Fostering the benefits of team diversity in the workplace : the influence of diversity perspective, leadership style and membership type on willingness to communicate in diverse teams

Fostering the benefits of team Diversity in the Workplace:

The influence of Diversity Perspective, Leadership Style and

Membership Type on Willingness to Communicate in Diverse teams

MSc Communication Science: Corporate Communication Master’s Thesis

Yara Jalal Student Number: 11196009 Graduate School of communication Supervisor: Luzia Helfer 03/02/17

Abstract

A diverse workforce can have both benefits and disadvantages for organizations. Managers can have a substantial influence on ensuring that the benefits of diversity are experienced rather than the drawbacks. One particular benefit of a diverse workforce is the variety of perspectives it offers. This can only be achieved however, if employees are willing to express their voice when working in a diverse team. This study explores how managers’ leadership style and diversity perspective can influence employee’s willingness to express themselves when working in a diverse team and how the membership type of an employee (minority membership versus majority membership) influences this relationship by conducting an experimental survey using vignettes. The results of a two-way ANOVA suggest that there is no significant association between leadership style, diversity perspective and membership type on willingness to express voice. Various research that focus on creating an optimal workgroup climate currently exists. However, nowadays much of this research has gradually begun to focus particularly on creating an ideal climate for organizations characterized by diversity as a response to globalization. Nevertheless, there is a gap in such literature that this research hopes to fill in terms of how specifically the diversity perspective and leadership style communicated to employees by those in leadership roles, can ensure that diversity thrives in organizations and how this differs according to membership type.

1. Introduction

In today's increasingly globalized world, organizations have to progressively deal with the topic of diversity in the workforce (Cox & Blake, 1991). Research has shown that diversity can offer significant advantages for organization’s workgroups such as increased innovation and creativity, a broader range of skills, improved adaptability and one of the most argued advantages in literature, a variety of viewpoints (McLeod & Lobel, 1992; McLeod, Lobel, & Cox, 1996; Van Knippenberg, De Dreu, & Homan, 2004; Watson, Johnson, Kumar, & Critelli, 1998). On the other hand, diversity in workgroups can also lead to many challenges such as inefficient communication, lack of integration, difficulty achieving consensus, and barriers between diverse team members, which ultimately may lead to less inclination of individual team members to express their voice (Allison, 1999; Bassett-Jones, 2005; Lichtenstein, Alexander, Jinnet & Ullman, 1997). Communication by managers is thus necessary to ensure that the right context is created for diverse teams to experience the benefits of diversity and particularly the increased variety of perspectives, rather than the challenges.

One potential determinant that may influence whether diversity fosters the expression of multiple viewpoints is the diversity approach that is used to lead a workgroup. The diversity perspective held by a group influences how group members handle conflict related to diversity as well as whether they feel valued in the group which consequently impacts how well the group functions as a whole (Ely & Thomas, 2001). The diversity perspective that an organization holds is often expressed through the communication of the managers of teams. Organizations can present a multicultural approach in which they acknowledge differences between cultural groups in their communication and present them as beneficial for work

processes (Jansen, Vos, Otten, Podsiadlowski & van der Zee, 2016). Organizations can also use a colorblind approach where they believe people should be treated equally as individuals and therefore differences should be ignored in their communication (Jansen, Otten & Van der Zee, 2015).

Another potential determinant that may influence whether diversity fosters the expression of multiple viewpoints is the leadership style that the managers of teams use. This is reasonable to suggest since leadership involves having the ability to impact individuals by providing meaning and guidance to a group (Vigoda-Gadot, 2007). Certain leadership styles are likely to be more impactful in particular situations. Team leaders can use an empowering leadership style where they focus on stimulating employees’ feelings of self-efficacy and creating an environment that encourages a sense of autonomy and self-direction (Bobbio, Bellan & Manganelli, 2012). Team leaders can also use a directive leadership style that involves guiding and generating specific directions that the leader finds appropriate in order to achieve the teams goal to its best potential (Bass, Valenzi, Farrow, & Solomon, 1975). In light of the fact that organizational workforces are becoming increasingly diverse, it is crucial to explore which leadership style is most suitable to meet the demands of heterogeneous workforces (Kearney & Gerbert, 2009).

A leader’s role involves communicating a vision to its followers (Holladay & Coombs, 1993). Therefore, managers may make use of communication to convey a vision of a particular diversity perspective to their employees. Moreover, in order for leadership behavior to occur, it must be performed through communication because this is the vehicle by which perspectives of a leader’s personality are formed (Holladay & Coombs, 1993). This indicates that communication is also vital for managers to communicate a particular leadership style.

Although leadership style and diversity perspective may influence individual employees willingness to voice in a team characterized by diversity, it is likely that this relationship is further influenced by whether the individual team member is a majority or minority member. There may especially be a difference in the influence of a specific diversity perspective because one perspective may lead to either feelings of inclusion or exclusion depending on individual membership type (Jansen et al., 2016).

The aim of this study is to explore which diversity perspective and which leadership style used in communication to teams characterized by diversity leads to increased expression of individual voice and whether this changes depending on whether a team member is a minority or majority member. This leads to the following research question:

How does the diversity perspective communicated and leadership style used to lead diverse team activity influence individual team member's willingness to express their voice and how does this change depending on membership type?

