Enthusiastic Attitude towards Equality and Diversity Policies - Essay Example

Managing Diversity Discuss why line-managers might not have an enthusiastic attitude towards equality and diversity policies. To what extent mightdiversity practitioners help overcome this problem? Diversity management refers to the idea that every individual deserves equal respect and opportunities for progress in any field of life. Sociologically explained by Dawe (1970), sociological aspects of humanity, society and the interrelationships form the sociology of systems, which is extremely important for societal and individual well-being. On the other side, sociology of actions advocates the concept of an independent man, able to realize his full potential and to create a truly human social order only when freed from external constraint. Relating to this sociological theory, organisations may be compared with social systems in which individual needs were integrated with organisational needs through various approaches that reinforced human relations (Morgan, 1998). In general terms, diversity refers to the various differences that exist in human beings, not biologically, but based on sociologically created classifications such as gender, physical abilities, age, race, class, religion, socioeconomic status, and national and cultural groups. While the changes associated with human’s origin, like gender, race, and ethnicity do not change, other differences like socioeconomic status, age, political and national groups keep changing with time. From times immemorial, these differences are known to create inequalities among human beings that benefit some and harm others, overall creating an undesirable situation and yielding undesirable outcomes. From an organisational perspective, Barnard’s (1938) definition emphasizes the role of human beings in forming an organisation. However, if all the people belonging to the organisation do not get an equal opportunity to contribute, organisation’s scope for success and growth reduces. In addition to this, Barnard (1938) asserted that organisations play a significant role in shaping the society in terms of gender, race, class, political power, economic status, sociocultural influence etc (Handel, 2003; p.371). In the era of globalization, managing diversity promotes organisational effectiveness to a large extent. The term diversity management in business indicates a firm which employs heterogeneous workforce (like different generations, gender, race, age etc) and creates such an atmosphere that works for all employees. In order to manage the diversity successfully, an organisation must commit to maintain and create such a working environment that respects all the employees, acknowledging the perspective and the diverse talents of individuals. Organisations gain competitive advantages through low turnover, high motivation, less internal conflict and more job satisfaction if their workforce diversity is well managed. A diverse workforce enables an organisation to better meet the requirements of their customers. Different new ideas are brought to the organisations by diverse employees, which help them in solving various complicated problems. Cornelius et al. (2000) defined diversity management as, ‘the process of promoting equality through valuing difference between individuals and groups, particularly those who have traditionally experienced disadvantage. In addition, good diversity management should seek a strong ‘business case,’ which encourages inclusiveness and marshals difference’ (cited by Kirton et al., 2007; p.1979). According to the U.S Merit Systems Protection board (MSPB, 1993), ‘Diversity goes beyond employment equity to nurturing an environment that values the differences and maximizes the potential of all employees, one that stimulates employee creativity and innovativeness.” Diversity management is said to have originated in the United States with the Civil Rights Act, 1964 promoting equal employment opportunities (Mor-Barak, 2005). Realization of importance of diversity management through policies and legislation is a more recent affair in most of the countries. The main prerequisites of diversity management are said to be equal rights legislation and affirmative/positive action policies in order to create social, legal and organisational environment conducive for diversity management. The benefits of globalization have lured many organisations to become multinational and also adopt diversity management practices. Wrench (2005) considers diversity management as a tool now being used as a management practice to tackle discrimination and promote equality at workplace. This can be best evidenced by the Kosek and Lobel’s model (1996), cited by Mor-Barak (2005), of diversity management approach through diversity enlargement, diversity sensitivity, cultural audit and strategies for achieving organisational outcomes. With the legislative policies related to equal employment opportunities and antidiscrimination laws being introduced, most of the organisations started hiring people belonging to distinct groups and nationalities, incorporating a diverse workforce. Organisations employ different practices and activities to implement and promote diversity management; however, the activities used need to fit the culture, the environment, and the needs of each specific organisation to achieve the goals (Ferris, Rosen & Barnum, 1995). Kirton et al (2007) have clearly differentiated between the concepts of promoting social equality and adopting diversity management, one dealing with promoting equal justice and fairness and the other reinforcing organisational development along with social justice and fairness principles, respectively. To achieve this, they assert that the role of diversity professionals will be of paramount importance in an organisational setting. One of the points inferred from the MSPB (1993; p.xvi) conference states, ‘managing diversity is part of being a manager. It’s not a fad. It’s not a special task to be assigned to certain managers or staffs. It is automatically an obligation for all mangers to ensure that all their employees are included, are welcome and appreciated, and do not have to work in an environment that is hostile to them because they are different.’ In their research, Foster and Harris (2005; p. 4) assert, ‘In principle, diversity management encourages the development of more innovative HR policies and practices which offer greater reciprocity in the employment relationship by addressing individual needs.’ Considering these points, it is clear that diversity management is an activity requiring the involvement and commitment of different functions in different ways. On these lines, Kirton et al.’s (2007) study identified four stakeholders in diversity management, based on European Social Fund Research project: they are diversity specialists responsible for policy formation; diversity champions responsible for policy implementation and control; diversity consultants and representatives of campaign acting as the advisory; and national trade union equality officers, involved in organisations’ diversity agenda. From an organisational perspective, the diversity specialists and champions determine and assess the extent to which diversity management can be practiced. Handel’s (2003) conjecture of the Hawthorne’s experiments support the argument that higher output can be achieved through positive social conditions and organisational climate, and not through physical features of work, work design, human capacities or pay incentives. Creation of this positive social climate can be possible only by driving it through leadership groups. The first line managers possess the advantage of maximum reach to employees of an organisation; and hence possess the power of maximum influence. It is at this level diversity management practice should start and impact the critical mass of an organisation (workforce). This is possible through effective communicate with all of their employees throughout the organisation about the benefits, relevance and importance of such programs and a display of their commitment to these practices. The neutral treatment and equal opportunity policies meant for promoting equality create dilemmas to the line managers who, on the other side, are also committed to favour positive social characteristics. In this context, Foster and Harris (2005) refer to the European regulations of Anti-discrimination Framework directives that provide personal rights to citizens based on their personal circumstances, such as time for parental care, irrespective of personal characteristics. In such situations, line managers have, besides responsibility, a legal obligation to be aware of their people’s personal circumstances and individual rights. With this legal obligation, diversity management practice entails flexible working hours and part time working hours facilities meant for working parents. As the mother is considered as the caretaker, socially, more women tend to opt for such jobs. Evidences have shown this facility to have created huge differences in pay and the positions more often occupied by females. Scheele (2008) attributes this factor to the lesser working hours in weekly terms and also across the life course, which further affects women’s job opportunities and career development for reasons more socially inclined than from an organisational perspective. This issue of differences in pay, according to Article 119, Principle of Equal Pay, does not conform to the policy. Very often, part time workers are paid lesser than the full time workers in order to promote full time work. As a mere coincidence, most of the part time workers constitute women. In such situations, line managers fall into the trap of biasness for not providing the female employees with additional responsibilities and/or opportunities for promotion. From the procedural perspective, the liberty of managerial discretion has received much criticism from subordinates pointing to some form of discrimination or the other. In the radical approach of diversity management through equal opportunities, Cockburn (1989, 1991) points out that the schemes or initiatives undertaken to help certain social groups to improve their position in an organisation are rendered as ‘special treatment,’ thus spreading negative messages of biasness and feelings of fear from the dominant groups (cited in Kirton and Greene, 2005). Thus, an effort to encourage the prospects of particular groups may lead to suffering of the excluded ones. It is a proven fact that culture has its impact on people’s social behaviour and their actions. It has embedded assumptions that in turn influence thinking, emotions and the actions without their knowledge. For organisations and nations who fail to recognize and appreciate this fact, international business would be disastrous. The two important implications and patterns of variations present in the differences of culture are goal setting and reward systems with respect to individual versus team-wide or organisation-wide, and communications with respect to gestures, eye contact and body language in high-context cultures versus precision with words in low-context cultures. Though the communications aspect cannot be defined in diversity management policies per se, appropriate training and awareness on these aspects have to be provided to the managers doing performance management and feedback activities (Cascio, 2006). Working in teams to produce greater results is the approach in almost all the organisations. Lynda Gratton, professor of management practice at London Business School, had stated that great teams are built on diversity, and she quotes, ‘innovative teams have different mindsets brought by taking men, women, and people from different age groups and nationalities’ (Ford, 2009). However, in such a setup, a shared outlook forms the base of high performance. In the absence of a shared vision, group thinking can be dangerous for the organisation. Also, Kosek and Lobel (1996) expressed (cited Mor-Barak, 2005; 213), ‘the approach in multicultural teams is motivated by compliance to laws and public expectations of political correctness rather than a deep understanding of the business need for diversity.’ Although diversity management policies get implemented successfully, they may not be able to produce the desired results. One important diversity management practice employed in organisations across the globe is performance management and feedback mechanism. Successful large companies link compensation directly to employee performance to drive incredible business results. A well-structured performance management system is believed to bring about appropriate goal alignment, increased motivation, improved retention, and cost savings in terms of repeated recruitment and training. This system promises to inspire employees belonging to any group or class, owing to the ‘rewards’ and ‘money’ factors involved. However, performance management has to be linked to feedback mechanism in order to bring out the best in employees. In a multinational setup, implementation of global performance management system is difficult as it depends on factors such as nature of overseas job, support from and interaction with the parent company, nature of environment, and degree of expatriate and family adjustment. Cascio (2006) further elaborates on this aspect with respect to its relation with culture. While, a two-way performance feedback is given high importance in individualistic cultures such as US, UK and Australia, collectivist nations such as Korea, Guatemala, and Taiwan treat it as an unacceptable behaviour and they use indirect methods such as communication through intermediary source to deliver feedback. A high level of sensitivity