Journal of Applied Psychology2000, Vol. 85, No. 6, 1004-1012

Copyright 2000 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.0021-9010/00/$5.00 DOI: 10.1037//0021-90I0.85.6.1004

Trust in Leadership and Team Performance:Evidence From NCAA Basketball

Kurt T. DirksSimon Fraser University

This study empirically examined the relationship between trust, leadership, and team performance with 2objectives. The 1st objective was to empirically examine an assumption found in several literatures—thata team's trust in its leader has a significant effect on the team's performance. The 2nd objective was toexplore a more complex and dynamic relationship between trust and team performance whereby trust inleadership mediates the relationship between past team performance and future team performance. Thisrelationship is derived by combining theories of trust with an attributional theory of leadership. Surveyand archival data from a sample of men's college basketball teams provides support for both hypotheses,indicating that trust in leadership is both a product and a determinant of team performance.

In the past 3 decades, research from several literatures in appliedpsychology, as well as writings in the popular press, has impliedthat a higher level of trust in a leader results in higher team (ororganizational) performance (e.g., Bennis & Nanus, 1985;Fairholm, 1994; Golembiewski & McConkie, 1975; Kouzes &Posner, 1987; Likert, 1967; McGregor, 1967; Zand, 1972, 1997).This proposition has served as the basis for the claim that trust isan important variable in applied settings and therefore deservesfurther research. The proposition also provides a justification forthe importance of management practices such as leadership devel-opment and team building.

Despite its importance for research and practice, the relationshipbetween trust in leadership and team performance has been thesubject of little empirical research. The purpose of this article is toaddress two specific issues. First, does trust in a leader affect teamperformance? At this point, there is no empirical evidence todirectly substantiate the proposition that a higher level of trust ina leader results in higher team performance. It is dangerous to usethis untested assumption as a basis for research and practice—particularly given that related studies on the main effects of trust inteammates on team performance have provided very inconsistentresults (Dirks & Ferrin, in press). Second, this study explores amore complex and dynamic relationship between trust and teamperformance. Specifically, the study examines whether trust inleadership mediates the relationship between past and future teamperformance. This idea advances prior research that has focused ona unidirectional relationship (trust —> team performance) by ex-

The funding for data collection was provided by the Carlson School ofManagement at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Campus, and theDepartment of Business Administration at the University of Illinois atUrbana-Champaign. I gratefully acknowledge the contributions of severalcolleagues: Larry Cummings played an important role in developing thestudy, and Stuart Bunderson, Brenda Lautsch, and Sandra Robinson pro-vided comments on the manuscript.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Kurt T.Dirks, Faculty of Business Administration, Simon Fraser University, 8888University Drive, Burnaby, British Columbia V5A 1S6, Canada. Electronicmail may be sent to kdirks@sfu.ca.

amining how trust is both an important product and a determinantof team performance.

In addressing the preceding issues, this research is intended tocontribute to the growing literature on the role of trust in appliedsettings (Kramer, 1999), as well as to the more established liter-atures on leadership and group performance. Given the frequencyof the use of teams in applied settings, understanding the role oftrust in leadership within teams is particularly important for re-search and practice.

Theory and Hypotheses

Trust

It is clear that trust has been defined in multiple ways in theliterature. Although each researcher has used slight variations,most empirical studies seem to conceptualize and measure trust asan expectation or belief that one can rely on another person'sactions and words and/or that the person has good intentionstoward oneself (e.g., Cook & Wall, 1980; Cummings & Bromiley,1996; Dirks, 1999; McAllister, 1995; Robinson, 1996). As Mayer,Davis, and Schoorman (1995) and Rousseau, Sitkin, Burt, andCamerer (1998) have noted, trust is most meaningful in situationsin which one party is at risk or vulnerable to another party.

In this study, the focal referent of the belief or expectation is theleader of the team. Specifically, the study conceptualizes trust asan expectation or belief that the team can rely on the leader'sactions or words and that the leader has good intentions toward theteam. Trust in leadership is a meaningful concept in many teams,because the leader typically has the most formal power on the team(Bass, 1990), causing others to be vulnerable to him or her. As Idiscuss later, I also take into account the extent to which teammembers trust each other, because they are also vulnerable to eachother, given their interdependence.

