Understanding Diversity

Daan van Knippenberg is Professor of Organizational Behavior at RSM Erasmus University, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands. His research interests include work group performance, especially work group diversity and group decision making, leadership, in particular the roles of self and identity, and of emotions, and social identity processes in organizations. In his inaugural address he argues that the effects of work group diversity on group performance should be understood in terms of two processes that have independent and interactive effects: elaboration of task-relevant information and social categorization. He outlines how an integrative model of these processes may explain inconsistent findings in diversity research and provide clear directions for the management of diverse groups. In this respect, he advocates in particular attention for group members’ understanding of work group diversity. Daan van Knippenberg is co-founder of the Erasmus Centre for Leadership Studies, and Associate Editor of Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes and of Journal of Organizational Behavior. His research is published in such academic outlets as Journal of Applied Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, and Annual Review of Psychology.The key question in diversity research is how differences between group members affect work group process and performance. Over 50 years of research have made clear that diversity can have positive as well as negative effects on performance, but research and practice are still struggling to formulate models that are able to make sense of these diverging effects and that offer clear guidance in how to manage diversity. The Categorization-Elaboration Model (CEM) addresses this issue. The CEM proposes that the effects of work group diversity on group performance should be understood in terms of two processes that have independent and interactive effects: elaboration of task-relevant information and social categorization. Diversity may have positive effects on performance to the extent that it engenders the exchange and integration of task-relevant information (elaboration). At the same time, diversity may be detrimental to performance to the extent that it engenders "us-them" distinctions (social categorization) and intergroup biases – especially because these intergroup biases disrupt information elaboration processes. The CEM also identifies the factors on which the occurrence of elaboration and social categorization processes is contingent, factors that may offer clear angles for the management of diversity

Work group diversity

Work group diversity, the degree to which there are differences between group members, may affect group process and performance positively as well as negatively. Much is still unclear about the effects of diversity, however. We review the 1997–2005 literature on work group diversity to assess the state of the art and to identify key issues for future research. This review points to the need for more complex conceptualizations of diversity, as well as to the need for more empirical attention to the processes that are assumed to underlie the effects of diversity on group process and performance and to the contingency factors of these processes..

Buying and selling exchange goods: Loss aversion and the endowment effect

An experimental market was used to investigate whether exchange goods may be susceptible to the endowment effect. Previous research (Kahneman et al., 1990) suggested that the endowment effect will not be observed in exchange goods. The present study demonstrates that it may be observed, but only when traders are uncertain about future exchange prices. It is argued that this is a manifestation of loss aversion due to the difficulty of computing the net gains and losses of trade when exchange rates are uncertain

Providing Information in Public Opinion Surveys: Motivation and Ability Effects in the Information-and-Choice Questionnaire

The Information-and-Choice Questionnaire (ICQ) is an instrument for public opinion survey in which respondents are presented with a policy-relevant decision problem and provided with information relevant to the problem (e.g. information about the consequences of the policy options). In the present paper we study the effects of respondents' motivation (operationalized as involvement in the issue) and ability (operationalized as respondent's level of education) on the formation and stability of preferences in the ICQ. Data were gathered in a nation-wide (N=991) survey on preferences for different ways of generating electricity in the Netherlands. As predicted, more motivated and more able respondents appeared to engage in more elaborate information processing

Leadership and Fairness: The State of the Art

Research in leadership effectiveness has paid less to the role of leader fairness than probably it should have. More recently, this has started to change. To capture this development, we review the empirical literature in leadership and fairness to define the field of leadership and fairness, to assess the state of the art, and to identify a research agenda for future efforts in the field. The review shows that leader distributive, procedural, and especially interactional fairness are positively associated with criteria of leadership effectiveness. More scarce and scattered evidence also suggests that fairness considerations help explain the effectiveness of other aspects of leadership, and that leader fairness and other aspects of leadership, or the leadership context, may interact in predicting leadership effectiveness. We conclude that future research should especially focus on interaction effects of leader fairness and other aspects of leadership, and on the processes mediating these effects

The value of emotion in visionary leadership

__Abstract__ New research shows that emotional displays from leaders can have a profound and influencing effect on the way that employees think, feel and behave relative to an organisation’s visionary goals

Unity through Diversity: Value-in-Diversity Beliefs, Work Group Diversity, and Group Identification

Research on work group diversity has more or less neglected the possibility that reactions to diversity may be informed by individuals' beliefs about the value of diversity (vs. homogeneity) for their work group. We studied the role of such diversity beliefs as a moderator of the relationship between work group diversity and individuals' identification with the work group across two studies. Study 1 was a cross-sectional survey that focused on gender diversity and gender diversity beliefs. Study 2 was a laboratory experiment in which work group diversity and diversity beliefs were manipulated. Results of both studies support the prediction that work group diversity and group identification are more positively related the more individuals believe in the value of diversit

The catalyst effect: how meta-knowledge can improve team performance

__Abstract__ Effective teamwork is critical given the complexities of doing business today. However, it is all too often the case that teams fail to get the best out of the specialist knowledge they possess. Addressing this problem, new research shows that understanding who knows what within a team may improve its effectiveness

Tango in the Dark: The Interplay of Leader’s and Follower’s Level of Self-Construal and its Impact on Ethical Leadership

In line with romantic views on leadership, leaders are traditionally held responsible for any kind of ethical misconduct in organizations. Through explicating the influence of followers on their leaders' (unethical) decision-making, we aim to add some nuances to this view with the present chapter. To begin with, we suggest that people generally regard leadership as ethical when the leader takes the collective into account, while only focusing on own gains is largely regarded as unethical. We then posit that the degree to which leaders' decisions are directed towards the one versus the other outcome depends on the leaders’ level of self-construal, that is, the way how they see themselves in relation to others. Looking at leader's ethical decision making through this lens suggests that it is open to external influence, in that leaders’ self-construal is susceptible to external cues. In particular, followers form an important part of such external cues for a leader's level of self-construal. We thus suggest various mechanisms via which followers indirectly influence their leaders' ethical decision making. In sum, we put forward a model in which we show how leaders and followers reciprocally affect their level of self-construal and thus ultimately the degree to which ethical leadership is enacted

The X-Factor: On the Relevance of Implicit Leadership and Followership Theories for Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) Agreement

While Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) research shows that leaders engage in different kinds of relationships with different followers, it remains somewhat of an enigma why one and the same relationship is often rated differently by a leader and the respective follower. We seek to fill that conceptual void by explaining when and why such LMX disagreement is likely to occur. To do so, we reconsider antecedents of LMX quality perceptions and outline how each party’s LMX quality perception is primarily dependent on the perceived contributions of the other party, moderated by perceived own contributions. We then integrate the notion of Implicit Leadership and Followership Theories (ILTs and IFTs) to argue that the currencies of contributions differ between leaders and followers. This dyadic model sets the stage to explain that LMX disagreement can stem from (1) differences in both parties’ ILTs as well as both parties’ IFTs, but also from (2) differences in perceptions of own and other’s behavior. We conclude by discussing communication as a means of overcoming LMX disagreement and propose an array of potential studies along the lines of our conceptualization