/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// CONFLICT AND CREATIVITY WITHIN DESIGN TEAMS Tim Haats / Lois Frankel Carleton University School of Industrial Design thaats@connect.carleton.ca ABSTRACT Organizations are faced with a fast-paced competitive marketplace and rapidly advancing technologies, yielding the need for an innovative response for any hope of survival. This innovative response requires the establishment of diverse, collaborative design teams that can confront the increasing complexities of design. As members collaborate and interact with one another, conflicts arise that have both beneficial and detrimental effects on the creative process. Through a review of extant literature, this paper focuses on the relationship between conflict and creativity, and how cognitive- and affective conflict affect the generation of ideas and the development of design solutions that contribute to innovative outcomes. Cognitive conflict, if experienced at a moderate level, is found to be beneficial for stimulating creativity whereas affective conflict is considered detrimental. In order to enhance creativity during the early conceptual design phase, cognitive conflict between team members must be moderated while preventing the impedance of affective conflict. Keywords: Conflict, Creativity, Design Teams. INTRODUCTION Over the years, design has become more of an integrated activity requiring the efforts of multiple individuals to work in teams and to collaborate on design projects (Cross & Cross, 1995). Design today is complex and teams need to foster diversity amongst their members in terms of backgrounds, experience, skills, and knowledge (Badke-Schaub, Goldschmidt, & Meijer, 2010). This diversity is very important as organizations are faced with rapidly advancing technologies and an increasingly competitive and fast-paced marketplace, resulting in the need to be creative and to develop innovative products or services (Chen, 2006; Farh, Lee, & Farh, 2010). Existing knowledge is considered inadequate in supporting this innovative development which means that design teams need to sprout new knowledge that will contribute to creative and innovative thought (Leenders, van Engelen, & Kratzer, 2003). Bringing together team members with different disciplinary knowledge and promoting the sharing of this knowledge is essential for maximizing the creative performance of the design team and for implementing a quality design process (Badke-Schaub, Goldschmidt, & Meijer, 2010). However, this introduces considerable challenges for effective collaboration (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003). It is inevitable that design teams will experience conflict at some level during a project. A clash of views, interests, goals and values is not uncommon in a group of diverse members (Badke-Schaub, Goldschmidt, & Meijer, 2010). When studying design teams, it is important to consider the effects of conflict on the team’s performance and output. Mooney, Holahan, and Amason (2007) state that conflict “may be at once the most powerful centrifugal and centripetal force with which a team must contend” (p.755). It is easy to think that conflict would be detrimental to design teams, but much research has found that different types of conflict have different effects on team functioning and that conflict can actually be beneficial (Jehn, 1995). However, studies have also shown that the effects of conflict vary depending on what tasks are being completed and which stage or phase of a project the team is at, meaning that conflict is dynamic throughout the entire design process and is not just a statically occurring event (Chen, 2006; Jehn, 1995). By analyzing the effects of conflict at different phases of the design process, !"#$%&"'( *+, -+"'(. !"#$%%&'()* #, -./0123445 67% 867 9#":& ;#(,%"%($% #( 0%*')( 1%*%<"$75 =4 >$6#?%" @ 8 A#B%C?%"5 0%:,65 67% A%67%":<(&*D E&'6%& ?F ADGDHD 1##I%(?J")5 KDKD ;7%( L !DMD /6<NN%"*D