Diverse Workforce in Australia - Case Study Example

RUNNING HEAD: DIVERSE WORKFORCE IN AUSTRALIA Diverse Workforce in Australia [Name of the Writer] Nam of the Institution] Diverse Workforce in Australia Introduction Workforce diversity increases creative ideas, builds morale and more importantly plays a vital role in the effectiveness of organisations. In terms of age, ethics, language and cultural beliefs Australia’s labour force is diverse. In Australia the qualifications of migrant workers are not recognised. Australia (including its public sector) has a workforce of increasing diversity and changing values. Increasing workforce diversity, rising educational requirements for entry to the public service, questioning of the public service as a career for life and other factors mean that the public sector of 10 years hence will need to be managed in different ways if it is to retain skilled and motivated people. The Australian workplace is a microcosm of society in general. What happens in the workplace is really just an extension of what happens in the neighbourhood, suburb, rural town or community where people live. Of course the context is different in that, by and large, the productive effort in the workplace (at least those that are businesses) needs to result in measurable improvement in efficiency and effectiveness. The 'productive' effort in society might be 'measured' a little differently with an emphasis on our ability to live harmoniously given our diversity. The paper covers the following points: Diverse nature of the workforce in Australia Disadvantage’ and discrimination’ in the diversity literature Disadvantage’ and discrimination’ within the workforce is managed within the Australian industrial relations system Strengths of the Australian approach to the management of a diverse workforce\ Weaknesses of the Australian approach to the management of a diverse workforce Lessons that can be learned from a study of the Australian approach to the management of a diverse workforce Diverse nature of the workforce in Australia Heightening competitive pressures within Australia and internationally are placing increased pressure on the public sector to demonstrate that it adds value to (or at the worst does not detract from) the competitiveness of Australia's private sector. The expectation may become that governments will set the framework within which public services are provided and will regulate that provision efficiently, while service provision, as such, is managed by increasingly diverse sources depending upon their relative effectiveness -- the so-called 'purchaser/provider model' whereby core government purchases service delivery to the community from a variety of potential sources (eg in-house delivery, the voluntary welfare sector, private commercial enterprises including perhaps even overseas providers of, say, routine data-processing services). The changing nature of the public sector workforce and the scope for creativity inherent in its increasing diversity, the increasing demands upon public servants of the kinds outlined above, and their increasing access to information about the workings of public agencies all suggest that 'command and control' approaches to the management of public servants will be of no relevance to a high-quality public service of the twenty-first century (if indeed they have any continuing relevance today). The management of diversity is at the forefront of organisational debate for many reasons including changes in the demographics of the workforce, globalisation and changes in organizational structures (Cope and Kalantzis, 1999). Workplace policies that promote equality of opportunity and accommodate diversity play an important role in mobilising the increasingly diverse labour supply and in enhancing the opportunities available to all current and potential labour participants. The management of diversity in work groups and teams has also been shown to contribute to organizational innovation (West and Anderson, 1996, 1998). Legal Structure: Disadvantage’ and discrimination’ in the diversity literature Let us spend a little time examining how diversity is managed in society in general. We need to use the word 'manage' a little loosely to include the formal and informal systems in place at any given time. These would include: state and federal legislation and related enforcement processes community practices, and accepted and encouraged behaviours. In the area of legislation, there are a range of both federal and state laws. At the federal level there is the Racial Discrimination Act (1975), which gives effect to Australia's obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. In addition, there is the Sex Discrimination Act (1984) and Disability Discrimination Act (1992) and, finally, the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Act (1986). At the state level, New South Wales has the Anti-Discrimination Act (1977) and Victoria, the Equal Opportunity Act (1995). Collectively, this raft of legislation provides substantial power and ability to make legal determinations on matters related to diversity. Employee relations and family friendly arrangements not only have to consider young families but also have to take into account Australia's aging population. Employees aged over 45 are the fastest growing sector in the workforce and there are a number of issues associated with these employees. One issue of growing concern is that in spite of anti discrimination legislation, age discrimination exists in human resource recruitment and retrenchment practices. A report released by the Equal Opportunity Commission found that older employees were systematically screened out at recruitment on the basis of being ‘over qualified’, and questions such