The Effect of Trust in Leadership on Team Performance

The idea that trust can have an important influence on teamperformance can be found in several literatures, as well as inmanagement practices. In the early literature on organizational

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psychology, Argyris (1962), McGregor (1967), and Likert (1967)professed the significance of trust in leadership for effective teamsand organizations. Consistent with these ideas, more current re-searchers studying trust have suggested that it is an importantelement of effective work groups (e.g., Golembiewski & Mc-Conkie, 1975; Larson & LaFasto, 1989). Other researchers havebegun to examine empirically the effects of trust in leadership onworkplace outcomes, including organizational citizenship behav-ior, information sharing, goal acceptance, and task performance(Oldham, 1975; O'Reilly & Roberts, 1974; Podsakoff, MacKen-zie, Moorman, & Fetter, 1990; Rich, 1997). Multiple theories ofleadership have also cited the critical role of trust. For example,theories have suggested that charismatic leaders build trust in theirfollowers (Kirpatrick & Locke, 1996; Shamir, Zakay, Breinen, &Popper, 1998), that integrity or trustworthiness is an important traitof leaders (Bass, 1990), that trust is a core basis of effectiveleadership (Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Fairholm, 1994; Zand, 1997),and that trust is central in subordinates' perceptions of effectiveleadership (Hogan, Curphy, & Hogan, 1994). Lastly, a number ofmanagement practices, such as leadership development programs,recognize the importance of trust to varying degrees (e.g., Conger,1992; Peterson & Hicks, 1996). To date, however, the idea that ateam's trust in its leader has a main effect on team performance hasnot yet directly been examined or validated empirically.

The studies previously cited share a common theory as to whytrust in leadership is assumed to be an important determinant ofteam performance. In short, trust in leadership is important in thatit allows the team to be willing to accept the leader's activities,goals, and decisions and work hard to achieve them. The leader'srole typically involves a number of activities related to teamperformance, such as determining team member roles, distributingrewards and motivating employees, developing team members,and setting the team's goals and strategies. When the team feelsthat it cannot rely on the leader or that the leader does not have theteam's interests at heart, team members are unlikely to carry outthe roles specified by the leader or to work toward the perfor-mance-related objectives and strategies set by the leader. Thismakes it difficult for the team to work together effectively andperform at a high level.

Although elements of this idea can be found in several domainsof leadership research, the literature on transformational and char-ismatic leadership provides perhaps the best case in point. Trust inleadership is cited as one means by which transformational lead-ership operates (Yukl, 1998).' Podsakoff et al. (1990) empiricallyexamined how trust mediated the effect of transformational lead-ership on whether subordinates worked beyond role expectations.Other researchers have suggested that trust is important if follow-ers are to accept the goals, beliefs, or vision of the leader (Bennis& Nanus, 1985; House, 1977). One might hypothesize that theseeffects are particularly important under conditions of perceiveduncertainty (Waldman & Yammarino, 1999). For instance, underhigh levels of perceived uncertainty, trust in the leader may becrucial for getting individuals to buy into a common goal and worktoward it as a unit. Given little trust in the leader, team membersare unlikely to be willing to sacrifice their interests for the team orits goals in a context of uncertainty.

Hypothesis 1: Trust in leadership has a positive effect on teamperformance.

It is important to note that the effect of trust in leadership isdistinct from the potential effect of another form of trust within ateam that has received attention in the literature: trust in teammates(work partners). Prior empirical research examining the role oftrust in teams has focused on the proposition that a higher level oftrust between team members results in higher team performance(e.g., Dirks, 1999; Klimoski & Karol, 1976), although the resultshave been mixed (Dirks & Ferrin, in press). This proposition isbuilt on the logic that trust increases the ability of group membersto work together, which in turn increases team performance (Lar-son & LaFasto, 1989). Although the distinction between trust inthe leader and trust in teammates is implicit in the literature, it hasnot been clarified, nor has it been used empirically. In this study,I empirically control for the potential effects of trust in teammembers when examining the impact of trust in leadership on teamperformance.

Trust as Mediating the Effects of Past Performance onFuture Performance

The logic in the prior section, as well as in existing research, hasbeen focused on a relationship between trust and team performancethat is unidirectional—that is, trust affects team performance. In thissection, I examine a more complex relationship between trust andteam performance, whereby trust mediates the relationship betweenpast and future team performance. Examining this connection mayhelp advance understanding of trust from a simple unidirectionalrelationship to a more sophisticated and dynamic relationship. Thefoundation for this argument is derived by combining theories oftrust with attributional theories of leadership.

