1. Introduction
The global market for talent has increased the need to find out the various effects of team diversity on project management teams. There have been studies that suggest that injecting diversity in teams has positive impacts on performing teams (Rock & Grant, 2016). While admitting that there are five key factors that make a team succeed, Cox (2021) noted that team composition is the most important of all. Simplistic thinking points to the fact that merely getting the right talents in terms of skills from a wider pool that the global market provides will achieve this goal. There are significant challenges (Gardenswartz & Rowe, 2009) that are associated with bringing people together when they may not have the same cultural background or speak the same language.
Every project manager craves an excellent team that will bring about the successful delivery of project requirements to the full satisfaction of all stakeholders. It is on this note that Biskupek (2019) declared “the most important requirement for a successful project is the team chosen to carry it out” Accordingly, “a team with better knowledge and better experience has a better chance to succeed in accomplishing the projects’ objectives”. While the project manager has time constraints to organize the team and complete the project, it becomes challenging to get a perfect team, even as the talents are not unlimited.
According to Rock and Grant (2016), in their study “Why Diverse Teams are smarter” (published by Harvard Business Review). Teams with diversity are likely to put up better performance, they concluded that Teams in diversity are more careful. This includes diversity from gender, racial, and cultural perspectives. There is increased accessibility to a larger pool of talents that otherwise could not be accessed in a homogeneous community, this helps organizations to reach out for the best talents to fit into multiple roles that will optimize value in achieving organizational objectives.
It has become increasingly important to investigate the elements that make diversity a motivational catalyst to team performance and project team performance.
Our interest here is to look at performing organizations and project management teams and find out how the individual members apply their behaviors when they are working in teams with diversity.
1.1. Aim
Our aim is to find out the factors that influence project team members’ behaviors when they are engaged in a team with diversity to become successful as against when they are in non-diversified project teams.
We may be able to provide basic information to project team leaders and management teams that will assist in decision-making, as well as stimulate further studies in this area.
1.2. Research Goals and Questions
Are there significant alterations in the behavior of project team members that impact project teams with diversity that reflect on their performance as opposed to when they work in homogeneous project teams?
Are the teams more motivated or driven to perform better at work other than the fact that recruiters can get more quality talents by virtue of having a wider reach from globalization?
What factors are more critical to the teams’ behavior and performance?
It is very important to understand what affects the positive behaviors of project team members when they are working with other members from diversity so that such factors will be reinforced to foster more healthy relationships between team members, and the project team leaders for ultimate improved project performance.
It is also intended that the outcome of this paper will become an addition to the knowledge of project management practice and the effort to improve project team performance that benefits organizations.
While it will be important for management and team leaders and project managers to hone on the positives, it may expose any difficulties or drawbacks that could be researched to reverse negative impacts. This will also add to the studies on team motivation.
1.3. Assumptions
Globalization has opened a talent market for project team recruiters. There is more access to diverse expertise and skills and as such every team has the opportunity to reach and meet their resource needs.
It is believed that only the talents that have experienced working at both teams with diversity and teams without diversity are able to make appropriate comparisons and limit the level of bias that would be associated with data from talents that are experienced in one of the two settings.
Hypothesis: There is a significant change in project team members’ behavior when they work in either homogeneous teams or nonhomogeneous teams.
Null Hypothesis: There is no significant change in the behavior of project team members when they work in either a homogeneous team or a nonhomogeneous project team.
1.4. Significance of This Study
The significance of this paper lies in being able to identify behavior change drivers as motivators or otherwise, and make them available for future research, as well as become available to practitioners, leaders and organizations for application.
2. Literature Review
“Teams are more than groups of people working together (Sturgess & Higson, 2012). They are consciously built” To qualify as a team in this respect the team must “combine individual skills and strength with a shared commitment to perform” It suffices to say that we do not just take a group of people as a team because they know each other, or they have just been assembled or that they get along. They must be working together and have relevant characteristics to qualify them as a team.
They must be able to collaborate and show the willingness to do so. A good team must display a sense of unity, sense of responsibility, and accountability with a common goal. Sturgess & Higson tied teamwork to the attitude and behavior that team members display in their teamwork.
They listed common characteristics of a performing team as attentive, cohesive, supportive, trusting self-encouraging, and focused on problem solving. Team members empathize with each other and demonstrate transparency and collective responsibility.
Accordingly, these authors came up with a Team Model “STAR” that is explained as Strength, Teamwork, Alignment and Results.