While previous academic literature has explored how leadership style (Ashford et al., 2009) and diversity perspective (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003) may influence willingness to voice, as well as how membership type influences employee perceptions of diversity perspective (Jansen et al., 2016), there is lack in literature that looks at the potential moderating effect that these variables may have on the relationship between leadership style and willingness to voice. Moreover, by using the vignette method, this study allows for the chances of any conscious bias amongst participants to be reduced making the results more scientifically relevant.

This research hopes to bridge this gap and provide insight in how to create an optimal environment for the benefits of diversity to be fostered.

2. Theoretical Framework Diversity in organizations

Diversity is a concept refers to the degree to which members of a particular entity differ from each other (Gonzalez & Zamanian, 2015). Over the past years, organizational diversity and its management has become a prevalent topic of interest for organizations and researchers alike (Bendl, Bleijenbergh, Henttonen & Mills, 2015). This is likely a response to the fact that the world is becoming increasingly globalized (Cox & Blake, 1991), making it inevitable for organizations to manage differences amongst their workforce. In 1987, the report “Workforce 2000: Work and Workers for the 21st Century” forecasted a significant rise in the employment of women and minority members as well as in the median age of workers (Knights & Omanović, 2015). This report encouraged researchers and practitioners to scrutinize the changing workplace demographics, making organizational diversity a crucial topic of social and political concern (Knights & Omanović, 2015).

Nowadays, research on diversity and diversity management practices focuses especially on forming and managing a climate of inclusion and exclusion as well as the consequences of diversity on organizational outcomes (Bendl et al., 2015; Lichtenstein et al., 1997; McLeod & Lobel, 1992; Van Knippenberg et al., 2004; Watson et al., 1998;). Such research often considers diversity in organizations as a double-edged sword, having potential to both benefit and disadvantage firms (Gonzalez & Zamanian, 2015).

A diverse workforce can have many benefits for organizations as it offers a variety of perspectives and broader range of skills, which ultimately is argued to stimulate innovation and creativity (McLeod & Lobel, 1992; McLeod et al.,1996; Van Knippenberg et al., 2004; Watson et al., 1998). This understanding of diversity has its roots in the information/decision-making theoretical perspective. This perspective states that the range of characteristics and knowledge offered by a diverse group results in a larger cognitive resource base to consider (Van Knippenberg & Schippers, 2007). This in turn allows for an increase in creativity and innovation in group decision making resulting in higher quality decisions as the group must consider a variety of options before coming to a conclusion (Gonzalez & Zamanian; Van Knippenberg & Schippers, 2007).

In contrast with this view, the social categorization perspective suggests that diverse groups experience more conflict, less trust, poorer communication and cooperation as well as cohesiveness compared to homogeneous groups (Gonzalez & Zamanian, 2015). This perspective stems from theories of social categorization and social identity, which proposes that individuals have a basic need to identify with social groups and doing so allows characteristics of the group to become part of the self (Gonzalez & Zamanian, 2015; Hofhuis, Van der Zee, Otten, 2012). When individuals can identify with other group members, they are likely to experience a sense of security that helps them to understand the social environment around them (Hofhuis et al., 2012). Moreover, these theories explain that during social interactions, people show favoritism towards those within their own social group and as the similarity-attraction paradigm suggests, people are drawn to those who have similar attributes as themselves (Gonzalez & Zamanian, 2015).

These two perspectives on the consequences of diversity insinuate that a diverse workforce can both benefit or disadvantage an organization. While one of the main benefits of diversity is that it offers a variety of perspectives which allows a group to be more creative, if the individuals in the group are unable to identify with each other, this may lead to conflict and a lack of security which may ultimately result in group members not being willing to express their voice.

Organizational Voice and Silence

The organizational voice of individual employees is a valuable contribution to organizations as it is the principal source of change and creativity (Frohman, 1997). For this research a generally accepted, comprehensive understanding of organizational voice is considered thus defining voice as the voluntary expression of ideas, information, opinions or concerns to influence organizational actions (Banerjee & Somanathan, 2001; Bowen & Blackmon, 2003; Hayes, 2007). This definition combines those of Banerjee and Somanathan (2001), Bowen and Blackmon (2003) and Hayes (2007) used to conceptualize voice. It has been chosen because it encompasses the expression of voice with various possible aims whereas other definitions are too specific and limiting to explore the research question at hand. Operationalizing willingness to speak by identifying how inclined someone is to voice their opinion or concern is useful because it addresses more than simply a willingness to engage in a conversation but specifically behavior that hopes to make a difference (Hayes, 2007). Willingness to voice is seen as the voluntary expression of ideas, opinions and information about issues concerning the organization and has the aim to influence organizational actions (Banerjee and Somanathan, 2001; Bowen and Blackmon, 2003)

When employees are reluctant to express their voice, this can lead to organizational silence where individuals decide not to speak up or contribute to discourse (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003; Morrison & Milliken, 2000). Noelle-Neumann (1985) developed the theory of “the spiral of silence” to explain how individuals examine their surrounding environment in order to ascertain the dominant view that is held and are then more willing to express this view compared to the minority perspective. Hence, employees that do not perceive that their co-workers support their opinion or that their opinion may be responded to with resistance are less likely to express themselves honestly. The “climate of opinion” is thus a deciding factor in the decision to either express one’s voice or to stay silent in a workgroup (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003). As Shamir (1995) explains, public opinion dynamics are the result of surrounding social pressures and interpersonal sources are key to assessing the climate of opinion. Social cohesion, trust and identification towards a workgroup consequently play a vital role in determining the climate of opinion (Bowen & Blackmon). Therefore, in order to facilitate the expression of opinion within a group, members must feel that their views do not diverge too much from those of the majority opinion and that they can relate to other group members in some way. Thus, in a diverse group where individuals are less likely to identify with each other and have opposing opinions, individuals may not be as willing to express their voice leading to a spiral of silence which limits the contributions of individuals to an organization.

