Gender and race/ethnic composition of technical work groups: Relationship to creative productivity and morale

This study explores the relationship of the gender and race/ethnic composition of work groups for 2331 research and development professionals with measures of creative productivity and morale. We find that male professionals appear to be more innovative and more likely to remain in their laboratories in predominantly male work groups, while female professionals appear to find more job satisfaction in predominantly female work groups. We find that non-Hispanic white technical professionals appear to have more patents in racially balanced work groups (defined by an equal number of whites and nonwhites), but they appear to find more job satisfaction where whites are the majority and are more likely to remain in the laboratory in all-white work groups. The relationships of group composition for nonwhites differed by subgroup. Outcomes for black technical professionals were less favorable in racially balanced work groups. No significant relationships of work group composition were found for Asians and Hispanics. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.