2.1. McClelland’s Human Motivation Theory
David McClelland’s Human motivational theory expounded by Mind Tools (2020) highlights three driving forces that motivate people at work. The theory identifies these drivers as: 1) Need for Achievement, 2) Need for Affiliation, and 3) Need for Power. There is always one that is dominant in a person.
McClelland believes that these needs cut across gender, age, and culture, and are learned from experience and our expectations. Accordingly, it fits into our study since the individuals bring into the team their experience and pass-through other learning in new stages of project team development. They have their expectations, which are then integrated into their teams.
Thus, the achievement as a driver comes in the form of a desire to accomplish tasks and goals and be acknowledged or recognized for the progress made.
Affiliation as a driver cherishes collaboration, warmth in the team with a sense of belonging; being part of the team.
The need for power manifests in the form of influencing, organizing, recognition and status or position. The drivers for the basis for individual behaviors that may be moderated in a project team environment.
Tuckman’s Team Building Theory
Like any other project team formation, with diversity or monoculture, a process of team development must evolve. Using Turkman’s 4 stages Model of team building (later modified to 5 stages) a team with diversity potentially has more to display in this model (Miner, 2005).
Forming
The first stage is where people who do not know each other are meeting in a work environment for the first time. There is a tendency to “size” each other, and develop impressions about one another, either from their appearance, race, gender, ascent, etc. This is considered a” Forming stage” Team members are meeting at a kick-off meeting where they must learn about the project vision and goals, the project team structure, and clear roles (Assaf et al., 2014). Some team members may easily display their personalities as introverts or extroverts. We note here that diversity characteristics may be displayed at this point, given room for “silent scrutiny of members perceived as different”.
Storming
In the next stage team members tend to react to their perception of others, some with suspicions, and skepticism, while there are some that want to cease on the moment and impose themselves on others or take a stance of superiority over other team members, either by knowledge, experience or background. At this point working relationships will seem doubtful, and may introduce fear of failure, but gradually this will fade away. Therefore, project managers and leaders must introduce team building activities to breed unity, closer understanding among team members.
Norming
The stage is a product of previous activities, team members now understand their roles and working relationships and respect it. They start sharing ideas and work information as needed and appreciate the fact that they have a common goal. Team members begin to warm up to each other to build closer bonds. Individual team members’ biases, and unfound perceptions of others start giving way to objectivity.
Performing
In this stage, everyone becomes focused on the collective project goal and exerts their best ability to succeed and get their contribution recognized and eventually be rewarded. Team support will come naturally as individual interests become aligned to the collective project goal. At this point, individual team members could rely on one another to take responsibility for giving their best and ensure the success of the project. The team works interdependently as a family with a strong sense of achievement and pride” (Gharaibeh, 2019).
Nevertheless, there is a tendency for individuals to feel challenged, by the expertise of team members who are “different from them” and will want to “push” and challenge their own skill and experience to equally match other team members. This phenomenon may be overlooked in a homogeneous team, as this type of challenge may not arise.
Adjourning
Finally, the next stage, originally seen as a transitioning point from a project to another assignment, or at the project closing calls for celebrations, rewards, and customer feedback. Recognition today does not have to wait till the end of a project. Team members are recognized and appreciated, rewarded even on flight. It does not have to be a big reward; a simple acknowledgement of individual contribution is good enough. This becomes another form of challenge as diverse team members equally will strive to be recognized with career development and rewards (Santhanam, 2020).
2.2. Trend in Literature
Major motivational theories (Miner, 2005) have one thing in common; that is to identify ways to motivate employees to elicit the best work attitude and behavior that will improve their performance. From Abraham Maslow’s motivational hierarchy theory to McClelland’s achievement theory, researchers have continued to search and identify the forms of motivation (Forsyth, 2019): that will help to build formidable winning teams to support organizational performance. Akin to Maslow’s is Turkmen’s team building model that has been upgraded from 4 stages to 5 stages.
As the world has become a global market for talents, it has become important to see the elements that make diversity a motivational catalyst.
2.3. Leadership
In this study, we want to see the relationship and the role of leaders in teams with diversity, “The effectiveness of a team has a very strong relationship with the effectiveness of the project manager or a leader. It is therefore very important that the project managers create and develop teams to win using relevant team-building tools (Banister-Hazama, Moreci, & England, 2012).
