Dynamic Capabilities of Multicultural Project Teams: An Analysis of Value Additionality

Dynamic Capabilities of Multicultural Project Teams: An Analysis of Value Additionality

Complexities of multiple cultures have received significant attention in research and practice, with most scholarly efforts focusing on problems surrounding multicultural teams (MTs). This research investigates additionality of value that MTs bring to projects and organisations. It studies benefits, challenges and organisational enablers of cross-cultural integration, and key variables and correlates of MTs’ additionality. Further, it proposes a framework for operationalising the additionality through team’s dynamic capabilities (DCs). A mixed-method (MM) approach is the core of the research, involving data collection through interviews and questionnaires. Semi-structured interviews were used to identify benefits, challenges, and organisational enablers of MTs, whilst questionnaires measured the various dimensions of value additionality through their relative statistical significance and interdependencies. Results of the qualitative and quantitative studies formed the operational framework. An overwhelming majority of participants (interview, 100%; questionnaire survey, 96%) agree that MTs bring benefits to teams and organisations. Dimensions of the benefits include creativity, flexibility and optionality, rarity, and team enrichment. Key variables driving the benefits are diversities of ideas, experiences and thinking, unique mix of diverse people in MTs, and cultural alignment with clients. The research findings also suggest MTs bring challenges. A significant number of participants (interview, 72%; questionnaire survey, 70%) support this claim. The challenges include trust issues within teams and difficulty in measuring the value of cultural diversity. Key drivers of these challenges are stereotyping, cultural diversity being too soft to measure, and difficulty apportioning team performance. The research also found that organisational enablers enhance value additionality of MTs. 80% of interview participants and 90% of survey respondents affirm this claim. Dimensions of these enablers include organisations’ culture of respect and HR and Recruitment Systems with fewer biases. Variables of these dimensions include promoting respect in teams, a recruitment system with a pipeline of culturally diverse candidates, intercultural training for teams, and organisational leadership. Insights of these findings can enable stakeholders to learn, unlearn and see MTs and their diversity as an asset rather than a mere source of problems. Key organisational players can focus on how teams’ multiculturality is best understood and managed to maximise productivity, especially in multicultural countries like Australia.

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