as ‘how old are your children’ masked discrimination at interviews. It was also found that older employees did not have the same opportunities for training as younger people and they were often pressured to retire or were the main targets during organisational downsizes. These human resource practices and a lack of consideration to the issue of an aging workforce in employee relations means that a growing proportion of older employees are finding themselves forced from the labour market into unemployment or early retirement. Once forced out of the labour market, people over the age of 45 generally find it difficult to gain full-time employment again. As a consequence many are forced to seek out part-time employment or other forms of precarious work where available. Another significant issue related to the aging Australian population that is consistently overlooked with in relations is growing number of employees that now have to juggle work with caring for elderly parents. For many, this can mean a whole new form of transition from the labour market back into the private home. Although a few employers have made some provisions for employees to take carer's leave when required, anecdotal evidence suggests that many workers who need to care for elderly parents have to change to part-time employment or leave work altogether. Of course at a more community level and, one might argue, a more pro-active level, there may be a range of community practices that support and encourage diversity. This might include translation of key documents into several languages, gender-exclusive swimming sessions at the local pool or provision of special support services for the aged. Accepted and encouraged behaviours have developed over time as societies such as Australia immersed themselves in diversity. At the heart of diversity is tolerance. While we might not directly engage in activities or actions that result from our diversity, we accept the right of those who wish to do so. Of course, sometimes the tolerance is tested and the acceptance is not always universal. Diversity in Australian Workplaces Because of the increasing migrants, Australian society is changing to multicultural society at a vast rate (Australian Bureau of Statistics 1999; Wilkinson & Cheng 1999). That means Australian organisations will have to competitively manage a diverse working environment within their boundaries. (Barker & Härtel 2004) Managing diversity has been added to the organisational policies since 1990s. Broadly organisations cover people of different backgrounds to maximise their business profits and to expand the popularity of their firms (Strachan, French and Burgess 2010; French, Strachan and Burgess 2010). The management of diversity is at the forefront of organisational debate for many reasons including changes in the demographics of the workforce, globalisation and changes in organizational structures (Cope and Kalantzis, 1999). Workplace policies that promote equality of opportunity and accommodate diversity play an important role in mobilising the increasingly diverse labour supply and in enhancing the opportunities available to all current and potential labour participants. The management of diversity in work groups and teams has also been shown to contribute to organizational innovation (West and Anderson, 1996, 1998). You would think that given the long-standing reality of diversity in Australian society it could be assumed that we have automatically managed it at the workplace. Surprisingly, Australian management with the odd exception has been a little slow to not so much acknowledge the diversity but, rather, pro-actively manage it. Proactive management of diversity would involve, among other things, HR policy and practice integration by establishing clear links to the bottom line, monitoring employee morale and developing a more productive workforce. In fact in some areas of diversity management the penny has only recently dropped! For example, when Consulting Partners Australia surveyed businesses in 1998, only 26.1 per cent reported they had either a written or informal policy for managing diversity. Pleasingly, by 2001 this had grown to 69.9 per cent. But as you can see the management of this issue has only gained recent prominence. This somewhat slow take-up of effective diversity management is even more surprising given there is some evidence to suggest that very real problems can arise if it is not managed. So really Australian corporate business cannot afford not to give considerable thought to diversity management. And of course diversity management as a key human resource management issue is the logical extension of this position. Let us make use of a realistic but fictitious case paper to highlight the impact and relevance of diversity management to the HR function. Strengths of the Australian Approach to the Management of a Diverse Workforce From a sense-making perspective, organizations are conceived as “networks of intersubjectively shared meanings” that are constructed and sustained through social interaction (Walsh & Ungson, 1991, p. 60). Such interaction often presents people with equivocal events, which they attempt to interpret (Weick, 2004). Thus, sense-making is defined as this attentional process of interpreting the interpersonal and interactive facets of organizational life and assigning meaning to past events (Weick, 1995). Grounded in identity construction and maintenance, sense-making processes derive from an orientation toward situations that help individuals to maintain esteem and consistency in their self-identities (Ring & Van de Ven, 1989). As part of the identity maintenance process, individuals categorize themselves and other people into groups and use those groupings to help interpret