What is Cognitive Diversity?
Diversity can play an important role in strengthening the performance and innovation of teams, and in creating fair organizations that ensure equity and representation. We all have different identities that are a sum-total of our demographic, experiential, and cognitive diversities [1].
A few years ago, several organizations started assessing their diversity quotient and sharing statistics and photographs highlighting their existing demographic diversity (i.e., diversity based on demographic factors such as gender, race, and age). Recently published reports from some of these organizations indicate their progress and commitment on this front (e.g., [2] and [3]). A type of diversity that can be difficult to assess through photographs and reports though is cognitive diversity.
Cognitive diversity is a type of diversity that represents the different ways in which people think, understand, or interpret a situation. The question that arises then is, are demographically diverse teams always cognitively diverse too? To answer this question, let us look at the connection between demographic diversity, cognitive diversity, and their impact. While demographic diversity can potentially influence cognitive diversity and boost "crowd wisdom", when demographically diverse teams start to think alike due to various factors (e.g., organizational policies, long-term proximity, and shared biases), the performance benefit associated with demographic diversity (when considered by itself) can weaken [4]. Furthermore, cognitive diversity can also be seen in demographically homogeneous teams [4].
Cognitive diversity plays a critical role in innovation, which in turn is needed for solving problems cost-effectively and staying competitive. Organizations that depend upon innovation for success could consider encouraging cognitive diversity right from the recruitment stage. Such organizations can consider identifying the differences in the thinking style of the candidates that they interview and selecting at least some of those whose thoughts, expertise, and solutions are complementary to theirs. Hiring such cognitively diverse candidates who are also fearless and self-motivated and including them in the design thinking process can potentially lead to innovative products and processes. Such candidates can help teams in identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats that other like-minded team members may miss.
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Three cheers for all the diverse teams!
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