Within-Group Agreement in Perceptions of the Work Environment: Its Antecedents

There is an increasing interest in within-group agreement in organizations, in response to evidence that agreement is predictive of various outcomes of interest. The model in this study suggests that within-group agreement on perceptions of the work environment is predicted indirectly by the quality of exchange relationships, specifically team-member exchange (TMX), leader-member exchange (LMX), social interaction and work interdependence, through the mediation of social influence, and directly by demographic homogeneity. Chan\u27s (1998) typology of composition models was used to appropriately conceptualize the variables at the group level.Results suggest that average high quality LMX relationships are predictive of within-group agreement, and that high quality relationships within the team are predictive of perceptions of social influence within the team. The mediation model was non-significant, and contrary to existing literature, social interaction and work interdependence were not significantly related to any of the other variables in the model.Demographic homogeneity was related to both perceptions of social influence and to within-group agreement on perceptions of the work environment in the opposite direction from that hypothesized. Post-hoc analyses suggest that organizational cultural orientation (collectivist or individualist) may moderate the relationship between demographic homogeneity and within-group agreement on perceptions of the work environment