicity have no significance to the adoption of self-managed teams. Overall this research demonstrates that leadership s consideration of the basic psychological needs can greatly increase chances for success in the change to an agile organisation. The practical implications of this study were demonstrated in the conclusion of this research.