Understanding Diversity in the Workplace

Question:

Discuss about the Necessity of Diversity Management in Cera.

Diversity management entails the practice of focusing and supporting multiple cultural and personal lifestyle and characterization within an organization. In any multinational company, there are employees from various cultural and social backgrounds, and it is the responsibility of the management to control and prevent any conflicts aroused in the organization. CERA is one of the global innovative human resource management companies that continuously seeking for growth and by attracting talents from all over the world, which refers to the need for diversity management in the organization. Diversity management is one of the major strategies followed in any multinational organization to support, accept and respect diverse racial, societal, economical, cultural, political and geographical backgrounds. In other way, the diversity management refers to the ability of the management of an organization for managing the personal and cultural differences in the same. The management of the company needs to acquire specific skills and knowledge to design the strategies for managing the diversity in the organization. A multinational company may have their branches throughout the world which means to have the employees around the world. The management of the company needs to follow certain strategies to handle employees from different cultural and societal background. In this report the chosen company is CERA, where the diversity management id indeed needed for building a fine and appropriate work environment. However, this has been a subject of debate in the business rationale, but there is severe need for applying diversity management strategies in multinational company like CERA. The following report discusses the necessity of diversity management for adding values to the organization.

In the world of ever changing, dynamic and overly complex social and organizational structure, diversity is one of the major factors that need to be managed efficiently. The infusion of the modernity and the post colonialism into the organization having multicultural perspective has enabled the organization of effective management of the complex and diverse manpower resources in the workplace (Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, 2011). Perception of different researchers and management scholars of diversity is different and can be distinguished as broader and narrower scope of diversity. The broader aspect of the diversity deals with the age, race, ethnicity, gender and spiritual diversification of the people within an organization. Whereas, the narrower aspect of diversity deals with the issues regarding race, sex and class. As per the organizational perspective of diversity, this can be stated that managing the diversity problems within an organization is about recruitment, retention and establishment of proper workplace relationships among the employees belonging to the specific and distinctive cultural backgrounds by eliminating the anti-social and conflicting behavior within the organization.

Challenges of Managing Diversity

The rapid change of demographical situations in the society as well as the in the organizations has been marked as primary reason for diversity in the organizational workplace. This primary reason requires awareness in the management system for managing the same. The issue of diversity can be different on the basis of country. There are many countries that do not consider the issue of diversity management as the severe one, whereas in many other countries the issue of diversity management is given special and prior attention (Critically Analyze The Diversity Management At Multicultural Organizations Business Essay., 2017). Again, the beneficial aspect of the diversity in the organization refers to the need for rich cultured competent manpower which requires a great effort from the management. The management of the organization is responsible for ensuring the correct and fair treatment for each employees and managing the entire workforce for promoting better rewards in order to add competitive value to the organization (Triana & Garcia, 2009). Again, the lower cost advantages achieved through the lower expenditure on the training of the employees highlights one individual occasion while evaluating the value appreciation of diversity (Martins & Parsons, 2007).

The cultural aspect is one of the major and prime focuses while evaluating the idea of diversity management of any organization. Globalization and the cultural conflicts are internally connected with each other (Ozbilgin & Tatli, 2008). Hence, the rate of globalization indicates the cultural issues that can be aroused in an organization (Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, 2011). To understand the issue of diversity and that of its management, one must understand the notion of cultural clashes or the cross-cultural aspect in the multinational workplace.

Furthermore, the diversification of culture can be distinguished in several types while discussing the same in the workplace such as managerial cultures, workers culture and the culture of the organization as a whole. The cross-cultural diversity is capable of constituting new dimensions, which can result into the cause of work values and organizational beliefs, communication, competition within the organization, conflicts in decision-making and the authoritative power (Shachaf, 2008). However, the diversity management contains promoting and appreciating different cultural beliefs and values, diminishing discriminations and prejudices and streamlining numerous positive dimensions of diversity in order to ensure healthy and professional relationship, better productivity and the greater workforce outcome (Mujtaba, 2007). The management of the organizations need to be competent and experienced enough to face these challenges and overcome the same.