Managers within an organization can play a big part in creating the best environment and particularly the optimal opinion climate to foster the benefits of diversity. Leaders can have a substantial influence on employees’ psychological

state and choice to express their voice (Ashford, Sutcliffe & Christianson, 2009; Hsiung, 2012).

Leadership Styles

Leaders play a major role in impacting the psychological state of employees’ as well as the choice to voice their opinions and concerns or to stay silent (Ashford et al., 2009; Dutton & Ashford, 1993; Hsiung, 2012; Morrison & Milliken, 2000). Leaders can form employees’ perceived instrumentality of their own voice behavior by the way that they respond to it which will in turn influence employee decisions to voice or stay silent (Ashford et al., 2009). This is particularly useful considering that individuals are more likely to speak up when they believe that doing so will make a difference (Blatt, Christianson, Sutcliffe & Rosenthal, 2006). Leaders can also help to form perceptions of the risks that employees take by expressing their voice, which may largely influence whether employees speak up or not (Ashford et al., 2009). Moreover, leaders have the ability to create opportunities for employees to voice themselves.

Literature on leadership introduces a variety of leadership styles. Two distinctly different leadership styles mentioned prevalently are the empowering and the directive styles (Clark, Hartline & Jones, 2009; Lorinkova, Pearsall & Sims, 2013; Peterson, 1997; Somech, 2006; Zhang & Bartol, 2010).

The empowering leadership style pays particular attention to encouraging employees’ perceptions of self-efficacy and creating an environment that inspires individuals to be self-directive and independent (Bobbio et al., 2012; Sims, Faraj & Yun, 2009). In doing so, the empowering leader encourages their employees to develop self-leadership competencies (Sims et al., 2009).

In contrast, the directive leadership style is a more traditional approach that involves guiding individuals by generating precise tasks that are considered relevant and crucial in order to meet the goal to its best potential. Employees led by the directive style often do not feel they have much autonomy and have little influence on the leader who makes most of the decisions, however it is also seen as being very effective by many (Baumgartel, 1957; Aronson, 2001).

While the two leadership styles both have their benefits, one is likely to be more effective in encouraging employees to express their voice when working in a diverse group (Somech, 2006). As Bobbio et al. (2012) demonstrate, an empowering leadership style is a relevant predictor for trust in the leader. Since trust is vital for creating a climate of safety in which individuals feel willing to express themselves, this suggests that an empowering style may help to encourage individuals to speak up. Furthermore, studies have shown that empowering leadership influences psychological empowerment to the extent that individuals see empowerment as essential to their employee role identity (Zhang & Bartol, 2010).

Employees who feel psychologically empowered are likely to feel more inclined to voice their opinions than those who do not (Gao, Janssen & Shi, 2011). This is especially plausible considering that psychological empowerment functions as a process that facilitates and develops employee’s task initiation and persistence (Conger & Kanungo, 1988). The directive leadership on the other hand has been claimed to lead to individuals being over dependent on the leader and in turn, less internally driven to reach their goals (Baumgartel, 1957). Moreover, the lack of autonomy imparted using directive leadership can result in bitterness and hostility, which reduces the quality of performance as well as fulfillment for employees (Baumgartel, 1957). Since a climate of safety is often a prerequisite to drive

individuals to feel willing to express themselves, a directive leadership style, which can lead to a hostile environment, is likely to be less influential than the empowering style, which fosters a climate of trust (Martin & Bush, 2006). This leads to the following hypothesis:

H1: Individual voices expressed will be higher in diverse teams where the

leadership style is empowering than when it is directive.

While particular leadership styles likely help to increase willingness to express voice in diverse teams, it is likely that the diversity management strategies that managers use also play a role in doing so by creating an environment that preserves employee wellbeing.

Diversity Perspectives

In order to attain the benefits of diversity managers have established a variety of tactics to allow them to effectively manage the cultural differences in their teams. One tactic mentioned prevalently in diversity literature involves forming a particular perspective towards diversity that reflects the organizations’ normative beliefs and prospects about the value that a diverse team can have for the work processes and outcomes of an organization (Stevens, Plaut & Sanchez-Burks, 2008). Diversity approaches advocate either addressing or ignoring diversity and seeing diversity as a challenge or an asset (Podsiadlowski, Gröschke, Kogler, Springer, van der Zee, 2013). The goal of using diversity approaches is ultimately to facilitate productive work outcomes as well as to maintain employees inner wellbeing (Jansen et al., 2015). Diversity management does this by preventing discrimination and forming

an environment where individuals feel safe and integrated (Jansen et al., 2015). This is especially beneficial for organizational teams because employees demonstrate higher levels of trust as well as enhanced performance in teams that are considered to be socially safe (Jansen et al., 2015). However, when organizations entail diverse teams, a social barrier may be formed between the different group members particularly as a result of their differences in values (Bantel & Jackson, 1989; Hofhuis et al., 2012). As “the spiral of silence” suggests, individuals in diverse groups are thus less likely to express their voice because the differences in values amongst the group may mean that they do not perceive that their coworkers will support their opinion (Noelle-Neumann, 1985). Yet, if managers proactively initiate a particular way of thinking about diversity amongst their employees that drives them to feel safe and included, it is plausible that some of these social barriers can be overcome and group members will be more willing to express their opinions.

