Favour teams with maximised cognitive diversity
Description
Build teams with people who think differently and have different perspectives (i.e., cognitive diversity), regardless of the team’s technical focus.
Rationale
Teams with maximised cognitive diversity outperform other teams, all other things being equal. Scott E. Page, in his book “The Difference”[1] , examines the evidence for this.
Teams with a high deviation (cognitive diversity) from the standard perspective are more likely to solve a problem than non-diverse teams, according to an experiment reported in the Harvard Business Review[2]. A high degree of cognitive diversity could generate accelerated learning and performance in the face of new, uncertain, and complex situations.
In a scaled environment, there is often a tendency to choose team members with a focus on knowledge, skills and experiences and to forget about selecting for broader cognitive diversity.
The following are aspects that can be observed in a Team where cognitive diversity is having an impact on the life of the team:
- More options are offered and discussed before agreeing on a solution
- Multiple alternative perspectives are visible in discussions
- There is an appreciation for different ideas
- Creativity sparks from different ideas being discussed
- Often there is more tolerance to the other’s point of views
Related Principles:
- Maximise team empowerment and localised decision making
- Favour Teams with broader Solution Accountability
- Favour Teams with broader Business Domain Competence
- Maximise Team autonomy
- Limit Team Mental Workload
- Maximise the Scope of Product Increment
- Product solution design is driven from within development teams
- Amplify Speed and Quality of Learning Cycles
- Technical leaders as coaches, mentors and community leaders
- Invest in quality
- Create a Learning Organisation
References
- ↑ Page, S. E. (2007). The difference: How the power of diversity creates better groups, firms, schools, and societies (3. print., and 1. paperback print., with a new preface). Princeton Univ. Press.
- ↑ Lewis, D. G., & Reynolds, Alison. (2017). Teams Solve Problems Faster When They’re More Cognitively Diverse. Harward Business Review.