There is this new belief system of group productivity everywhere, from corporate to schools. At work places, we have open offices, team building and all sorts of group work but what we are forgetting is that solitude is an important ingredient to productivity.. When we just rely on group-work and teams, sometimes we do forget what we are capable of doing independently.

People are different, we have introverts, extroverts and those who enjoy these two different worlds, ambiverts. Introverts like spending some “alone” time, their inner world is much more stimulating and rewarding to them as opposed to extroverts. The point here is, groups are composed of different people, who yield results differently, embrace that.. The IT industry lucky enough, understand this concept better than any other industry, look at Google Inc. for instance, employees have a sense of freedom yet they also collaborate to produce world leading products and services...

Most, if not all of the fabulous Eureka moments were found on a solitude time away from the influence of group dynamics. Newton sitting under a tree, a fruit fell on his head, gravity. Albert Einstein - father of modern physics, Graham Bell - invented the first practical telephone, and the list goes down..

From contemporary psychology, it turns out we can't be in a group of people without instinctively mimicking their opinions. You will start aping the beliefs of the people around you without even realizing that's what you are doing! Group seamlessly follow the opinion of the most dominating or charismatic person in the room even though there is zero correlation between being the best talker and having the best ideas. You might follow this person with the best ideas but you might not…. And you really want to leave it up to chance.

It's much better for everyone to go off by themselves, do research and generate their own ideas freed from the distortion of group dynamics and then come together in as a team/group to talk them through in a well managed environment and take it from there.

The more freedom that we give to team/group workers the more likely that they are to come up with unique solutions to the problems.. Sometimes we need to get into our own head, so stop the madness of constant group work and encourage people to think! There should be a balance between group work and personal work to increase creativity and importantly, personal growth.

P.S. Read “Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking” – By Susan Cain