Seminar: Ability Dispersion and Team Performance

Time: 13.00-14.00 hours
Location: CPB-office, Van Stolkweg 14, The Hague

Presentation: Sander Hoogendoorn (CPB)

Discussant: Benedikt Vogt (Maastricht University)

Language: English

Registration: Please register by sending an email to seminars@cpb.nl.

Abstract subject:
What is the effect of dispersed levels of cognitive ability of members of a (business) team on their team’s performance? Our study addresses this question using a field experiment in which 573 students in 49 teams start up and manage real companies under identical circumstances. We ensured exogenous  variation in — otherwise random — team composition by assigning students to teams based on their measured cognitive abilities (Raven test). Each team performs a variety of tasks, often involving complex decision making. The key result of our experiment is that the performance of business teams first increases and then decreases with ability dispersion, following an inverse u-shaped pattern.

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