Diversity in the Workplace with Reference to Communication - Research Proposal Example

Diversity in the Workplace With Reference To Communication Student’s Name College Diversity in the Workplace With Reference To Communication Contemporary Issue in Business As a matter of fact, United Arab Emirates (UAE) has got people from many parts of the world that includes Philippines, the USA, India, northern Africa, and China among others like other developed or developing nations (Oxford Business Group, 2012). Majority of the expatriates do not understand Arab. And actually the people of UAE speak the Arab language and some speak English among other languages. Thus, as the expatriates have gone to UAE to work and are employed or have ventured in various organizations, communication problem is experienced. Actually, all communication turns to be cultural that is; it is the way through which people have taught themselves to speak and offer nonverbal messages. The issue is that, the likelihood of miscommunication between people residing and working in UAE organizations is inevitable. Such miscommunication leads to conflicts or exacerbates conflicts which already exist. In the long run, businesses suffer losses as a result of miscommunication. Research Problem The research problem of my study is to explore the diversity in the UAE workplace in consideration of communication. Given the UAE’s labour force, my research study targets to find out if or not diversity strategies and intercultural communications have built up within the UAE workplace to present levels believed to be demanded for success. Additionally, my study also explores if the UAE approaches used to cope its diverse labour force tend to be assimilative and comparatively ineffective to meet the future and present objectives and needs in the organizations. As a result of the bulkiness of alien employees within the UAE place of work, it would turn to be a hotspot of investigative study concerning the employee needs for more diversity wisdom and successful intercultural communication, as well as the result that cultural recognition has on the job environment. Research Objectives My first objective of this research will be to find out whether aliens face any communication issues at their workplaces My second objective will be to find out the consequences of diversity challenges on treatment and adjustment of alien workers to them and the organization My third objective will be the investigation of the current situation to determine how employers can influence the latent gains of diversity, at the same time maintaining its negative consequences at minimum levels My other research objective will be the determination of whether native officials and foreign workers possess similar or contrasting responses in their assessment and value of place of work diversity practices within their organizations. Research Design In my study, I will make use of one method approach referred as quantitative to come out with a complimentary data set concerning practices involving some variables. Actually, using quantitative method in my study turns to be more desirable. In this case, quantitative observations will offer me diverse ways of measuring and operationalizing hypothetical constructs and realistic concepts. As a matter of fact, quantitative method will offer me a high measurement level together with arithmetical power. Geographic Area (United Arab Emirates) As a matter of fact, managing diversity in the places of work has turned to be a main concern among organizations operating in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) currently (Oxford Business Group, 2012). As such, the UAE possesses one of the earth’s biggest net rates of migration, and the number of employees from the USA, Australia, Indonesia, the Philippines and India among other nations, has risen considerably in recent years. The United Arab Emirates cross-boundary mobility has hugely contributed to the interaction of individuals with diverse ethnic customs and language backgrounds (Oxford Business Group, 2012). Though diversity has often been indicated to possess a number of gains, comprising of employee competence and creativity, that recognition is frequently found more theoretically than practically. Diversity contributes to dysfunctional adaptation manners, miscommunication and the barrier creation which decrease the gains diversity is capable of bringing to any organization (Oxford Business Group, 2012). Owing to the UAE’s workplace nature that the majority is foreign labour force, my research critically evaluates the gains an organization enjoy as well as the challenges that it faces in the diverse labour force of the UAE. Actually, intercultural communication these days has become important in several places of work due to the globalization forces. Thus, there might be no other place where that need is more apparently evident than within the Arabian Gulf, and more particularly, the UAE (Al-Jenabi, 2012). There are arguments that executives turns to be the most uncovered to the global mobility of work due to the globalization. That is particularly apparent within UAE where an extremely a large number of the labour force is alien. The requirements of those executives are altering and more and more centre on sought skills’ nature in an atmosphere where comprehension of global issues and standards is a competitive gain (Oxford Business Group, 2012). Within the UAE, which comprise of seven unlike emirates, expatriates comprise of 90% of that populace, comprising of citizens from China, South Asia, northern Africa, Western countries, Philippines and the Thailand. The UAE’s racial diversity is contributed more by having one of the earth’s utmost net rates of migration that might be attributed to multiple factors, among them alterations in political and economic systems and the discrepancy acknowledgement of human rights by nations across the globe. In the United Arab Emirates, emigrants get concentrated within two major sectors: domestic work and construction, though several work in the other service industries (Oxford Business Group, 2012). An insignificant number of migrants are in the career fields, like, technology and education. The UAE is under heightened pressure to suitably employ and deal with people of different racial and cultural backgrounds. Therefore, the nimble management of diversity within the place of work via different means has come up as a new main concern in the United Arab Emirates. This causes a rising need for managers within UAE organizations to comprehend and put in place the best diversity strategies and communication when doing work with a highly diverse labour force (Oxford Business Group, 2012). As might be the expectation, however, like several organizations, UAE companies possess, at best, contradicting methods and policies regarding intercultural communication and diversity. Sampling Method The method of sampling I will use in this research will be convenience sampling as it is fast, inexpensive and convenient and every person has a chance of being chosen again if need be (Oxford Business Group, 2012). In this method, I will choose