Diversity within Diversity Management: Volume 21

The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of the research presented in this edited volume.

This report is based on 17 chapters, which vary in terms of research approach, design, and method, yet aims to present different country perspectives on diversity within diversity management.

The chapters present new insights on how the national and macro-social environment impacts the institutional approaches to diversity management across the world. Findings indicate the need for organizations to focus on deep-level diversity, rather than choosing a tick-box policy on surface-level diversity. Empirical studies reveal that every institution can adopt a diversity-friendly approach in a way that best fits their structure, culture and the mentality of their top management team.

The report summarizes and integrates novel insights on country perspectives and approaches on diversity management.

The literature on equality, diversity, and inclusion in organizational and societal contexts has grown in leaps and bounds over the last two decades or so. Our understanding of these phenomena in a global context is, however, limited, as attention has mostly been paid to the United States and other Western countries. This chapter aims to address this gap by exploring workplace diversity in Nigeria, an under-researched context, characterized by high diversity and low inclusion. Our goal is to understand the factors that shape diversity management operating in such a challenging context and to analyze the problems and prospects of building a highly diverse and inclusive environment.

Using a case study approach, the chapter analyzes four dimensions of equality and diversity (ethnic, religious, age, and HIV/AIDS) across four organizations.

This exploratory study highlights the challenges of building a diverse and inclusive workplace in a weak institutional environment. We identify competing logics of managing diversity in Nigeria: institutionalizing ethnic representation vs building a meritocracy (ethnic), maintaining religious neutrality vs promoting religious freedom (religion), keeping the elder tradition vs harnessing the power of youth (age), and managing safety and reputation vs providing employment security (HIV/AIDS).

This study sheds light on the importance of underlying thoughts on the effectiveness of diversity policies and argues that managers and organizations need to know how to balance competing logics and manage paradox effectively. It accentuates the importance of the national institutional environment in shaping diversity practices and provides insights for practitioners and policymakers.

Diversity management in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is of particular importance given the fact the UAE is the sixth country in the world for hosting the largest number of international migrants in 2017. The purpose of this exploratory study is to understand how diversity is managed in the public and private sector and to identify the most important factors to diversity manangemet in the UAE context.

A Grounded Theory approach to research was used to explore this very sensitive issue for the case study. In the absence of robust data on diversity management in the UAE, this inductive qualitative method was preferred since it does not presuppose a hypothesis and allows a contextually relevant theory to be derived from the data, which were collected through interviews with the participants from the public and private sector. An open-ended interview schedule was emailed to the purposefully selected group. Careful thematic analysis was undertaken to identify the resonant issues related to diversity management in this context.

This heralds increased demographic diversity in the public sector, even if only at a strategic level in order to achieve political and social objectives. Further, as the UAE embarks on being a Smart nation, successful diversity management will be a critical indicator of public sector reform.

The study analyzed the perceptions of the participants using a qualitatitve method which might not be considered to be as objective. Hence a confirmatory follow up study using quantitatve design will be required to verify the findings.

This chapter will explore the diversity management in the public and private sectors of the UAE, the role leaders and managers have to play, challenges faced, and what is on the horizon in this new public–private partnership environment.

This chapter suggests the need for a unified understanding of diversity management among leaders in the public and private sector of the UAE as a crucial enabler of productivity, development and social cohesion.

This heralds increased demographic diversity in the public sector, even if only at a strategic level in order to achieve political and social objectives. Further, as the UAE embarks on being a Smart nation, successful diversity management will be a critical indicator of public sector reform. This chapter will explore the diversity management in the public and private sectors of the UAE, the role leaders and managers have to play, challenges faced, and what is on the horizon in this new public–private partnership environment.

Diversity management concerns organizational practices to enhance the value of diversity in organizations by changing organizational culture and shaping work environment in which diversity can promote the organizational goals. The purpose of this chapter is to examine the diversity management practices in sustainability reports by exemplifying in the case of Turkey, which is an emerging economy with a complex and multiethnic society.

A comprehensive literature and qualitative research is conducted in order to understand the diversity management in a cultural context by looking at the company’s sustainability report in Turkey.

