Extemporaneous Coordination in Specialist Teams: The Familiarity Complementarity

Team production is ubiquitous in the economy, but managing teams effectively remains a challenge for many organizations. This paper studies how familiarity among teammates influences performance of specialist teams, relative to nonspecialist teams. Applying theories team contexts where members coordinate interdependent activities extemporaneously, we develop predictions about factors that shift marginal returns specialization along two dimensions familiarity: social and functional familiarity. We test our hypotheses context Defence Ancients 2 (DOTA2), major e-sports game where, some formats, players are exogenously assigned five-person After analyzing nearly 6.5 million matches, find relatively more successful when socially functionally familiar with one another. The results suggest plug-and-play perspective on incomplete; rather, complements dynamic environments extemporaneously. Funded: Financial support from UCL School Management Worcester Polytechnic Institute gratefully acknowledged.