Process gains in group decision making

Abstract

Purpose – Hidden profiles are decision-making tasks in which groups have the potential tooutperform individual decision-makers. This paper has two purposes: first, to provide a conceptualanalysis of how the group potential for solving hidden profiles can be measured; second, to empiricallydetermine the solution rates hidden profile groups would achieve: in the absence of any groupprocesses (i.e. the group potential); and in the absence of any dysfunctional group processes.Design/methodology/approach – The group potential was determined by averaging the groupmembers’ decision quality prior to the discussion. To determine the hidden profile solution rates in theabsence of any dysfunctional group processes, the standard hidden profile procedure was modified sothat nothing but the individual-level constraints could hamper the solution of hidden profiles.Findings – The actual group performance was significantly higher than the group potential, butsignificantly lower than the performance in the no dysfunctional group processes condition. Hence,dysfunctional group processes interfere with the realization of process gains. However, even in theabsence of any dysfunctional group processes, groups did not always solve hidden profiles. Finally,the detrimental group process hampering the solution of hidden profiles does not seem to be biasedinformation pooling favoring shared information but rather insufficient amount of informationpooling.Practical implications – The results indicate that tools, which aim to facilitate the solution ofhidden profiles, have to overcome both dysfunctional group processes, and individual-levelconstraints.Originality/value – This is the first attempt to quantify process gains in hidden profile groups.