Discussing Diversity Interactions And Students’ Cognitive Development

The Need for Innovative Thinking in the Business Environment

Discuss About The Diversity Interactions Students Cognitive.

Due to globalization of business and regular change in the business environment because of advance technologies, the business has not remained the same as it was in old time. Also the demands from customers and even the life style of people have changed a lot. So, in this situation if an organization has to maintain itself in this business market it must possess some special ability (Teza, et al., 2016). In this business environment every organization is fighting a tough competition. To gain this top position the organization should have some competency and creativity with innovation is one of the most demanding ability which is in need for working in this business environment. Being innovative means implementing an improved product or some process or some change related to working place.  As we know that every month there is some new updated related to the technology or we can say that our technology is getting older in almost every month and to handle such situation a creative mind is necessary(Johnsson,2017). An organization does not run it is own, it is the people of the organization which runs it. So, if an organization has to be innovative then its employee needed to be innovative. An innovative employee can only give the creative ideas which will best suit to the existing business.

 So, it is the duty of the leader to provide the employees an internal working environment full of creativity through which innovative ideas can be generated. Such an environment can be only created with the help of working culture; a culture is actually the total presentation of the organization which includes the values, believes and tradition. It is not at all easy to bring changes in some ones believe or value or tradition and as per as innovation is concern it always require need for change.

 
Change always associated with resistance so it is the duty of manager to  brought life to the change program in the organization, one of the best way is to educate the employees related the benefits of this change through Training and development strategy in which training, workshops and some study material  will be given to the employees and also aware them how this change in organization culture will reshape their future in a manner that they will be enough competent to withstand with the changing external environment (Naranjo-Valencia, Sanz- Valle and Jimenez-Jimenez, 2011). This changing organizational culture will motivate employees to develop such a working place in which every employee is able to express his/her ideas and then these ideas will be segregated on the fulfilment of that current situation. This innovative culture will not show the uniqueness by which this organization will be able to gain the major share of the business market in which many organizations are fighting for same or related product or services and it is helps to solve the problem related to employee turnover as employees are getting attracted towards most innovative companies with the believe that they will have a better future with that particular organization (Stempfle, 2011).

Cultivating Creativity in Students

As mentioned that innovation always starts with solving the difficult problems. If there is a particular university and this university is suffering from lack of innovative thinking in their students (Docherty, 2017). In present time where everyone is expecting creative people and at this time if we are not able to develop creative thinking in these students then their career as well as career of university would be on risk. So, one of the first priority of the university is to design a creative environment which will take care of all the important aspects which will develop need for innovation. So, the university should open a knowledge base centre under the name of centre for critical thinking. In this centre a course of innovative programs will be conducted in which first will be making class room a vision reflection (Kurokawa, 2013). In this activity the students will be able to absorb more updated happening by daily bringing some recent innovative invention. This will not only increase the creativity of student that brings the material but also the creativity of other class students because seeing the student explaining the topic will develop an interest in between the classmates and then will somewhere feel that they should also come up with such interesting topic in the class.  Other event is design to integrate more hands on learning for the students to develop creativity. A famous slogan was Tell me and i forget, teach me and i may remember, involve me and i will learn.

 Use of design thinking is best to generate innovative thinking within the students. Five phase of design thinking – discovery (I have a challenge), interpretation (I learned something), ideation (I see an opportunity), experimentation (I have an idea) and evolution (I tried something) (Dam and Siang, 2018). For first step personas method can be used it helps in recognizing the need and wants of the statement. In this a presentation is intended to communicate project effectively. For second step journey map will be done which will include all the related steps which are to be pre organized. For third step a blue print will be formed which will include flow of the process during the event. For fourth step a prototype strategy is applied to find the most suitable option solution for the given problem and finally for last step the outcome of the chosen option is observed.

Brainstorming as a Problem-Solving Technique

As, the problem is related to the creativity of the students so it does not me that only students have to get involved in this, the whole management should get involved because if they do not then the students will take this event not seriously and will not give their full efforts. If some change is needed in the students then the change should come with in the working environment, the only this changing environment can bring change in to the thinking of students where they will get a sense that if we have to survive in this competition the only way is to adopt the creative way of thinking (Chasanido and Lee, 2015).

It was to be believed that great minds have same thinking style. But it is not like that they do not think in the same way, if they would then there would be no such word known as genius. It is actually the difference in thinking style of human being which makes human being to achieve progress and become successful in their life (Clairmont, 2018). If same idea rings in the minds of two people at the same time it does not mean that they have same thinking style, it may be because of the situation present at that time or it can be because of intellectual complacency or may be harmony over rightness. If people would think in the same way then it would have become very easy to manage the people and all the organization would be on the same progressive platform (Open learn, 2018).

 Then there would be not extra expense to be spend on the training of the individual person, the organization had to just give training to all people of organization together and they would be sure that they will get same result out of it and there is no need for conducting performance test to check their abilities.  There would be no such word call failure. The most insightful point about cognitive thinking style difference is the analysis and synthesis point. Difference in our thinking is what we perceive around our surrounding can have effect on connection with the people (Stum and Kirton, 2009). The analytical thinking is because of modern society which some time creates more complex situation and synthesis is actually as holistic thinking. It is believed that synthesis thinking is very difficult as compared to analytical thinking because drawing a whole picture is very hard from a piece of picture. As innovative theory mainly focuses on cognitive tendencies along with problem solving style, by learning and understanding this concept my way of thinking approach towards any top and then the problem solving approach has changed a lot, now I do not directly start working in one direction.

