The moderating variable of environmental turbulence is not impacting the relation ship between individual creativity and team acceptance of that creative idea. The context is radical new product development. What could be the possible explanations for that? Any references?
There could be many reasons. The credibility of the person presenting the idea, the degree to which the presenter can explain the value and benefits of the idea, the cohesiveness or lack of of the team, an informal leader within the team who influences the response of others, the actual value and benefits of the idea, a lack of understanding or acceptance of the need for urgency, the actual reality of the urgency, fear of the implications of the idea, and many more. You may find it helpful to ask those involved, in s safe way, why they reject the idea. Also turn the question around and ask what are the factors - essential and supporting - that generate acceptance of ideas?
From a pure entrepreneurship point of view you are talking about a pivot. It happens a lot and it's always stressfull. The best way (from my point of view) is to focus on the "why we are a team" and not the "what we do as a team". I have taken this philosophy from Simon Sinek who presented it at a ted talk (which I strongly recommend to see, link below). If your new product is in line with the "why" answer of your team then it is easier to accept it since it satisfies the ultimate goal you want to achieve, it's just a detour.
I don't know if that help you but feel free to reply to me in private to talk about it.
Well Zheesan,
I think it has all to do with the nature of decision making which plays an important role in fields such as psychology, management (business and government), politics, economics, to mention a few. And I think if it is about a radical new product all these fields come into play. I will mention a few reasons here, why I think under turbulence and pressure of time a radical new idea for product development can be neglected:
a. Information overload: maybe to much information has been given, so if you have to make a quick decision you have to take too many factors into consideration and very often a creative idea can be brushed aside. It is maybe to new and nobody wants to take the responsibility for accepting that idea that is not proven yet with all its consequences, which can't be overseen.
b. Problem analysis: Maybe the problem hasn’t been properly analyzed because you have to look it from all angles and under time pressure and turbulence that is not possible. So it is due to faulty decision analysis that it can be neglected.
c. Structure of domination: maybe somebody in the group or a sub-group has the power to dominate the group decisionmaking. It is possible because of the dominance of knowledge, authority, budget control, relationship, bureau politics and those kind of things. And above that not everybody is clearheaded in a situation of time pressure and turbulence to take right decisions. A minority view then can dominate the decision making in one direction: 80/20 percent principle (see Richard Koch, 1998: The 80/20 principle).
d. Groupthink: sometimes if you have to take a decision under pressure in a group there is a psychological drive to consensus by which all other alternatives are suppressed. Dissent is not tolerated.
I could go on and mention some more reasons such as provided in e.g. game-theory, but you can check the literature on decision making and here are some sources that can be helpful: The function of the Executive (Chester Barnard, 1938); Administrative Behaviour (Herbert Simon, 1947); Essence of decision making (Graham Allison and Phillip Zelikow, 1999); The Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenster, 1944) and Handbook of Decision Making (Paul C. Nutt and David C. Wilson, 2010).
May be due to information overload, emergent and quick response requirement, and cognitive stress.
I would suggest to start looking at smith and Coff, 2011, SEJ, where they talk about the positive effects of team's work on creativity generation and implementation, proposing a different perspective.
Lack of trust in the idea's originator, and/or lack of team "ownership" of the idea. The latter could be strong enough to negate a fully trusted idea originator!
In a systemic perspective , there is not a cause but mostly interractions between different elements. We must consider the whole system into question and see each interraction on weight .
Once a creative idea is out it is self-sustaining, meaning that it has a potential impact on any kind of environment including turbulent environments. Team members are not so rigid that an impacting idea cannot sway them. Eventually the creative will prevail.
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