In Turkey, companies have responsibility to position the participation of employees in business opportunities as an important value of corporate culture by implementing diversity projects, and they announce these initiatives in their sustainability reports.

This research is a study about diversity in Turkey case. An example is limited to the company publishing a sustainability report.

This study may be useful for the board of directors and managers since they should become aware of understanding of the diversity management in the workplace especially in their sustainability mechanisms.

This study is valuable and attractive to create an open organizational culture where each employee is valued and where diversity issues all employment practices. Also, it is original to show why diversity is important in sustainability disclosures.

(1) Critically analyze the role of diversity and inclusion practitioners and the legal/policy framework for managing diversity and inclusion in Australia. (2) Propose enhanced framework to improve outcomes for disadvantaged groups in the workforce.

Review of international and Australian literature, overview of gains and continuing gaps for disadvantaged groups, and consideration of the features of work health and safety (Robens-style) legislation that could be adapted to the diversity and inclusion jurisdiction.

The role of diversity and inclusion practitioner is often transient and fragmented, offering a limited base to advance the diversity and inclusion cause. Based on indicators, much more work is required to achieve full diversity and inclusion. A stronger legislative/policy framework is needed to increase the effectiveness and longevity of the diversity and inclusion practitioner role, spread responsibility, and achieve improved outcomes.

A lack of qualitative data from workplaces to augment our understanding of the challenges encountered by diversity and inclusion practitioners. To date, there has been no opportunity to test the feasibility of Robens-style legislation/policy in this area.

Opportunity to develop a fully worked proposal for legislative/policy reform to present to the government, employers, professional associations, trade unions, and representatives of disadvantaged groups.

Reforms could have far-reaching implications for the regulation and administration of diversity and inclusion practice in Australia

Critical review of the diversity and inclusion practitioner role and associated legislation/policy in Australia and consideration of an alternative framework for diversity and inclusion in the workplace.

This contribution is focused on diversity management in the Czech Republic (CR) with a special focus on foreigners and ethnic diversity management. The importance of diversity management, as part of human resources management, in the CR has increased after the integration into the European Union (EU) in 2004.

The chapter introduces three current cases of companies which demonstrated the implementation of diversity management principles. The author of this text supervised the research where internal documents were studied and interviews with a survey were conducted.

The topic is relatively new both in theory and in Czech practice with the increase in academic publications after the year 2000. It has become an important issue as a consequence of the changing workforce structure due to demographic changes in the Czech society, followed by globalization of the labor market. Foreigners make 5% of the total number of citizens in the CR. Majority of them live in Prague and Middle Bohemia. More than half of foreigners legally residing on Czech territory have permanent stay. The most common nationalities have been for many years Ukrainians, Slovaks, and Vietnamese. Foreigners working in the CR make 9.1% of total employment in the national Czech economy. The most common foreign workers coming to CR to seek for a job are EU citizens, mainly Slovaks, followed by people from Romania, Poland, and Bulgaria. Ukrainians are the most common from the third countries. The number of foreigners in the CR is rising mainly due to foreigners from EU. The main pull factor is work. The most frequent groups are Ukrainians, Slovaks, Vietnamese, and Russians. Three case studies are introduced to show current developments in international companies which are successful in the area of ethnic diversity management.

For further development of the knowledge about recent trends, it is very valuable to collect case studies. I suggest to continue in this activity and collect more studies to have a wider space for comparison.

These selected cases show the developments in the CR (and Slovakia) in the past 20 years. Local branches of multinational companies have been inspired by experiences from the headquarters and the needs where adapted to local conditions. As the second case shows, it can be also a rather different story with an original Czech company which rapidly succeeded not only on the market but also in the implementation of diversity management. Companies are using benefits of diversity by enrichment of working teams using specific features of multi-ethnic composition of workers. Diversity management is used in the broader meaning, respecting national, cultural, gender, and other differences. All these examples of activities, projects, clubs, councils, or reports can be an inspiration to anybody who aims to increase diversity in any organization.

This chapter brings original contribution about current trends in diversity management in the region. It can bring very valuable information to academics, experts in diversity management, managers, students or public in general.