has to be applied to the process of performance management and feedback by understanding local customs and appropriately using the methods suitable, and this is a challenge for the line managers working in multinational organisations that employ and operate with people from different nations and cultures. From a HR perspective, this task would involve many modifications and adjustments from their end for implementation of diversity management practices. Although organisations are trying hard to employ men and women in equal proportions, majority of specific jobs occupied by women eventually get gendered, as meant for women. In Brickell’s (2006) opinion, drawn from key sociological constructions, constructs related to gender are actually a result of the social practices that produce apparent differences. Gendering of jobs, somewhere, emerged as a consequence of female critique of dominant social science tradition. This may be evidenced in various works that men and women do; work here refers to the unpaid labour within employment, and such work includes activities such as counseling an angry peer, attending first-aid session, arranging get together parties etc. Connell (1987) points out that gendering of work emerges as a consequence to embodied pleasures and pains and understanding of work, making the concept very complex and having a reciprocative impact (Morgan, Brandth & Kvande; 2005), somewhere demeaning the concept of diversity management. Based on this notion, line managers tend to delegate work according to what ‘suits’ women and men best, rather than their interest and ability. Based on these ethical, moral and legal quandaries faced by the front line leadership, organisations will have to identify such underlying and potential issues related to diversity management. Besides aligning the diversity management practices to legislations, business profit and growth perspective, Human Resource personnel should consider behavioural aspects, from both employees and the front line leadership perspectives, and implement practices that can help both the groups in understanding and adhering to the concept of diversity management in a much more effective manner. Practices such as training programs to educate line managers about managing people from a diversity perspective, including the cultural influences, clear and effective communication, team building, performance management and feedback mechanism, and succession planning activities in a systematic way will help in two ways, spreading awareness about the potential risks involved in diversity management practices and effective application of these diversity management practices. Mentoring and managing personal growth are the two strategies which help in creating good supervisor-subordinate communication. And improved communication leads towards three different approaches: valuing diversity, affirmative action and managing diversity (MSPB, 1993). This discussion points out that diversity management has hidden challenges, which can be realized only upon application of the practices, situations more often encountered by leadership team that is directly connected to people involved in the operational and other activities of an organisation; for this reason, these challenges have a greater potential to cause harm and unintended outcomes. On the contrary, the same leadership can have a significant role in creating this stereotype as well as eliminating it. Organisations can play a significant role in bringing a paradigm shift in perceptions related to diversity, such as discrimination and biasness with respect to gender, race, ethnicity, etc. by adopting the role-based approach for growth, hiring and promotion; by hiring from all sectors, societies, age groups; by setting high expectations from staff and develop them to deliver; by providing diversity training dealing with education, age, gender, work style, leadership, behaviour and culture; it is extremely important to develop effective leadership that can influence their people to support, promote, and follow equality and diversity management concept. References Cascio, W.F. (2006). Global Performance Management Systems. In Stahl K, G and Bjorkman, I’s (Eds.) Handbook of Research in International Human Resource Management. U.K: Edward Elgar Publishing. Ferris, G.R, Rosen, S.D. and Barnum, D.T. (1995).Handbook of human resource management. U.S.A: Wiley-Blackwell. Handel, M.J. (2003). The sociology of organisations: classic, contemporary, and critical readings. California: SAGE. Kirton, G and Greene, A.M. (2005).The dynamics of managing diversity. 2ND ed. London: Butterworth-Heinemann. Mor-Barak, M.E. (2005). Managing diversity: toward a globally inclusive workplace. California: SAGE Publications Inc.. Morgan, G. (1998). Images of organisation. California: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Morgan, D., Brandth, B., Kvande, E. (2005) Gender, Bodies and Work. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Ltd. Scheele, A. (2008). A Relevant Element of Management Culture? Equal Opportunities between Diversity Management, Regulation and ‘Good Will.’ In Blanpain et al’s (Eds) Challenges of European employment relations: employment regulation, trade union organisation, equality, flexicurity, training and new approaches to pay. Netherlands: Kluwer Law International. Articles and Journals Brickell, C. (2006) ‘The Sociological Construction of Gender and Sexuality’, Sociological Review. Vol.54, No.1, pp: 87-113 Dawe, Alan. (1970). The Two Sociologies. The British Journal of Sociology. Vol. 21, No. 2, pp: 207-218. Foster, C. and Harris, L. (2005). Easy to say, difficult to do: diversity management in retail.’ Human Resource Management Journal Vol. 15, No. 3, pp: 4-17. Ford, E. (2009). How to . . . build a winning team in business. The Times. Times Online, London. Published on 24 June, 2009, accessed January 8, 2010 from, http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/career_and_jobs/article6564888.ece Kirton, G., Greene, A.M. Greene and Dean,.D (2007) British Diversity professionals as Change Agents: radical, tempered radicals r liberal reformers? International Journal of Human Resource Management . Vol: 18, No.11. pp: 1979-1994. Lapid-Bogda, G. (2004). Diversity and Organisational Change. The 1998 Annual: Volume 2. (310) 829-3309. Accessed January 8, 2010 from, http://www.bogda.com/articles/DiversityandOrgChange.pdf Wrench, J. (2005).Diversity management can be bad for you. Race & Class. Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 73-84. Accessed January 8, 2010 from, http://rac.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/46/3/73 MSPB (1993). The Changing Face of the Federal Workplace: A Symposium on Diversity. U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board. Released September 1993. Accessed January 8, 2010 from, http://www.mspb.gov/sites/mspb/default.aspx/ Read More