Austria European Workplace Diversity Strategies

In “Managing a culturally diverse workforce: Diversity perspectives in organizations,” Podsiadlowski, Groschke, Springer, et al (2013) present two different but related studies on how Austrian workplaces manage diversity. Both studies address ways organizations conceptualize diversity and leverage diversity. The first study uses interview data to gain insight into how organizational cultures reflect either a diversity approach or resist diversity. The second study involves the development of what could become a standardized test for diversity perspectives. Goals of the questionnaire include measuring perceived threats and benefits of diversity in the workplace. The authors acknowledge the importance of diversity management, and increasing understandings of how to develop a diversity framework that reflects the organization’s mission and values. Similarly, the authors emphasize the significance of developing a framework for diversity as globalization leads to more diverse workforces.
To operationalize the definition of diversity, the authors suggest that all aspects of diversity including gender, age, and educational status—and not merely ethnic or national diversity—be included in the conversation. Defining diversity broadly has its drawbacks, but the authors show how a broad definition of diversity is critical for understanding the implications of diversity for human resources development, managerial styles, and organizational culture. Prior research has revealed that more diverse groups outperform less diverse groups on measures related to creativity, innovation, and productivity. Moreover, the literature suggests that diversity improves an organization’s ability to respond to change, and enter new marketplaces. The crux of diversity management is leveraging the different approaches to problem solving, diverse worldviews, communication styles, and ways of thinking. Essentially, a diversity strategy can become an important competitive advantage.
Apparently the terms diversity strategy, diversity orientation, and diversity perspective can be used interchangeably. This study also addresses the five diversity perspectives: Reinforcing Homogeneity, Color-Blind, Fairness, Access, and Integration and Learning (Podsiadlowski, Groschkw, Springer, et al, 2013, p. 160). Reinforcing homogeneity is essentially the same as resistance to change, or resistance to diversity, entrenched in company policy and organizational culture. In fact, reinforcing homogeneity is more than just denying diversity or denying the need to respond to it intelligently; reinforcing homogeneity is actively disparaging the principles of diversity and can be considered an overt or covert embrace of discrimination.
Color-blindness and fairness are two diversity perspectives that fall under the general rubric of discrimination-and-fairness models. These perspectives stress the importance of equality and fairness, but may overlook the importance of interpersonal differences and how those differences might inform company strategies, policies, and performance. The access perspective sees diversity from a utilitarian perspective, in terms of how to leverage a diverse workforce for entering new marketplaces, enhance a public relations or communications strategy, or improve a company’s reputation. Finally, the integration and learning perspectives value diversity for its own sake, recognizing that the organization learns and grows specifically because it has a diverse workforce. These five diversity perspectives are linear, placed on a continuum of dysfunctional resistance to diversity to forward-thinking, realistic, optimistic, and proactive organizational strategies.
The five-part perspective model supersedes the tripartite division of diversity management in terms of discrimination/fairness, access/legitimacy, and learning/effectiveness (Podsiadlowski, Groschkw, Springer, et al, 2013, p. 160). The authors also address the various productive and dysfunctional responses to increasingly diverse workforces, such as “to include or exclude, to deny, to assimilate, to suppress, to isolate, to tolerate, to build relationships, and to mutually adapt,” (Podsiadlowski, Groschkw, Springer, et al, 2013, p. 160). Because the authors focus on a European population, multiple diversity perspectives and practices are represented and analyzed systematically.
In Study 1, the authors use an exploratory research design to examine how organizations respond to and manage diversity. The interview topics address subjects like how managers or leaders set examples for diversity attitudes and practices. Likewise, the interview topics cover specific policies and strategies used to manage diversity. Results of Study 1 show that most organizations in Austria use an “access” approach, followed by integration and learning. These results imply Austria is not far along in diversity management thinking and sees how diversity is an effective organizational/business strategy. The purpose of Study 2 was to design an effective survey instrument that can be used in future research. Study 2 stresses the significance of the five-factor model, but unfortunately reveals some contradictory and conflicting results.
The results of both studies show how important it is for organizations to be proactive, and especially resist the tendency to reinforce homogeneity. Both studies show that organizations need to move beyond limited thinking restricting diversity strategies to those that emphasize fairness, as fairness should be integrated fully into organizational policy. Diverse workforces should not be seen as having utilitarian value, but inherently important to promoting corporate social responsibility.






References

Podsiadlowski, A., Groschke, D., Kogler, M., Springer, C. & van der Zee, K. (2013). Managing a culturally diverse workforce. International Journal of Intercultural Relations 37(2013): 159-175.