Diversity in teams
Contents |
Abstaract
There are several types of diversities, from gender diversity to age diversity, personalty diversity and so on. As the world gets globalized, projects become more international and project groups are formed across country borders. This leads to cultural diverse project teams, which can have both positive and negative effects.
The purpose of the this article is to highlight the challenges and opportunities that cultural diversity creates, and how a project manager can handle these.
Big Idea
How is connected to the standards People - communication State of subject
Cultural diversity is the existence of a variety of cultural or ethnic groups in a team [1]. All though research suggests that there is no direct connection between cultural diversity and team performance, it still affects the teams in several ways. [2]. The effects of diversity, including cultural diversity, have traditionally been understood trough three different perspectives: [3]
1. Similarity-attraction
People are attracted to working with those with similar values, beliefs and attitudes.
2.Self-and social categorization
People categorize themselves into specific groups, based on a race, gender, values, beliefs among others, and others as outsiders. This creates an atmosphere where the outsiders are judged more stereotypically, and there are different expectations for those in the same groups and the outsiders.
3.Information processing
Individuals in groups with cultural diversity have access too other individuals that have different backgrounds, networks, information and skills. This increases the amount of information within the group and creates an atmosphere that can improve the group-performance
Cultural diversity in teams is strongly connected to all three perspectives. People from the same culture often share the same values, beliefs and attitudes and therefore prefer working with each other. In a culturally diverse group, it can also be easy for the group members to categorize themselves into specific groups, especially based on ethnicity or nationality. Group members from different cultures also often have different backgrounds, perspectives and skills which leads to different means of information processing in a team.
Application
Limitation
Annotated bibliography
- ↑ Oxford Languages for Google. Cultural diversity definition. Available at: https://www.google.no/search?rls=com.microsoft%3Anb%3A%7Breferrer%3Asource%7D&sxsrf=ALeKk00Aga05cPg7KF2xXvAQudX3lPwCFQ%3A1613070110502&ei=Hn8lYISXHqXnrgTy7L6oAw&q=cultural+diversity+definition&oq=cultural+diversity+definition&gs_lcp=CgZwc3ktYWIQDFAAWABgsCFoAHAAeACAAVWIAVWSAQExmAEAqgEHZ3dzLXdpesABAQ&sclient=psy-ab&ved=0ahUKEwiEnry3wuLuAhWls4sKHXK2DzUQ4dUDCA0
- ↑ Stahl, G., Maznevski, M., Voigt, A. et al. Unraveling the effects of cultural diversity in teams: A meta-analysis of research on multicultural work groups. J Int Bus Stud 41, 690–709 (2010). Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/46526123_Unraveling_the_effects_of_cultural_diversity_in_teams_A_meta-analysis_of_research_on_multicultural_work_groups
- ↑ Mannix, Elizabeth & Neale, Margaret A (2005). What differences make a difference? Psychological Science in the Public Interest. Available at: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1529-1006.2005.00022.x?casa_token=qiXUEAO_nPIAAAAA:77IXwF62pgU5VFPWF6eW7mm2XyX56bgBE-cmFbnMJsl6NTVD1S2u9EEHZIry56F8RPzRaaAfDdyu
