Effective team structure is critical when managing creativity and creative output. It appears that many individuals are effective alone Einstein, Marco Polo etc however, what is usually overlooked is that these people often collaborated regularly. Also, it is very difficult to separate the idea from its influences. In any case, individuals are prone to path dependency, parochialism and reduced insight through reduced intellectual cross-pollination. The negatives of the individual are reduced somewhat by the addition of another individual. Pairs keep each other grounded and there are no core and peripheral information flows there are only two people. However, parochialism and path dependency are still factors. The core aim of a pair should be to encourage diversity and novelty in each individual. As groups get larger, the quality of results increases with intellectual cross-pollination. But group negatives prevent breakout: a) Symptoms of group think increase b) The percentage of individual performance declines c) Groups of three to five elicit much more conformity than just one or two d) Evaluation apprehension increases e) Core and peripheral information flows exclude some people f) Political strategies increase In conclusion, a tactical combination of team structures increases creative output. More information about this topic can be found at http://www.managing-creativity.com/ You can also receive a regular, free newsletter by entering your email address at this site. Kal Bishop, MBA ********************************** You are free to reproduce this article as long as no changes are made and the author's name and site URL are retained. |
