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Business News/ Industry / Kellogg School Corner | Fresh blood is good for teams
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Kellogg School Corner | Fresh blood is good for teams

Kellogg School Corner | Fresh blood is good for teams

Illustration: Jayachandran / MintPremium

Illustration: Jayachandran / Mint

The global recession has caused companies to shift their approach to business. Many institutions, gripped by the global financial crisis, have made dramatic cuts to their workforce. With unemployment at uncomfortable heights, managers and employees, alike, are charged with the daunting task of finding ways to increase productivity.

According to new research by a professor from Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, better decisions come from teams that include a “socially distinct newcomer". That’s psychology-speak for someone who is different enough to bump other team members out of their comfort zones. The study cites that having these newcomers as teammates can actually increase the quality of results when working in groups.

Illustration: Jayachandran / Mint

Researchers noticed this effect after conducting a traditional group problem-solving experiment. The twist was that a newcomer was added to each group about five minutes into their deliberations. And when the newcomer was a social outsider, the teams were more likely to solve the problem successfully.

In this particular study, the key factor is simply whether newcomers are distinct in some way from the other group members.

The research is published in the March issue of Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin with co-authors Katie Liljenquist of Brigham Young University’s Marriott School of Management and Margaret Neale of Stanford Graduate School of Business.

Phillips’ breadth of research focuses on understanding the impact of social and task-relevant diversity on group functioning and individual outcomes. She has looked at the impact of gender on the utilization of expertise, the impact of race and other social distinctions on information sharing in groups and generally speaking, seeks to understand how to get any group of people to share, listen to and successfully integrate the ideas and information possessed by all members of the organization.

The experiment also revealed a fallacy in the assumptions we make about our own effectiveness in groups. The subjects in the experiment were members of different fraternities and sororities. In general, when the newcomer was from the same sorority or fraternity as the other team members, the group reported that it worked well together but was less likely to correctly solve the problem.

In contrast, when the newcomer was a member of a rival sorority or fraternity, the opposite was true—these groups felt they worked together less effectively, yet they significantly outperformed socially homogeneous groups.

“Oftentimes when people think of the effects of diversity, they focus on the one or two people in the minority, instead of thinking about how the diversity impacts the majority of the group," says Phillips. “In diverse groups, everyone is more likely to focus on the available information and to bring in new ideas, not just the people who are ‘different’."

What explains the results? According to Phillips, newcomers in the experiment did not necessarily ask tougher questions, possess novel information or doggedly maintain a conflicting point of view. Just being there was enough to change the dynamic among old-timers who shared a common identity.

When a member of the group discovered that he agreed with the new outsider, he felt alienated from his fellow old-timers—consequently, he was very motivated to explain his point of view on its merits so that his peers would not lump him in with the outsider. An opinion alliance with an outsider put his social ties with other team members at risk.

Even more important was the response of the rest of the group—everybody in the groups where the newcomer was a social outsider worked hard to solve the problem and resolve the social discomfort.

This discovery provides keen insight into team dynamics, especially during the global economic recession when companies are creating teams of employees with different professional identities.

Common “social distinctions" in today’s workplace that include, but go beyond the typical demographic differences we traditionally think about (for example, race and gender), Phillips says, would include:

• One employee from accounting working on a team in which everyone else is from sales

• An employee of a company that has just been bought finding herself on a team of people from the acquiring firm

• An American employee of a London-based company finding himself on a team full of native British workers

If managers want employees to be critical thinkers and problem solvers, diverse teams are essential to the workplace. However, socially distinct newcomers may create some discomfort, says Phillips.

To help employees cope in those situations, managers would be wise to explain that such conflict can actually generate better results. Her research shows that these “managerial" assets are valuable to a company’s profit, especially during an economic downturn.

“Many organizations are trying to figure out what is the value of diversity," says Phillips. “I think it will be very hasty for organizations to set aside or get rid of their diversity efforts. Creating a diverse and inclusive workplace affects everybody in the organization, even if they don’t look ‘diverse’ on the surface. Dropping those diversity efforts may put the company at risk of losing their competitive edge."

Send your comments to kelloggscorner @livemint.com

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Published: 05 May 2009, 02:44 AM IST
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