Effect of Team Diversity on Physician Performance and Reputation: Evidence from an Online Healthcare Platform

TY - JOUR

T1 - Effect of Team Diversity on Physician Performance and Reputation

T2 - Evidence from an Online Healthcare Platform

AU - Wang, Bingkun

AU - Yan, Zhijun

AU - Yang, Liang

AU - Yang, Han

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © The author(s) 2026.

PY - 2026/1

Y1 - 2026/1

N2 - With the development of the Internet, an increasing number of patients are consulting and solving their health problems via online healthcare platforms. Medical team service is a new cooperative paradigm introduced by online healthcare platforms to cater to the diversified needs of patients. Existing studies have examined the performance of online medical teams at the team level, whereas little attention has been paid to the performance of individual team members. To fill this gap, we perform an empirical study to analyze whether online medical team diversity affects team members’ performance and reputation. Leveraging the data collected from a leading online healthcare platform in China, we employ a fixed-effect model to investigate the impact of online medical team diversity in experience and reputation on physician performance and reputation. The results indicate that both the experience diversity and reputation diversity of online medical teams positively impact team members’ individual service performance. However, interestingly, our results suggest that reputation diversity of online medical teams negatively influences individual reputation and positively influences individual service performance. Meanwhile, our findings indicate that the presence of “superstar physicians” within the team amplifies the positive effect of team experience diversity, though a similar effect is not observed in the context of team reputation diversity. Our study provides valuable insights into the factors influencing physicians’ decisions to join online medical teams and sheds light on strategies to improve the performance and reputation of team members.

AB - With the development of the Internet, an increasing number of patients are consulting and solving their health problems via online healthcare platforms. Medical team service is a new cooperative paradigm introduced by online healthcare platforms to cater to the diversified needs of patients. Existing studies have examined the performance of online medical teams at the team level, whereas little attention has been paid to the performance of individual team members. To fill this gap, we perform an empirical study to analyze whether online medical team diversity affects team members’ performance and reputation. Leveraging the data collected from a leading online healthcare platform in China, we employ a fixed-effect model to investigate the impact of online medical team diversity in experience and reputation on physician performance and reputation. The results indicate that both the experience diversity and reputation diversity of online medical teams positively impact team members’ individual service performance. However, interestingly, our results suggest that reputation diversity of online medical teams negatively influences individual reputation and positively influences individual service performance. Meanwhile, our findings indicate that the presence of “superstar physicians” within the team amplifies the positive effect of team experience diversity, though a similar effect is not observed in the context of team reputation diversity. Our study provides valuable insights into the factors influencing physicians’ decisions to join online medical teams and sheds light on strategies to improve the performance and reputation of team members.

KW - experience diversity

KW - online healthcare platforms

KW - reputation diversity

KW - service performance and reputation

KW - signaling theory

KW - social learning theory

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/105033781712

U2 - 10.26599/IJCS.2024.9100039

DO - 10.26599/IJCS.2024.9100039

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:105033781712

SN - 2398-7294

VL - 10

SP - 1

EP - 12

JO - International Journal of Crowd Science

JF - International Journal of Crowd Science

IS - 1

ER -