International Journal of Managing Projects in Business

Antecedents of team turnover intentions in temporary organizations:

Development of a research model
Helge F.R. Nuhn Andreas Wald
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Received 8 October 2014
Revised 12 November 2014
29 April 2015
Accepted 30 June 2015
International Journal of Managing
Projects in Business
Vol. 9 No. 1, 2016
pp. 194-213
© Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1753-8378
DOI 10.1108/IJMPB-10-2014-0067
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Antecedents of team
turnover intentions in
temporary organizations
Development of a research model
Helge F.R. Nuhn
Horváth & Partner GmbH, Frankfurt, Germany, and
Andreas Wald
School of Business and Law, University of Agder, Kristiansand, Norway
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to shed light on the antecedents of team turnover intentions
in temporary organizations such as projects, programs, or temporary teams.
Design/methodology/approach – The authors systematically combine the findings from the
literature on the antecedents of turnover intentions in permanent organizations (PO) with
the characteristics of temporary organizations (TO) and develop a research model comprising
personal factors, job-related factors, and organization-related factors.
Findings – A research model consisting of testable propositions that the authors derived from both
specificities of TO and the antecedents of turnover intentions in PO.
Originality/value – The authors contribute to literature by identifying potential antecedents of
turnover intentions that are specific to TOs and those that also exist in POs but are adapted to
a temporary context. The research model allows future empirical research on turnover in TO to be
conducted in a systematic way and supports the development of theory.
Keywords Turnover, Project, Team, Turnover intentions, Permanent organization,
Temporary organization
Paper type Conceptual paper
1. Introduction
Temporary organizations (TO) such as projects, programs, or task forces are a
widely employed working mode within permanent organizations (PO) (Bakker,
2010). Although in practice the distinction between a TO and a PO is not always
clear-cut (Hanisch and Wald, 2014), the literature on TOs has carved out several
specificities which differentiate this organizational form from POs and require
further analysis in research (Bakker, 2010). One of these yet unconsidered
specificities lies within the quitting/staying behavior of employees that work within
these TOs. Similar to employees holding positions within POs, employees working
for a TO may develop the wish to work in another TO but to remain with the same
company nevertheless. Analyzing such employee behavior is important, because
turnover has detrimental effects: research on turnover in project teams found that
project turnover can negatively affect the motivation of project team members,
reduce project performance and prevent the project objectives from being met
(Parker and Skitmore, 2005; Hall et al., 2008; Scott-Young and Samson, 2008).
For instance, members of a TO bear important knowledge, which is lost when they
prematurely leave the team (Lindner and Wald, 2011). It is therefore important to
understand how turnover intentions in TO develop, in order to distinguish them
from regular turnover intentions.
 The aim of this paper is to develop a comprehensive research model that comprises Antecedents
different factors which influence turnover intentions in temporary organizations of team TITO
(TITO). We first elaborate on the characteristics of the TO before we review different
antecedents of turnover intentions revealed by empirical research that was conducted
in a PO context. Finally, we present a research model whose propositions are informed
by systematic combination of these two dimensions. The research model will allow
future empirical research on TITO to be conducted in a systematic way and support the 195
development of theory.
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2. Temporary Organizations
Goodman and Goodman (1976) define the TO as “A set of diversely skilled people,
working together on a complex task over a limited time period […].” More recently,
this definition has been refined by research that tried to carve out the characteristics
that distinguish TOs from POs (Lundin and Söderholm, 1995; Hobday, 2000; Mathieu
et al., 2008; Janowicz-Panjaitan et al., 2009; Bakker, 2010; Hanisch and Wald, 2014).
We build on this work and consider four main characteristics of TOs: team, task,
time, and context.

2.1 Time
Temporariness constitutes the most important characteristic of TOs. Literature
seems to widely agree on three main aspects of temporariness: first, the end may be
pre-determined (Turner and Müller, 2003); second, the organization is only in
existence for a relatively short time; and third, there is a collective awareness of the
impending termination ( Janowicz-Panjaitan et al., 2009). TOs are usually part of a
permanent surrounding organization (Bakker, 2010), which often implies that
members are part-time members only. It may thus be of importance how an
employee’s working time is divided between (potentially multiple) TOs and the PO.
Although temporariness is at the core of TOs, it yet remains an under-researched
aspect of TOs ( Janowicz-Panjaitan et al., 2009).

