Benefits And Challenges Of A Diverse Workforce For Organisations

Benefits of a Diverse Workforce

Discuss the benefits and challenges a diverse workforce brings to an organisation.

The essay provides an insight into business writing in the perspective of a diverse workforce within an organization. A diverse workforce is important for an organization since it results in opportunities and profitability of the workers (Podsiadlowski et al. 2013). A simple statement put forward by the Manzoni, Strebel and Barsoux (2010) shows the benefit and challenges of diversity. The statement states, ““When it comes to corporate boards and diversity, the conventional wisdom is simple: Diversity is good. When directors are too alike, the thinking goes, they look at problems — and solutions — the same way. There’s no one to challenge prevailing ideas, or to speak out on issues important to certain groups of customers and employees. By contrast, diversity leads to more innovation, more outside-the-box thinking and better governance. Sounds great. And it is, in theory. Unfortunately, few boards that pursue diversity ever see the wished-for returns. Many report no significant change in their performance, while others bog down in conflict and gridlock.” The essay tries to provide a further elaboration on the challenges and benefits that a diverse workforce offers to an organization.

The diverse workforce comprises of the employees having varied characteristics and not limited by only gender, political beliefs, ethnicity, geographic location and socio economic backgrounds. According to Ogbo, Ukpere and Kifordu (2014), diversity of the workforce has a positive influence on the competitive advantage. Competitive advantage refers to strategy element that provides the organization with distinctive competence. The advantage and competence stems from the processes where diversity management have positive impact on the effectiveness and the organizational behavior. Effectiveness entails in doing the things right and hence represents a factor related to organizational performance. However, the diversity in the workforce also helps in lowering cost and improving the attitude of the employees. Organizations with diverse workforce lower cost by different means. This might be in the form of reduction of absenteeism and expenses related to employee training and recruitment. Diverse workforce within organizations helps in the generation of higher sales, bigger share of the market and generation of a higher level of corporate profit. Schultz and Schultz (2015) have stated that researchers such as Hoftstede put forward that diversity in the work force leads to the promotion of creativity, productivity and innovative means of productivity and problem solving. This happens due to the sharing of the diverse perspectives and ideas. Kanter (2006),  however stated that innovative companies encourages formation of heterogeneous teams in solving problems that made them not only employ increased number of women and people belonging to different creed. This is because a diverse group possesses a broader perspectives and experiences. On a similar note, effective education of the diverse group helps in enhancing the training, exposure and development.

Challenges of a Diverse Workforce

A diverse workforce also ensures benefits in the form of high morale, creation of different perspectives, leads to a global impact and helps in building community relations (Wambui et al. 2013). A diverse workforce within an organization helps in the creation of a high morale by validating the feelings of the people and considering them as important irrespective of the differences. Diversity puts forward opportunities to the employees for working with the people having different views and skills to table that helps in recognizing the importance of each of the employees. The act of feeling valued helps in improving the morale of each of the workers thereby promoting positivity within the workplace. An organization with diversity of the workforce remains exposed to different ideas and viewpoints. This enables the people in sharing and hearing different perspectives along with sharing ideas. A variety of solution put across the table when there is a brainstorming activity, taking place within a diverse workforce. Diversity also gives access to a variety of ideas that helps in generating the best possible solution. In a globalized economy, a diverse workforce helps the companies on expanding their business to the worldwide market (Saxena 2014).  An organization with a diverse workforce helps in promoting effective communication thereby creating relationships and has better understanding of the cultural differences and nuances of doing business. This ensures the creation of the opportunities that effectively helps in business development within the global market. Diversity within the work force helps in building community relations. The trend towards the diversification enables organization in recognizing the community they serve. For instance, it is vital for the organization in effectively communicating with the customers and thereby understanding the needs irrespective of the culture and language of the customers. A diverse workforce in such a scenario helps in making such employees available who will be able to initiate a communication irrespective of the language. Customers and communities also prefers in engaging with companies that employs people from diverse background. Thus, a diverse workforce acts as an advantage in the competitive market (Bal and Bozkurt 2013).

However, Green et al. (2015) puts forward that a diverse workforce also puts forward various challenges because managing diversity involves something more than acknowledging the differences in the people. It involves recognition of the value of the differences, promotion of inclusiveness and in combating discrimination. Diversity also leads to discrimination and prejudice that lands the company into legal battles, work productivity and the loss of the personnel. Organizational diversity might lead to negative attitudes thereby harming work relationships, productivity and employee morale. These negative attitudes primarily include stereotyping, discrimination and prejudice.