The idea that trust has multidirectional relationships with othervariables has a precedent in research that has theorized that trust isinterrelated with risk-taking behaviors (Butler, 1995; Golem-biewski & McConkie, 1975; Mayer et al., 1995). To date, how-ever, research has not discussed such a relationship between trustand group performance. A multidirectional relationship betweentrust and performance may, however, be derived from Bhatta-charya, Devinney, and Pillutla's (1998) proposition that trust in-volves expectations about outcomes associated with another partyunder uncertainty. From this definition, one can argue that expec-tations about future outcomes in situations of uncertainty are likelyto be created by observing past outcomes produced by the party. Inother words, observations of past outcomes (e.g., performance) are

' The meaningful role of trust in transformational leadership is recog-nized by the conceptualization of the charismatic component (Bass, 1985)and its measurement (at least 3 of the 19 items in the charismatic compo-nent of the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire are related to trust build-ing). To the extent that the charismatic component does involve sometrust-building behaviors, there exists indirect evidence of a relationshipbetween trust in leadership and leader effectiveness or unit performance(see the results of the meta-analysis by Lowe, Kroeck, & Sivasubrama-niam, 1996). Nevertheless, the qualities or behaviors of leaders are distinctfrom the outcomes (e.g., trust, motivation, identification) they produce.Several recent studies have provided evidence that it is useful to distinguishbetween behaviors of transformational or charismatic leaders and the levelof trust that followers have in them (Kirpatrick & Locke, 1996; Podsakoffet al., 1990; Shamir et al., 1998). Hence, the present study providesevidence relevant to, but not directly overlapping with, existing research ontransformational leadership.

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likely to shape those expectations, particularly in an uncertainenvironment.

Although the preceding idea helps explain why past perfor-mance of a team might influence trust, it does not speak to why thebelief might be transferred to the leader. Attributional theories ofleadership provide the explanation. According to Lord and Maher(1991), "people tend to assume that a major function of leaders isto produce good performance outcomes, and they infer leadershipfrom knowledge of successful task or organizational performance"(p. 55). Studies have suggested that because of the ambiguityinvolved in team or organizational performance, individuals tendto make inferences about the leader on the basis of informationabout past performance (Lord & Maher, 1991; Meindel, Ehrlich, &Dukerich, 1985). Positive qualities tend to be inferred from highteam performance, and negative qualities tend to be inferred frompoor team performance (Staw, 1975).2

Hence, in the present case, the team would perceive a team'spast performance and would be likely to attribute (correctly orincorrectly) that performance to the team's leader. After attributingthe performance to the team's leader, team members may come toform expectations about team outcomes from those attributions—and hence may be more or less willing to trust the leader. Perceiv-ing low performance may cause the team to expect low teamperformance in the future and make them unwilling to trust theleader and unwilling to "put themselves in the leader's hands." Incontrast, perceiving high team performance in the past may causethe team to expect high team performance in the future and makethem willing to trust the leader and put themselves in his or herhands. In summary, trust in the leader seems to be a viablecognitive process through which past performance is translatedinto future performance.

Hypothesis 2: Trust in leadership mediates the relationship betweenpast team performance and future team performance.

Method

Sample

I examine the previous questions using a sample of men's collegebasketball teams that are members of the National Collegiate AthleticAssociation (NCAA). Head coaches of teams were identified using theNCAA directory and were contacted either by mail or by telephone. Teamsfrom Division I and Division III were contacted to obtain maximumvariation in teams within the NCAA. Thirty-four teams originally agreed toparticipate by completing surveys; data were eventually received from 31teams. One team was subsequently dropped from the analysis when it wasdetermined that the coach was new, leaving a total of 30 teams (11 DivisionI and 19 Division III). The 30 teams are members of 12 different confer-ences located in the Midwestern and Western United States. In these 30teams, 355 individuals completed surveys.

College basketball teams are an attractive setting, both empirically andtheoretically, for studying the relationship between trust and team perfor-mance. Empirically, the setting provides a reliable and valid measure ofteam performance that is independent of team members' perceptions(which are the source of measure of trust). In addition, the setting providesaccess to reliable and objective measures of control variables. Lastly, eachteam operates under the same guidelines (NCAA rules) and has the sameperformance objectives. Because these issues typically present problems incollecting data on teams, the present sample is attractive. Theoretically,basketball teams provide a setting in which trust in the leader and trust inteammates are likely to be meaningful. Teams are highly vulnerable to the

coach, because he or she controls many resources (e.g., playing time, keydecisions) that are valuable to the team. In addition, given the interdepen-dence on the team, basketball teams provide a setting in which players arehighly vulnerable to each other. Lastly, there is significant uncertainty(actual and perceived) for players on important issues, including thelikelihood that a coach can help a team win, the performance of one's ownteam and opposing teams throughout the season, and the amount of playingtime one will receive. As I noted earlier, perceived vulnerability, interde-pendence, and uncertainty are likely to be important factors for trust inleadership.3