The diversity perspectives mentioned most frequently in diversity literature is colorblindness and multiculturalism (Stevens et al., 2008). The colorblind perspective of diversity emphasizes that people should be treated equally regardless of their differences and these differences should be ignored when making decisions (Jansen et al., 2015; Markus, Steele & Steele, 2000; Stevens et al, 2008). The colorblind perspective considers overlooking differences as the best way to diminish inequalities and ensure integration because the circumstances of different groups are not always equal in today’s society and still largely structured by certain differences (Markus et al., 2000).

The multicultural perspective of diversity emphasizes that the differences between groups and individuals should be overtly recognized as beneficial for the organization and its employees (Cox, 1991; Jansen et al., 2015, Stevens et al.,

2008). This view is rationalized by the idea that individuals who come from different backgrounds will hold more variety in their abilities, perceptions and networks which can be beneficial for organizations (Jansen et al., 2015; Stevens et al, 2008).

The colorblind perspective is considered to be less likely to ensue a safe and inclusive environment compared to the multicultural perspective because this view intentionally ignores differences amongst individuals and in teams where differences are perceived to be ignored or undervalued, discontent, conflict and anger are likely to occur (Chrobot-Mason & Thomas, 2002). This anger particularly arises from those who do not perceive support for their opinions because when following the colorblind approach, these differences in opinions should be ignored. Consequently, when this perspective is used, individuals are likely to be less willing to express their voice because they experience less social cohesion and identification with the team (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003). As a result, the climate of opinion within the team in general may be less established because fewer members are willing to voice their opinions, which subsequently leads to less willingness to voice in the team in general (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003). In contrast with the colorblind perspective, the multicultural perspective ideally promotes an accepting and inclusive environment suggesting that team members may feel more integrated (Brief, Umphress, Dietz, Burrows, Butz & Scholten, 2005).

Therefore, the multicultural diversity perspective, which puts more emphasis on creating a safe and inclusive environment, is more likely to foster a climate in which employees feel more willing to express their voice. This leads to the following hypothesis:

H2: Individual voices expressed will be higher in diverse teams where the diversity

perspective communicated by the team leader is multicultural than in teams where the diversity perspective communicated by the team leader is colorblind.

As previously mentioned, team members who perceive their differences to be ignored or undervalued are likely to experience discontent. However, this will especially happen to those who are perceived to be different than most of the group members. This therefore suggests that whether an individual is a majority or minority group member may further influence the decision to speak up.

Membership Type

Previous research shows that being aware of one’s group membership can guide social interaction (Lücken & Simon, 2005). This suggests that the membership one identifies with may influence willingness to speak in a team. This research focuses particularly on membership related to diversity in terms of the criterion nationality. This criterion has been chosen because nationality is considered the principal source of solidarity suggesting that it has high potential to direct social interaction (Miller, 2000).

Members in a group can be considered minorities or majorities. Subgroups with fewer members are considered minority members while those with numerically bigger groups are majority members (Brewer, 1998; Moscovici & Paicheler, 1978; Simon, Aufderheide & Kampmeier, 2001). These members differ with regards to how they identify with their in-group and process social information (Lücken & Simon, 2005). Moreover, as the spiral of silence (Noelle-Neumann, 1985) suggests, individuals’ willingness to voice is influenced by the climate of opinion in the sense

that, when they are uncertain that the majority of the group agrees with their opinion, they feel reluctant to speak up. Since minority members are likely to differ in their values and beliefs, when minority members assess the climate of opinion they may become aware of this difference and thus not be willing to express themselves as freely (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003). This leads to the following hypothesis:

H3: Individual voices expressed will be higher in diverse teams when the

membership type of the individual is majority than when membership type of the individual is minority.

Hence, individually, an empowering leadership style is likely to lead to a higher willingness to voice because this style fosters a sense of autonomy in the subordinates making them feel more psychologically prepared to take initiative (Conger & Kanungo, 1988). The elaboration of task-relevant information such as discussing potential ideas and information linked to the task at hand is the central process by which teams can benefit from their diversity Kearney and Gerbert (2009). Since the empowering leadership style involves the stimulation of discussion and assimilation of potential ideas and information about the task, it is reasonable to suggest that one of the benefits of diversity that will be experienced more profoundly is that members of the team may be more willing to speak up. Moreover, a multicultural diversity perspective is likely to lead to higher willingness to voice in diverse teams due to this perspective resulting in a more established opinion climate (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003). Therefore, it is fair to assume that the combination of both an empowering leadership style and a

multicultural diversity perspective will increase individual willingness to voice in diverse teams even more. Nevertheless, minority and majority members differ in their preference for diversity perspective because minority members tend to feel more included when the multicultural perspective is used while majority members feel more of a sense of belonging with the colorblind perspective is used (Jansen et al., 2016). Therefore, whether an employee is a majority or minority member may influence this relationship in the sense that when a multicultural perspective is used, minority members may be more willing to voice compared to majority members. This leads to the following hypothesis:

H4: Individual voices expressed will be higher in teams where diversity perspective

communicated is multicultural than when it is colorblind, but this effect will be more pronounced in diverse teams where the team leadership style is empowering than where the team leadership style is directive and when individual membership type is minority than when it is majority.