Conclusion

Diversity in the workforce results in divisiveness (Machado and Davim 2017). Diversity also implies various other influences within the workforce that includes ethnic, racial, physical and social challenges in various organizations. The influences ensure creation of a sense of the community amongst the group members thereby creating self-awareness. Workers considering them to be different bands bond together into communities within workplace thereby leading to the loss of the management control within single-minded pursuit of the objectives of the company. Diversity might not always be compliant with the various acts that might lead to the rise in cost related to the revamping of the office facilities for ensuring compliance. Diversity in the workforce impairs the freedom of speech.  Within a diverse workforce, colleagues from different cultures might be less likely in getting their voices heard. It is to be noted that the presence of a diverse brainpower is not sufficient and it is critical in creating an inclusive and open work ambience that will make the team members feel empowered for contribution. Sometimes integration between the multicultural teams would be difficult in the presence of cultural stereotypes and prejudice. Underlying prejudices between the cultures makes the workforce in working together. Negativity in the cultural stereotypes is not only detrimental to the company morale but also affects productivity.  In a diverse workforce, professional communication might be misinterpreted or face difficulty in understanding across the cultures and the language. This is because the non-verbal communication aspects determine the effectiveness in cross-cultural communication (Martin and Nakayama 2013). This type of communication is the most delicate part of the cultural interaction that primarily led to misunderstandings amongst the team members as things like the comfortable levels of the physical space, maintaining an eye contact or gesturing is different across the cultures. Diversity might lead to challenges while navigating the requirements for visa and cost of workplace accommodation. Hiring talent from the overseas might lead to HR challenges since the regulations and the requirements are different in each of the countries as well as between countries, which might undergo frequent change. Moreover, the organization might also make effort in retaining and recruiting a diverse workforce by respecting the employee beliefs and by considering their religious and cultural holidays. Facilities might also come in the form providing a quite space for the prayers that the diverse workforce might find welcoming. Within the diverse workforce, there might be challenges in the difference in understanding of the professional etiquette. This because employees from diverse workforce posses different values, behaviors, attitudes and etiquette. Although this might be enriching and beneficial to the diverse environment but can also lead to ill feelings and misunderstandings amongst the team members. Diversity in the workforce might also result in conflicting work styles across the teams (Comfort and Franklin 2014). This is due to the difference in attitude towards the work, compounding differences and cultural values. If left unnoticed the conflicting approaches towards the work would put a break on the productivity.

Conclusion:

To conclude one can however say that a diverse workforce acts as a reflection of the changing marketplace and the world.  Presence of diverse workforce adds higher value to the organization. Respect for the individual differences will be beneficial for the workplace as it leads to the enhanced productivity thereby rendering the company a competitive edge. Diversity also benefits the associates through creation of a safe and fair environment where everyone has the access to opportunities and challenges. An organization with a diverse workforce requires the use of the management tools for educating everyone about the concept of the diversity and the issues including the laws and the regulations. Nowadays, most of the workplaces have diverse cultures that have its own benefits and challenges that the organization should not only learn but also adapt.

References:

Bal, Y. and Bozkurt, S., 2013. Globalization and Human Resources Management: Managing the Diverse Workforce. Cultural and Technological Influences on Global Business, p.1.

Comfort, J. and Franklin, P., 2014. The mindful international manager: How to work effectively across cultures. Kogan Page Publishers.

Green, K., López, M., Wysocki, A., Kepner, K., Farnsworth, D. and Clark, J. (2015). Diversity in the Workplace: Benefits, Challenges, and the Required Managerial Tools. [online] Available at: https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/pdffiles/HR/HR02200.pdf [Accessed 6 Jun. 2018].

Kanter, R.M., 2003. Challenge of organizational change: How companies experience it and leaders guide it. Simon and Schuster.

Machado, C. and Davim, J.P., 2017. Managing Organizational Diversity. Springer International Publishing.

Manzoni, J.F., Strebel, P. and Barsoux, J.L., 2010. Why diversity can backfire on company boards. Wall Street Journal, 25.

Martin, J.N. and Nakayama, T.K., 2013. Intercultural communication in contexts. New York: NY: McGraw-Hill.

Ogbo, A.I., Anthony, K.A. and Ukpere, W.I., 2014. The effect of workforce diversity on organizational performance of selected firms in Nigeria. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, 5(10), p.231.

Podsiadlowski, A., Gröschke, D., Kogler, M., Springer, C. and Van Der Zee, K., 2013. Managing a culturally diverse workforce: Diversity perspectives in organizations. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 37(2), pp.159-175.

Saxena, A., 2014. Workforce diversity: A key to improve productivity. Procedia Economics and Finance, 11, pp.76-85.

Schultz, D. and Schultz, S.E., 2015. Psychology and Work Today: Pearson New International Edition CourseSmart eTextbook. Routledge.

Wambui, T.W., Wangombe, J.G., Muthura, M.W., Kamau, A.W. and Jackson, S.M., 2013. Managing Workplace Diversity: A Kenyan Pespective. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 4(16).