Overcoming Barriers to Collaboration: Psychological Safety and Learning in Diverse Teams

A.  Edmondson; Kate  Roloff

Chapter | Team Effectiveness in Complex Organizations: Cross-disciplinary Perspectives and Approaches | 2008

Overcoming Barriers to Collaboration: Psychological Safety and Learning in Diverse Teams

by A. Edmondson and Kate Roloff

Abstract

We review research on psychological safety and team learning to identify core ideas and findings in these closely related literatures and to propose a model in which a negative relationship between team member diversity and team collaboration is moderated by psychological safety. We argue that when team members with diverse backgrounds must work together to accomplish challenging goals, psychological safety will facilitate their ability to overcome barriers to communication created by their differences. Although psychological safety may be of intrinsic value for all employees because it allows them to voice ideas, concerns, and questions at work, this chapter emphasizes the especially critical role of psychological safety in diverse teams. We hypothesize that the—potentially negative—effects of diversity on team collaboration and performance are mitigated by psychological safety.

Keywords: Interpersonal Communication; Groups and Teams; Social and Collaborative Networks; Performance Improvement; Learning; Diversity;

Format: Print

Citation:

Edmondson, A., and Kate Roloff. "Overcoming Barriers to Collaboration: Psychological Safety and Learning in Diverse Teams." In Team Effectiveness in Complex Organizations: Cross-disciplinary Perspectives and Approaches, edited by E. Sales, G. G. Goodwin, and C. S. Burke.Organizational Frontiers Series. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2008.

Case | HBS Case Collection | September 2019

Teaming Up To Win The Rail Deal At GE (A)

Amy Edmondson, Ranjay Gulati and Rachna Tahilyani

In 2012, Nalin Jain, then head of GE aviation for South Asia, was given the added responsibility for GE’s transportation business in India, including bidding for a $2.5 billion contract to manufacture, service and maintain 1,000 diesel locomotives for state owned Indian Railways (IR). The deal, which would have been “the largest deal on the planet” for the transportation business, had been under discussion for six years, and many within GE had given up hope that it would materialize, but Jain persisted. In February 2015, when IR requested companies to submit a financial bid in six months, Jain quickly built an autonomous team, sequestered from the rest of GE, with people from multiple businesses and functions. His team overcame internal resistance from people at headquarters and stiff competition to help GE win the deal by a narrow margin. Jain was then tasked with executing the deal. As many of his earlier team members had moved on, Jain hired new people and built a new diverse yet integrated team for execution, with members able to put aside their many differences, look beyond their functional silos, and focus on the project deliverables. However, 2017 brought a series of challenges. GE changed India’s organization structure, making India business leaders report only to their respective global business leaders instead of reporting to both their business leaders and the India country leader. Jain’s mandate was expanded to include the entire international operations of GE’s transportation business. And, sub-optimal company performance forced GE to announce cost cuts of $2 billion. In the face of this turmoil, Jain wonders, “Have I created an agile team that can succeed in GE’s matrix environment and deal with the internal challenges? Do the team members have the maturity and motivation required for the project to succeed?”

Keywords: Recruitment; Selection and Staffing; Human Capital; Leadership Style; Leading Change; Organizational Design; Organizational Structure; Industrial Products Industry; Manufacturing Industry; Rail Industry; Transportation Industry; United States; India;

Citation:

Edmondson, Amy, Ranjay Gulati, and Rachna Tahilyani. "Teaming Up To Win The Rail Deal At GE (A)." Harvard Business School Case 420-058, September 2019. View Details

Cite View Details Educators

Today the most promising innovation and business opportunities require collaboration among functions, offices, and organizations. To realize them, companies must break down silos and get people working together across boundaries. But that’s a challenge for many leaders. Employees naturally default to focusing on vertical relationships, and formal restructuring is costly, confusing, and slow. What, then, is the solution? Engaging in four activities that promote horizontal teamwork: (1) developing cultural brokers or employees who excel at connecting across divides; (2) encouraging people to ask questions in an open-ended, unbiased way that genuinely explores others’ thinking; (3) getting people to actively take other points of view; and (4) broadening employees’ vision to include more-distant networks. By supporting these activities, leaders can help employees connect with new pools of expertise and learn from and relate to people who think very differently from them. And when that happens, interface collaboration will become second nature.

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Overcoming Barriers to Collaboration: Psychological Safety and Learning in Diverse Teams

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