Given the possibilities and availabilities of abundant talents, the leadership or the project manager that has the responsibility of selecting team members should skillfully determine the skill requirements and engage individual resources with matching skills to every position that a project needs to succeed. They should ensure that their candidate will add value to the team and demonstrate team capability overall. To factor in diversity is therefore not just for the sake of diversity, even as Stahl & Maznevski (2021) assert that it is the process variables that impact the performance as “cultural diversity does not have direct impact on team performance”.
The talent should demonstrate team capability overall. The project manager should be familiar or knowledgeable with individuals’ demographics appeal (Zhang, 2018) from the perspective of emotional and cultural intelligence, be capable of resolving issues with stress and conflicts, and build trust to create an enabling and positive working environment. The leadership has a responsibility to strive towards building a perfect team.
Globalization and virtuality empowered by technological communication, are making it possible for recruiters to get talents across the globe. It may be challenging to assemble a team that is close to being considered perfect.
Researchers are taking an interest in this development and see phenomenal increasing team diversity in teams’ membership. While increasing multiculturalism in project teams in diversity has the consequent result of more qualitative teams and improved team and performance, there are challenges that can deter people who do not have the same work habits or the same cultural intelligence, they may have initial trust issues to come together and become better-performing teams. It is noted that cultural differences have created conflicts (Zillante et al., 2019) that cause projects and organizations to fail when not properly managed. It is for this reason that we want to find out what makes the project team members strive to succeed and become better performers.
2.4. Contrast
Lessons learned remind us about team failures that failed even while they may be formed with diversity expecting improved performance, The BMW-Rover merger that had the core of German and British stakeholders and workforce failed partly due to poor learning culture (Whiteley, 2012). This is besides other challenges to building diversity (Boundless Management, n.d.).
2.5. Project Team Composition
A typical project team may consist of a Project Manager who has overall responsibility for the project, and at least a Business Analyst who has the responsibility for requirements elicitation. There is a designer who handles the architecture, the design, and interfaces. There is the Developer who has the responsibility to read and understand and interpret the design, develop the component items or data in an integrated manner to give form to a conceptualized outcome. There is a tester who checks and tests the created item, product or result for conformance to requirements and customers’ specifications. There may be a quality team member who conducts quality checks for inputs, resource, performance, and procedures being followed.
In construction projects, for example, you have a plumber, an electrician, a surveyor, a construction and building engineer, painters, etc. This list is the basic minimum and depending on the complexity and size of a project, there are many other roles that may be needed, and sometimes there are several individuals for a particular role under a leadership.
Notwithstanding, the team composition, roles and organization may differ when in either the predictive project Lifecyle or the adaptive project Lifecyle.
2.6. Enabling Positive Atmosphere
The art of front-loading, otherwise described as project onboarding the project resource, is considered crucial and has become one of the major factors that contribute to project success or failure. Focusing on the positive factors are listed five aspects that must be taken care of. These include effective communication of project expectations understood by all stakeholders, the project manager, and the team members.so that everyone shares the goals.
Ensure that all relevant tools are readily available. This will include software, funds, and equipment. These should be planned for and scheduled appropriately and communicated to those who will need them.
The third point is to ensure that an adequate budget including the necessary reserves is in place. The team will be paid as when due and all procurements are provided and ensure that the team will not have cause to stop their work due to budget overrun.
It is also very important that the team understands the project’s priority from the start. In this case, if any team member will have to be engaged in multiple projects, it should be clear how much time and at what intervals the resource will be available for any of the projects.
Built-in customer satisfaction has become very important right from the initiation stage. The project manager ensures that there is a team and customer interface especially when they have external clients. Allow for a client brief phase where team members can properly understand the client, and at the end deliver customer-satisfying results.
These set aspects prevent situations that will create major misunderstandings between the project team and the stakeholders. Project onboarding for the project team is the responsibility of the project manager to ensure that team members are boarded smoothly (Halabuda, 2020).
This process avoids mistakes where team members misunderstand the requirements and spend time with the project manager struggling to explain requirements and issues from time to time. The team members should have firsthand knowledge of the requirements, the project goals, and all the stakeholders, and contribute to sessions with stakeholders making it easy for the project manager to simply transfer knowledge work to the team members. It is not sufficient for the project manager to assemble a team; it is critical for teams to have an onboarding session.
Learning from The Reina Dimensions of Trust, “Why Trust is Critical” (Reina et al., 2017) research report by Center for Creative Leadership, Trust is a nonnegotiable for performing organizations. The “Three Cs” (competencies, character and connection) represent the dimensions brought to the fore.
