Can Mindfulness Be Helpful in Team Decision-Making? A Framework for Understanding How to Mitigate False Consensus

Abstract

Mindfulness has recently attracted a great deal of interest in the field of management. However, even though mindfulnessbroadly viewed as a state of active awarenesshas been described mainly at the individual level, it may also have important effects at aggregated levels. In this article, we adopt a team-based conceptualization of mindfulness, and develop a framework that represents the powerful effect of team mindfulness on facilitating effective decision-making. We further discuss how a conceptualization of team mindfulness may mitigate the process of false consensus by interacting positively with the following five central team processes: open-mindedness, participation, empowerment, conflict management, and value and ambiguity tolerance. A false consensus constitutes a cognitive bias, leading to the perception of a consensus that does not exist. In essence, we argue that, although a conceptualization of team mindfulness does not guarantee effective decision-making in itself, it may successfully reduce false consensus when coupled with these five team processes. Accordingly, this article contributes to the theory and practice of team decision-making by demonstrating how a conceptualization of team mindfulness can be helpful in the increasingly complex and ambiguous situations faced by contemporary teams.

Rethinking the role of team mindfulness in team relationship conflict: A conflict management perspective

“…This examination is vital for improving our understanding of team mindfulness, not least because it plays a unique role compared with other mindfulness mechanisms in influencing conflict. While theory suggests that the relational nature of team mindfulness (Liu et al, 2020) affects team relational processessuch as the team's preferred conflict management approach (Rupprecht et al, 2019)-empirical research on this topic is limited (Selart et al, 2020). We provide an interpersonal interactional perspective on how team mindfulness affects relationship conflict, rather than studying individual-level ones; thus, our work advances the nomological network and the construct of team mindfulness in a team setting.…”

“…Further, the mechanisms between team mindfulness and relationship conflict remain undeveloped. Scholars have identified team mindfulness benefits for individuals (Liu et al, 2020(Liu et al, , 2021Xie, 2021) with a focus on individual psychological experiences as key mechanisms, ignoring the role of team mindfulness in interpersonal interactions (Selart et al, 2020). This is a serious oversight since relationship conflict is partly attributable to the nature of bidirectional and interpersonal interactions rather than unidirectional and intrapersonal states in a team.…”

“…More importantly, team mindfulness essentially involves attentive and nonjudgmental interactions in a team. Hence, despite the fruitful insights from prior research that has explored mindfulness mechanisms more generally, a macro approach is needed to directly examine team-level interactive approaches as the mechanisms and to leverage the unique features of team mindfulness to explain why it reduces conflict (Selart et al, 2020). Notably, scholars state that downplaying the role of interactions may mask and even hamper our understanding of the actual team mindfulness phenomenon (Selart et al, 2020).…”

“…Hence, despite the fruitful insights from prior research that has explored mindfulness mechanisms more generally, a macro approach is needed to directly examine team-level interactive approaches as the mechanisms and to leverage the unique features of team mindfulness to explain why it reduces conflict (Selart et al, 2020). Notably, scholars state that downplaying the role of interactions may mask and even hamper our understanding of the actual team mindfulness phenomenon (Selart et al, 2020). Ideally, research on the unique mechanisms involved in the team processes underlying the link between team mindfulness and team functioning can explain the functions of team mindfulness more accurately (Selart et al, 2020).…”

“…Notably, scholars state that downplaying the role of interactions may mask and even hamper our understanding of the actual team mindfulness phenomenon (Selart et al, 2020). Ideally, research on the unique mechanisms involved in the team processes underlying the link between team mindfulness and team functioning can explain the functions of team mindfulness more accurately (Selart et al, 2020).…”