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Teamwork is becoming more and more important in the business world, as interdepartmental and interdisciplinary teams are brought together to solve complex problems within the organization. At the same time, the workplace is becoming increasingly diverse in terms of gender, age, culture, and many other factors. As such, in recent years businesses have been faced with the dual challenges of creating effective teamwork and managing diversity among employees (Lankard, 1994).
There is significant evidence to suggest that diversity has a largely positive effect on teamwork. Deborah Gruenfeld of Stanford's Graduate School of Business suggests that teams with at least two diverse points-of-view on a specific topic make more effective decisions than teams with a single point-of-view. Notes Gruenfeld (2000), "the pressure of the minority forces the majority to think more complexly and consider diverse evidence." Further, Ernest H. Drew, CEO of Hoechst Celanese notes that diverse teams (consisting of a mix of minorities, females, and white males) have broader solutions to business problems than a homogenous group of mostly white males (cited in Lankard, 1994).
At the same time, researchers note that cultural diversity can have a strong negative impact on the effectiveness of teamwork. Cultural differences can show up in differences...
For example, some cultures tend to be more reserved and speak in low, soft voices, thus potentially leading to the domination of group discussions by members of more aggressive, loudly spoken cultures. Further, cultures can also differ greatly in their perception of emotional tone in group communication, and even communication through eye contact can be determined as intrusive, shameful, acceptable, or challenging, depending on cultural perspective (Lankard, 1994).
As such, businesses are faced with the problem of not only reducing intercultural conflicts and problems with communication, and taking advantage of the potentially positive creativity and diversity of opinion that comes from cultural diversity. While this is a simple enough statement in practice, the actual reality of managing cultural diversity in a team environment is much more complex. In almost any business environment, a number of other variables come into play, including specific organizational culture, the nature of the task, physical environment (are groups meeting face-to-face or in a virtual environment), and the particular cultures and individual personalities involved. As such, it is often profoundly difficult for businesses to effectively manage culturally diverse teams in…
References
Gruenfeld, Deborah. 2004. Better Decisions through Teamwork. Stanford Graduate School of Business. 17 June 2004. http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/research/ob_teamdecisionmaking.shtml
Lankard, Bettina A. 1994. Cultural Diversity and Teamwork. ERIC Digest No. 152. Source: ERIC Clearinghouse on Adult Career and Vocational Education Columbus OH. ERIC Identifier: ED377311. Publication Date: 1994-00-00. 17 June 2004. http://www.ericfacility.net/databases/ERIC_Digests/ed377311.html
UPS. Workplace Diversity. 17 June 2004. http://www.community.ups.com/community/diversity/workplace/main.html
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