Trust of character forms the foundation of a performing team; otherwise, we have a gathering of people. Inherent faith is developed to trust one another for what they can do, determines the tone of any team, and initiates the guiding rules. At this point, the team knows what is right and what is wrong and can determine collectively, teamwork expectations, who does what, and when. These character dimensions are developed over time as the team gets to work together. Individual vulnerabilities are recognized, and support is provided to ensure a common focus for the team.
Trust communication, or connection dimension allows transparency and honest collaboration for individuals within the team and for the team. There is openness without fear of reprisal or distrust, breeding a safe sincere two-way communication loop. Mistakes are recognized as mistakes and are accepted; Issues are openly discussed to find solutions that promote a healthier work and learning environment. Accordingly, these support the findings (Bond-Barnard, Fletcher, & Steyn, 2017) that there is a relationship between Collaboration and Trust as the human factors that are essential ingredients for project success or failure.
Trust of capability or competency is derived from the process of talent acquisition through onboarding, where the right skills and experience are matched with specific position requirements. Every member has trust in the capability of other team members to contribute and add value to the team effort towards the project goals set. There is healthy competitiveness as skills are integrated, affecting cross-functional learning, and reliability on diverse skills in trust to accomplish a common objective. Reina linked these dimensions to 16 behavior patterns that high-performing organizations explore for innovation, and creativity that are born out of trustworthiness.
2.7. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Motivation Theory
Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs theory, of motivation updated by Dr. McLeod (2020) looks at a generalized concept of how people’s needs differ based on their employment situation. This is important to us to the extent it tries to explain how individual behaviors shaped depending on their circumstances in life are and it influences their behavior in a team environment. In diversity, people come from different backgrounds to form a blend.
The theory creates five levels of needs, namely, Physiological needs, Safety needs, Belonging and love needs, Esteem needs, and Self-Actualization needs. The theory stipulates that the lowest level of need in the hierarchy, physiological need must be met before a person begins to move to the next level of need, which is safety need. Thus, the basic need of having food to eat, water to drink, free from cold, shelter and moments to rest must be met in the life of everyone. The following is the need to be safe, protected, and applicable to the safety of employment. The individual will do everything to keep a job or look for an alternate job to ensure a level of stability.
In the third stage, the individual becomes aware of belonging and love needs. The employee wants a relationship with teammates. The individual begins to desire team and group association, work collaboratively; start trusting and supporting team members and start seeing the big picture rather than personal concerns. The team building process leads to the performing stage.
At the fourth stage of esteem needs, the individual starts seeing the need to achieve and be seen as an important person as an individual and in the team.
In the fifth stage, Self-actualization, full potentials are being achieved, there is personal marked growth, creativity, and innovative ideas set in. Fulfillment and influence are natural and shared. At this point, there is individual “ownership of team” where every team member will tend to take responsibility for the actions of other team members.
Taking a cue from Maslow, McLeod (2020) decided to focus on the positives and expounded on self-actualization. While acknowledging that it is built from behavior, he highlighted the characteristics that make self-actualized persons excellent team players.
They accept other people including colleagues, for what they are. They are” problem-centered” (not self-centered). They have peak experience. They have strong moral/ethical standards. They are highly creative, and they look at issues objectively to ensure authentic outcomes. This suggests that they embrace diversity.
3. Research Methodology
We relied on primary research data (survey questionnaire and interviews). We had some interactions with key practitioners for insights. The discussions from the practitioners helped us to authenticate the list of attitudes and behaviors that we need for the questionnaires. We also brought into perspective the bond of competency, character, and connections (Reina et al., 2017) in simple language to support our questions. Some critical team attributes for example, Trust, leadership style, etc. are filtered out as they are common and important in either environment but not from the teams themselves.
We target organizations with team members that have both homogeneous and heterogeneous team experience. This is further randomized in industries, in multicultural and gender-diverse settings. Responses as to their behavior and preferences in these situations are collated to make relevant analyses. The challenges of the pandemic and finance have limited the scope of this investigation (conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic era).
To reach a wider continuum we have limited responses from an individual team to only two team members who have experience both in homogeneous and heterogeneous settings. There will be no direct comparative value derived from a team member who is exposed to only one setting. Though it makes the population restrictive, it is intended to make the sample selection authentic. We received 103 respondents from 100 different teams, different organizations, and cultures. These are from teams that have both homogeneous and nonhomogeneous team experience. It is safe to declare that we had a 100% response rate of return. This is because we provided the questionnaires to only qualified people who agreed to participate with minimal incentive. Notably, some of the respondents avoided some questions they considered sensitive.
