Importance of Diversity at Cosmo - Case Study Example

Cosmos diversity Student’s Name: Instructor’s Name: Course Code: Date of Submission: Introduction Diversity is a term used to refer to various elements that make people to be unique from one another. The variables which are used to make diversity possible include the race, religions, age, sex, geographic origin, nationality and color among others (Mor Barak2013). Diversity has become a major practice among many organizations because they want to gain competitive advantage through diversity. Diversity brings in new skills to the organization which could help to improve the performance of the organization. Also through diversity, the reputation of the company will improve thus gaining competitive advantage as it will be perceived as a caring organization. In this regard therefore for any organization to compete globally, it has to consider the issues of diversity among its employees to improve its public image (Mor Barak2013). This essay aims to analyze the ways of increasing diversity at work place in relation to Cosmo Company of Australia, importance of practicing diversity, barriers to practicing diversity and recommendations on how to improve diversity at workplaces. Cosmo is a company based in Australia and has more than 150 retail outlets and employs more than 2000 employees. Ways of improving diversity There are various strategies which have been applied Cosmo in regard to promoting diversity. The first strategy is to ensure that the personnel managers have undergone some training which will enable them to conduct interviews which are more effective and can enable them to select individuals from minority groups (Wehman 2003). In the past, the personnel managers did not have the skills to conduct interviews from non-traditional backgrounds. This training therefore will enable them to be equipped with techniques of interviewing all people from different origins and be fair when selecting the employees to ensure they practice diversity in the company. This is a good strategy for a company which aims at improving diversity at their workplace. Another strategy of improving diversity at Cosmo is placing advertisements in locations where there are minority groups. Through the placements of the advertisements in places where there are minority groups, they will be able to access the advertisement and if they are qualified they will apply for the interviews (Mor Barak2013). In this case of Cosmo, the personnel management had resolved to place advertisements where there are minority groups like the disabled and the young aged to entice them apply so that they will be able to have a large base of selecting the most qualified people from the minority groups. Therefore, there are higher chances of accessing the minority groups who might be having adequate experience for various positions in the company. Another rationale applied by Cosmo to improve diversity is the support from top management. The top management focused on the market and was able to understand the importance of practicing diversity in the company (Mor Barak2013). The top management gave the necessary support to the personnel department to ensure they hired employees from all variables. Without the support of the top management, it could be hard for the company or the personnel manager to practice diversity as it needed extra training and advertisement. Finally, the personnel management did not offer extra training for employees from non-traditional backgrounds. This is because through extra training, the employees will feel isolated and will not feel that they are part of the organization (Wehman 2003). The effect of feeling not being part of the organization is that the employees might decide to abandon the organization and look for other jobs somewhere else. Therefore deciding not to offer extra training for the employees, the company is able to maintain people from the minority groups. Importance of diversity at Cosmo Diversity has great importance to organizations. To start with, diversity enables an organization to improve its productivity (French 2005). This is because diversity brings in different skills to the organization with different talents leading to high production. Through diversity loyalty to the organization can be achieved leading to retention of competent skills which help the company to improve its performance. Another benefit of diversity at the workplace is that it enables easier problem solving. Diversity brings different minds together focusing a common issue, hence there are high chances of coming up a better solution to problems (French 2005). When they're different people in the organization it means that there are different thinking of approaching an issue and when the ideas are brought together a problem can be easily solved. Diversity helps an organization to attract and retain skills within the organization. When the minority groups feel that they have been taken care of, they will develop loyalty to the organization and therefore they will be satisfied with their jobs (Wehman 2003). Through job satisfaction the employees will increase their productivity because the skills of the minority groups will be maintained within the organization and the company will be able to compete globally. Through diversity, the organization will be able to improve synergy within the organization. Diversity enables the organization to employ people from different backgrounds including different communication backgrounds which help to improve communication within the organization (French 2005). Through synergy, there will be improved communication and sharing of ideas leading to positive attitudes towards processes hence improving the productivity of the organization. Diversity on the other hand reduces the expenses of the company. This is because a minority group can seek the legal services by suing the organization because it neglects their rights (French 2005). Through these lawsuits, the company can spend a lot of financial resources during the suit hence consuming the resources of the company and damaging the reputation of the company as well. Therefore, when the organization practices diversity, there are no chances of being sued in the court of law. On the other hand, diversity enables the organization to increase its market share. By employing people from different backgrounds, the image of the company will be good which will attract and retain many customers (French 2005). As a result, the company will have competitive advantage and its products will sell more in the market than those of the competitors and this helps to improve the market share of the company which leads to increased profitability. There are two paradigms to diversity and they include discrimination and fairness