This chapter focuses on the underlying levers of diversity management, namely inclusive leaders, authenticity, networking and visibility, and clear career paths in two best practice cases. The aim of our research is to provide the strategic orientation of developing diversity management through business education in Slovenian business environment based on best practice cases as well as content analysis of 104 responses within management course at the Faculty of economics University of Ljubljana.

Qualitative joint content analysis was selected to analyze the data, in order to quantify qualitative data collected, by understanding its context.

Based on findings, the conceptual model of diversity management curriculum is introduced.

Limitations of the study are in the open-ended questionnaire design in addition to analyzing only two purposely chosen best practice cases, which do not provide for the overall state of diversity management in Slovenia.

Discussion is based on the findings of diversity management inclusiveness, offering also concrete theoretical and practical implications for deans, academic community, as well as students who want to practice inclusive diversity management.

Our chapter raises awareness on diversity management development and implementation on the basis of identified good practice examples. By presenting Slovene cases and analyses of the diversity management implementation, we promote the value of inclusion and diversity in the workplace.

Our chapter presents two original case analyses within Slovene diversity management and offers the conceptual model of diversity management curriculum.

The purpose of this conceptual chapter is to critically review the efficacy of diversity management in institutions of higher education with the intention of highlighting context-specific challenges in South African Higher Education Institutions (HEIs).

Diversity is conceptualized with the assumption that equity and redress should form part of institutional practices for managing and integrating diverse workforce in HEIs. Because HEIs are tasked to reduce inequalities and exclusions and to ensure integration through redress at all levels, the argument in this chapter is that diversity and social inclusion go hand in hand and that discrimination of people in whatever form should be eliminated.

Findings reveal that diverse learning environments in HEIs help sharpen critical thinking and analytical skills and prepare institutional members to succeed in an increasingly diverse and interconnected world.

The challenge with diversity management, however, is in implementing diversity management in a practical HEI environment.

Implications are that managers should empower diverse institutional members with the ability to accommodate ethnic and cultural diversity, to succeed in maintaining institutional unity.

The study is significant for ensuring effective management of diversity and institutional workforce integration.

The chapter informs policy choices for the day-to-day management of diversity.

The aim is to describe the cultural richness of Peruvian racial diversity. The articulating and unifying role of Peruvian gastronomy is highlighted in building a national identity, which acts as a platform for social cohesion.

Qualitative analysis is used in order to understand the drivers that enabled a cultural revolution through gastronomy.

Under a vast cultural diversity, gastronomy arises to articulate and unify it into a common sense of national identity and social inclusion. Although Peruvian gastronomic boom started as an initiative of a group of entrepreneurs, it actually has had an impact at society level.

Ethnographic studies among different social classes and racial groups are needed in order to elucidate the perceptions that they have regarding their social inclusion. At a quantitative level, econometric studies could be conducted to reflect the impact of gastronomy on poverty reduction or on inequality reduction, especially in urban-marginal or rural areas.

Gastronomy is also a business strategy model on the basis of the creation of a cluster as a viable alternative for developing countries.

Peruvians no matter their racial heritage or social class are proud of their cousin and of being Peruvians, creating a sense of national union and social inclusion.

The contribution is to highlight the importance of gastronomy as one of the main articulators in the construction of national identity under a racially diverse population. Society, public policy officers, and businesses may benefit from this.

The intention of this chapter is to review and test the degree to which organizational changes related to gender parity, adopted within Venezuela since 1999, have affected the C-level positions and Boards of Directors among banking institutions.

Through review and qualitative analysis of primary and secondary data, along with triangulation, given names were used as proxy to define gender among groups of individuals.

Evidence indicates that besides some parity in lower positions, middle management, and some C-level positions, at the Board of Director level, there remains a gender imbalance. Government-owned institutions show improved gender balance, but still there is a need for progress.

Coercive isomorphisms may be the most common explanation for organizational change; nevertheless, this is not necessarily the case unless there is clear law enforcement. Practitioners must analyze the underlying reasons that females may reach a C-level position, yet don’t reach the Board of Directors in the same proportion.

This research analyzes gender issues and composition among corporate governance bodies (Board of Directors and C-level positions) in Venezuela. It offers preliminary insights on gender imbalance within the upper echelon of Venezuelan banking institutions.