Responses as to their behavior and preferences in these situations are collated and analyzed. The questions are guided by feedback from recognizable practitioners, and derivatives from the literature review.
Challenges associated with this study include Finance, the pandemic situation and the restrictive nature that is inherent in the study itself. Respondents were reluctant to share their demographics.
We do not have such funds as an incentive to get more individual team members to commit to completing the questionnaire, even as the study itself does not need everyone in a project team to participate.
The data collection approach is through an online survey sent to individual organizations with identifiable persons and identifiable project teams (who have worked on both teams with and without diversity). This study, however, was conducted in Canada, a nation that is considered to have a large concentration of people from diversity. We specified the category of individual team members that needed to complete the questionnaires, and the system, google form automatically registers and collates the submissions. The sample size of 103 is deduced from the actual number of respondents who agreed to participate after screening. The nature of comparison that we need did not require that we are open to every practitioner despite making a random selection of organizations, genders, and nationalities. Only 35 respondents were open to answering demographic questions (somewhat considered sensitive).
Each respondent was made to answer questions from 2 different perspectives, when they worked in a homogeneous environment and when they worked in teams with diversity. This brings about the strength and integrity of the responses and the data derived for them.
Some of the data derived are presented in bar figures with percentage notations while others are in pie figures indicating the proportion of inclinations in percentages and size on the pie.
After collecting the data, we engaged a few individuals to get more insight into the responses some of which will help our analysis.
4. Data and Analysis
Figure 1(A) indicates that only (35) respondents under the age of 40 signified their participation in the survey.
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Figure 1. Age group & gender figure. (A) Age distribution of participants; (B) Gender representation.
Figure 1(A) & Figure 1(B) shows that only 35 respondents made their age groups known (34% of the total participants.), and they are all below the age of 40 years.
These respondents are also in the ratio of 60% females and 40% males.
Figure 2 shows that the respondents are 50% from small project teams, 26.5% from medium-sized teams, and 23.5% work in large project teams.
Figure 2. Team categories by organization size.
Figure 2 shows that the survey cut across teams from different organization sizes. The limited number of respondents here does not guarantee proper representations except that it stops with answers to demographic questions.
Figure 3 shows respondents from IT, Construction, Professional Services, Business, and Others represented here as 34.3%, Construction 2.9%, Professional services 11.4%, Business 20%, and Others 40%, respectively.
Figure 3. The representations by industries.
Meanwhile the team sizes range from small size 50%, medium size 26.5% and large size 23.5% representation of the acknowledged respondents. Nevertheless, It suggests that diverse sectors are recognized in this study.
Figure 4 shows from very high to highest 53.4% (26.7% + 26.7%) interest in individual recognition (motivation) in heterogeneous teams as against 50% (15.7% + 34.3%) interest in individual recognition in homogenous teams. The margin of 7.4% is significant. Thus, it indicates that team members with diversity put a premium on individual recognition, their worth, and their uniqueness, and hence it is another motivator.
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Figure 4. How individuals appreciate recognition of their recognition both in teams’ with and without diversity. (A) The importance of individual team member’s recognition in team without diversity. (B) Importance of individual team members’ recognition in team with diversity.
Figure 5 shows 50% of respondents from high and highest (30.4% + 19.6%) agreeing with self-regulation for heterogeneous team members and 47.6% from high to highest (35% + 12.6%) agreeing with self-regulation for homogeneous teams. The margin of 2.4% on self-regulation advantage in heterogeneous teams above the homogeneous team is noteworthy. It is also seen as being more self-aware, being more conscious of their actions.
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Figure 5. The degree both homogeneous and heterogeneous teams are self-regulated. (A) The level to which the teams are self-regulated for teams without diversity. (B) The level to which the teams are self-regulated for teams with diversity.
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Figure 6. The level of concern for accountability by both homogeneous and heterogeneous teams. (A) The level of concern for accountability by teams without diversity; (B) The level of concern for accountability by teams with diversity.
Figure 6 indicates that very high and highest heterogeneous teams record 62.7% (33.3 + 29.4) ranking for accountability as against 58.3% (36.9% + 21.4%) for homogeneous teams. The margin of 4.4% accountability in heterogeneous homogeneous teams’ points to superior commitment, a greater nudge to be accountable.