MeasuresThe measurement strategy was intended to maximize internal validity

through three procedures. First, data were collected from different sourcesand different methods to remove the potential for inflated statistical rela-tionships. Second, the procedures attempted to make the timing of datacollection appropriate. Data on trust were collected in the first few weeksof the conference schedule, and data on group performance were gatheredduring the conference schedule. This served several purposes. By thebeginning of the conference schedule, the entire team had practiced to-gether in the present season for at least 6 weeks and had played severalgames, in addition to any prior experience they may have had together.This should have allowed a relatively stable level of trust to form. Inaddition, the timing increases the ability to draw conclusions of causality,because trust is measured at the beginning of the performance period.Third, the study includes measures of alternative predictors (control vari-ables) of team performance representing elements of the coach (experience,career record) and players (talent, trust, tenure). Two variables (pastperformance, preconference performance) capture elements of the coach,players, and institution.

A series of 1-hour interviews were conducted with coaches and playersto make sure that the measures described in the following sections wereappropriate for the sample. Information from the interviews was used togain a better understanding of the context and the dynamics related to trustin the leader.

Trust in the leader (coach). The trust variable was measured using anadaptation of the instrument reported in McAllister (1995). Two adapta-tions were made to the instrument, on the basis of interviews with basket-ball coaches. First, two items were dropped, as interviews with coachessuggested they would not apply in this context. This left nine items.Second, minor wording changes were made to the items to reflect thecontext (e.g., the referent was changed to coach). The items are providedin the Appendix.

Each player on the team was asked to complete a survey.4 The meannumber of respondents for each team was 12. Response rates per team

2 Following the social information processing perspective (Salancik &Pfeffer, 1978), the process is likely to involve numerous social processes(discussion among team members) and symbols (e.g., ceremonies, news-paper articles), particularly in a team context that would foster a commonperception on the team.

3 As a reviewer pointed out, although all teams face perceived uncer-tainty, vulnerability, and interdependence, there is likely to be some vari-ation between teams. Although highly restricted, this variation may impactthe relationship between trust and team performance.

4 The instructions asked that assistant coaches distribute surveys toplayers, collect the completed surveys, and mail them back to me. Playerswere given security envelopes in which they could seal the completedsurveys. This was intended to remove the potential for inflating responsesbecause of the fear that the coaching staff or other players would see theplayers' answers. I saw this strategy as more desirable than asking playersto mail back the surveys themselves and expected the latter to result in alow response rate.

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ranged from 50% to 100%, with a mean of approximately 88%. These datawere transformed into a trust score for each team through a two-stepprocess. First, a score for each individual was computed by summing theresponses to the nine items on the survey. Next, the team level of trust wascomputed by using the mean scores of the players.

A principal components factor analysis indicated that all items loadedonto a single factor (eigenvalue = 7.23) that accounted for 80% of thevariance. Items loaded on the factor at values ranging from .84 to .96.Coefficient alpha for the scale was .96.

As I noted earlier, the data were aggregated to the team level. This isconsistent with Rousseau's (1985) suggestion that the level of analysis bechosen on the basis of the focal unit of the study—the team. Focusing onthe team level of analysis is particularly important in this case, because thedependent variable, team performance, is a function of the entire team'sefforts (i.e., an aggregation of them). Hence, it would not be meaningful toexamine the relationship between a single individual's attributes and theteam's performance. In addition, this practice is consistent with the practiceof the teams themselves, as they aggregate individual factors (e.g., turn-overs) to a team level when attempting to understand the bases of teamperformance. Because it is necessary to determine whether aggregation isempirically justifiable, I performed the eta-squared test (Georgopolous,1986). The analysis yielded an eta-squared of .35, which exceeds the .20hurdle used in prior research (e.g., Jehn & Shah, 1997), thus indicating thatit was appropriate to aggregate the data. As a second check, I computed^?wg (James, Demaree, & Wolf, 1984), which was an acceptable .87.

Team performance. In a season, teams play a series of games, withapproximately two thirds of the games being played against an opponentfrom the team's conference (e.g., Big Ten). The success of a season istypically judged by the ratio of wins to total games in a season (i.e., thefrequency with which a team outscores its opponents). In this study,performance is measured by the team's ratio of wins in the conferenceschedule to total games played in the conference schedule. Data werecollected from NCAA or team records. The mean number of conferencegames played by teams in this sample was 16.

