Although shared leadership is widely recognized as a key predictor of virtual team effectiveness, it is often treated as a static, one-time factor rather than a dynamic phenomenon that evolves over time. Understanding the trajectory of shared leadership is crucial, as it reflects the true dynamic nature of the phenomenon and informs the development of effective management strategies and interventions. In this study, we aim to answer three key questions: (1) How does shared leadership in virtual teams evolve over time? (2) How does technology influence this evolution? (3) How do changes in shared leadership impact virtual team satisfaction? Our study distinguishes between task-oriented and relationship-oriented shared leadership to provide a nuanced examination of the questions. Analyzing data collected over nine weeks from 1,919 individuals in 358 virtual teams, we find that both types of shared leadership follow a linear decline over time. This decline is moderated by media richness, with teams using richer media maintaining higher levels of shared leadership. We further find that changes in relationship-oriented shared leadership significantly affect overall team satisfaction but changes in task-oriented shared leadership do not.