2.2 Team
Team aspects include team size, diversity, cohesion, personality, and other aspects like
leadership or team-member interactions (Bakker, 2010). TO teams are usually highly
skilled and display high degrees of heterogeneity and interdisciplinarity (Zwikael and
Unger-Aviram, 2010; Mello and Ruckes, 2006). TO teams may change their composition
over time (Kozlowski and Bell, 2003; Bakker, 2010) and, as opposed to teams in POs,
disperse upon termination of the TO (Chen et al., 2004).

2.3 Task
Tasks in a TO are usually new, unique, or complex (Bechky, 2006; Goodman and
Goodman, 1976). This causes higher degrees of uncertainty and risk (Atkinson et al., 2006;
Brockhoff, 2006). TOs are often employed to bring about change and therefore rely
less on standardized processes and routines than POs (Amabile et al., 1994; Hanisch
and Wald, 2014).

2.4 Context
Bakker (2010) adds context to the characteristics of the TO. He introduces this
perspective to suggest how POs can make use of TOs. From the point of view of the PO,
TO membership of employees may appear like a temporary part-time assignment.
 IJMPB However, we consider how TOs relate to their context: as the context comprises usually
9,1 one or more companies, the context category should rather consider how TOs integrate
into their surrounding PO(s). To this end, the context of a TO is a set of rules and
boundaries (Hobday, 2000).

3. Research on the antecedents of turnover intentions

196 In order to identify the relevant antecedents of TI in TO contexts, we conducted a
literature review on the antecedents of turnover intentions in POs. We build upon
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comprehensive findings on motivational forces behind turnover intentions (Maertz and

Griffeth, 2004; Griffeth et al., 2000). Yet, we needed to reduce the vast amount of
existing research in order to allow for systematic analyses at the interface of TOs.
The main objective is to only include those findings which would likely be affected by
the conditions met in TO. Reviewing the literature, a potential categorization of TI
antecedents suggested itself, which we will use to structure our research model:
personal, job-related, and organization-related TI antecedents.

3.1 Personal factors

Personal factors include personal traits, feelings, attitudes, and states of mind.
Motivation plays a major role in studies on work-related behavior and can be
considered a prime factor leading to turnover intentions. Lacking intrinsic or extrinsic
motivation affects employees in a similar way (Spillane, 1973; Deci and Ryan, 1985;
Galletta et al., 2011).
A lack of well-being or satisfaction also makes employees want to leave (Barak
et al., 2006). Sager et al. (1989) points out that employees can develop (dis)satisfaction
with many different things, though, such as satisfaction with payment or promotion
possibilities. Therefore, findings on the link between satisfaction and TI are always in
need of further interpretation.
Organizational commitment is a feeling of belonging and giving one’s own best to
support the organization, which has also been shown to reduce TI (Meyer et al., 1993;
Meyer and Herscovitch, 2001; Herscovitch and Meyer, 2002). Related concepts are
organizational identification (Dick et al., 2006), organizational citizenship (Mamman
et al., 2012; Organ, 1990; Lee et al., 2004), organizational support (Tremblay et al., 2010),
experience-based trust as well as swift trust (Meyerson et al., 1996), and collective
affective commitment (Gardner et al., 2011).
Blau (1989) demonstrated the need to separate career commitment from
organizational commitment. Career commitment describes the willingness and intent
to follow a certain career path. Accordingly, high-career commitment goes along with
low-turnover intentions if advancement possibilities are given within the company.
Chang (1999) also showed that career commitment is distinct from affective and
continuance commitment and rather mediates the effect of organizational commitment
on turnover intentions.
Finally, character traits are important variables in the category of personal factors.
The “Big Five personality inventory” distinguishes five main personality traits:
openness to new experiences, agreeableness, neuroticism, conscientiousness,
and extraversion (Goldberg and Saucier, 1995; Rammstedt and John, 2007).
Although research that relates traits to turnover is scarce, existent work agrees that
some traits affect turnover intentions (Moberg, 1999; Timmerman, 2006; Zimmerman,
2008). For instance, the trait “openness to new experiences” characterizes people who
 are naturally open to new experiences. They are inclined to seize chances that present Antecedents
themselves and would in general be tempted to switch positions because they are prone of team TITO
to act proactively. In contrast, the trait “agreeableness” is supposed to negatively affect
turnover intentions. Agreeable people are empathic, prefer harmony and will likely not
stir conflicts (Boudreau et al., 2001). Therefore, they may endure unpleasant situations
and not readily consider turnover as an option.
197
3.2 Job factors
Job and task complexity describe how skillful employees have to be in order
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to complete their tasks successfully. Put differently, it gives an impression of how

