Nonspatial Proximity and Project Team Resilience: The Role of Knowledge Sharing and Team Cohesion

Abstract

Project teams often work in a turbulent and uncertain environment, which tends to bring various dilemmas to them over the projects’ duration. Resilience makes it possible for project teams to minimize, manage, and mend the damage caused by adversities. The research on project team resilience is emerging, but not fully developed. Many inputs of project team resilience including team composition have attracted less or even no attention. We explored the influence of team composition on project team resilience from the perspective of proximity and discussed the role of knowledge sharing and team cohesion in their relationship. An analysis of 256 responses from Chinese construction project teams shows that (a) cognitive proximity has a U-shaped effect on project team resilience, knowledge sharing, and team cohesion; (b) value and social proximity positively affect project team resilience, knowledge sharing, and team cohesion; (c) knowledge sharing and team cohesion have a positive influence on project team resilience and mediate the relationship between cognitive, value, social proximity, and project team resilience. This study enriches the empirical literature on team resilience, broadens the boundary of project management, team resilience, proximity, and conservation of resources theory, and provides practical suggestions and future direction.