In this dissertation, I evaluate the importance of behavioral synchrony – specifically, team members following when others lead – as a primary driver of team success. Previous empirical research suggests that teams whose members engage in leading behaviors perform better, and points to the value of team members sharing in the fulfillment of leadership. Trending followership theories and qualitative research indicate that whether team members engage in following behaviors, and whether they share in the fulfillment of followership responsibilities, are equally vital for team success. Building on conceptualizations of leadership and followership as parallel, mutually interdependent processes that jointly determine team outcomes, I investigate how and why they must occur in synchrony. Drawing from published literature in social and organizational sciences, I suggest that synchrony moderates the relationship between leadership and team performance and the relationship between followership and team performance such that relationships are stronger if team members behave more synchronously with regard to leadership and followership. I embed these research questions within an input-process-outcome framework while also examining the predictors and consequences of behavioral synchrony across multiple events. Hypotheses were tested using behavioral data from teams engaging in high-fidelity emergency medical simulations. Trained research assistants coded videos of these teams, then an algorithm was applied to coded video data to determine how synchronously each team’s members worked together throughout every event. Regression analyses were used to test a reduced model positing that three key personal characteristics combine to influence team performance (average expertise, similarity in expertise, and similarity in psychological collectivism); that leadership sharing mediates the relationship between these characteristics and team performance; and that either followership sharing or synchrony moderates the relationship between leadership sharing and team performance. I discovered that average expertise and average psychological collectivism among team members were the most predictive personal characteristics. Neither shared followership nor synchrony moderated the relationship between shared leadership and team performance. Synchrony did predict team performance above-and-beyond personal characteristics, however. Ancillary analyses that focus on individuals’ patterns of behavior were conducted to further inform the questions under study – results of which indicate a need for future research to focus on the importance of following behaviors, the flexibility with which team members fluctuate between different roles throughout a task, and the balance of behaviors among team members. Limitations of this study, as well as implications for research and practice, are provided.
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