CULTURALLY DIVERSE WORKFORCE

Compare and Contrast to Methods for Creating an Environment that is Effective in Attracting and Retaining a Culturally Diverse Workforce

Compare and Contrast to Methods for Creating an Environment that is Effective in Attracting and Retaining a Culturally Diverse Workforce

Introduction

Workplace diversity can be defined as the differences between people in the organization. These differences include gender, race, tenure, background, Personality, age, education, ethnic group and more. It ranges from person to person. Through diversity a perception is made about people who differentiate them from others. These perceptions affect the individuals. In order to be successful, the organization needs to mange work force diversity. In order to function effectively the organization must focus on managing workforce diversity issues such as adaptability, communication and change as it is increasing at a faster rate.

As far as my organization is concerned work force diversity is managed here by considering the different factors such as a culture should be developed which should be infused in the organization. Most of the employees resist change in the organization so they should be motivated enough to face the change. Leaders and manages must also incorporate policies regarding workforce diversity. In order to achieve this management should cooperate with the employees working there. Employee satisfaction survey should be carried out in the organization so that the best practices of the work force diversity can be extracted. It creates a sense of consideration and ownership for the employees. Similarly, by this organization's policies are well communicated between the employees.

With time the economy is becoming global, similarly the workforce diversity is increasingly becoming diverse. In order to be competitive and successful organizations must manage it effectively by developing successful policies for the future.

Discussion

The Entrance of Diversity

Diversity's entrance into the management discussion can be traced to the 1987 Hudson Institute report, Workforce 2000, which stated that women, blacks, Hispanics and immigrants would make up 85 percent of new job seekers by the year 2000 (Lorbiecki and Jack, 2000).

Although the findings of Workforce 2000 were challenged, this report led to the realization that managers would no longer be managing a homogeneous workforce. In fact, as Tsui et al. (1992, p. 549) pointed out, “more and more individuals are likely to work with people who are demographically different from them in terms of age, gender, race, and ethnicity”.

Impetus for Diversity Conversation

Even before diversity entered the management conversation, the 1964 Civil Rights Acts made it illegal for companies to discriminate in the hiring or management of employees on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin. The Civil Rights Act and the subsequent Executive Order 11246, which requires government contractors “to take affirmative action to overcome past patterns of discrimination,” led to the founding of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and began the equity /affirmative action conversation (Herring, 2009). However, by the late 1970s and early 1980s, private companies began to realize that these legal mandates were “insufficient to manage organizational diversity effectively” and began to offer training programs aimed at ...