The Flip Side of a Dubious Claim
The question that inspired this blog remains — is a heterogenous group of attorneys smarter and more creative than a homongeneous group of attorneys?
That’s the claim made by law firm after law firm after law firm, but is it a valid claim? What about the flip side of the claim, which sounds like this — a group of Chinese attorneys is neither as smart nor as creative as a group of Yankee attorneys.
You can’t have one without the other. If a heterogeneous group is smarter and more creative than a homogeneous group, than a homongeneous group is dumber and less creative than heterogeneous group. According to the claim, a group of Chinese lawyers is dumber and less creative than a group of Yankee lawyers. More than that, any group of Chinese — lawyers or engineers, doctors or accountants — is dumber and less creative than its Yankee counterpart. Ditto for Japanese groups, or Arab groups, or Jewish groups. They can’t compete with Yanks because they lack diversity.
That’s the flip side of what many law firms are claiming.