non-routine a task is. Rosse (1987) considered task complexity as a moderator of the
relationship between ability (the employee’s skills) and turnover intentions but found
no effect. The study of Chung-Yan (2010) revealed that job complexity generally can
reduce turnover intentions but that this effect is non-linear, i.e., at a certain point the
trend reverses, and it dependents on the degree of autonomy. It needs to be mentioned
that task complexity can also increase turnover intentions. In this context, Becton et al.
(2011) show that some employees generally seem to avoid complexity by repeatedly
switching jobs when confronted with it.
Finegold et al. (2002) found that the importance of the balance between time spent at
work and time committed for pastime, the work/life balance, varies by age of the
employees but always affects turnover intentions strongly. Likewise, companies have
acknowledged the importance of the work/life balance and try to reduce turnover
by introducing flexible work arrangements like “work-to-family enrichment” (McNall
et al., 2010; Wittmer and Martin, 2011; Kopelman et al., 1983). McNall et al. (2010) found
employees who had the chance to benefit from flexible work arrangements to have
lower turnover intentions. Wittmer and Martin (2011) analyze the role involvement of
part-time employees and find a positive relationship between the number of roles an
employee has to play and turnover likelihood. A rising number of roles require more
efforts for balancing different demands. This effort may provoke the development of
turnover intentions.
Absence of autonomy in task accomplishment is another driver for turnover intentions
(Galletta et al., 2011), at least for employees who seek autonomy support in their
companies and leaders (Galletta et al., 2011). The effect of autonomy is similar to that
of empowerment as it generally reduces turnover intentions (Gardner et al., 2011).
Autonomy and empowerment are also often found to go along together (Deci and Ryan,
1985; Spreitzer and Mishra, 2002).

3.3 Organizational factors

Employees develop expectations toward their companies and leaders and develop
turnover intentions if their company does not fulfill them. Hence, Cho et al. (2009)
considered constructs like perceived organizational support and perceived supervisor
support. Similarly, also Maertz et al. (2007) found the perceived support within the
relationship between the employee and its organization to be relevant for turnover.
Kuvaas and Dysvik (2010) showed that employees even consider what their companies
invest in their development when considering a leave.
Wells and Peachy (2011), Long and Thean (2011), and Long et al. (2012) considered
the impact of different leaderships behaviors on turnover intentions. Both transactional
and transformational leadership styles seem to be negatively related to turnover.
Transactional leadership considers leadership as an exchange relationship between the
 IJMPB leader and the follower. This task-oriented leadership behavior assumes that setting
9,1 targets and providing rewards for reaching the targets provide the necessary motivation
for the followers (Tyssen et al., 2014b). On the contrary, transactional leadership includes
person-oriented factors such as individual consideration, charisma and inspiration.
A transformational leader brings about positive changes in followers’ values, attitudes,
perceptions, and expectations (Yukl, 1999; Winkler, 2009). More recent research
198 has shown that both, transactional and transformational leadership positively affect
project commitment but that the effect of transformational leadership is much stronger
(Tyssen et al., 2014a).
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Yang et al. (2012) found a mismatch in perceptions about career opportunities and
career reality to be another important driver for turnover intentions which applies to all
employees in an organization. A company where such a mismatch prevails is very
likely to experience high-turnover rates. High-turnover rates may also increase
turnover intentions of employees who are currently still continuing in position.
Collective turnover is a phenomenon which only recently experienced increased
attention (Hancock et al., 2013; Hausknecht and Trevor, 2011). It focusses on a macro
level and studies which factors are causing turnover rates to rise. For TOs, the question
whether actual turnover rates affect the development of future turnover intentions
could be of interest.
All the effects mentioned above occur in a social system. Consequently, their
demographic properties are worth considering. Wiersema and Bird (1993) found that a
top management team’s demographic heterogeneity increases turnover from the team.
This finding can also be relevant for TOs, as they usually bring together very different
kinds of people (Bakker, 2010).

4. A research model on TITO

In order to develop a research model, we matched the TO characteristics (time, team,
task, context) with the identified categories of TI antecedents (personal, job related,
organizational). This approach yields a high number of potential antecedents for the
generation of propositions. We only include those antecedents in our model that
are either purely TO specific (i.e. they do not exist in PO) or antecedents that may also
exist in PO but that can be supposed to be influenced by TO-specific characteristics.
Consequently, we do not consider antecedents that can be assumed to affect turnover
intentions in TOs and POs in a similar way.

