For those people who have read Matthew Syed's brilliant book, Rebel Ideas, it has become accepted wisdom that we need more diverse ideas. I want to argue this isn't always the case.

Divergent thinking only works so far in getting ideas to the table. We also need convergent thinking to get things nailed. Divergent for the design; convergent for the execution.

• A new curriculum plan needs plenty of ideas but a definitive target to work towards;

• A fresh product line requires a range of creative suggestions but a final, concrete item to take to market;

• The big event you're delivering will benefit from a variety of proposals but a fixed schedule has to be agreed;

Too many cooks spoil the broth.

We definitely need to diversify those around the table: gender, ethnicity, age, political persuasion. This is necessary for the ideas stage only.

What I mean by this is that when we are at iteration, ideation and prototyping stages of a project, the more ideas we get, the more likely we are to find a viable solution, and certainly one that hits the mark for different people. However, once we have agreed on a solution, the time for divergence has ended. It's now time to converge.

Here's why:

If we don't have singular vision, we will find ourselves with division

Every team member must make a decision to back the decision. If they can't, they need to get out of the way. Harsh but true.

Too many organisations have been blown apart by lots of people thinking they know best. Famously, Steve Jobs was voted out in 1985 of the company he founded because of a clash of ideas on pricing the Macintosh and an attempted coup against then Apple CEO, John Sculley and the board. We know he came back in 1997 but the lack of clarity of purpose ultimately led to division of epic proportions.

Divergence is good up until a point.

That point is when a decision is made. After this, we need a long obedience in the same direction.

We've had pale, male and stale dominance for way too long. We need the spectrum of voices and this needs to happen faster than it currently is doing. When we have got this diversity, we need to work it for all its worth. Then, we need to converge on a singularity with laser focus. The time for divergence is then done.