Benefits of Diversity in the Workplace

Gender diversity is one of the major and prior issues that need proper and delicate handling by the management of the organization, as this issue plays a very vital role in the diversity management. Gender diversity is considered as a potential and prominent cultural factor that causes workplace conflicts and employee turnovers. For example, if the female employees of the do not find much respect and equality in the workplace meeting regarding the business growth, then the eligible and competent female employees may leave the organization. The gender diversity being a prominent factor of cultural architecture is proved by the socialization of the women (Shen et al., 2009). It is found that the women are more capable of handling conflicts in workplace and dealing with ambiguity, which exhibit their flexibility for being better managers than men are. Such situations can cause several vexations to the male employees in the organization such as work depression, lower self-confidence, job insecurity, jealousy for female employees and negative thoughts about women. For example, any female employee, having a background of an ethnic group, is more efficient and eligible for promotion to a manager. The male employees may find it unsatisfactory and suffer from job insecurity which can further results employee turnover.

As previously mentioned, the gender segregation gives birth to the cause of personality diversity. Personality of the employees constitutes the entire set of factors affecting the interaction among the employees within the organization (Kearney,  Gebert & Voelpel, 2009). The Big-Five personality model briefly helps the management to analyze the employee personality by pointing out the major characteristics of a person (Musek, 2007). Implementing the model in the organization for managing the diversity in workplace, can widely differ the reactions of the employees. The employees falling under the model are found more flexible and tolerant towards the workmates depicting their actions and emotions such as sympathy, openness, kindness, helpfulness than others. In other way, employees, who do not fall under this personality model, are capable of projecting negative influence inside the workplace of the organization.

Despite being several determinates pertaining the diversity within an organization, there is a beneficial aspect of the diversity too. Having diverse workforce within an organization can help to ensure and enhance the business growth. The diverse culture of the workplace can produce multiple beneficial factors for the business. The first and one of the important outcomes of the diversity is the innovation (Talke, Salomo & Rost, 2010). An organization having employees from different cultural and societal background can be the cause of innovative business ideas for the organization. The introduction of innovation not only helps the organization to improve their business growth, but also help building a creative culture within the organization.

Strategies for Promoting Diversity

Another importance the diversity of workforce within an organization projects is to attract the external professional talents, stakeholders, and customers (Mujtaba, 2007). One of the popular and effective business magazines states that a business organization, which is authentically diverse both from outside and inside can be successful advancing its business growth. The complementation of the idea of diversity management mentions that any organization that manages the diversity issues within the workplace, is capable of attracting more competent professional from diverse backgrounds. This not only adds value to the competitive business advantages, but also builds a rich work culture within the organization (Kearney, Gebert & Voelpel, 2009).

There is different definition of cultural diversity (Shachaf, 2008). One group of scholars and researchers perceive the idea of cultural diversification as the belonging of the people to different backgrounds. Whereas, another group of scholars defines the cultural differences as different beliefs acknowledged by different people (Moran,  Abramson & Moran, 2014). The fact can be foregrounded that increasing globalization and different societies are enabling one to acquire more than one culture at a time. In other way, this can also be stated that the employees learn work culture from the seniors in the organization, whereas, they learn their individual cultural beliefs from their parental cultures (Martins & Parsons, 2007). Therefore, this can be said that the diversity in the context of individual culture has various definitions and each is different from each other, which can help the organization to be rich with the culturally intelligent labor, which will further improve the work culture as well as the organizational culture.

Apart from providing challenges in the workplace, the diversity management is also an effective process of adding value to the organization (fbe.unimelb.edu.au., 2017). It is a blessing to the companies having diverse work culture, since this enable them to be armed with numerous i9deas, views and perspectives, which can further strengthen their abilities to design strategies, communicate and render the same. The diversity management also provides opportunities to the employees for innovating creative ideas through interacting with each other.

Diversification of the work culture determined by the employees belonging to the different market sectors and demographics help the organization to understand the customer base for their business. In short, the diversity management helps the organization to segment the market for their business, which undoubtedly adds values to the business as well as to the entire organization (Triana & Garcia, 2009).

