Speaker: Zachariah Berry (Assistant Professor of Management and Organizations, University of Southern California Marshall School of Business)

Speaker Bio: Zachariah Berry studies morality at work. His current research explores how people 1) think about moral character, 2) ascribe morality to their work and relationships, and 3) think about and navigate conflicts between their values. He is also interested in diversity and the experience and consequences of giving up on career pursuits. His research has been published in leading academic journals such as Organization Science, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Management Science, and Nature Human Behaviour among others. He has also authored several articles for Harvard Business Review. He received his Ph.D. in organizational behavior from Cornell University, master of arts degree in psychology from the University of Chicago, and dual bachelor of arts degree in psychology and philosophy from Bethel University.

Talk Title:“Demographically Diverse Teams are Perceived as Less Corruptible”

Talk Abstract: Demographic diversity is a salient feature of teams, shaping how third-party actors perceive and interact with them. Although diverse teams are frequently seen as having conflicting values and viewpoints that can create challenges for the team, we propose that this perceived conflict is viewed as a strength in the moral domain. Across five main studies and eight supplemental studies utilizing different paradigms and stimuli (N = 3,970), we find that people evaluate diverse (vs. homogeneous) teams as less corruptible because they are considered to have higher ethical conflict—disagreements over how to think about and navigate moral issues. We further demonstrate that these perceptions are consequential and impact behavior as they influence how people create teams with different moral motives. Finally, we explore two areas in which people show a preference for homogeneous teams. Together, these findings suggest that perceived ethical conflict in diverse teams is less a challenge to be managed, and instead a signal of moral strength that influences how people judge, construct, and align with teams in consequential ways.