ABSTRACT
Dr. Randy Pausch, a professor in computer engineering from Carnegie Mellon University, is well-known for the last lecture he gave before he died of pancreatic cancer in 2008. In this lecture, he explained why he turned down a chance to fulfill his childhood dream of working at Walt Disney Imagineering to continue working as a professor at Carnegie Mellon University where he could help his students reach their own childhood dreams. 1
Dr. Pausch also explained that it was after turning down the offer to work at Imagineering that he decided to create a course called ‘Building virtual worlds’ where he brought together a team of students majoring in art design, drama, and computer science to work on a two-week project developing entertainment software programs. The course was so successful that students, professors from other courses, and even parents lined up outside his classroom to watch students present their creations.
Dr. Pausch knew how to take advantage of diversity to promote creativity in teams, and for this reason, his classes were so successful. Research has already shown that teams comprised of people with diverse backgrounds are more likely to produce a creative output than homogeneous teams. 2 However, studies 239have also shown that diversity may not always lead to creativity, and that several factors can moderate this relationship. 3 Specifically, while heterogeneous teams are more likely to take advantage of their diverse pool of resources and produce more creative and innovative work, 4 these teams are also more likely to face emotional conflict, and experience different forms of misunderstandings. 5 In this paper, we review the literature on the relationship between team-diversity, team-creativity, and innovation. Furthermore, we propose a model that explains how team-conflict management styles, and team-and leadership identity could moderate the relationship between team-diversity, team-creativity, and innovation. In particular, we argue that these factors will moderate the relationship by influencing the level of conflict in teams.