Control variables

In addition to the three aforementioned variables, there are several other factors that may influence this relationship. There are likely differences in willingness to communicate in organizations amongst different ages as well as gender (Donovan and MacIntyre, 2004). Moreover, introverts have a tendency to prefer to be more quiet compared to extroverts thus suggesting that orientation towards extroversion may influence whether or not individuals are willing to express their voice (Eysenck & Chan, 1982). Therefore, this study will control for the variables age, gender and extroversion orientation.

3. Methodology

3.1 Participants

Participants were obtained through snowball sampling, which involved the survey being distributed online through e-mail and social media, and shared further with participants’ contacts. Data was gathered over a period of two weeks.

189 respondents participated in this study. Due to some participants not being employed and not completing the entire survey, 45 respondents had to be excluded from the ultimate sample (N=144), which remains well above the minimally 120 participants required in total for testing the four experimental conditions. The dropout rate was 23%. Respondents were aged between 19 and 68 (M= 33.70, SD= 12.05), spoke English and were employed at an organization where they worked minimum 20 hours a week. 47.2% of participants were female and 52.8% were male. The majority of participants were Dutch (23.1%) and Belgian (22.4%). The other 54.5% of participants were of various other nationalities.

3.2 Design

This research used a 2x2x2 between-respondent factorial experimental design with the factors team leadership style (Empowering/Directive), Diversity perspective communicated by the team leader (Multicultural/Colorblind) and Membership type (Minority/Majority).

3.3 Measures

Independent Variables Diversity perspective

The diversity perspective communicated by the team leader in the scenario contains two levels namely the colorblind and multicultural perspectives. In each vignette presented, after the scenario was described, the team leader in the scenario incorporated in their communication either the colorblind diversity perspective or the multicultural diversity perspective. The colorblind diversity perspective was communicated by the team leader in the scenario by stating that in the team everyone is “equal and that differences between all team members are irrelevant in this organization”. The multicultural diversity perspective on the other hand was communicated by the team leader in the scenario by stating that in the team everyone is “different and thus have a variety of skills and perspectives to offer this organization”.

Team leadership style

The team leadership style contains two levels, empowering and directive styles. In each vignette presented, after the scenario was described and the diversity perspective was established, the team leader in the scenario made use of one of two types of leadership styles. The directive leadership style was communicated in the

scenario by stating that the team leader went on to “create a plan and generate tasks, which he delegates to you and your team members in order to solve the problem”. The empowering leadership style was communicated in the scenario by stating that the team leader went on to “ ask you and your team questions like “What is the problem?” “Do we know the cause of the problem?”, “How can we influence the root of the problem?”. These questions start a discussion amongst the group.” Membership Type

Whether participants were a majority or minority member was measured with two questions asking them to indicate both their country of residence and their nationality. Once the data was gathered, a new variable was created so that when nationality and location were the same that participants were considered majority members and when they were different, participants were considered minority members. 46.9% of participants were minority members while 53.1% were majority members.

Dependent Variable Willingness to voice

In this experiment voice measured the willingness of individuals to express their ideas, information, opinions or concerns (Banerjee & Somanathan, 2001; Bowen & Blackmon, 2003; Hayes, 2007). This was measured with one question that could be answered using a 7-point Likert scale. The question that measured this variable was “How willing would you be to express an idea, opinion, concern or information to

the group?” and is based on a combination of Banerjee and Somanathan (2001),

Control Variables Age

Participants were asked to indicate their age in numerical form. Gender

Participants were asked to indicate their as either female, male or other. Extroversion Orientation

Extroversion orientation was measured on part of a 15-item scale that measured the big five personality types (de Raad, 2006). Three of the 15 items measured extroversion orientation. These items measured how noisy, enthusiastic and talkative participants were by asking them to indicate if they see themselves this way on a scale from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”. A Cronbach’s alpha reliability test for the extroversion orientation subscale indicated an acceptable reliability. Extroversion orientation was measured with three items, for example “I see myself as enthusiastic”. One outcome variable was computed for extroversion (α = 0.64,

M=4.78, SD=1.11).

Manipulation checks

In order to improve the reliability of this research, several control measures were conducted. During the survey, two manipulation checks were presented, one to control for diversity perspective and one to control for leadership style (For more information see Appendix B). Two chi-square tests were conducted for both diversity perspective and leadership style separately in order to test whether the manipulations were successful and to ensure that most of the participants perceived the condition they were in correctly. The chi-square test for the diversity perspective showed that there was a significant association between the diversity perspective that

participants were exposed to and the diversity perspective that the participants indicated they perceived in the manipulation check question χ2(2)=52.26, p<.005. Based on the odds ratio, the odds of participants having indicated the diversity perspective they were exposed to was 56.40 times higher if they were actually exposed to that diversity perspective. The cross-tabulation for the manipulation checks of diversity perspective is reported in Figure 2. Although the manipulations for diversity perspective did not meet our expectations, the chi-square test suggests that their success was still quite acceptable.

