Katinka Bijlsma-Frankema

This longitudinal study aimed to explain performance differences of knowledge intensive project teams. Team level data gathered at three measurement moments were used. Antecedents of performance studied were: trust in team members, trust in supervisors, monitoring by team members and monitoring by supervisors. Heedful interrelating, a concept developed by Weick and Roberts ( 1993 Weick, K.E. and Roberts, K.H. 1993. Collective Mind in Organizations: Heedful Interrelating on Flight Decks. Administrative Science Quarterly, 38: 357–381. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] [Google Scholar] ) was expected to mediate between trust in team members, monitoring by team members and team performance. Correlation analysis and structural equation modelling were employed to analyse the data. The results show that heedful interrelating of team members, built on a combination of trust and monitoring by team members and trust in supervisors is an important factor in promoting team performance.

This article aims at contributing to the understanding of the trust-control nexus. The objective is to bring the discussion around the relationship between both concepts a step further by identifying common foundations, distinctive mechanisms and key implications relevant for theory-building and empirical research on trust and control. First, the concept of trust and related concepts are introduced. Second, the developments related to the diminished effectiveness of control and a growing importance of trust in both intra- and inter-organizational relations are discussed. Finally, the state of the art regarding the trust-control nexus and a brief summary of the four articles included in this special issue are provided.