Identification of dominant approaches and applied practices in the field of diversity and diversity management (DM) in Polish companies in the context of trends on labor market. Although there is not much diversity in Poland now, it is expected that there will be more age related and ethnic diversity in future.

Semi-structured interviews with HR specialist in 50 innovative companies (medium and large companies) were conducted. A synthesis of the current achievements of Polish research in this area was also carried out.

The concept of DM is not popular yet in Polish organizations. There are mostly observed declarative activities concentrating on image-related benefits and focusing on the equal employment opportunity. Findings are consistent with the results of other authors.

The study was limited by research methodology which presented one-sided, HR managers, view of the problem. Further studies examining other perspectives are required.

Observed trends on labor market require changes in attitudes toward diversity on organizations. A major challenge is to overcome the traditional approach. Potential benefits and threats ought to be documented, legal regulations adjusted to changes on labor market developed. The regulations ought to take the growing number of immigrants and problems associated with retirement age being lowered into consideration. Further studies are required.

The assessment of the state of DM implementation in Polish organizations in the context of labor market changes and associated challenges constitutes an original character of the present study.

The purpose of this report is to help companies and other organizations recognize the need for the adoption of antidiscrimination and inclusion practices.

The chapter describes the diversity practices employed and the results achieved by two companies in Greece, as reported through interviews with the Managers of Human Resources that are responsible for their implementation.

This chapter outlines the demographic and social profile of the population of the country, examining gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, age and disability. It also presents the practices of two companies operating in Greece, Vodafone and Coco-Mat, which tackle discrimination and inequality, proving that diversity management can be implemented successfully in the Greek workplace. The diverse policies implemented by the two companies also prove that every organization can incorporate relevant policies in a way that fits best their structure, processes and the mentality of the leadership team.

The development and activation of diversity and inclusion processes in the workplace should also dictate CSR practices, which address the needs of communities, both within and outside the organizations.

There is little research regarding discrimination and diversity in the Greek workplace, despite its growing relevance and importance for the community. This report aims to inspire further research, as well as the development and implementation of diversity management practices by managers and policy-makers.

This chapter analyzes the influence of inclusion, equal opportunity and antidiscrimination policies on the strength of diversity in a foreign firm domiciled in a developing country.

It used a questionnaire to collect fact from the depth of employees’ experiences of diversity management in practice to understand its implication for the strength of diversity in the workplace. It questioned the nature of the constructs on diversity in line with the effect of equal opportunity in the workplace.

The component factor analysis extraction method obtained valuable constructs from the stated dimensions of items in the questionnaire. The regression technique was used to analyze the influence of these constructs on the strength of diversity in the workplace.

The results revealed that inclusiveness is necessary to intensify the strength of diversity in foreign organization in a developing nation, with the need to deepen alternative equal opportunity policy and diverse work culture awareness. Power relations strategies foster staff welfare, but weaken compensation by merit heighten employees’ sentiments.

Data were only collected from the companies head office; its branches were not covered.

Employees detect biases in equal opportunity policies beyond the guises of control power relation. Thus, besides a policy for diversity and inclusion in the workplace, an alternative equal opportunity policy is essential to intensify diversity.

It empirically probes foreign organizations in a developing country staff response to changes in the workplace due to the cautious implementation of inclusion, equal opportunity and antidiscrimination policies to foster diversity.

This chapter will discuss diversity and discrimination within Trinidad and Tobago (T&T) (in employment and wider society) and critically assess the findings of the extant literature as it relates to such small island developing states. The chapter will examine race, sex, disability, and sexual orientation, specifically exploring current accepted practice and the effect of the recently enacted anti-discrimination legislation. This discussion is important as there is limited available literature as it relates to discrimination, diversity, inclusion and equality in the Caribbean region.

This chapter will rely on secondary data, primarily studies which focus on T&T, in the fields of management, psychology and sociology; as well as country reports published by international agencies including the United Nations and the World Health Organization; and T&T Equality Commission Reports.

Diversity exists within T&T, as does discrimination, within employment and wider society. This reflects an acceptance of the status quo as part of the culture of the twin island state, rather than challenging why it is still regarded as acceptable to treat some minority groups less favorably than others as a result of their immutable characteristics.

