Pioneering development teams behind innovative products like the Dyson Supersonic hair dryer and SpaceX’s reusable Falcon 9 rocket rely on complex interdisciplinary collaboration among engineers, designers, and project managers. Karthik Ramachandran, Dunn Family Professor of Operations Management, knows that breakthrough products often don’t emerge from the solitary efforts of a lone genius.
In a new research article, “Help or Hindrance? The Role of Familiarity in Product Development Teams,” Ramachandran and his co-authors Necati Tereyagoglu and Murat Unal, show the crucial role familiarity plays in team dynamics.
“Every creative organization deals with a fundamental tension,” Ramachandran said. “People love working with teammates they know well, but innovation often depends on fresh perspectives.”
There is a lot to be said about familiarity. Famously, it breeds contempt. Previous studies have shown that repeat collaboration helps teams execute smoothly. But smooth operations don’t always translate to commercial success. Ramachandran’s research shows that it can breed a different kind of trouble — an environment free from friction, debate, and novelty. Those conditions may be comfortable, but they don’t help creativity thrive. Video game development, it turns out, provides the perfect setting for productive tension.
“Video games require both bold creative ideas and flawless execution,” Ramachandran shared. “They blend art, engineering, storytelling, and software into a single product. We were curious about how familiarity impacts team dynamics within this industry. When does it help and when does it quietly get in the way?”
The Method
The video game industry demands constant innovation. It also uses detailed crediting practices that allowed Ramachandran and his co-authors to track who worked together, when, and in what roles.
“That combination of creative intensity, role clarity, and data transparency is incredibly rare and incredibly powerful for studying team dynamics,” said Ramachandran.
Representing $18 billion in estimated revenue, the dataset behind this research spanned 752 video games across nine platforms, 13,230 developers, and 100,000+ prior games, enabling the authors to map familiarity patterns with high granularity. Each developer was identified as a designer or coordinator.
Designers included writers, artists, and gameplay creators responsible for generating new ideas and features. Coordinators included producers and product managers who integrated the work of dozens of specialists.
Designers vs. Coordinators
The study uncovered a surprising distinction in how familiarity shapes market outcomes based on roles. Familiarity among designers reduced sales by 15.4%. Meanwhile, familiarity among coordinators had a strong positive effect, boosting sales by 9.1%.
The research showed that familiar designer teams created fewer product features, which translated into lower sales. Familiarity hurts creativity because it breeds comfort, and comfort reduces the creative tension so crucial to expansive thought.
“When designers know each other too well, teams can slip into shared assumptions or self‑censorship,” Ramachandran said. “They may recycle old ideas without realizing it. A little discomfort, disagreement, and cognitive diversity is often a sign that creative work is happening.”
Among coordinators, familiarity improved execution. “Coordinators benefit from familiarity because their job is all about alignment,” Ramachandran explained. “They keep everyone moving in the same direction, and familiarity makes that easier.”
Coordinators’ shared history helped video games succeed in the market because they improved conflict resolution and cross-team communication and practiced an ability to anticipate issues and integrate complex features.
The research proved that great products need more than just good ideas—they need those ideas to come together as a coherent whole. “While designers push boundaries and imagine what’s possible, coordinators make sure everything fits together, ships on time, and works as intended,” Ramachandran said. “Too much emphasis on creativity can lead to chaos; too much coordination can lead to safe, boring, and forgettable products. Firms live or die by how well they manage that balance.”
Beyond Gaming: Lessons for Product Development Across Industries
Ramachandran emphasized that these insights apply far beyond video games.
“Any industry with cross‑functional teams can learn from this,” he said. “Automotive design, consumer electronics, enterprise software. Each of these industries have creative specialists generating ideas and coordinators integrating them into a final product.”
Five key takeaways for any industry, include:
- Avoid over-relying on “proven” creative teams: Comfortable designer teams may quietly recycle ideas.
- Intentionally create productive tension: Healthy disagreement among designers boosts idea diversity.
- Track collaborative history—not just résumés: Past ties matter as much as skill sets.
- Maintain stability in coordination roles: Coordinators need shared experience to integrate work efficiently.
- Rotate designers to keep creative energy high: Even familiarity built in non-design roles has negative effects for designers.
A New Way to Design Teams
For Ramachandran, the takeaway isn’t to avoid familiarity, but rather to be intentional about where familiarity helps and where it hurts. For firms across industries racing to bring new products to market, Ramachandran’s research offers a roadmap for assembling teams that deliver both creative breakthroughs and strong commercial performance.
“Organizations should create environments where designers feel safe pushing unconventional ideas,” Ramachandran said. “At the same time, they should invest in a strong cohort of coordinators who can absorb that creative turbulence and turn it into something customers love. That tension, when managed well, is where innovation is made.”
Read More: Help or Hindrance? The Role of Familiarity in Product Development Teams