I used performance in the conference schedule for several reasons. Formost teams, the conference schedule is a critical performance period,because of longstanding rivalries among teams within the conference, thecrowning of a conference champion, and the fact that success in theconference provides a primary avenue to postseason play. In addition,using only the conference schedule for team performance serves to reducethe variation in the talent of the team's opponents, as the nonconferenceschedule often includes teams of much less or much greater talent. As Idiscuss later, using the conference schedule also facilitates the creation ofa talent measure for a control variable. Lastly, it is a performance indicatorthat all teams have in common.

Prior team performance. Prior team performance is a measure of howwell the team has performed over the past several seasons. I collected dataon the ratio of wins in the conference schedule to total games played in theconference schedule for each team for the prior four seasons. The meanratio served as the indicator of prior team performance.

Trust in teammates (players). I measured trust in teammates using thesame scale and procedure as I used to measure trust in the leader. Thedifference is that the referent specified in the items was changed to players.

A principal components factor analysis indicated that all items loadedonto a single factor (eigenvalue = 6.94) that accounted for 77% of thevariance. Items loaded on the factor at values ranging from .82 to .93.Coefficient alpha for the scale was .96. The eta-squared value was .28, and/?wg was .87, indicating that it was appropriate to aggregate the data.

Team talent. The level of talent on a team, particularly on a sportsteam, is likely to be an important determinant of team performance (Jones,1974). College basketball has a well-established procedure for identifyingits most talented players. At the end of the season, each conference polls itscoaches about which players within the conference performed at thehighest levels. The result is an all-conference team. The all-conference

team typically consists of several different tiers signifying increasing levelsof performance or talent: second team, first team, and most valuable player(MVP; the single top performer, typically selected from the first team).Hence, the number of players on a participating team that are elected to theall-conference team should be an indicator of the level of talent on theteam.

To construct a measure of team talent, two issues must be dealt with.First, conferences vary on the number of players they elect to the first andsecond teams. Second, all conference teams have tiers that signify differentlevels of talent. To create a single measure of team talent and deal withthese two issues, I created a formula involving two steps. In Step 1,conference records were used to determine the number of representatives(if any) there were for the participating team on the second team, first team,and MVP position, respectively. Given variance across conferences in thenumber of players included on the different teams, I standardized this bydividing the number of representatives by the total number of playerselected to each category (e.g., first team). If a participating team had theMVP, I divided this score by 5 (as there are typically five players on thefirst team) and did not count that individual on the score for the first team.In Step 2, to recognize the differences in status between levels, I adapteda procedure that Pollock (1998) used for comparing status among organi-zations. The scores from Step 1 were multiplied by a value equal to theinverse of their status, divided by the number of status levels.5

The measure appears to have reliability and predictive validity. Toestimate the potential reliability of the coaches' votes, I compared theall-conference team as elected by the coaches with the all-conference teamas independently elected by media over a 5-year period, using a conferencein which both sets of data were available. The analysis indicated that thereis reasonable consistency between the two types of "raters." Ninety-twopercent of the players elected to the all-conference team (as members of thefirst or second team) by the coaches were also elected to the team by themedia. There is also some tentative evidence of predictive validity for thismeasure: The correlation between talent and team performance in thisstudy is almost identical to that found by Jones (1974), who used a sampleof professional basketball players.

Coach career record. The extent to which a coach is consistentlysuccessful or unsuccessful over a number of seasons is an indicator of hisskill and reputation for being a skilled coach. I created a variable to takethese two factors into account. Specifically, a score for each coach wascreated using the following formula: career winning percentage X (1 -I/seasons coached). The first part of the equation captures the overallsuccess ratio of the coach. The latter part of the equation is intended torecognize the fact that a high winning percentage accumulated over many(e.g., 25) seasons is worth substantially more in terms of reputation andskill than a high winning percentage accumulated over a few (e.g., 5)seasons is. The variable has significant zero-order correlations with per-formance in the current season (r = .39) and prior seasons (r = .44), whichprovides tentative evidence of its predictive validity. Data were collectedfrom NCAA records.

Players' tenure. The length of time that respondents had played underthe coach was measured by self-report on the survey. The variable is themean tenure.

Coach's experience. The coach's experience is a potential indicator ofknowledge and acquired skill. The variable is measured in number ofgames coached by the head coach in his career.

5 Specifically, this meant they were multiplied by values of 1, .66, and.33 for MVP, first team, and second team, respectively. As an illustrativeexample, assume that a particular conference chose 1 MVP, 5 players forthe first team, and 7 players for the second team. If a participating team didnot have the conference MVP but had 1 player elected to the first teamand 2 to the second team, its talent score would be computed by thefollowing formula: 1.0 X (0/5) + .66 X (1/5) + .33 X (2/7) = .23.

