Diversity and Conflict in Teams : A Contingency Perspective

Diverse teams are becoming widespread in the workplace. However, previous research shows that many organisations fail to successfully manage diversity. Using survey data collected from 27 teams in ten different countries, we investigate the link between team diversity and intra-team conflicts. Building on a contingency approach, we analyse moderating effects of the surrounding organisational context of teams, namely organisational supportiveness and openness. The results of our quantitative study show that the diversity-conflict relation strongly depends on a team’s context. This presents interesting alleys for future research and leads to implications for practice regarding the design of a team’s context