The most important part of aligning various expectations is to clearly describe the problem you are trying to solve and identify at least three different ways diverse users experience this problem. The more diverse your team, the better you'll be at doing this.

Minimization is what happens when we take the "world is flat" idea too far...and act as if people everywhere are the same (and thereby minimizing the differences).

When you start paying attention to diversity, you notice it (and notice its absence!). And based on the culture of your upbringing and the culture of your organization, you may or may not be primed to think consciously about innovation.

The more diverse your team, the better you'll be at identifying what a diversity of users perceive as problems.

Trust is consistently seen as a make or break component of innovation - particularly because the freedom to fail is an important part of innovation.

The best way to improve perspective taking is to see users up close.

I never expected my graduate degrees to give me all the practical how-to's that can perhaps only be learned through the school of hard knocks.