4.1 Personal factors and time aspects

According to Steel and König (2006) motivation tends to be higher when a deadline
arrives and when the achievement is still considered to be possible (Baker, 2001).
In a TO, the most important deadline might even be the last: the termination of the TO.
Toward the end of its lifecycle, a TO usually offers both, time pressure and a clear
visibility on the achievability of the TO goal. Therefore, if TO members have not
abandoned the belief in the achievability and experienced a decrease of motivation,
the impending ending of a TO will likely increase motivation to successfully meet the
deadline. As motivation tends to decrease turnover intentions, TO members will likely
decrease their intention to quit a team toward the end – unless they do not believe in
achievability of the TO goal anymore:
P1. A low belief in achievability in the presence of short remaining TO lifetime
increases TOTI.
 4.2 Personal factors and team aspects Antecedents
Cleveland et al. (2011) state that the development of a social identity within a newly formed of team TITO
team is of high relevance to each individual member. In the course of time, relationships
build up and common mental models are jointly developed (Zaccaro et al., 2002).
Until this has happened, swift trust makes up for it in teams whose members are
not familiar to each other and decreases turnover intentions (Meyerson et al., 1996).
Swift trust is a concept of trust that does not rely on common past experiences but rather 199
takes the current situation into account (e.g. a project kick-off of a project type that every
project member is familiar with), and is dependent on the willingness to let aside feelings
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of doubt ( Janowicz-Panjaitan et al., 2009). As especially TOs usually incorporate members

that are not familiar with each other, members experiencing swift trust would be
less prone to leave the TO. As TOs develop, its members familiarize and thus swift
trust becomes less important:
P2a. The presence of swift trust decreases TITO.
P2b. The effect of swift trust is higher in early stages of the TO.

4.3 Personal factors and task aspects

Motivation is task-dependent (Griffin et al., 1981; Thomas and Velthouse, 1990). We assume
that uncertainty and newness of a task undermine motivation (Gällstedt, 2003). Uncertainty
is present when tasks or causalities are uncertain, not well-understood or even unknown,
in need for explanation and coordination (Ezzamel, 1990). So, if TOs member operate in
especially uncertain environments, its members have little guidance to evaluate their efficacy
in relation to the task they try to accomplish. This is especially the case for new or unique
tasks ( Janowicz-Panjaitan et al., 2009) that may impair their willingness to continue
cooperating and consequently raise the level of TITO (Deci and Ryan, 1985; Bandura, 1977):
P3a. Intrinsic task motivation reduces TITO.
P3b. TO-task uncertainty inhibits the effect of intrinsic task motivation on TITO.
P3c. TO-task newness increases the effect of intrinsic task motivation on TITO.

4.4 Personal factors and context aspects

Bearing in mind that the TO is embedded within the PO, organizational commitment
can be influential on different levels. Stanley et al. (2013) suggest multiple typologies of
employees. Accordingly, different profiles of PO commitment and TO commitment may
be present and influence the behavior of employees (Kam et al., 2013). We suggest that
TITO will be small if commitment to the TO is higher than commitment to the PO.
For long lifetimes, this effect should diminish, though, because TO membership is not
exclusive anymore and rather considered as part of the regular job:
P4a. The greater the commitment to the TO, compared to the commitment to the PO,
the lower the TITO.
P4b. Long TO lifetime decreases the effect of the greater the commitment to the TO.