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Preconference performance. One may suggest that the correlationbetween trust in the leader and team performance (within the conference)is an artifact of factors associated with team performance during the currentseason. To control for this possibility, I included the team's winningpercentage in the preconference schedule (i.e., the period immediatelybefore the survey data were collected) as a variable.

Results

I used a regression procedure for mediation (Baron & Kenny,1986) to examine both hypotheses. The procedure involves esti-mating three separate regression equations: (a) The mediator isregressed on the independent variable, (b) the dependent variableis regressed on the independent variable, and (c) the dependentvariable is regressed on both the independent variable and themediator. The following conditions must be met in each equation,respectively: (a) The independent variable must affect the media-tor, (b) the independent variable must affect the dependent vari-able, and (c) the mediator must affect the dependent variable.Lastly, to support mediation, the effect of the independent variableon the dependent variable must decrease in magnitude when themediator is added in the third equation. Whereas all three regres-sions are needed for examining Hypothesis 2 (mediation), only thethird regression is necessary for examining Hypothesis 1. Hence,past performance can serve as a control variable in Hypothesis 1,even if trust does not act as a mediator. In all three regressions,control variables were entered first.

Descriptive statistics are provided in Table 1. For each of theregression equations, residual plots were examined to verify thatregression assumptions were met (Neter, Wasserman, & Kutner,1990). In addition, the variance inflation factors (VIFs) wereexamined in the regression analyses to determine whether multi-collinearity was operating. The highest VIF was 5.4, and the meanof the VIFs was 2.9. According to the guidelines provided by Neteret al. (1990), these statistics indicate that multicollinearity is un-likely to be problematic. Lastly, analysis was conducted to verifythat the relationship between trust in the coach and team perfor-mance did not differ significantly by division.

The estimates for the three regression analyses are provided inTable 2. The data provide support for Hypothesis 1. After control-ling for several potential determinants of performance, trust in thecoach had a significant effect on winning percentage (j3 = .44,p < .05).

Because trust had a significant effect on winning percentage,mediation can be examined. In the first two equations, the precon-ditions for mediation are fulfilled (see Table 2): Past performancedoes have a significant effect on trust (/3 = .61, p < .01) and aneffect on winning percentage (/3 = .44, p < .05), after controllingfor other variables. When trust was added in the third equation(/3 = .44, p < .05), the coefficient for past performance decreasedin magnitude (/3 = .20) and became statistically insignificant.Hence, the pattern of results from these three equations providessupport for trust mediating the relationship between past perfor-mance and future performance.

Trust in leadership and the control variables accounted for asubstantial portion of the variance in team performance (/?Jdj =.66). Variables other than trust in leadership that demonstratedsignificant bivariate correlations with team performance includeteam talent, past team performance, preconference performance,coach record (but not coach experience), and trust in teammates.

Discussion

Much of the current interest in trust arguably stems from itsassumed (and relatively empirically unvalidated) impact on theperformance of various social units. The present study examinesthe significance of trust by exploring potential relationships be-tween trust in leadership and team performance. The study pro-vides several noteworthy findings. First, the finding that trust inthe leader has an effect on team performance has significance fortheory and practice. This evidence validates an idea that is funda-mental to theories of trust and leadership and provides a basis formanagement practices. Although prior research has focused on theeffects of trust in leadership on various behaviors and attitudes,this is the first study to directly examine its effects on perfor-mance—arguably the most important criterion. The findings sug-gest that the effects of trust on team performance are not onlyimportant theoretically but also substantial in practical terms. Forexample, after I took into account a number of alternative deter-minants of team performance, trust in the coach accounted for asignificant amount of variance (A^dj = .07). A qualitative exam-ination of the data illustrates the substance of this difference. The 2teams reporting the highest levels of trust in their coach early in theseason excelled: 1 team was ranked as the Number 1 team in thenation for the latter part of the season, before being upset in the

Table 1Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations for Study Variables

Variable

Note. N = 30.* p < .05. ** p < .01.

M SD 1

1.2.3.4.5.6.7.8.9.

