Cultural Diversity in Organizations - Article Example

Two of the most important trends of the past decade are a continuously growing diverse workforce, and increased competition for businesses resulting from the globalization of markets. In Beyond Race and Gender: Unleashing the Power of Your Total Workforce by Managing Diversity (1991)1, Thomas states that diversity in the workplace means more than race and gender. Diversity can refer to lifestyle, tenure, position within organization, age, sexual preference, functional specialty, or geographic location. In Cultural Diversity in Organizations (1994), Cox notes that managing diversity is a skill today's leader needs and that an organization's ability to manage diversity will have a significant impact on the organization's performance. He states that the goal of managing diversity is "maximizing the ability of all employees to contribute to organization goals and to achieve their full potential unhindered by group identities, such as gender, race, nationality, age and departmental affiliation" (p 11). Cox also believes that diverse work teams are more creative and innovative and they consider more and better alternatives in decision making. Although Thomas believes that organizations should move beyond race and gender issues when considering diversity, racial/ethnic diversity is an important element of building a diverse organization. Globalization -- through the increased mobility of people, economic liberalization, new communication technologies, and industry consolidation -- is highlighting the importance of cultural diversity within and between states. In 1999, in addition to its ongoing work and building on the foundation of its "Our Creative Diversity" (1995) and Stockholm Action Plan (1998), UNESCO held a number of events to further explore key cultural diversity issues: a symposium on pluralism (January 1999), a conference on cultural diversity and trade (June, 1999), and a Round Table of Ministers of Culture "Culture and Creativity in a Globalised World" in November 2000. The G-7, in their summit declaration on Principles for an Information Society in Brussels in 1995, recognized the importance of preserving linguistic and cultural diversity in new and emerging technologies. Since its inception in 1949, the Council of Europe has developed its cultural activities around defending and extending a plurality of cultural identities. In 1998, the OAS approved the Inter-American Program of Culture, designed to support the efforts being undertaken by member states and foster cooperation between them in the areas of cultural diversity, dissemination and protection of cultural heritage, human resource training, creativity incentives, and promotion of cultural tourism. The U.S. government recognizes that culture and cultural difference have a major impact on foreign policy - from issues ranging from trade to ethnicity to gender. Recent discussions about cultural diversity in the Administration reveal a recognition that the U.S.'s status as an international cultural powerhouse gives it the potential to overpower other national cultures. One of the few exceptions to the generalization of cultural diversity involves the proscription of turbans in a workforce that uses helmets as part of their normal work (Sherwood v. Brown, 1980) unwarranted. In 1992 and 1994 the CEO of the oldest French multinational, Saint-Gobain, emphasized that the strategy of a multinational is deeply influenced by the nationality of its main shareholders. For him, in their relationship to their customers and to their workforce, multinationals can learn from national differences but also can try to transcend them, and the trend is towards more convergence. A good example of this promising path is given by the changes achieved in the early 1990s by Renault's automobile plant in Slovenia, whose workers dramatically increased both productivity and quality. One must judge between those corporations that deliberately tried to build a genuine language and culture (e.g., IBM) and of those that take cultural diversity into account (e.g. the Swiss-Swedish multinational, ABB). Again, Apple Computer has made this motto its advertising campaign: " Think Different". And thus it helps them to market with clients promising them to help solve problems, see solutions, discover opportunities, and penetrate markets that otherwise might be ignored or go unrecognized There are four basic arguments that have been used to promote embracing cultural diversity - the workforce argument, the moral and ethical argument, the legal argument, and the marketplace argument. The workforce argument uses census data and estimates from groups such as the Hudson Institute2. Data indicates that the ethnic diversification of the U.S. labor force continue to rise that assist in the development of strategies that facilitate the full and active participation of ethnic, racial, religious and cultural communities. Cultural diversity can be protected and promoted only if human rights and fundamental freedoms, such as freedom of expression, information and communication, as well as the ability of individuals to choose cultural expressions, are guaranteed, says the "Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions"3 It addresses diversity in a comprehensive way from three viewpoints, including individual, group and organizational level factors in understanding diversity. Thus it presents a conceptual model of how these factors interrelate and presents tools to help an organization change. Thus true organizational diversity is able to articulate and apply relevant historical and contemporary issues central to the experiences of women, men, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, heterosexuals, people with disabilities, African Americans, Latino/as, Whites, members of other racial/ethnic groups, and other people in the U.S. and in organizations, across a range of diversity dimensions. Again, Political democracy introduces cultural diversity as an issue of human rights. This involves state politics, as well as activities of nongovernmental organizations, particularly minority organizations. The umbrella of such activities is an interpretation of cultural diversity as a basic human right. In the "Globalization and Diversity, UNESCO and Cultural-Policy Making: Imperatives for U.S. Arts and Culture Practitioners and Organizations" January 10-11, 2005 Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C4, Richard Arndt remarks that on the grounds of cultural diversity, the US's policy of 'working pluralism will always serve as an example to the rest of the world' (p 4). In traditional firms long-term co-existence