4.5 Job factors and time aspects

TOs mostly operate under time pressure (Turner et al., 2008). Yet, TO work is often
imposed onto employees on top of their regular tasks and therefore causes overtime work
(Lindgren and Packendorff, 2006; Engwall and Svensson, 2004). In addition, TO members
experience stress from having to incorporate multiple roles as TO members and PO
 IJMPB members at the same time, especially if the company requires them to be particularly
9,1 flexible (Guimaraes and Igbaria, 1992; Stavrou and Kilaniotis, 2010). Therefore, similar to
PO settings, overtime may likely cause TI (Stavrou and Kilaniotis, 2010). We suppose
that this would only have an effect if the situation is considered to be an enduring one:
P5a. Permanent overtime due to TO membership increases TITO.
200 P5b. Flexible work arrangements decrease the effect of permanent overtime on TITO.
4.6 Job factors and team aspects
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Harrison et al. (2003) suggest that familiarity of team members in a group helps the
group to produce a higher quality of work compared to other teams. This also affects
group-efficacy (Baker, 2001), which is the notion of collective ability to achieve in a
given task. This is obviously a problem for TOs, which usually comprise members that
are unfamiliar to each other (Bakker, 2010). As lengthier lifetimes help the development
of such familiarity within a TO (Kozlowski and Bell, 2003), we also assume members’
turnover intentions to decrease over time:
P6a. High degrees of familiarity within the TO decrease TITO.
P6b. As the age of a TO increases, its members’ TITO decreases.
4.7 Job factors and task aspects
Although research on the effects of task complexity on turnover intentions showed
mixed results, high degrees of complexity can reduce turnover intentions (Rosse,
1987). Because of the fact that TOs commonly work on complex tasks and experts
from different backgrounds are assigned to project teams for resolving complex
problems, task complexity in a TO can be assumed to increase the motivation of the
team members. Nevertheless, complexity may become a problem when there is only
limited time left to deal with it. We therefore expect complexity to decrease TITO also
for TOs, but we expect this effect to decrease as the time of termination arrives
(Bakker, 2010). Even more general, we already expect a short lifetime of a TO to have
such an effect:
P7a. Task complexity in TOs decreases TITO.
P7b. A short remaining lifetime moderates the effect of complexity on TITO.
P7c. A short lifetime of a TO moderates the effect of complexity on TITO.
To draw on from this, Man and Lam (2003) state that increased job complexity in the
presence of autonomy has been shown to cause higher levels of cohesion in groups.
A higher cohesion is apt to decrease individual turnover intentions (Mamman et al., 2012).
But also, autonomy needs to be present (Galletta et al., 2011) in order to be able to cope with
complexity under time pressure. As TOs grow in age, they seem to allow for more
autonomous behavior (Rekonen et al., 2013), thus decreasing TITO tendencies even further:
P7d. The effect of task complexity on TITO is moderated by autonomy.
P7e. The effect of autonomy on the relation between task complexity and TITO is
moderated by the lifetime of a TO.
4.8 Job factors and context aspects
Of all job-related antecedents of TI, compensation is probably the one most influenced
by contextual aspects of the TO. Usually, payment is administered by the PO and not
 by the TO. Compensation problems arise when compensation is not bound to attaining Antecedents
TO goals, but is completely dependent on the working arrangements within the of team TITO
permanent surrounding organization (Dickinson, 2001). If increased overtime, need for
flexibility, and more exhausting working environments cannot be met by adequate
flexibility in compensation, TITO will arise (Ali, 2008; Seiler et al., 2012):
P8. The tighter payment is coupled to the performance within the TO, the more will
it reduce TITO. 201
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4.9 Organizational factors and time aspects

A transformational leadership style enhances the development commitment in a project
team and reduces turnover (Strauss et al., 2009; Tyssen et al., 2014a, b). It will thus also
decrease TITO:
P9a. Transformational leadership decreases TITO.
Transformational leadership cannot come to effect in short-living TOs (Long and
Thean, 2011), because personal identification with the leader has to be established first
(Keegan and Den Hartog, 2004; Tyssen et al., 2014a, b). In situations of limited time,
clear decisions on tasks and responsibilities have to be expressed by the TO’s leader.
This may cause negative excitement among the TO members, though. Based on this,
we assume leadership styles to have different effects in different time settings of TOs.
As Gersick (1989) showed, TOs may experience drastic adjustments to their modes of
operation roughly in the middle of their planned time of existence and may go along
with changes in leadership styles. TO members may be irritated by such sudden
changes and consequently develop turnover intentions:
P9b. Total TO lifetime moderates the effect of transformational leadership on TITO.
P9c. A change in leadership style close to the impending ending of a TO increases
TITO.

4.10 Organizational factors and team aspects

Research on collective turnover tries to determine how turnover rates within
organizations are affected and by which factors. A focus on turnover rates within TOs
may be of limited benefit, as the lifetime of TOs is often too limited to reasonably
calculate such rates. Nevertheless, it seems reasonable to assume that high levels of
fluctuation increase the willingness in every employee to make a move as well and they
increase the acceptance for such decisions among the remaining employees. For TOs,
we therefore assume collective turnover within the temporary team to generally
increase TITO. Second, we assume this relation to be significant only when the lifetime
of the TO is rather long:
P10a. High-turnover rates within the TO lead to high TITO.
P10b. A low-total lifetime of a TO reduces the effect of TO turnover rates on TITO.
Leaders in TOs have to cope with situations they might never have encountered before
and where they can only apply generalist leadership styles. Different leadership styles
were found to be positively correlated with coping with task complexity or time
constraints (Clift and Vandenbosch, 1999). In every team, some sort of leadership is
present or will automatically develop (Humphrey et al., 2007). Team size is an important
determinant for the relative influence the team members gain (Fay et al., 2000).
 IJMPB Also, TO members experience two leadership behaviors at the same time: leadership
9,1 within the TO and within the PO. TITO will thus also vary with the relative desirability
of leadership within the TO as compared to leadership in the PO (Collins et al., 2009).
Undesired leadership will only have effects for rather long-living TOs, though:
P11a. Leader acceptance decreases TITO.
202 P11b. TO lifetime moderates the effect of leader acceptance on TITO.

