Knowledge Management Technology for Revealing Cognitive Diversity within a Management Team

The cognitive diversity of top management teams has been shown to affect the performance of a firm. However, most approaches to measure cognitive diversity never attempt to open the "black box" to understand what makes up the cognitive diversity of the team. This research reports on an approach that identifies diverse belief structures, i.e., cognitive subgroups, through the use of causal mapping and cluster analysis. The procedures of the approach are automated using group support systems technology resulting a Group Cognitive Mapping System (GCMS). The results from a study of 13 top managers on a strategic planning team for an information services firm show that the use of causal mapping provides an efficient and effective way to identify idiosyncratic and shared knowledge among members of a top management team.