Team performanceFulurl,TrustLeaderTeam performancePriorTrustTeommatesTeam talentCoach recordExperiencePreconferencePlayer tenure

0.5951.010.51

48.770.150.45

305.270.672.14

0.236.560.215.400.110.18

218.420.280.42

.57**

.62**

.37*

.72**

.39*

.19

.41*

.18

—.60**.64**.27.18

-.11.10

-.04

—.23.54**.44**

-.08.25.08

—.24

-.06-.14

.13

.04

—.26.06.45*

-.02

—.71** —

-.05 .21 —.36* .50** .16 —

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Table 2Summary of Regression Analyses for Examining Effect of Trust on Team Performance

Variable

Equation Dependent Independent

12

3

Trusted,., Player tenureTeam performanceprior

Team performanceFulurc Player tenureTrustTeammalesTeam talentExperienceCoach recordPreconferenceTeam performancePrlor

Team performanceFinure Player tenureTrustTeamm.,tesTeam talentExperienceCoach recordPreconferenceTeam performancepriorTn>stLeader

-.08.61.11.18.41.34

-.22.14.44.18

-.07.48.33

-.25.15.20.44

-0.543.97**0.781.412.49*1.46

-0.780.962.14*1.32

-0.453.16**1.56

-1.001.160.932.35*

.32

.59

.66

Note. N = 30. AS2 = .07 in Step 3, p < .05. Degrees of freedom are 27, 22, and 21 for Equations 1, 2, and 3,respectively.*p<.05. **p<.01.

NCAA tournament, and the other team ended up playing in thechampionship game for the national title. In contrast, the team withthe lowest level of trust in its coach won approximately 10% of itsconference games, and the coach was fired at the end of the season.

The effect of trust in leadership is particularly interesting whencompared with the effect of another frequently cited determinantof team performance—trust in teammates. Although the effect oftrust in leadership was substantial and significant, trust in team-mates was not significant after controlling for other variables,despite the fact that it was studied in a context that theoreticallyshould have allowed both variables to be important. Althoughsome may consider this to be surprising, they should note thatother researchers have also found that trust in a partner does nothave a main effect on the performance of the group or dyad (e.g.,Dirks, 1999; Kimmel, Pruitt, Magenau, Konar-Goldband, &Carnevale, 1980). The relative importance of trust in these twodifferent referents for group outcomes provides an interestingdirection for future research. Researchers might, for example,examine whether the relative importance of trust in the leaderversus trust in the team differs by the type of task the teamperforms. For instance, would the relative importance of the tworeferents differ if the team was engaging in a problem-solving task(e.g., creating a new product or idea), as opposed to performing aphysical task that requires carrying out a strategy (particularly insituations in which the leader champions the strategy)? To date,there is not enough research on trust to address this question.

The results of the current study provide initial evidence that trustin leadership is critical to team effectiveness in some situations.Building on the theory discussed earlier, one might speculate thattrust in leadership is particularly important because the decisionsare of great importance to the team and must be embraced byfollowers for the team to perform well. Exploratory interviewswith coaches and players provide some tentative support for thisidea. According to one coach, trust "allows players to be willing to

accept their role, so that they can do what it takes to win" and to"be willing to do things that we ask of them that are unpleasant orhard but are necessary to win" (personal communication, April1998). Likewise, a player commented that

once we developed trust in Coach , the progress we made increasedtremendously because we were no longer asking questions or wereapprehensive. Instead, we were buying in and believing that if weworked our hardest, we were going to get there, (personal communi-cation, April 1998)6

Hence, trust in leadership allows the team members to suspendtheir questions, doubts, and personal motives and instead throwthemselves into working toward team goals. Future research mightexplore these ideas empirically.

Whereas past research on trust has focused on the effects of truston team performance, this study suggests that a more complexrelationship may exist than has been previously theorized. Specif-ically, the study provides theory and evidence that trust mediatesthe relationship between past performance and future performance.This provides several interesting implications. One implication ofthis idea is that trust in the leader is not only a determinant of teamperformance but also a product of it. Although researchers havesuggested that trust might have such a relationship with behaviors(e.g., Mayer et al., 1995), they have not yet examined theoretically,let alone empirically within a single study, this idea with regard toperformance.

On the basis of the findings of the mediating role of trust, onemight speculate that trust in a leader plays a crucial role in helpingtranslate past performance of a team into future performance. Priorresearch by Hackman (1990) "found considerable evidence to

6 Personal communications are taken from interviews that were con-ducted with the promise of anonymity.

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support the dictum, that, over time the rich get richer and the poorget poorer" (p. 481). Whereas existing research on this topicappears to be focused on team efficacy (e.g., Lindsley, Brass, &Thomas, 1995), this study suggests that one of the reasons that theinertia in performance can be sustained is because performanceaffects the team's trust in its leader, which in turn affects teamperformance. For example, low levels of past performance may betranslated into low levels of future performance, because the teamdoes not trust the leader and is unwilling to accept his or herdecisions, goals, and strategies. Future research might consider thesignificant role trust might play in this phenomenon.