4.11 Organizational factors and task aspects

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Companies will usually employ TOs in order to induce change within the company
itself (Lundin and Söderholm, 1995). Thus, TOs are not only influenced by the
surrounding organization, but also influence it themselves. Such change-related
endeavors are dependent on a high number of stakeholders – this in turn increases
complexity and uncertainty considerably, as these stakeholders may at times have
“clashing agendas” (Zaccaro et al., 2002). While the TO operates, members may
encounter resistance within the PO, even while receiving support by their direct
supervisor (i.e. the internal sponsor of the change project; Cho et al., 2009). While the
lack of organizational support itself may already cause turnover intentions
(Maertz et al., 2007), the additional inter-role conflict adds to the situation in a
negative sense (Hang-yue et al., 2005). Yet in addition, TO members who experience
such resistance may also feel to have lower chances of internal career advancement.
Impaired career opportunities cause turnover intentions (Yang et al., 2012),
but TO members can avoid such negative consequences by removing themselves
from the TO. Therefore, TOs with tasks that are likely to create conflicts within the
surrounding organization are more likely to cause TITO:
P12. Organizational support for the goal of the TO decreases TITO.

4.12 Organizational factors and context aspects

If a TO member is working within a PO for a considerable amount of time during and
parallel to the membership to the TO, conflicts with line managers may arise, e.g., due to
increased workload, target conflicts, or approaching deadlines ( Janowicz-Panjaitan et al.,
2009). This effect increases with the number of simultaneous TO memberships, because
they increase overhead significantly (Glebbeek and Bax, 2004). TOs have to be in
existence a substantial amount of time for these negative effects to occur, though:
P13a. Simultaneous TO membership is positively related to TITO.
P13b. The negative effect of multiple TO memberships on TITO is increased the
longer the TO lifetimes are on average.
Working in TOs is characterized by either isolation or integration of the TO (Keegan
and Den Hartog, 2004). This means that TO membership either takes place at the
regular work place or in a distant location. TO members that work in displacement
from their regular working places may suffer from the so called “no-home syndrome”
(Turner et al., 2008). This syndrome describes the circumstances, that the TO member
has no place to return to. In this case, the TO becomes the more relevant organization to
the TO member. Consequently, if the relative amount of time spent within the TO is
low, the potential negative effects of TO memberships are minimal and so should
be TITO. On the other hand, if an employee works exclusively for the TO, turnover
intentions from the TO, if they arise, will completely be caused by the TO membership.
 Consequently, we assume that TITO depends on the relative amount of working time Antecedents
that is spent for the TO: of team TITO
P14. The relative amount of work time spent within the TO increases TITO.
5. Discussion and conclusion
The antecedents and consequences of turnover in organizations have been studied
extensively with many contributions demonstrating the importance of turnover for the 203
success of organizations. Most of this research took place in POs and has not explicitly
considered the specificities of temporary forms of organizing. Given the increasing
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importance of TOs, we considered its characteristics and related them to the antecedents
of turnover intentions.
5.1 Theoretical contributions
We derived propositions on how the characteristics of TOs may influence turnover
intentions. Figure 1 integrates these propositions in a research model and shows the
postulated main effects along with moderating effects.
The developed propositions all base on the assumption that TOs specificities can
be captured in the dimensions “team,” “task,” “time,” and “context.” We paid special
attention to the effect of temporariness on turnover intentions in TOs (Janowicz-
Panjaitan et al., 2009). Therefore, a short duration and an impending ending of a TO
have received particular attention in our model. Whenever possible we have considered
a short perceived lifetime and an impending ending as two special properties, next
to temporariness.
Within the category of personal factors we identified several aspects whose nature is
in general positive, like trust, belief, commitment, and motivation. These factors will lead

Antecedents Main Moderators

effects short lifetime (lt) short remaining lt
(impending end)
+1
Personal Factors

Low belief in achievability

–2b uncertainty
Swift trust –2a
newness/uniqueness
Intrinsic task motivation –3a

Relatively greater TO –4a +4b –3b

+3c
commitment

flexible work. arr.

