The impact of active trust-building on creative performance of work groups : an exploratory study

Abstract

This study explored the relationship between active trust-building and group creativity. More specifically, it investigated whether or not trust can be actively built within work groups, and whether or not such actively-built trust can enhance group creative performance. A trust-building programme was developed for the purpose of this study and tested in an experiment using a pre test, post test format. Two work groups of six members each were: randomly selected to participate in the study from the customer care, department of an international betting company situated in Malta. One of the groups was randomly assigned the text condition while the other was engaged as a control group. Both groups were tested on their level of trust (using a validated questionnaire developed by Blais and Thompson, 2009) and on their creative output (using an adaptation of creativity tests developed by Klimoski and Karol, 1976) in identical conditions in the pre-test and then again in the post-test. The test-group received an intervention between the pre test and the post-test in the form of the abovementioned tailor-made trust-building programme (four sessions of two hours each spread over three weeks). The control-group received no intervention but attended the trust-building programme after the study was completed to ensure fair and equal treatment of all participants. A Wilcoxon test revealed that while the test-group enjoyed a significant increase (of 7.53%, p < .05) in the level of trust from the pre-test to the post-test (following the intervention), there was a slight but insignificant decrease (of 2.49%, p > 05) in the control groups level of trust over the same period of time (where no intervention took place). Furthermore, there was an improvement in the creative output of the test-group (operationalised as the number and quality of ideas generated in the creativity tests) following the intervention, while the control-group's creative performance deteriorated. These findings suggest that the trust-building programme was effective in building trust among its recipients, and that this higher level of trust may contribute to better performance on their group creativity tasks. Although this study was exploratory in nature (due to a lack of empirical research on trust building and its impact on group creativity, and due to the small sample size used in this study), and although further research is required before firm conclusions and generalizations can be made, these findings offer preliminary support for the hypotheses that trust can be actively built within work groups, and that higher levels of trust are beneficial for creative performance.