every individual randomly and exclusively by opportunity. In this scenario, the entire study participants will fall in the age bracket of 20 – 70 years and comprise of 170 males and 150 females who will be selected randomly. Nationalities to be embodied will include Jordan, New Zealand, Morocco, the Philippines, the US, Britain, Pakistan, Egypt, Australia, Lebanon, Germany, China, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Syria, Ireland, Brazil, and Gulf nations (Saudi Arabia, Oman, Bahrain) (Oxford Business Group, 2012). Levels of education in my research will not matter for the research provided the participants will know how to read and write. My sample will be representing employees working in industries like, construction offices, Transco Company, Al-Ain and Abu-Dhabi Distribution companies, Abu-Dhabi University, Al Ain and Tawan hospitals and UAE University. Data Collection Methods a) Literature Review My first method of data collection will be literature review. In this case, I will use literature review which is the methodical exploration of printed work for discovering what is already known regarding the proposed research topic (Oxford Business Group, 2012). As such, I will seek information from the books, magazines, newspapers, and from online materials among others. The information I will obtain will be published work from various sources which will include the number of people from different countries in various UAE companies. The information will show their statuses in the companies, like, HR managers, production engineers, drivers, and sales persons among others. In the written materials, the ages of those employees would also be gotten. The other information I will derive through literature review will be the employees’ perception on diversity. In this regard, some studies that were conducted by earlier researchers will reveal to me what some communities were experiencing in communication and the feelings that they developed on that. The literature review will also offer me the employers’ view on diversity with the employees. b) The Quantitative Questionnaires Method My other data collection method would be quantitative questionnaire method. As such, my quantitative method will consist of 320 surveys (Oxford Business Group, 2012). In this case, several survey questions will offer space for unlimited written responses by the participants. I will pick participants following whichever order. I will distribute the questionnaires across two principal emirates of UAE namely: Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Actually, those two emirates are characterised by the presence of several immigrant employees working in major sectors, like, domestic work and construction. All survey participants will be required to be working and have attained the minimum age of 20 and a maximum age of 70 years. I will select both males and females to participate in the answering of the questionnaires (Oxford Business Group, 2012). I will give participants one week to fill their questionnaires. For the purposes of obtaining accurate information, I will avail all the questionnaires in all the national languages of the participants who will provide information. The participants who will require assistance in answering the questions I will offer it. Some participants who will require pens for answering the questions I will also give them to avoid preventing them from participating. I will also allow participants who will wish not to include their names, but country of origin to participate in the research. In order to boost reliability, I will use dissimilar-worded questionnaires to measure similar attribute without altering the meaning. I will measure test-retest dependability by having similar respondents to accomplish a study at two dissimilar positions within time to evaluate response steadiness (Oxford Business Group, 2012). I will eliminate idealistic surveys which will show inconsistencies and contraindications. My survey report will be presented in form of graphs. d) Types of Scale to be used for the Quantitative Questionnaire The first type of scale that I will use for the quantitative questionnaires will be the nominal scale (Oxford Business Group, 2012). In this case, I will label the questions in the questionnaire with no quantitative values. For example, I will require participants to state their gender or country of origin and this would be the first question, but this will only be necessary for telling the gender number. In this case, it will not mean that that question will be more important than the other questions. The other scale that I will use will be ordinal scale (Oxford Business Group, 2012). With ordinal scales, what is significant and imperative is the sequence of the values, but the disparities between them is not actually known. In this case, I will require participants to state at the last question on how they will feel on answering the research questions. For instance, the answers that I will provide will be happy, unhappy, very unhappy, ok or very happy and will be used to determine those who will be excited by the survey. Data Analysis a) Quantitative Data Analysis The type of data analysis that I will use in the research will be quantitative (Oxford Business Group, 2012). As a matter of fact, quantitative data is the statistical measurement articulated by numbers rather than natural language. In this scenario, I will use quantitative data in the analysis as it will give the figures involved. For example, 100 of participants will answer that; language barrier will not be a bigger issue in their workplaces. On the other hand, 30 participants will answer that language barrier will be bigger issue in their places of work. Similarly, the number of female respondents will also be tallied on their opinion of language assimilation in the workplace and compared to males. For instance, Out of 90 females, 50 of them will support language assimilation while 40 females will oppose. On the other hand, out of 120 men tallied on language assimilation, only 45 males will support language assimilation while the rest 75 males will oppose language assimilation. Timeline On the first day of the month of beginning the research process, I will print and photocopy the questionnaires that would be required for the research. I will go through them to make sure that they meet the minimum set standards for the research. In case of any error that will be seen, I will correct it and ensure everything will be fine. In the second day, I will count the number of printed questionnaires and arrange them according to the printed languages. Then I will pack them in the carrying bags. On the third day, I will begin giving out the questionnaires to various people in different companies. Since I will be in charge of giving out the papers to participants, I will take only one week to issue all of them. Then I will wait for people to fill the questionnaires and collect them. After one month, I will begin analysing the findings and presenting them in form of graphs. Reference Oxford Business Group. (2012). The Report: Abu Dhabi. Abu Dhabi: Oxford Business Group. Read More