The challenge of managing diverse teams - Coursework Example

Affiliation Number The Challenge of Managing Diverse Teams Due to the increasing globalization rate, a number of corporations and organizations have encouraged team diversity in their working environments. Diversity among teams is becoming inevitable thus companies have resorted to use this in order to increase their presence globally. People with diverse skills, backgrounds, values and belief can now work together in order to achieve an organization’s goals and objectives. Nevertheless, Management of diverse teams remains still a great challenge in many organizations with a number of difficulties.

Management of cultural diversity, culture differences and its associated conflicts have become the main challenges and drawbacks in such teams (Jager & Raich 2011)One advantage of this is that diverse teams have become an important factor in promoting organizational effectiveness Joplin & Daus (2010) and good leadership. Leaders learn to recognize and accommodate the views and opinions of the diverse team members; this can help in the generation of good organizational results in relation to productivity from a more concrete and diverse decision making process that gives them an advantage over their competitors.

Another advantage of diverse teams is that it could not only help in achieve maximum performance of an organization,but can also help the company to acquire great opportunities and strengths and at the same time minimizing environmental threats and weaknesses. Diverse teams enhance organizational performance, the diverse skills and talents among team members can help in the promotion of invention and creativity within an institution. When diverse members work together, the output could be of more quality than a uniform team (Johnson & Suriya2002)..Managing diverse teams also comes with it limitations and challenges.

According to Jager & Raich(2011),one of the key challenges of management of diverse teams is the lack of appropriate leadership that can effectively manage cultural diversity in the employees of an organization. They state that global leaders need to acquire enough competence in order to properly manage cross-cultural teams. There is need for them to obtain skills in cross-cultural awareness to counter the challenges and demands that are associated with team diversity.Another limitation of diversity is the difficulty in making cohesion among members.

Naturally, an individual will tend to feel comfortable to work with people of similar characteristics and opinions. This renders teamwork and unity among members to be more difficult. Leaders have a responsibility to manage and diffuse conflicts that emerge due to such shortcomings. They should ensure that diversity and emotional involvement do not deviate team members from their primary focus of achieving the organizational objectives (Joplin & Daus 2010)One real-world example of organizations that have successfully realized the importance of diverse teams is the Fashion industry in UK.

The Company has adopted a management system of diverse teams that has enabled them to globally expand their presence. The inclusion of diverse teams in their workforce has helped the company to get a better understanding of both the local and international markets that has helped them to grow and expand. The Fashion industry has promoted its business globally through using models that reflect society’s diverse and unique nature in terms of age, race, ability and shape.ConclusionIn summary, Management of diverse teams requires leaders to develop enough skills that will enable them to counter the challenges that are associated with it.

It is important for global organizational leaders to positively approach the issue of diversity management in order for the organization to yield much benefits rather than focusing on the negative part of the issue.ReferencesJäger, M., & Raich, M. 2011. The management of multicultural teams: opportunities and challenges in retirement homes. Journal of Management & Marketing in Healthcare, 4(4), 234-241.Johnson, S. D., Suriya, C, 2002. Team development and group processes of virtual learning teams.

Computers & Education, 39(4), 379-393.Joplin & Daus 2010. Managing diversity: Beyond affirmative action in Australia. Women in Management Review, 13(4), 133-142.Mullin,2010. Age-based faultlines and perceived productive energy: The moderation of transformational leadership. Small Group Research, 41(5), 593-620.Yukl, 2010. Leadership modes: Success strategies for multicultural teams. Scandinavian Journal of Management, 26(3), 258-267..