The more complex relationship just noted was derived by com-bining theories from the trust and leadership literatures to explainwhy past performance influenced a team's trust in its leader. Thedata suggest that this effect was quite strong. This evidence sug-gests that researchers should consider trust as having the potentialto be both an outcome and a determinant of organizational out-comes. The finding also suggests that future research on thedeterminants of trust in a leader clearly should take past perfor-mance of a relationship into account.

Implications for Practice

The increasing use of work teams makes the findings of thisstudy important for practice. This is particularly the case becausemuch of the existing research on trust has been focused on indi-viduals. Given some evidence that trust in leadership can affectteam performance, one can begin to speculate about the implica-tions for selecting, evaluating, training, and retaining leaders forteams. On the basis of the present study, trust, whatever its origins,appears be a valid criterion for these decisions, as it can haveperformance implications.

Given that trust is important, leaders may consider existingresearch on how trust can be built through their actions. Forexample, research suggests that leaders can build trust by engagingin transformational leadership behaviors such as role modeling(Podsakoff et al., 1990; Rich, 1997), by creating fair processes(Korsgaard, Schweiger, & Sapienza, 1995), and by allowing fol-lowers to participate in decision making (Magner, Welker, &Johnson, 1996).

Lastly, the data from this study highlight the fact that there aremany determinants of team performance, of which trust is onlyone. For example, team talent appeared to be the single greatestdeterminant of team success in this sample. Clearly, leaders needto attend to many of these factors to create successful teams.

Limitations and Directions for Future Research

This study has several limitations that provide opportunities forfuture research. First, the correlational design of the study does notcompletely rule out all plausible relationships between trust andteam performance. For example, despite the statistical support formediating the relationship between past performance and futureperformance and statistically controlling for other key constructs,the design cannot completely rule out the possibility that trustco-occurs with group performance, as opposed to affecting itdirectly. This idea needs to be ruled out using an experimentalmethod.

Second, this study provides data from a single setting—men'scollege basketball teams. Although the teams in this sample sharenumerous attributes (e.g., performance objectives, ongoing rela-tionships, existing roles and norms) common to most types ofteams that are of interest to applied psychologists, it is importantto highlight differentiating attributes. One of the most commonattributes used to differentiate groups is their task (McGrath,1984). The task of the teams in this sample primarily involved theexecution of manual or psychomotor tasks, as opposed to intellec-tive tasks. As McGrath (1984) noted, these type of tasks arguablyconstitute much of the work of groups in organizations but areoften overlooked in research. A second factor to note is that Iintentionally chose teams with hierarchical leader-member rela-tions (i.e., "manager-led teams"—see Hackman, 1990) and highlevels of interdependence to create high levels of actual vulnera-bility. Vulnerability is likely to help maximize the magnitude ofthe effects of trust; therefore, the magnitude of the effect in thepresent sample may be higher than in samples of less hierarchicalteams. Even if the effect was smaller in other contexts, trust inleadership would, however, still be likely to be important, giventhe magnitude of the effect in the present study.

Lastly, as I discussed earlier, higher levels of perceived vulner-ability (Rousseau et al., 1998) or perceived uncertainty (Waldman& Yammarino, 1999) may increase the impact of trust in leader-ship on team performance. Although they are not assessed in thisstudy, these factors are likely to vary between teams for a varietyof reasons (e.g., higher levels of player turnover, autocratic lead-ership styles). Future research directed at examining the potentialmoderating effect of perceived vulnerability and perceived uncer-tainty (and the factors creating them) may advance knowledge ofthe conditions under which trust in leadership is more or lesscritical to team success.

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(Appendix follows)

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Appendix

Measurement Scale for Trust in Leader

Trust in leader (a = .96)

Most team members trust and respect the coach. (. 93)I can talk freely to the coach about difficulties I am having on the team and know that he will want to listen. (. 84)If I shared my problems with the coach, I know he would respond constructively and caringly. (.90)I have a sharing relationship with the coach. I can freely share my ideas, feelings, and hopes with him. (. 86)I would feel a sense of loss if the coach left to take a job elsewhere. (. 96)The coach approaches his job with professionalism and dedication. (. 87)Given the coach's past performance, I see no reason to doubt his competence. (. 87)I can rely on the coach not to make my job (as a player) more difficult by poor coaching. (. 88)Other players and coaches consider the head coach to be trustworthy. (. 94)

Note. Instructions specify the head coach as the referent. Factor loading for the items are shown in parentheses. Allresponses were on 7-point Likert scales ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree).

Received July 15, 1999Revision received January 17, 2000

Accepted January 17, 2000