The use of secondary data may have limited the scope of the findings.

The development of the Equal Opportunity Act (2000) is a pivotal event in the trajectory towards equality; however, further action will be needed to reduce discrimination within society. The exclusion of sexual orientation from the Act and the criminalization of private sexual behavior must be addressed in order for Trinidadian society to become truly inclusive and diverse.

This discussion is important as there is limited available literature as it relates to discrimination, diversity, inclusion and equality in the Caribbean region and much of what is accepted as representative of reality is based on anecdotal evidence.

The purpose of the chapter is to integrate the understanding of diversity from different perspectives in Indian context and see how the holistic view emerges.

The methodology used is primarily the literature review of the concepts and their evolution in Indian context and the use of secondary sources to extract praxis information.

It emerged from the exploration on diversity practices at the societal as well as organizational level in India that the country demonstrates intent to mainstream the people from different wakes, but with the changing context the format of the practices has changed.

The basic premise of the chapter needs to be explored further through primary data from practice.

This chapter is novel in a way that it integrates the diversity scholarship of four different streams viz. caste, gender, disability, and generation. Most of the existing research focuses only on a thin slice/one key dimension of diversity.

The purpose of the present study is to understand the diversity management concept in Taiwan setting by providing a closer look into local companies’ practices. Rational and focus for this research exploration is based on three areas related to diversity management in organizations: external and internal pressures for diversity in Taiwanese companies; companies’ approaches and senior leadership attitude toward diversity; companies’ diversity management practices.

The authors have collected secondary and primary data, including 15 interviews with management, at three large Taiwan semiconductor companies and build a case study of diversity management in Taiwan.

Taiwan companies’ diversity management is motivated mainly by business case and social responsibility goals. They experience a need for diversity management and proactively introduce diversity management policies.

Further studies should look into diversity management practices of smaller private/family-owned companies in Taiwan to get a deeper understanding of the concept in the country using quantitative and qualitative approaches.

Taiwan is historically culturally homogeneous society, which undergoes massive demographic changes under the influence of low birth rate and high rate of immigration. Taiwan situation creates specific economic, cultural, and political context for diversity management that differs from other Asian, European or Western societies.

This chapter offers an overview of Indigenous Entrepreneurship (IE) in the national Canadian context and aims to analyze how the diversity among the Aboriginal peoples of Canada in society is managed with regard to entrepreneurship.

Taking into account the scope of diversity, three major dimensions were identified for analysis – (1) the sociocultural dimension, in reference to the worldviews and values of indigenous peoples, (2) the institutional dimension, in reference to the political management of reservations and the Band Council system, and (3) the financial dimension, in reference to the financial opportunities available to indigenous entrepreneurs.

This chapter’s original contribution rests in its critical analysis of IE in Canada, taking into account the history, the process of colonization and the diversities within the diversity.

The purpose of this chapter is to create awareness and provide practical solution for the diversity conflicts and challenges facing people in Afghanistan.

The content comes from the literature and personal observations of living in Afghanistan, while also meeting several ministers and the former president of the country.

While most people around the globe might perceive Afghanistan as a homogeneous society made up of people with similar beliefs and goal, the reality is far from it due to the heterogeneity of ethnicities, values, and languages spoken in the country. Of course, heterogeneity can make a society much more complex when diversity is not managed effectively, and this is certainly the case in Afghanistan’s divided population. When a heterogeneous society is not inclusive and not managed well, its consequences can be high levels of discrimination, distrust, violence, and animosity among diverse people groups. Afghanistan is an Asian collective culture, which has suffered from many negative consequences caused by mismanagement of diversity, low levels of education, and political acrimony among different people groups based on tribalism.

There was no funding to conduct primary research. As such, the literature and conclusions are based on personal experiences of the author, interviews with the current and former political leaders, and previously published materials.

This chapter suggests that inclusion, education and diversity management are especially crucial for Afghanistan. A review of the Afghan cultural diversity is provided along with suggestions for creating a more inclusive country for all citizens.

The chapter is an original writing based on the author’s socialization, education and interaction with the Afghan culture. As an expert trainer and researcher, the author provides practical content for education, application, and policy development in Afghanistan.