In this Era of Globalization, where every organization is working towards having an international competitive advantage, the importance of managing diversity which implies the need to be proactive in managing the needs of a diverse workforce under equal opportunities based on gender, age, race, disability, sexual orientation, religious belief etc and also it is a concept that recognizes individual differences beyond equal opportunity and discrimination.
The workforce in advanced industrialized economy is diverse and the management challenge is to match that diversity within the organization. This is both for legal compliance and to gain possible business advantage from this environmental change- there is indeed a business case for diversity. (Boddy, 2008)
Diversity in employment goes further than equal opportunities. The ways in which people meaningfully differ in the work place include not only race and ethnicity, age and gender, but personality, preferred working style, individual needs and goals and so on.
To manage the conditions of a diverse workforce need to be proactive in areas, such as,
- Tolerance of individual differences
- Communicating effectively with ethnically diverse workforce and teams
- Managing the adjustments to be made by increasingly aged workforce
- Dealing with differences in literacy, qualifications in an international workforce
- Managing flexible working, family structures and responsibilities
Gender and ethnic origin are the two most important dimensions of diversity. However it has to be understood that some aspects of equal opportunities can be achieved by legislation while others depend upon practicing fair models of work practice which have no legislative foundation.
Human resource need to make and communicate the business case for diversity. They need to set and sell goals and target, hold managers accountable for these, and change the organizational culture to embrace diversity.
Ingham (2003) suggests the following key steps in implementing a Diversity policy taking into account all equal opportunity requirements.
- Analyze your business environment
- Define diversity and its business benefits
- Introduce diversity policy into corporate strategy
- Embed diversity into core HR processes and system
- Ensure leaders implement policy
- Involve staff at all levels
- Communicate
- Understand your company’s needs
- Evaluate
Managing diversity involves managing cultural differences. Therefore can further analyze the significance of culture, globalization and understanding the National cultural differences using Hofstede’s model. (Hofstede, 1991)
In order to exploit the advantages of diversity; provide an open, supportive and flexible work environment that values the potential differences and uniqueness of each individual employee through its leadership and management, communication strategies, & recruitment and training programs need to be adopted.
This is to promote the understanding of individual differences which covers but are not limited to gender, race, cultural values, religious beliefs, age, disability and sexual orientation. The strategic plan should be able to cover five goals, which are Communication, Education and Training, career development, recruitment hiring and work-life balance.
References
Harrell, L. (2016) Diversity Management- A Concept beyond Equal Opportunities and Discrimination. Journal of Business Management & Social Sciences Research (JBM&SSR) ISSN No: 2319-5614 Vol 5, No.5 [Online] Available at : www.borjournals.com/a/index.php/jbmssr/article/download/2278/pdf London
[Accessed 10 December 2017]
Hofstede, G (1991), “Cultures and Organizations”. London: McGraw Hill.
Holbeche, L. (2002) The High Performance Organization. [Online] Available at : https://books.google.lk/books?isbn=1136357696 [Accessed 11 December 2017]
Ingham, j (2003) how to implement a diversity policy. People management, 24th July.
Hofstede, G (1991), “Cultures and Organizations”. London: McGraw Hill.
Holbeche, L. (2002) The High Performance Organization. [Online] Available at : https://books.google.lk/books?isbn=1136357696 [Accessed 11 December 2017]
Ingham, j (2003) how to implement a diversity policy. People management, 24th July.
if divercity canot be happned bcz some cultural situation are staritly impact on divercity on work place.
ReplyDeleteGreat Topic Rumana. Diversity if managed well could be a great advantage to an organization, while if poorly managed could be a great hazard to an organization and its employees.
ReplyDelete“Managing diversity is about ensuring that all people maximize their potential and their contribution to the organization” (Armstrong, 2006)
Would like to share some details of the acronym MOSAIC which I came across in Armstrong's book, defined by Kandola and Fullerton in 1998 to describe characteristics of a diversity oriented organization.
Mission and values – Should be strong and positive where diversity management is a long-term goal.
Objective and fair processes – Should exist and be regularly monitored.
Skilled Workforces - Aware of the effects of not managing diversity effectively.
Active flexibility - Increasing flexibility in working patterns, practices, policies and procedures.
Individual focus – Should not average out similarities or differences
Culture – Should be open with trust between employees and absence of prejudice and discrimination.
(Armstrong, 2006)
References
Armstrong, M. (2006) Human Resource Management Practice. 10th edition. London: Kogan Page Limited.
Managing Diversity in the work place is a core as well as a challenging task for HR.
ReplyDeleteSince you have covered the steps/actions required for managing diversity I would like to add few point on the advantages an organization will gains through diversity.
1. A bigger and a better talent pool - employees with different cultural, demographical and gender groups will make up a stronger talent pool.
2. Linguistic Skills - A diversified employee group will consist people speaking different languages, thus the organization will be able to establish better communication channels with both suppliers and customers.
3. Varied View points - this will enables better decision making.
A combination of above advantages will increase the organizational productivity while providing job satisfaction to it s employees.
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ReplyDeleteManaging diversity within an organization is an art and it purely depends on the management of an organization to ensure an energetic, enthusiastic and dedicating workforce.
ReplyDeleteDiversity is a natural process and if it is managed well, it could be the entire reason for the development of an organization. Equal opportunities have to be given to every employee for their retention in a work place.
Apart from the factors discussed above, I would also prefer that some extra arrangements like celebrating every religious festival, celebrating the birthdays’ of employees and organizing annual staff trip would add some value in managing diversity in an organization.
Embracing diversity? That’s where the beauty of varied viewpoints comes to life! By uniting distinct backgrounds and thoughts, we foster a lively and innovative work environment where everyone is appreciated, and collaboration flourishes!
ReplyDelete