Figure 7 shows that while both teams hold their special knowledge and skills, heterogeneous teams record 69.6% (22.5% + 47.1%) from very high to highest, against 55.4% (14.6% + 40.8%) from very high to highest; the difference of 14.2% is significant and points to the degree of emphasis on knowledge and skills that are considered in heterogeneous team over homogeneous teams. This tends to suggest that heterogeneous teams have better knowledgeable and skilled talents. By this, it is inferred that the team members in a team with diversity challenge themselves to bring out the best in their knowledge and skills.
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Figure 7. The distribution of knowledge and skills in both homogeneous and heterogeneous teams. (A) The level of knowledgeable and skills of teams without diversity; (B) The level of knowledgeable and skills of team members in diversity.
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Figure 8. The distribution of levels of competencies among both heterogeneous and homogeneous teams. (A) The level of competencies among team members that are not in diversity. (B) The level of competencies in teams with diversity.
Figure 8, while both teams are ranked high in competency, the record of 23.5% as against 19.4% for Heterogeneous teams and homogeneous teams respectively (4.9% differential) points to the fact that heterogeneous teams are more conscious of their competencies to apply them at work. From this data, it suggests that they have a higher tendency to fully activate their competencies in order to stand out and compete.
Figure 9 indicates that heterogeneous teams from very high to highest records 68.6% (30.4% + 38.2%) for team members’ emotions, against 62.1% (35.9% + 26.2%) for homogeneous teams’ emotions, from very high to highest. The margin of 6.5% recorded indicates a higher level of attachment and feeling for their job and team. It suggests that a team with diversity tends to activate and develop high emotional intelligence.
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Figure 9. The level of emotions found among team members in both homogeneous and heterogeneous teams. (A) The level of emotions among team members of a team without diversity. (B) The level of emotions among teams with diversity.
Heterogeneous teams have 86.3% (50% + 36.3%) and homogeneous teams have 79.6% (42.7% + 35.9% within the range, very high and highest of challenges to prove themselves. With 6.7% Margin. This suggests that project teams with diversity are more motivated to prove themselves (Figure 10).
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Figure 10. How challenges working with colleague help to make them prove themselves. (A) How challenges working with colleagues impact diversified team members. (B) How challenges working with colleagues impact non-diversified team members.
Heterogeneous teams record 85.3% from very high to highest and homogeneous teams 75.7%, with a scale range of 4 to 5. A significant margin of 9.6% suggests that employees are motivated to work in teams with diversity. That is to say, working in diversity is motivation on its own (Figure 11).
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Figure 11. The desire to work with people from different backgrounds.
Summary analytical table:
Figures |
Motivational Elements |
Highest on
Heterogeneous % |
Highest on
Homogeneous % |
Increase in
Heterogeneous |
Ranking |
4 |
Individual contributions Recognition |
26.7 |
15.7 |
11% |
2 |
5 |
Self-regulation |
19.6 |
12.6 |
7% |
6 |
6 |
Accountability |
29.4 |
21.4 |
8% |
4 |
7 |
Special knowledge |
22.5 |
14.6 |
7.9% |
5 |
8 |
Competency |
23.5 |
19.4 |
4.9% |
8 |
9 |
Care for other people emotions |
38.2 |
26.2 |
12% |
1 |
10 |
Challenge to prove self |
86.3 |
79.6 |
6.7 |
7 |
11 |
People of other background |
85.3 |
75.7 |
9.6 |
3 |
|
Quality in team |
34.3 |
30.1 |
4.1 |
9 |
5. Conclusion
Our result confirms our premise that there is a significant change in the behavior of project team members in diversity over those that are in non-diverse teams.
Our study points to high indicators with respect to our ranking:
1) Care for other team members—activating and building emotional intelligence.
2) Recognition for individual contributions—confirming uniqueness in performance.
3) Work with diverse team members—acknowledging diverse contributions.
4) Accountability—from diligence and a high sense of responsibility.
5) Special knowledge and skills—from knowledge sharing.
6) Self-regulation—leading to a high level of self-awareness.
7) Challenge to prove oneself—engendering healthy competition.
8) Competency—built by skilled talents.
9) Quality of team—drawn from a large pool of talents.
From this study, we can state that these constitute nine critical elements that drive project teams, and other teams made up of talents from diversity to succeed. While the ranking here may not apply to all teams, leaders should be in a position to gauge the factors to leverage to build a cohesive and high-performing team.
Recommendations
While we recommend that leaders and practitioners consider these motivational elements and enhance them to improve their team performance, there will be the need to investigate the uniqueness of each element as they may not follow a specific ranking in all circumstances.
To the researchers, we consider our work as a base for future exploration.