INTRODUCTION

Workplace diversity is a people issue, focused on the differences and similarities that people bring to an
organization. It is usually defined broadly to include dimensions beyond those specified legally in equal
opportunity and affirmative action non-discrimination statutes. Diversity is often interpreted to include
dimensions which influence the identities and perspectives that people bring, such as profession, education,
parental status and geographic location.
Overview....

 Diversity not only involves how people perceive themselves, but how they perceive others.

 Diversity will increase significantly in the coming years. Successful organizations recognize the need
for immediate action and are ready and willing to spend resources on managing diversity in the
workplace now.

 Diversity is based on the following points-

 
BENEFITS OF WORKPLACE DIVERSITY 

(i ) Diversity is beneficial to both the organization and the members.Diversity brings substantial potential
benefits such as better decision making and improved problem solving, greater creativity and innovation, which
leads to enhanced product development, and more successful marketing to different types of customers ].
(ii) Simply recognizing diversity in a corporation helps link the variety of talents within the organization.
(iii) The act of recognizing diversity also allows for those employees with these talents to feel needed and have
a sense of belonging, which in turn increases their commitment to the company and allows each of them to
contribute in a unique way.
(iv) Diversity also provides organizations with the ability to compete in global markets. Diverse organizations
will be successful as long as there is a sufficient amount of communication within them. Because people from
different cultures perceive messages in different ways, communication is vital to the performance of an
organization. Miscommunication within a diverse workplace will lead to a great deal of challenges.
(v) Diversity is not only about preventing unfair discrimination and improving equality, but also about valuing
differences and inclusion, spanning such areas as ethnicity, age, race, culture, sexual orientation, physical
disability, and religious belief.
 Scott Page’s (2007) mathematical modelling research of team work supports this view. He
demonstrated that heterogeneous teams consistently out-performed homogeneous teams on a variety of
tasks.
CHALLENGES OF WRKPLACE DIVERSITY:

There are challenges to managing a diverse work population. Managing diversity is more than simply
acknowledging differences in people.
(i) Many organizational theorists have suggested reasons that work-teams highly diverse in work-
relevant characteristics can be difficult to motivate and manage.
(ii) There are many challenges which face culturally diverse workplaces, and a major challenge is
miscommunication within an organization. In her article entitled Developing Receiver-Centered
Communication in Diverse Organizations, Judi Brownell explains that meanings of messages can
never be completely shared because no two individuals experience events in exactly the same way.
Even when native and non-native speakers are exposed to the same messages, they may interpret
the information differently. It is necessary for employees who are less familiar with the primary
language spoken within the organization to receive special attention in meeting their
communication requirements[.
 (iii) Cultural bias is an additional factor which challenges culturally diverse work environments.
Cultural bias includes both prejudice and discrimination. "Prejudice refers to negative attitudes
toward an organization member based on his/her culture group identity, and discrimination refers to
observable adverse behaviour for the same reason" .
(iv) Another challenge faced by culturally diverse organizational environments is assimilation.
According to the journal Cultural Diversity in the Workplace: The State of the Field, Marlene G.
Fine explains that "Assimilation into the dominant organizational culture is a strategy that has had
serious negative consequences for individuals in organizations and the organizations themselves.
Those who assimilate are denied the ability to express their genuine selves in the workplace; they
are forced to repress significant parts of their lives within a social context that frames a large part of
their daily encounters with other people." Fine goes on to mention that "People who spend
significant amounts of energy coping with an alien environment have less energy left to do their
jobs. Assimilation does not just create a situation in which people who are different are likely to
fail, it also decreases the productivity of organizations"

CREATING MTULTI CULTURAL ORGANIZATION

"The key to managing a diverse workforce is increasing individual awareness of and sensitivity to differences of
race, gender, social class, sexual orientation, physical ability, and age". There are several ways to go about
creating the multicultural organization that performs extremely well.

SOLUTIONS TO DIVERSITY RELATED PROBLEMS:

 Ward off change resistance with inclusion. - Involve every employee possible in formulating and
executing diversity initiatives in your workplace. 
 Foster an attitude of openness in your organization. - Encourage employees to express their ideas and
opinions and attribute a sense of equal value to all. 
 Promote diversity in leadership positions. - This practice provides visibility and realizes the benefits of
diversity in the workplace.
 Utilize diversity training. - Use it as a tool to shape your diversity policy. 
 Launch a customizable employee satisfaction survey that provides comprehensive reporting. - Use the
results to build and implement successful diversity in the workplace policies.
 As the economy becomes increasingly global, our workforce becomes increasingly diverse.
Organizational success and competitiveness will depend on the ability to manage diversity in the
 workplace effectively. Evaluate your organization's diversity policies and plan for the future, starting
today. 

IMPLEMENTATION:

Diversity issues change over time, depending on local historical and dynamic conditions. Overt
"diversity programs" are usually limited to large employers, government agencies, and businesses facing rapid
demographic changes in their local labour pool, and they help people work and understand each other.

 The implementation of diversity is often limited to the Human resources department  when there is also
a good economic case for UK companies to use it as a tool to reach new market shares

Diversity is so much more than legal "protected categories."  With such great variety in
diverse characteristics, we can easily see that we have a wide variety of areas to be
aware of and a great variety of people to learn more about.

THANK YOU.....