equivocal social situations. Because people tend to notice and rely on visually prominent physical features or personal characteristics to aid interpretation (Fiske & Taylor, 1991), race and gender may be more likely than nonphenotypical characteristics, such as education or sexual orientation, to draw attention and serve as a basis for spontaneous categorization (Jackson, Stone, & Alvarez, 1993). Moreover, categorizations based on race and gender are identity relevant (McCann, Ostrom, Tyner, & Mitchell, 2000) and as such tend to confer higher or lower status on members of particular racial and gender groups (Berger, Cohen, & Zelditch, 2002). Thus, to the extent that an organization has employees with visibly diverse demographics, such diversity is likely to be a significant feature in spontaneous sense-making in that workplace. Sense-making is also a social activity (Weick, 1995), one in which individuals generate and share alternative explanations to resolve ambiguities about what has happened and why. Research on social networks suggests that people who are demographically similar may have stronger interpersonal connections than do people who are demographically dissimilar (Ibarra, 1993, 1995). Thus, it seems likely that interpretations of equivocal workplace events will be shared more often within than across such demographic groupings. This may prompt divergent sense-making about diversity incidents such that people who share a common frame of reference due to ethnicity or gender generate interpretations that are at odds with those of people in different ethnic or gender groups. Particularly in monolithic and pluralistic organizational cultures in which diverse employees are present (Ely, 1995), conflicting accounts may come to epitomize how subgroups view and interact with each other. Given the potential impact of sense-making on self-categorization and intergroup interactions, there is a need to identify the conditions, situations, or events that are spontaneously categorized as being diversity related. Establishing the parameters for such categorization processes will both aid in understanding the genesis of workplace conflicts and provide key grounding for building theory about identity at work. Moreover, there is a need for systematic analyses of the themes that emerge in accounts of diversity-related incidents. Such thematic analyses can indicate what meanings were attached during sense-making and point to issues that might be addressed to minimize future conflict. In this study, we sought to address these issues and advance an understanding of how people think about workplace diversity. Weaknesses of the Australian Approach to the Management of a Diverse Workforce The broad patterns of workforce participation, earnings, and advancement noted above are manifestations of systemic, pervasive barriers and challenges to the vocational behavior of diverse workers. Barriers can be external, such as discriminatory educational and occupational practices, hostile educational and workplace climates, and other forms of disadvantage that are located in the surrounding environment. These external barriers lead, in turn, to internalized oppression, which decreases self-confidence and self-efficacy, thwarts aspirations, and compromises achievement. Moreover, some disadvantage is active, that is, direct and overt (e.g., biased performance evaluations, inequitable salary distributions), whereas some is more passive or indirect, manifesting itself as an absence or the sense of something being missing (e.g., lack of mentors and role models, lowered performance expectations, withheld resources). Finally, some forms of disadvantage clearly are major or egregious problems (e.g., impoverished schools, lack of handicap access, harassment and violence), whereas some kinds of disadvantage may appear to be relatively minor (e.g., lack of encouragement, occupational stereotyping). These dimensions intersect to create unique and complex forms of disadvantage for each worker. For example, a woman's negative interaction with a male coworker might involve factors that are external (sexist workplace climate), active (overt sexual remarks and gestures), and major (being subjected to harassment). On the other hand, increased attention to the underlying problems of multiple roles for women—that is, structural aspects of workplaces (e.g., lack of on-site child care or flexible work arrangements) and family life (e.g., expectations regarding the primacy of maternal roles for women and breadwinner roles for men) that constrain women's choices and behaviors—can help to raise awareness of needed social change that would make home and work responsibilities more manageable for all women without role strain and overload. Attention to the work–home interface also can help to mend the separation between work and family that typifies both the psychological literature and many workplaces (Blustein, 2008), allowing for a more holistic perspective on the mutual influences of work and family life. The development of self-efficacy is important because it has been linked strongly and consistently too many critical educational and occupational outcomes such as aspiration, persistence, achievement, career interests, occupational choices, employment, and satisfaction (Betz, 2001). It also provides a heuristically useful pantheoretical explanation for the effects of other constructs related to educational and occupational achievement described in this article (e.g., one of the primary mechanisms of stereotype threat may be decreased self-efficacy). Finally, it offers a fertile location for vocational intervention, as research indicates clearly that self-efficacy expectations are amenable to change. As vocational intervention can be supported