Culturally diverse teams, research shows, can help deliver better outcomes in today’s organizations. This is largely a good thing: Diverse teams have the potential to be more creative because of the breadth of information, ideas, and perspectives that members can bring to the table. But these teams often suffer from conflicting norms and differing assumptions between members, which can keep them from reaching their full creative potential. When managers don’t know how to spot and address these situations, cultural diversity may actually inhibit a team’s creative performance.
The Most Creative Teams Have a Specific Type of Cultural Diversity
Here’s how organizations can cultivate these groups.
July 24, 2018
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Summary.
Culturally diverse teams can help deliver better outcomes in today’s organizations. But these teams often suffer from conflicting norms and differing assumptions between members, which can keep them from reaching their full creative potential. When managers don’t know how to spot and address these situations, cultural diversity may actually inhibit a team’s creative performance. A series of studies shows that two types of culturally diverse team members can help a team’s creativity: cultural insiders (people who have multicultural experiences that map directly onto the cultures they are bridging), and cultural outsiders (people with experience in two or more cultures not represented on the team).