+5a autonomy Turnover

Permanent overtime
Job-Related

autonomy+lifetime
Factors

–6a –6b –5b Intentions

Team familiarity –7d –7e
+7c +7b
–7a
Task complexity in
–8
Payment coupling Temporary

Organizations

–9b
Transformational leadership –9a
–10b +9c
+10a
Related Factors

High turnover rates –11b

Organization-

–11a –13b
Leader acceptance
–12
Figure 1.
Organizational support for TO Antecedents of
+13a
Simultaneous TO membership turnover intentions
change in
+14
leadership style
in TOs
PO work time proportion
 IJMPB to decreased TITO as they would lead to TI in POs as well (Stanley et al., 2013; Roberson
9,1 and Williamson, 2012). Nevertheless, the importance of time is further reflected by
several propositions which take into consideration the future development of the TO.
In addition to that, commitment seems to be a major topic that deserves attention in
TO research. The time component is of special importance when TOs and POs compete
for commitment, identification, and citizenship behavior. Our research model may thus
204 help to explain the multitude of outcomes that may arise from conflicts regarding
multiple simultaneous TO memberships or simultaneous TO and PO membership.
For job-related factors, we assume permanent overtime and high dynamics to be
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primary drivers of TITO. Nevertheless, contingent factors may make up for dissatisfactory
job setting, for example, a nice team to work with as well as acknowledgment on sides of
the company.
Most of the organizational factors bear a potential for increasing TITO. Although they
influence how much an employee is prone to leave or stay, they were hardly considered in
the literature. Neither are we aware of best practices that help to cope with problems
like status inversion, high workloads, and overtime work. These subjects should
be tackled first, before turning to more complex topics like collective turnover from TOs.
(Oh et al., 2004; Smith and Harrington, 1994).
More recent research on TOs pointed out that the distinction between TO and PO can
be sometimes overdrawn and that POs can also feature characteristics of TOs and vice
versa. TOs and POs represent opposite poles along a continuum and organizations can be
located closer to the ideal type of a TO or a PO (Hanisch and Wald, 2014). This is reflected
by the recent discussion in organization theory on concepts like fluid organizations
(Schreyoegg and Sydow, 2010), and ambidextrous organizations (Raisch et al., 2009) which
refers to the fact that PO increasingly adopt temporary elements. Contrariwise, it can be
assumed that the longer the TO lasts, the more will it resemble a PO and function
accordingly. For example, concerning personal turnover factors, job satisfaction, and task
satisfaction may be different for short-living TOs, but nearly identical for long-living ones.
Further, we have to expand the meaning of the time aspect of teams acting as a TO.
As TOs are usually embedded in POs, it may be of importance to what percentage of time
a member works solely for the TO and not for the PO.
Although we elaborated on the temporariness and the (short) remaining lifetime of
TOs as important moderators of the antecedents of TITO, we did not make any
assumption on the relative importance of the different categories and of the different
antecedents itself. Therefore, our model seems to exhibit a rather linear logic. However,
we do not believe that all antecedents in our model are equally important but the current
state of research does not allow for a theory-based hypothesizing of potential differences.

5.2 Empirical and methodological considerations

Before developing ideas for future research, we first present methodological
considerations that may guide the empirical testing of our model. Although our
research model directly invites for the testing of the propositions, we suggest a
stepwise approach that starts with a qualitative, exploratory part that is followed by
quantitative studies on the three categories of antecedents. Finally, a comprehensive
test of the full model may provide evidence on the relative importance of the different
categories of antecedents.
The development of the research model was based on the academic literature on
TO and on turnover in PO. As to our knowledge no dedicated empirical study on TITO
exists, we propose conducting a qualitative pre-study before embarking on quantitative
 proposition-testing. A qualitative study based on expert interviews with experienced Antecedents
managers and collaborators of TO may serve to validate the proposed antecedents and of team TITO
to adjust and/or extend the research model (Kempster and Parry, 2011). At a first
glance this preliminary step may seem unnecessary as many antecedents such as
leadership, task complexity, and organizational commitment have already been studied
in the context of POs. Nonetheless, research on different topics in a TO settings has
demonstrated, that a qualitative pre-study can be helpful for adjusting existing 205
concepts and measurement approaches to the context of the TO (see e.g. Hanisch et al.,
2009 and Lindner and Wald, 2011 for knowledge management in TOs).
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As a second step, we suggest the empirical testing of the three categories of