  I will first try to analyse all possible ways and then among them try to finalize the most suitable way for that topic. This theory will also help me in understanding the other person better by understanding their way of thinking as well as their capability of solving problems. According to their capability the topic can be allotted to them for best outcome. One case was in which Students diversity interactions affect creates negative cognitive development. A total of 2500 student were involved in this program which result that student from different races have experienced with negative interaction which include hostile connection with other students have impacted on the thinking ability of these students for cognitive development (Vollman,2017). They feel that their views were disregarded as a pre-set mind makeup and in many situations they feel threatened on the basis of their race, believes and other identity sections. No doubt the positive feel was there in all the groups but there was also a feel of negative cognitive diversity.

Brainstorming is actually a process in which a group of people combine together try to generate new idea with a specific interest. Here all ideas are noted down and no idea is opposed until the session is completed. As the session is completed all the members of the group one by one starts opposing the presented idea and the idea which become difficult to oppose become the best possible solution for the presented problem (Fobes,2018). As, every individual works on some given project but there are some problems which needed to be worked as a group. The success of any group or team is totally dependent how effectively the brainstorming session is completed.

Brainstorming process consists of four steps: Layout the problem we want to solve, identify the objectives of a possible solution, and try to generate solution individually and once idea is cleared go for it. As we know that today is the time for globalization where every organization is only looking for creative employees in such situation, Problem statement some students of the college are not creative at all (ISU,2018). So, the challenge will be to generate creativity with in these students with the help of activities. We can say that within one month, our college will be taking part in intercollege competition based on creative thinking platform so we have to make our student to be ready for bringing their beat creativity in them.

So, we are going to start with brain storming program with the help of cause and effect diagram or fish bone technique which will provide us the information about the possible cause of lack of creativity in students and effect of it on their life. From this technique we will be able to design the plan to develop creative thinking in the students with the help of activities. Activities like assumption Busting – one is stuck because of out of idea and others make assumption around the environment surrounding that person, Brain sketching – make sketches and pass that sketches to near student, concept mapping- nodes are given which are to be linked with the concept for graphic formation, Laddering – toggling within the two generated ideas , Reverse brainstorming – analysing list of current ideas instead of previous ideas, Role play – a kind of drama performed by students on the related topic (Life hacker, 2018).

By conducting this event we will be able to motivate students to go for design thinking or we can say creative thinking with the help of action plan on the things which will come out from cause and effect diagram and by truly following this action plan we will be able to develop creative thinking in the students and Eger of participant in the inter college competition will give them a platform to not only learn about the creative thinking but also to perform that ideas on real ground and see its effect naturally on ground and will help all the students to develop such thinking that will not only help them in solving problems related to their professional as well as personal life (AIB,2018).

Australian Institute of Business. (2018) Why brainstorming is a crucial element in business [online]. Available from: https://www.aib.edu.au/blog/innovate/why-brainstorming-is-a-crucial-element-in-business/ [Accessed 18/6/18].

Chasanidou, D., and Lee, E. (2015) Design thinking methods and tools for innovation [online]. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/273319018_Design_Thinking_Methods_and_Tools_for_Innovation [Accessed 18/6/18].

Clairmont, N. (2018) If great minds really did think alike, we would be living in a dystopia [online]. Available from: https://bigthink.com/the-proverbial-skeptic/great-minds-do-not-think-alike [Accessed 18/6/18].

Dam, R., and Siang,T. (2018) 5 stages in the design thinking [online]. Available from: https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/article/5-stages-in-the-design-thinking-process [Accessed 18/6/18].

Docherty, C. (2017) Perspectives on design thinking for social innovation [online]. Available from: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14606925.2017.1372005 [Accessed 18/6/18].

Fobes. (2018) Four steps to successful brainstorming [online]. Available from: https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2013/03/05/4-steps-to-successful-brainstorming/#12d86d645992 [Accessed 18/6/18].

Iowa State University. (2018) 14 creative ways to engage students [online]. Available from: https://www.celt.iastate.edu/teaching/teaching-format/14-creative-ways-to-engage-students [Accessed 18/6/18].

Johnsson, M. (2017) Innovation Enablers for Innovation Teams-A Review. Journal of Innovation Management, 5(3), pp.75-121.

Kurokawa, T. (2013) Design thinking education at universities and graduate schools [online]. Available from: https://www.nistep.go.jp/en/wp-content/uploads/Science-Technology-Trends-Quarterly-Review-No.46%EF%BC%8Dreport4.pdf [Accessed 18/6/18].

Life hacker. (2018) How to brainstorm effectively [online]. Available from: https://lifehacker.com/the-best-brainstorming-is-divergent-1821356300 [Accessed 18/6/18].

Naranjo-Valencia, J.C., Jiménez-Jiménez, D., and Sanz-Valle, R. (2011) Innovation or imitation? The role of organizational culture. Management Decision, 49(1), pp.55-72.

Openlearn .(2018) Understanding the environment: thinking styles and models [online]. Available from: www.open.edu/openlearn/OCW/mod/oucontent/view.php?printable=1&id=3333.

Stempfle, J. (2011) Overcoming organizational fixation: creating and sustaining an innovation culture. The Journal of Creative Behavior, 45(2), pp.116-129.

Stum, J. (2009) Kirton’s adaption-innovation theory: Managing cognitive styles in times of diversity and change. Emerging Leadership Journeys, 2(1), pp.66-78.

Teza, P., Miguez, V.B., Fernandes, R.F., Dandolini, G.A. and Souza, J.A.D. (2016) Ideas for innovation: a systematic mapping of the literature. Gestão & Produção, 23(1), pp.60-83.

Vollman,A. (2017) Negative diversity interactions affect students cognitive development study [Online] Available from: https://www.insightintodiversity.com/negative-diversity-intoeractions-affect-students-cognitive-development-study-shows/ [Accessed 18/6/18]