Gender Diversity and its Impact on Employee Turnover

Employees having diverse social and cultural backgrounds influence the medium of communication. The different cultures become the reason for different languages, which adds benefits to the organization in communicating with different linguistic stakeholders, vendors and customers. Moreover, the diversity management helps those organizations who practices Corporate Social responsibilities towards the ethnic community, for communicating with the people belonging to the same groups. Precisely, the diversity management of the organization helps developing the linguistic skills for the entire company.

As discussed previously, the diversity within the workplace gives birth to the creative and innovative ideas for the improvement of the business. In other way, managing the diversity produces intrapreneur within the organization, which no doubt adds business values to the organization by innovating creative and smart ideas. These not only helps in creating an entrepreneurial atmosphere inside the organization, but also find out new, creative and future talents (Bridgstock et al., 2010). 

Being enriched with staffs coming from different cultural backgrounds benefits the organization by understanding the market needs. Culturally diverse employees are capable of understanding the different cultural market, which further helps the organization in delivering products according to the market needs. Gender diversity in this case also helps the organization to point out different gender needs and demands and accordingly the organization can improve their productivity. This is how the diversity management of a organization can add values to its business.

CERA, being an international company, possess employees from different cultural and social background, which makes the company to have a multicultural workforce (Ozbilgin & Tatli, 2008). The HR of the organization must implement the diversity management in order to avoid the workplace conflicts and ensure the value addition to the business. As discussed in the previous section of the report that the diversity management is an important and value adding factor for the organization. Similarly, foe CERA the diversity management is necessary to improve the business growth by understanding the different market segmentation as well as the customer needs. The HR of the company must understand and realize the necessity of implementing the diversity management in the organization.

CERA has a global market and branches in most of the countries throughout the world. In addition, the organization possesses international market, which is categorized by different cultures. Therefore, the employees of the company are also enriched with diverse cultural traits, beliefs and practices. Having a vast range of cultural employees, the implementation of the diversity management is indeed needed for the company. the diversity management of the company will help the CERA to promote and appreciate different cultural intelligence and practices, which will encourage the employees to improve the productivity of the company. For example, if the company has any employees who belongs to any ethnic group, he can understand the customer demands and needs for particularly to that group.

Personality Diversity and its Impact on the Workplace

Hiring people from different cultural background can also help the company in advancing their business to the new area, which can be effective in terms of adding business values to the organization. Recruiting staffs from diverse background can also provide opportunities to identify new stakeholders from diverse ethnic groups. Again, being a global business company, the prevalence of the gender diversity needs to be managed. The gender diversity management can help the company to understand the gender based needs and design business strategies accordingly. This need to be mentioned in this regard, the management of the gender diversity needs to be done delicately, since this issue can create conflicts in the workplace. Moreover, the diversity management within the workplace of CERA will produce effective result by attracting more efficient and professional talents from the diverse cultural backgrounds (Shen et al., 2009). This will, no doubt help the organization adding values to the global business and achieve competitive advantages.

Conclusion:

Therefore, this can be concluded from the above discourse that the diversity management is one of the major factors that determine the value addition of the organization in terms of global business. The diversity management refers to the management of the diverse culture present in the company due to various cultural people from diverse backgrounds. There are several determinates that cause the diversity within an organization. However, the diversity in the workplace can be beneficial to the organization as it adds values to the organization’s business. The importance of the diversity management cannot be ignored as it helps a multinational company to improve their business and spread the same. The diversity management includes the innovation, talent acquisition, market segmentation and so many improvements to the organization. For a global company like CERA, it is important to implement the diversity management, because this will not only help the organization to enrich their work culture but also will add business value to the company. Diversity management will create opportunities for the new entrepreneurs to produce innovative ideas for the company. This way both the company and the entrepreneurs will be privileged. In addition, the company will be capable of identifying local stakeholders in order to spread the business into the local community. Thus, it is suggested to the HR of the chosen organization, CERA, to implement the diversity management into the organization for overall profit and business growth

References:

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