Dysfunctional Diversity : Entrepreneurial Learning in Cognitively Heterogeneous Teams

Summary, in English

This study explores how cognitive heterogeneity at the team level-i.e., the degree to which team members adhere to conflicting cognitive frames-impacts entrepreneurial learning behavior. We analyze learning processes in a new-venture team over three time-periods, leveraging rich data from 20 interviews, 990 emails, and 62 internal documents. We find that during time-periods when the team encompassed individuals with a heterogeneous set of cognitive frames, learning was self-reinforcing. During other time-periods, when the team was cognitively homogenous, learning was explorative. We detail the social-psychological mechanisms underlying these findings and present a process model of entrepreneurial learning during each period.

• Author: Ziad el Awad; Anna Brattström
• Department/s: Department of Business Administration
• Publishing year: 2018
• Language: English
• Document type: Conference - other
• Topic: Business Administration
• Keywords: entrepreneurial learning; cognitive heterogeneity; faultlines; attribution
• Conference name: RENT Conference 2017
• Conference date: 2017-11-16 - 2017-11-17
• Conference place: Lund, Sweden
• Status: Unpublished