paradigm and access and legitimacy paradigm (Wehman 2003). These are the two paradigms for managing diversity in an organization. Discrimination and fairness paradigm is where there is discrimination and no fairness in managing the workforce of the organization. This can also be a management technique whereby the organization discourages discrimination and promote fairness when hiring the human skills for the organization. Another paradigm for managing diversity is the access and legitimacy paradigm. This is the management technique where the company ensures that there is access to all the employee variables including the minority groups (French 2005). The organization ensures that it meets all the legal requirements of its employees by ensuring that its workforce comprises of all the variables of employees like the aged, gender, color and disability. In this regard, Cosmo falls under the category of access and legitimacy paradigm of managing diversity. This is because at first the company never used to access the employees from the minority groups (Wehman 2003). This means that the company did not practice diversity as it employed from majority groups and neglected the minority groups. Later the company started placing advertisements in places with minority groups ensuring that they access the skills of the minority groups. In this effect therefore, Cosmo falls under the access and legitimacy paradigm of managing diversity. Barriers to practicing diversity Despite the efforts by many organizations including Cosmo Company to practice diversity, there are also challenges which the management in the implementation of diversity strategies. These challenges include difficulty in managing the workforce (Wehman 2003). This is in the context that people who come from different cultures are hard to assimilate the new cultures. For instance, it will be difficult to assimilate the new salary structures which might be different from their backgrounds. This is a big challenge for the management to manage these different groups. Another challenge of diversity is the communication challenges. Different groups of people communicate differently so when these people are brought together to work as a team, communication becomes a problem (Wehman 2003). Some groups might resist the new communication structure and therefore it will be hard for these people to work in teams. There will be less synergy which will lead to poor performance of teams in the organization. Cosmo has set strategies to ensure it acquires skills from employees who are qualified and can be able to assimilate the new culture. The company has done this by sourcing from locations where there are minority groups but with required skills through advertisement. In addition, there is also the issue of corporate culture as a challenge to diversity. Some companies have established histories with their culture thus it will be hard to understand the need of diversifying the organization (Wehman 2003). This is where the management of the organization does not identify the need of practicing diversity. In these organizations, it will be hard to practice diversity unless the management changes their strategies to incorporate diversity. Cosmo has managed to eliminate this barrier because the management has understood the need of diversification and has encouraged it hence the diversification strategy will succeed. Furthermore, there is the barrier of skill preparation. Different organizations require different skills from different workforce. People from different cultures are prepared differently which makes it hard for one organization to hire workforce from anywhere (Wehman 2003). This makes planning difficult as each organization requires specific skills which might not be available among the minority groups because of the way they are trained. In this context, diversification becomes a problem because workforces are prepared differently. Recommendations for improving diversity at Cosmo The first recommendation to improve diversity is to offer training for English language. Language is a common barrier to practicing diversity because different people come from different languages and this will limit the base at which the company will select employees from (Mor Barak2013). Therefore the company should offer language training to increase the base for employing candidates which will increase the chances of hiring from minority groups. Developing an evaluation form will also improve diversity. This form enables the organization to know the extent of diversity. For instance when hiring, the form will enable the personnel team to avoid discriminations hence promote diversity at Cosmo. Another strategy is to use the current staff in managing diversity (Mor Barak2013). This is where there are minority groups in the company and will be used to know if they can refer the organization to other people from the minority groups who have the same skills as themselves. This will help to identify the best skills from the minority groups. Finally, there is need to clarify the importance of diversity at work place. By explaining the importance of diversity to all employees, they will readily accept the changes because they will not feel that their positions are threatened thus there will be no resistance in implementing the changes. Conclusion Diversity is where the organization hires employees from all variables including gender, age, race, disability and color. Cosmo has managed to practice diversity by training the personnel managers to hire people from all variables, placing advertisements in locations with minority groups, support from top management and eliminating extra training to minority groups. Diversity has the following benefits; improving the productivity of the organization, attracts and retains best skills in the organization, improves the corporate image of the company and enables the company to compete globally. There are also barriers to diversity and they include communication barriers, corporate culture barriers, managing different cultures barriers and skills preparation barriers. In order for Cosmo to improve diversity policies, it has to offer training for English language, design evaluation forms, use current staff and explain the importance of diversity at work place so that the employees do not feel threatened about their jobs. References French, E. (2005). The importance of strategic change in achieving equity in diversity. Strategic Change, Vol. 14, No. 1, pp. 35-44. Mor Barak, M. E. (2013). Managing diversity: Toward a globally inclusive workplace. CA: Sage Publications. Wehman, P. (2003). Workplace inclusion: Persons with disabilities and coworkers Working together. Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation, Vol. 18, No. 2, pp 131-141. Read More