Diversity Perspective in Vignette

Colorblind Multicultural Perceived Diversity Perspective Colorblind 54.5% 10.4% Multicultural 18.2% 77.6% Don’t Know 27.3% 11.9%

Figure 2. Cross-tabulation for diversity perspective manipulation check

The chi-square test for the leadership style showed that there was a significant association between the leadership style that participants were exposed to and the leadership style that the participants indicated they perceived in the manipulation check question χ2(2)=24.40, p<.005. Based on the odds ratio, the odds of participants having indicated the leadership style they were exposed to was 25.60 times higher if they were actually exposed to that leadership style. The cross-tabulation for the manipulation checks of leadership style is reported in Figure 3. This suggests that the manipulations for the directive leadership style did not meet our expectations although the manipulations for the empowering leadership style were quite successful.

Leadership style in Vignette Directive Empowering Perceived Leadership style Directive 41.0% 10.6% Empowering 35.9% 75.8% Don’t Know 23.1% 13.6%

Figure 3. Cross-tabulation for leadership style manipulation check

3.4 Procedure

This study employed an online experimental survey design that also incorporated vignettes. In the survey several demographic questions were asked before the vignettes were presented in order to measure potential moderators after the experiment was conducted. These demographics included gender, age, country of origin and residence and industry of employment. Four separate hypothetical vignette scenarios were constructed and included in the survey, which aimed to present one of the four scenarios randomly to participants. After being presented with one of the four vignettes, participants were asked to answer a question with regards to the scenarios that measured the dependent variable. Once this question was answered, other demographic questions that may have influenced participants’ perceptions of the scenario if placed before the scenario were asked. These demographic questions referred to the “big 5 personality traits”. The vignette method was chosen because it offers several advantages. First of all, this method reduces any conscious bias that stems from the respondent trying to gain the social approval of the interviewer (Alexander & Becker, 2016). In addition to this, since people are generally not aware of the factors that play a role in their own judgment-making process vignettes allow those factors to be uninfluenced (Alexander & Becker,

2016). In the case of this research for example, people may not be aware that diversity perspective and leadership style may influence their willingness to express themselves in a group, therefore asking them may not yield reliable responses. By creating a hypothetical scenario in which those variables are measured however, we can determine whether these factors do influence their willingness to express themselves regardless of whether individuals are aware of it or not. Moreover, the use of vignettes permits a systematic variation of certain characteristics of the scenario that results in a reasonably accurate estimation of the effects of changes in variables on respondent’s perspective (Alexander & Becker, 2016). Therefore, using vignettes for this research is makes it possible to study an interaction, in this case a moderation effect.

3.5 Data Analysis

In order to test whether the categorically measured potential control variable should be controlled for, a check was done to see if randomization of the data collection was successful or not, specifically a chi-squared test was done for gender. There was no significant association between age and the scenarios that participants were grouped in χ2 (3) = 1.76, p =0.625. This indicates that the randomization was successful and there was therefore no need to control for gender. To test which of the non-categorically measured potential control variables should be controlled for, a check was done to see if the randomization was successful by carrying out a one-factor analysis of variance to assess the influence of age and level of extroversion. There was no significant effect between age and the scenarios that participants were grouped in F (3,129)=0.14, p=0.937, η2 =19.66. It should be noted that the assumption of equal variances in the population has not been violated, Levene's F (3, 129) =0.71, p = .55. This suggests that the randomization was successful in terms of

age and therefore there was no need to control for age. There was however, a significant effect of level of extroversion on the scenarios that participants were grouped in, F (3, 125)= 3.16, p< .001, η2=1.17. It should be noted that the assumption of equal variances in the population has not been violated, Levene's F (3, 125) = 0.135, p = .939. This reveals that the randomization was not successful in terms of extroversion orientation and thus, it is necessary to control for this variable. Finally, in order to test the three hypotheses, the main analysis involved running a two-way ANOVA making it possible to compare the mean differences of willingness to voice oneself between participants in each of the four different conditions. This allowed us to understand whether an interaction occurred between the main variables.

4. Results

4.1 Descriptive Statistics

The descriptive statistics showed that for those in the colorblind/directive group, the average score of willingness to voice for minority members (M=5.80, SD=1.47) was a little bit higher than the score of majority members (M=5.76, SD=1.30). For those in the colorblind/empowering group the average score of willingness to voice for minority members (M=5.29, SD=1.69) was lower than the score of majority members (M=6.27, SD=0.96). For those in the multicultural/directive group, the average score of willingness to voice for minority members (M=6.00, SD=1.36) was a little bit lower than the score of majority members (M=6.10, SD=1.07). For those in the multicultural/empowering group, the average score of willingness to voice for minority members (M=6.20, SD=1.11) was higher than the score of majority members (M=6.12, SD=1.04). However, the results of the two-way ANOVA showed that there were no significant differences amongst these groups.

