Are There More or Fewer Challenges? Linking Affordances Perspectives to Conflict Experiences in Hybrid Virtual Teams

ABSTRACT Although hybrid virtual teams are increasingly common in organizations nowadays, there are limited studies focusing on conflict in these teams. Also, much of the literature in the field relies on deterministic frameworks that assume that technology uniformly shares team experiences. This research challenges this assumption by applying the affordances‐based approach that helps explain why people use the same technology in different ways or use other technologies in similar ways. This study explores how individuals in hybrid virtual teams perceive and use hybrid virtual environments and how this influences their conflict experiences. Using semi‐structured interviews, this study found three distinctive groups of hybrid virtual team workers—Social Butterflies, Efficiency Seekers, and Flexible Adaptors—who prioritize and maximize different environmental affordances and report different experiences of challenges and conflict based on the preferred affordances. This study argues that the impact of hybrid work arrangements may vary for different individuals, and organizations can adapt their strategies to help employees capitalize on these specific affordances to enhance their team collaboration experience and help overcome challenges and conflict.