by legislative and policy mandates (e.g., career education in schools, diversity training in workplaces), the next section of this article focuses on such possibilities. Barriers to employment most often identified include unavailability of appropriate jobs, lack of transportation, lack of accessible (e.g., Braille) occupational information, inadequate training, fear of losing benefits (e.g., Social Security, health insurance, Medicaid), family responsibilities, and discouragement from others. Typical necessary accommodations include accessible parking or public transportation, facilities modifications (e.g., elevators, adapted work stations, handrails, ramps), and restructuring of work arrangements (e.g., flextime) (Loprest & Maag, 2001). Lack of skills and inadequate job training has been identified by employers as the greatest barriers to hiring people with disabilities. This implicates the educational system, where the majority of youths with disabilities lag behind their peers in education and postsecondary training, and even college graduates do not consistently demonstrate marketable occupational skills. Segregated schooling, inadequately trained personnel, and inconsistent implementation of career education are widespread problems, and educational disadvantage is exacerbated by discriminatory attitudes of employers (Fabian & Liesener, 2005). Contemporary employers appear to have developed more global acceptance of workers with disabilities and have responded to nondiscrimination legislation by implementing accommodations (Bruyere et al., 2003). However, increased general tolerance does not translate into significant efforts to employ individuals with disabilities, toward whom employers' attitudes remain negative (Bruyere et al., 2003), and employers tend to rely on stereotypes of disability that exaggerate the extent to which a functional impairment might interfere with work performance (Fabian & Liesener, 2005). Diversity Related Situations and Events Existing research suggests that diversity perceptions are composed of individuals' views and biases toward others, attitudes regarding organizational policies and procedures used to promote diversity, and beliefs regarding the qualifications of diverse employees. Ely and Thomas (2001) also identified the nature of race relations in the work environment and the extent to which individuals feel valued and respected by others as components of their diversity experiences in organizations. Although these studies have been helpful in suggesting some situations or conditions that employees might categorize as “diversity related,” they have relied heavily on research designs that may not capture the full range of such situations. Furthermore, they offer limited insight into how respondents understood and stored interpretations of diversity-related episodes. For these reasons, we adopted a complementary approach. By analyzing respondents' natural language descriptions of incidents that they regarded as diversity related, we were able to assess a wider potential range of incidents in their accounts. Moreover, we were able to examine cues embedded in these accounts to pinpoint two dimensions of their sense-making processes, specifically, the salience of justice issues and level of abstraction at which events were encoded. On the basis of prior research, we anticipated that spontaneous categorizations of incidents as being related to diversity would likely arise from interactions among diverse employees, the nature of their relationships, and experiences in which organizational policies were invoked in connection with diversity. In particular, we expected the emergence of issues consistent with leading approaches to diversity management (Thomas & Ely, 1996), such as stories or other accounts of discrimination, hiring preferences, and the representation of diverse groups in the organization. Yet because our work was exploratory, we remained open to the possibility that a wider range of incidents than those described in prior studies (e.g., actions taken by management, perceived benefits from working with diverse others) might be viewed by employees as diversity related. Conclusion Practically, the paper suggests that incidents pertaining to discrimination, representation, management treatment, work relationships, levels of respect, and the diversity climate are salient and thus represent fulcrums for influencing how employees make sense of diversity experiences. Further, open clarification of the facts surrounding hiring or promotion decisions that could be viewed as discriminatory seem important for maintaining or enhancing intergroup relations, given that such incidents are recalled in more concrete terms. The paper also highlights the role of justice in the effective management of diversity. By emphasizing fair distribution of outcomes (e.g., equality in disciplining diverse employees), enactment of procedures (e.g., opportunities for diverse employees to participate in decision making), and interpersonal treatment (e.g., showing respect to all employees), organizations may be able to positively influence how employees interpret diversity experiences. Further, because language abstraction plays a key role in diversity-related attitudes, greater care in the language used to communicate diversity events and interactions might help root out biases, depolarize intergroup relations, and improve the success of diversity initiatives. The federal government's 1996 Workplace Relations Act significantly changed the nature of employment relations. The introduction of the Act theoretically paved the way for employers and employees to have more extensive involvement in the negotiation of working conditions. 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