4.2 Main Analysis

It was expected that individual voices expressed would be higher in diverse teams where the leadership style is empowering than when it is directive. The analysis revealed a non-significant main effect of leadership style on willingness to express oneself, F (1, 129)=.06, p=.807 ω2=.001. Results thus show that H1 needs to be rejected and that there is no significant association between leadership style and willingness to voice.

Furthermore, it was expected that individual voices expressed would be higher in diverse teams where the diversity perspective communicated by the team leader is multicultural than in teams where the diversity perspective communicated by the team leader is colorblind. The two-way analysis of variance indicated that there was a non-significant main effect of diversity perspective on willingness to express oneself, F (1,129)=.83, p=.363

ω

2=.007. Results thus show that H2 needs to be rejected and that there is no significant association between diversity perspective and willingness to voice.

Moreover, it was predicted that individual voices expressed would be higher in diverse teams when the membership type of the individual is majority than when membership type of the individual is minority. The analysis showed that there was a non-significant main effect of membership type on willingness to express oneself, F (1,129)=1.42, p=.236

ω

2=.01. These results therefore indicate that H3 should be rejected and that there is no significant association between membership type and willingness to voice.

Additionally, it was expected that individual voices expressed will be higher in teams where diversity perspective communicated is multicultural than when it is colorblind, but this effect will be more pronounced in diverse teams where the team

leadership style is empowering than where the team leadership style is directive and when individual membership type is minority than when it is majority. Results indicated that there was a non-significant interaction effect of leadership style and diversity perspective on willingness to express oneself F (1,129)=.68, p=.413

ω

2_{=.006. There was a non-significant interaction effect of diversity perspective and} membership type on willingness to express oneself F (1,129)=1.03, p=.313

ω

2=.009. There was a non-significant interaction effect of leadership style, diversity perspective and membership type on willingness to express oneself F (1,129)=.55,

p=.795

ω

2=.03. Results thus show that H4 should be rejected and that there is no significant interaction effect between leadership style, diversity perspective and membership type on willingness to voice.

Finally, the analysis showed that there was a significant main effect of the control variable, extroversion orientation of a person on willingness to express oneself F (1,129)=10.46, p<.005

ω

2=.09. A scatterplot revealed that the more extroverted a participant was, the more willing they were to express their voice which is in line with what literature suggests. It should be noted that the assumption of equal variances in the population has not been violated Levene's F (7, 121) = 1.20, p =.307.

5. Conclusions

5.1 Conclusions

The aim of this research was to explore how diversity perspective communicated, leadership style used and membership type influences individual’s willingness to express voice in teams characterised by diversity. The main results showed that leadership style used to lead a diverse team did influence individual willingness to

express voice. Moreover, diversity perspective used to lead a diverse team did not have a statistically significant effect on individual willingness to express voice. Membership type of team members also did not have a statistically significant effect on willingness to express voice. There was thus no significant interaction effect amongst these variables. However, level of extroversion did have a statistically significant effect on individual’s willingness to express voice. As a result of these non-significant main effects and interactions, hypotheses 1,2, 3 and 4 were rejected. This research could therefore not find evidence suggesting that individual voices expressed will be higher in diverse teams where diversity perspective communicated is multicultural compared to when it is colorblind. It also did not confirm that individual voices expressed will be higher in diverse teams where the leadership style is empowering compared to when it is directive. Moreover, this study did not find that individual voices expressed were higher for majority members than for minority members when the colorblind perspective was used. As a result, it could neither confirm that individual voices expressed will be higher in diverse teams where diversity perspective communicated is multicultural, but this effect will be more pronounced when the team leadership style is empowering and when membership type is minority, despite previous literature that suggests this.

5.2 Discussion and Limitations

There are several possible explanations for why these hypotheses had to be rejected. Although literature suggests that by establishing a particular diversity perspective organizations ultimately hope to enable productive work outcomes and maintain employees inner wellbeing (Jansen et al., 2015), this may not be as straight forward as simply stating the organizations diversity perspective during a one-time communication and seeing an increase in employee wellbeing. It is likely that

organizations need time to properly establish a particular diversity perspective as well as leadership style in order for its employees to see this as part of the organizational identity and for it to truly influence their own personal manner of thinking and avoid getting caught in the spiral of silence (Noelle-Neumann, 1985). Furthermore as Thomas and Plaut (2008) show, any kind of organizational change including employing new diversity policies is likely to cause some sort of resistance initially. Therefore, if the diversity perspective and leadership style presented in the scenario differed from participants’ real life work experiences, they may not have responded to this difference with acceptance.