antecedents. Given the complexity of the model, a separate consideration of the
categories seems to be appropriate as it allows for gaining an in-depth understanding
of the hypothesized main effects as well as the moderating variables. The testing of the
model requires data that is available for a high number of individual cases which must
be obtained via a standardized survey. A significant challenge will lie in the process of
data collection. In particular, the distribution of a questionnaire (online or paper based)
must assure that it targets a population of individuals with a significant record of
working in TO. The usual (commercial) databases with company data are not suited for
this purpose as they do no comprise contact data of the targeted respondents. To solve
this problem, one may survey managers of firms that operate in project-based
industries like construction, consulting, or film-making (Lindgren and Packendorff, 2006).
In these industries, value is predominately created in TO, such as projects, and
therefore employees regularly work in TO. Additionally, these industries reflect how
different TOs can be with regard to their “permanency” of temporariness, respectively
(Hollenbeck et al., 2012). Another solution that avoids potential industry-biases would be
the use of registers of members of professional associations for project management.
Those members also work in projects on a regular basis and usually their industry
affiliation is known and thus can be controlled for.
Provided that the targeted respondents can be reached with a survey, the
measurement of the antecedents of turnover intentions should be straightforward as
for many of the constructs established scales and items exist. Some measurements have
already been adapted to the context of the TO such as transformational leadership
(Tyssen et al., 2014a, b) or task complexity (Hanisch and Wald, 2014). Other antecedents
can be operationalized by using and adjusting scales that previously had been applied
to the PO. For instance, Kuvaas and Dysvik (2010) as well as Stanley et al. (2013)
suggested scales for measuring company turnover intentions and Spreitzer (1995) used
a scale for measuring autonomy.
The first two steps may lead to a refinement of the original research model. As a
final step we suggest the empirical test of the full model. This test will reveal the
relative importance of the three categories of antecedents of turnover which is of
particular importance for deriving managerial implications and for further theory
development. For the quantitative testing of the partial models and the full model the
usual statistical methods can be applied. We particularly suggest structural equation
modeling as it allows for the simultaneous analysis of complex causal relationships and
the consideration of latent and manifest variables (Chin, 1998).

5.3 Implications for future research

We believe that our research model can be a valuable guide for directing future studies.
We underline that the impending ending and a short TO lifetime are special characteristics
 IJMPB of TOs that should be considered when studying TITO. While some studies have already
9,1 analyzed what approaching deadlines mean to individuals (Steel and König, 2006),
a group-level look has not been taken at it. Similarly, we call for research on how
pre-determined endings of TOs affect the quitting behavior of its members.
These TO characteristics have received considerable attention in TO research
already. We point out the importance of yet another aspect for both TO research in
206 general as well as TITO research in particular: the proportion of time spent working
within the TO substantially influence turnover intentions and should be explained by
future research. We found that very little research cared about this factor, but deem it
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as very important for understanding how TOs are embedded in POs.

In addition to the new questions pointed out above, we see a need for more research on
mechanisms that are already well researched by studies using static, cross-functional
designs. Our findings indicate a great need to consider how the context of a TO, namely,
the PO that surrounds it, changes over time and how these changes influence the
behavior of the TO members. This is emphasized by the organizational factors and
the task-related factors we discussed above, but also personal aspects seem to be
valuable subjects of scrutiny in such a context. Therefore, we call for more research on
TITO using longitudinal designs. Furthermore, the effect of turnover intentions from
TOs on turnover intentions from the surrounding PO is an interesting aspect itself that
has to our knowledge not been given attention before.
Considering the diversity that the rather general definition of temporary teams we
applied in this paper abstracts from, more attention should be given to the vast number
of different types of TOs that exists in practice. Taxonomies like those introduced by
Hollenbeck et al. (2012) provide a means of classification. Organizational, job and task
aspects that we identified as potentially influencing TITO could hence be analyzed in a
structured way, applying cross-sectional research designs.
The number of different theories that can be used to study TO and turnover
intentions make it a difficult task to conduct research with only one underlying theory
in mind (Hanisch and Wald, 2011). We hope that our findings inspire scholars in the
respective fields to continue combining theories from both fields of research, to find out
about the need for a theory of turnover from TO and eventually to start building it.

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About the authors

Dr Helge F.R. Nuhn is a Senior Consultant at the Horváth & Partners Management Consultants
213
where he works for the Competence Center CIO & Project Advisory. He obtained his PhD from
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the EBS Business School of the EBS Universität für Wirtschaft und Recht, Germany. His research
is focussed on human factors in temporary organizations.
Andreas Wald is a Professor of Strategy at the School of Business and Law of the University
of Agder, Kristiansand (Norway) and a Adjunct Professor at the EBS Business School of the EBS
Universität für Wirtschaft und Recht, Oestrich-Winkel (Germany). His research areas include
temporary organizations, leadership, organizational networks, and innovation. Professor
Andreas Wald is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: andreas.wald@uia.no

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