ABSTRACT
While team temporal leadership (TL) has been widely regarded as beneficial for team functioning, existing research has largely overlooked the potential resource costs underlying these benefits. Drawing on conservation of resources theory, we conceptualize TL as a form of leader resource investment that may create a cross-role resource tradeoff between leader costs and follower benefits. Using two multiwave, multisource field studies, we examine how TL shapes resource dynamics that ultimately influence the task performance of both leaders and followers. Study 1 indicates that TL increases leaders’ emotional exhaustion while reducing followers’ emotional exhaustion, thereby shaping their respective task performance. Moreover, the beneficial effects of TL on follower outcomes are stronger under higher team task complexity. To unpack this tradeoff, we further theorize mental effort and process clarity as two micromechanisms. Study 2 shows that team task complexity does not moderate the effect of TL on leaders’ mental effort but strengthens the effect of TL on leaders’ process clarity, with downstream implications for their emotional exhaustion and performance. Team task complexity also strengthens TL’s effects in reducing followers’ mental effort and enhancing their process clarity. Overall, these findings suggest that team task complexity primarily amplifies the benefits rather than the costs of TL, making TL a more favorable resource investment when team tasks are more complex. This study advances TL research by uncovering its underlying resource tradeoff and clarifying how it is shaped by cognitive processes and contextual demands.