Moreover, diversity perspective and leadership style may not be as directly linked with willingness to voice as initially expected. For example, for diversity perspective, literature suggests that employees are more willing to express themselves when they feel that their co-workers will support their opinion (Noelle-Neumann, 1985). However, although the multicultural diversity perspective has the potential to foster a more inclusive and accepting environment (Brief et al., 2005), this does not directly indicate that their teammates will support their opinion. As a result, establishing a multicultural diversity perspective may not be sufficient to ensure individuals are comfortable enough to speak up. In terms of leadership style, since literature suggests that leadership style can influence willingness to voice especially when employees perceive the leader to be available to support them, it is plausible that employees’ perceived availability of the leader has an effect on the relationship between leadership style and willingness to voice (Ashford et al., 2009). The fact that no significant effect was found between membership type and willingness to voice oneself indicates that perhaps as a result of globalization, at this stage, nationality has become such a blurred concept that individuals do not consider

differences based on nationality as much but rather based on things such as values (Huntington, 1993; Smith, 2013). Therefore membership type in terms of nationality may not be significant in determining whether individuals are willing to speak up. Furthermore, there may be several other variables that determine whether or not individuals are willing to express themselves in a diverse group besides diversity perspective, leadership style and membership type that have not been controlled for in this research. For example, the level of job satisfaction one has may also play an important role as individuals may be more motivated in a role they feel truly satisfied with compared to one they feel dissatisfied with (Bowen & Blackmon, 2003, LePine & Van Dyne, 1998).

In addition to this, different organizations vary in terms of their organizational culture, which may also have an influence on employees’ willingness to voice (Botero & Van Dyne, 2009). If an organization’s culture involves speaking to one another in an informal manner employees may feel less inhibited when it comes to expressing themselves which could explain the overall high level of willingness to voice that participants indicated. On the other hand if an organization is very hierarchical, it may be less acceptable for individuals to voice their opinions as openly. Additionally it is also likely that individuals have personal preferences for a particular diversity perspective and leadership style based on their previous experiences with particular types of leaders and in diverse groups as well as their personality types (Hoffmann, 2006).

Besides theoretical drawbacks, there may be several reasons linked to the methodological approach used that could explain why this research did not find statistically significant effects. Firstly, due to the time restrictions for this research, there was a limit to the amount of respondents that could be obtained. Although the

final sample varied significantly in terms of demographics, ultimately, it was still quite small. Consequently, the sample that this study used may reveal results that cannot be generalized across all employees due to the sample size being too small. Many of the respondents came from The Netherlands and worked in the public sector in The Netherlands due to the use of snowball sampling to obtain participants. It is possible that there are differences across employees in the public sector than in the private sector considering that Joshi and Roh (2009) suggests that different contexts may initiate different levels of willingness to express oneself. Although generally the distribution was relatively good, since many participants were Dutch and working in The Netherlands this means that there were a bigger group of majority members compared to minority members. As a result, this sample may not have been big enough to see the differences amongst membership type significantly enough. Furthermore, since the majority of participants were Dutch, it is not surprising that the mean level of willingness to voice was so high because the Dutch are considered to be quite tolerant and outspoken (Kamans, Gordijn, Oldenhuis & Otten, 2009). Future research may thus benefit from aiming for a larger more generalizable sample in hopes of obtaining more reliable and interesting results. In addition to this, future research may consider conducting such research across various industries and comparing the results.

Moreover, research has shown that participants who are used to working in smaller teams may feel more willing to express themselves because as research suggests, members of smaller teams have a tendency to participate more actively than those in larger teams (Bradner, Mark & Hertel, 2003). Considering that some positions require more group work than others, it is plausible that those who do not often work in teams or are used to smaller teams than in the scenario, were unable to

identify with the hypothetical situation and thus simply assumed they would be willing to speak up. This could be prevented in future research by taking into consideration the size of teams participants tend to work in and comparing participants accordingly.

Furthermore, using vignettes as the methodological design for this study may have had its drawbacks (Gould, 1996). The final results indicated that many participants stated they would be very willing to express their voice, however it could be the case that many participants were not able to imagine the scenario they were presented with in a context that they could relate to. If participants did not have a similar working environment than the one that was explained in the vignette, it may be very difficult to visualize the situation happening to them making their response less reliable. This is often a major drawback of the vignette method as establishing reliable and valid results particularly related to external validity are difficult, making it hard to generalize findings (Gould, 1996). Future research on the topic could consider methods that are more visually and emotionally stimulating such as a survey that includes a video or perhaps an on the field experiment.

5.3 Implications and suggestions for further research

Organizations and academics alike should explore other potential variables that may influence willingness to voice in diverse teams besides leadership style, diversity perspective and membership type. In doing so, it would be useful to consider variables that can be influenced by the team leader, the organization and additionally the employees themselves. For example, team leaders could consider how their influence on the amount of contact group members have with each other potentially influences willingness to voice because the more time members spend with each other the more likely they are to feel comfortable to speak up (Clément, Baker &

MacIntyre, 2003). Moreover, organizations could explore whether employee job satisfaction may influence voice behaviour in order to investigate whether individuals feel more motivated to speak up when their job satisfaction is high, and if so, ensure that employees maintain high levels of job satisfaction (Rusbult, Farrell, Rogers & Mainous, 1998). Finally, whether the amount of previous international experience of a group member has an influence on how individuals interact in diverse teams could be considered so that both employers and employees are aware of whether this is a valuable characteristic in the workplace (Sambharya, 1996). In addition to this, team leaders could consider ensuring that teams have a certain amount of extroverts in order to establish a more open opinion climate that has the potential to make others feel more comfortable speaking up as well. Meanwhile, it would be beneficial to explore what can increase willingness to voice for introverted individuals.

Although the results of this research have proven to be insignificant and cannot be generalized across all employees, this study hopes to begin to bridge this gap in literature and serve as a starting point for further studies to explore how to create the optimal climate for employees to express their voice in a group characterised by diversity.

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