Human Resource Management - Assignment Example

According to Russell and Taylor (2006, p. 324), “Managing diversity is the process of creating and a work environment in which all employees can contribute to their full potential in order to achieve a company’s goals.” 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 equal rights legislation and affirmative/positive action policies in order to create social, legal and organisational environment conducive for diversity management (Mor-Barak, 2005; Russell & Taylor, 2006). Exemplified by IKEA in true sense, this concept reflects in their vision, ‘To create a better everyday life the many people.’ And, these people include employees, customer, as well as the community (Regani, 2008; p.707). Various initiatives supporting life balance and diversity were incorporated into the human resource management practices and were customized according to the needs of its employees and the organisation.

For example, ‘flexibility’ as one initiative was adopted in allowing employees to choose their holiday schedule against the traditional standard holidays for all employees. Secondly, the initiative, ‘Paddle Your Own Canoe,” was employed as an employee self-assessment tool that helped the employees, with assistance from managers, to decide what kind of personal development and skills were required for them to perform well or grow to the next level. These efforts were meant to reinforce employee motivation and morale through managements’ decisions and practices.

Kosek and Lobel’s model (1996) of diversity management approach employs diversity enlargement, diversity sensitivity, cultural audit and strategies for achieving organisational outcomes provide a