Diversity in the Workplace

Abstract

In this study we try to explore the concept of “workplace diversity” in a holistic context. The main focus of the research is on “the workplace diversity” and its relation with “cross-cultural factors in the organization”. The research will select three organizations as the target population. The study will draw a random sample from these organizations in order to accumulate the data. The data collection tool that will be used in this research is the self-administered questionnaire and the data would be collected via interview. The study will analyze the accumulated data through SPSS in order to get valid and reliable results. The results drawn from this study can be used in the future studies or to formulate effective strategies to manage diversity in organization.



Introduction

The word culture represent different categories: at the level of ordinary consciousness - as a set of manners and customs, and among cultural studies and sociology, in accordance with the definition of culture as a specific way of organization and development of human life, represented in the product's material and spiritual work in the system social norms and institutions, spiritual values, in the aggregate people's attitudes to nature and each other and to ourselves. Global environment affects cultural diversity formation in organizations and this diversity is perceived as differences and similarities between members of one group. National culture is the key dimension of cultural diversity; however, the notion of cultural diversity includes other dimensions as well: age, sex, sexual orientation, disability, religion, social status etc. There are no doubts about the usefulness of cultural diversity management.

They key competence of the individual enabling them to operate in the context of diversified culture is the intercultural one, and scientists from all the field of social sciences are giving special attention in the topic of workplace diversity. The purpose of this paper is expanding diversity consciousness in the workplace. This paper aims to explore the cultural diversity in three organization selected as the sample of this study and interpret the valuable information and statistical analysis of the data obtained from the organizations. The tool used in this paper to accumulate the data is the self-administered questionnaire, and the data would be collected via interview.

Literature Review

Underestimation of cross-cultural gaps in the joint work often leads to a crisis of business relations, lower business activity. Meanwhile, the connection of different business cultures in the management involves not only openness and mutual trust, but a serious effort to develop plans for strategic development and marketing programs. As a result, of cultural differences begin to play an increasing role in organizations and stronger influence on the marginal efficiency of business activities. There are several cross-cultural issues in international business, defined language, religion, politics, legislations, and other vital values (Alexander, 2006). Cultural differences between peoples have been the subject of business not so long ago, in the early 70's, and that for the first time to cross-cultural issues expressed interest small countries: Finland Sweden, Denmark and Holland; then they were ...