of different ethnic and national groups remains static i.e. cultural interaction is limited to acknowledging or an awareness (not always respectable interaction or enquiry but a guarded distance is maintained) common heritage background, but show a clear tendency amongst employees to preserve differences among peoples and cultures, which prevented the merging of distinctive groups into one team and affect functioning. Many very culturally homogeneous organizations represent professions, trades or industries that serve a culturally diverse group of clients, patients or customers - and those served will be growing even more diverse over the next decades. Because of this social interaction, the organization of work, in particular the matching of workers with different status concerns has strong implications for welfare and economic performance. The conventional wisdom is that culturally mixed societies face a higher potential for conflict, because members of such societies have different goals, habits and attitudes. In the market place, individual differences create the potential for trade and division of labor. Within smaller units, such as firms, individuals of different cultural background can exchange ideas and aggregate information (see Thomas and Ely, 1996)5 Economists are well aware of the other important considerations that are involved in the debate on the desired (or feasible) level of heterogeneity that may conflict with the gains from trade. The most important issues are probably associated with the provision of public goods in a multi-cultural political economy. For example, factories in the streets of Berlin, Amsterdam, Bangkok or Tel Aviv pursue cultural and ethnic heterogeneity, where it is the norm rather than an exception. The legal argument for cultural diversity in the workplace is that the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as well as other laws such as the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, the Age Discrimination Act and the American Disabilities Act "collectively outlaw discrimination on the basis of sex, color, race, religion, pregnancy, national origin, age, or physical disability" (Cox 1994, 12) Consequently, employers who once viewed diversity management activities as a legally driven bureaucratic cost are now seeking to create workplaces where employees from all backgrounds fully utilize their skills and feel personally comfortable. Overall, group differences in subjective measures of performance appear to be small yet pervasive. Substantial evidence shows that the job performance of black employees is evaluated as slightly lower compared to white employees for both objective and subjective measures (Ford, Kraiger & Schechtman, 19866; Sackett & DuBois, 19917). Similar patterns have been found for other minority group members, including women and older employees. Such ideas pervade the organizational decisions and are often supported by such studies. One of the most recent transgressions against cultural diversity best practices is held against Pacifica.8 A struggle between Pacifica stations KPFA in Berkeley, its staff broke out against the staunch Pacifica hierarchy. The "charges of racism being leveled at the KPFA group" is being examined that makes one consider the issues of diversity once more when it eliminated Persian and Arabian programme and also shows with homosexual biases and various community programme it held like the Chinese, Pakistani, Vietnamese, Atheist, Native American Programme et all have been cancelled one after the other. In "RACE AND POWER AT PACIFICA RADIO: The Future and the stakes today", Rafael Renteria former programming and news director, KPFT Houston, writes: "The Music of India program is gone after 19 years of service. There is not a single Asian program left on KPFT. Gary Coover's brilliantly produced Celtic music program, Shepherd's Hey has fallen, because Gary stood up and spoke out against the changes. Indeed, all organized opposition was crushed" The emphasis on competencies in the workplace has implications for the way that work is currently designed in organizations. This in itself raises numerous research issues around how employees and job candidates must equip themselves to participate in firms that employ this perspective of work organization Many corporations treats diversity as a new way of retaining good employees, thereby lowering costs by developing skills in-house through trainings that continue to help employees develop their skills, and also develop a reputation that helps attract new employees and most importantly not miss out on a good employee just on account of cultural bias especially when the demand for skilled labor is very high.9 Thereby by enforcing a free and open culture where all employees despite their cultural origin has free breathing space to exercise their potential and skills adds to the company's reputation and also help draw out maximum potential from employees and through their free interaction. Trying to fill positions with the right numbers of minorities is not enough to be seen as an equal opportunity employer; organizations and institutions must ensure that minorities and disadvantaged groups have the tools to rise to the top and succeed at that level. Works Cited 1. Cox, Taylor Jr. 1993. Cultural Diversity in Organizations: Theory, Research and Practice. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. 2. Ely R. and D. Thomas (2001). Cultural Diversity at Work: The Effects of Diversity Perspectives on Work Group Processes and Outcomes. Administrative Science Quarterly, 46, 229-273. 3. Judy, Richard W. and D'Amico, Carol. 1997. Workforce 2020. Hudson Institute Web Site: http://www.hudson.org/wf2020/EXSUMSW.html. Provides a summary of the Workforce 2020 project, which attempts to define what America's workforce will look like in the early 21st century. The authors claim that age; gender and race barriers will be removed because of the self-interest of employers. The share of African American workers will remain constant and Asian and Hispanic shares will grow. Because our population is getting older, the most successful firms will find ways to benefit from the talents of older workers. 4. Renteria, Rafael. "RACE AND POWER AT PACIFICA RADIO: The Future and the stakes today", KPFT Houston http://www.counterpunch.org/renteria.html 5. The General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural. Organization, meeting in Paris from 3 to 21 October 2005 at its 33rd session, Article 2 - Guiding principles. http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0014/001429/142919e.pdf 6. http://www.ethnicmajority.com/corporate_diversity.htm Read More