As humorous as Tom Wujec's analysis of the Marshmallow Challenge may sound, much of it makes sense. Granted, much of this sense could be argued to be from subjective sources, but it makes sense in its own way nonetheless. I agree with his analysis of what makes the team of kindergarten graduates more likely to succeed, and as cynical as it sounds I can understand where the team of MBA graduates are more likely to fail.
To dive in deeper, a recent MBA graduate is certainly going to be much more interested in the proposition of making their mark and getting ahead to get that nice corporate job than your average kindergarten graduate, and by way of training and the accumulated years of being taught to solve problems in a very systematic manner, an MBA graduate is much more likely to approach the challenge in an orderly step by step manner versus the more exploratory approach taken by the kindergarten graduate. In this specific scenario, although the marshmallow is logically the last step, its very mass and weight make it something of a central piece to be factored in. The kindergarten graduates, still being very young, are much more likely to be at a highly curious and exploratory of their lives and aren't as likely to see the marshmallow as a last step than they are to see it as something always there to be played with.
In the case of the CEOs versus CEOs with executive assistants, I think it has something to do with the diversity of perspective. While both sets of CEOs are likely cut from the same cloth of business minded people that want to get ahead, those paired with assistants have the benefit of a different perspective that ideally understand their bosses and what they're dealing with, yet come with a different point of view and without the baggage of a fixed way of doing business.Thus, at least in the subtle way assistants do, they can inject their thoughts in something of an advisory role and lead from within the team.
In any of these scenarios, one could argue the influence of various group behaviors and process interventions. For instance, the MBA group might do well at testing for consensus and summarizing (task functions), but they may not be so good at harmonizing and encouraging, plus the members may be vying continuously for emerging into a leadership function full time rather than going in and out, per what Brown notes in his text on page 203. They may also be more inclined to carry out individual functions, still in something of a mentality to stand out above peers. Kindergarten graduates, although they may not be the most likely to elaborate, do seem like the type that would ask a great deal of questions, and assuming they get along well, there may be greater harmonizing and encouragement within the group. Some of these factors might apply as well to the scenarios of CEOs with or without assistants. I imagine the assistants might provide some of both task and maintenance functions by keeping the CEOs on track and cohesive, as well as undertaking process interventions on page 204 such as generalizing and probing. CEOs alone may also be conscious of how they compare to others, while the executive assistants may still be comfortable in their roles of providing support to the boss and not grandstanding.
In short, besides matters of experience or perspective biases, I believe that some group types can be more conducive than others towards having members that strike a balance between the task and maintenance functions, and may have more or less members that are inclined to work towards individual functions. Finally, there may also be varying balances in the implementation (or lack thereof) of process intervention techniques in challenges such as this.
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