DIVERSITY TRAINING
Goal
The goal of this training is to enhance employee’s understanding of diversity and provide them with skills to effectively interact with people from diverse backgrounds. It is the company’s aim is to encourage employees to examine their own perceptions, values and biases, to provide strategies to respond effectively to situations arising from diversity, and offer skills to promote positive workplace interactions with various ages, genders, cultures and ethnic backgrounds
Objectives
• To provide training on diversity to employees
• To provide a process for employees to enhance their understanding and skills for working in a diverse environment
• To create opportunities for self-awareness and sharing with others to broaden one’s knowledge, and perspectives in workplace situations
• To identify similarities and differences between people of different racial and ethnic groups.
• To challenge commonly held stereotypes related to racial and ethnic groups.
Diversity training and education allows us to develop awareness, understanding, and the skills needed to create essential working relationships. This training provides the tools for acknowledging, challenging and dismantling the barriers, beliefs and attitudes that prevent some people from benefiting from the perspectives of others at work. This training is designed to assist employees in creating a truly inclusive work environment by:
• Offering ways to reflect about one's own attitudes on diversity and discrimination
• Acknowledging the need to take individual responsibility for working toward equality and the elimination of discrimination;
• Working toward removing barriers that isolate groups of people
• Providing opportunities for individuals to take actio...
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...ion, political belief, etc. Prejudice is an opinion, value or attitude whereas discrimination is an action one takes based on their prejudices. Never assume that forms of oppression are the same. Discrimination based on race or color is different from age discrimination. There may be some similar feelings but the effects are very different. You don’t grow out of your color.
As different cultures interact with each other, some experiences are not going to go very smoothly. This is because some people may not be accustomed to how other cultures act and communicate. The important thing to remember is that as individuals we must do everything we can to make every interaction we have with new and/or different people a good one. When one considers our world from such an incredibly compressed perspective, the need for awareness and understanding becomes glaringly apparent.
It sometimes give “the perception of ‘token appointments’ [of individuals] who could not be hired or promoted on performance ability alone” (Von Bergen, Soper, & Foster, 2002, p. 242). It can also create more discrimination in the form of reverse discrimination where those formerly believed to be discriminators are now unfairly victimized because of the color of their skin. Diversity training can sometimes be demoralizing and reinforces stereotypes when trainers resort to emphasizing differences that elicits anger and divisiveness (Von Bergen, Soper, & Foster, 2002, p. 245). Businesses can find their legal liabilities have increased when “unorthodox training techniques invade employee privacy and humiliate individuals in front of their co-workers” (Von Bergen, Soper, & Foster, 2002). According to Choi’s research “individuals in diverse groups tend to fell less safe and to trust each other less. Lower trust is more likely to lead to higher conflicts within groups” (Choi, 2008, p.
Many people know what prejudice and discrimination are, but some of us do not. Prejudice is known as the attitude which includes behavioral, cognitive and affective. This attitude is incorrect and is not justified because it usually deals with negative thoughts of a person. These thoughts can be based on any reasons, for example, it could be because of their social class, race, gender, sexuality, or anything else. Discriminitation on the other hand, is very similar, but involves taking action because of those thoughts. There have been many different types of discrimination, but the main one's are racial, age, and gender discrimination.
Stereotypes can be defined as sweeping generalizations about members of a certain race, religion, gender, nationality, or other group. They are made everyday in almost every society. We develop stereotypes when we are unable or unwilling to obtain all the information we would need to make fair judgments about people or situations. By stereotyping, we assume that a person or group has certain characteristics. Quite often, we develop these ideas about people who are members of groups with which we have not had firsthand contact. Stereotyping usually leads to unfair results, such as discrimination, racial profiling, and unnecessary violence, all behaviors which need to be stopped.
Harvey, C. P., & Allard, M. J. (2008). Understanding and managing diversity (4th ed.). Harlow: Pearson Education.
Diversity management initiatives are long term and strategic in focus. They strive not only to recruit, but to actively develop, promote and capitalize on the different skills and perspectives of minority employees (Marquis, 2007.) Every day, peopl...
Training and development is essential to employee’s retention, loyalty and overall satisfaction. When employees feel there is opportunity within a company and diversity leading the way employees pride and productivity is enhanced.
From the reading I learned prejudice is when a person attaches negative emotion to a certain group of people that is not based on facts. Prejudice has two levels cognitive or affective where the cognitive is thinking and feeling prejudice while affecting is actually doing prejudice actions. Discrimination is also discussed in chapter one. Discrimination is unequal behavior or treatment of a person based on them being a member of a group. An example of discrimination would be not getting selected for a job because you are African
“Stereotypes unreliable, exaggerated generalizations about all members of a group that do not take individual differences into account” (Schaefer 40). Stereotypes can be positive, but are usually associated with negative beliefs or actions such as racial profiling.
Diversity management efforts are based on a voluntary commitment to accept each individual’s uniqueness and to respect and learn from individual differences. In fact, diversity management efforts require a great deal of commitment particularly since it includes more than just image based differences (Cole, Salimath). Because it includes all differences and actively works to change prejudicial attitudes and beliefs, diversity management is the perfect complement to affirmative action. Together they can create an inclusive society that is race- and gender-conscious. Being race- and gender-conscious will highlight each individual difference which will facilitate acceptance without judgment and insensitivity.
Workforce diversity is defined as the variety of differences that is between the people that are in an organization (Scott and Byrd, 2012). The factors that encompass the diversity include race, gender, age, cognitive styles, organizational function and background. Diversity does not only involve how people perceive themselves, but how they are able to perceive others. On a personal level, workforce diversity is a way that can help me appreciate the differences in others and also learn from them on some basic life and work abilities that I lack. An example is the virtue of patience with others whereby diversity will make it easy for me to be patient with my work and also people who have different opinions about life. In the professional life,
Diversity in the workplace is important for employees because it manifests itself in building a great reputation for the company, leading to increased profitability and opportunities for workers. Making sure all members, students, parents and guarding’s are welcomed at all times in a well-mannered environment Workplace diversity is important within the organization as well as outside ensuring all different are put aside and everyone can come together and work well as a great team.
Therefore, it is imperative for employers to put in place a deliberate training program that explains in detail the benefits and positive outcomes of a diverse climate in the workplace. Employers must communicate the effects of diversity in the workplace to ensure that the employees understand and embrace the climate. The most common practice to unleash diversity is through continuous training and mentoring. A continuous learning environment promotes understanding, improvement, and develops interpersonal skills. Employees must understand that diversity is an organizational attribute and not just a policy. When that understanding is achieved, the organization’s workforce is united and has a better chance of success in their mission. Therefore, organizations must adopt a diversity management practice that retains talent, improves satisfaction, and augment the organization’s
Diversity issues will gain importance because of the effective interactions and communications between the people. Diversity is the reality of the business world. It can have negative and positive impact on the employee’s behaviour towards work and work results. This also depends on how the employees have understood it and grasps it.
people who are different from each other to diverse the company culture to find different viewpoints and ideas to gain Competitive advantage (Simmons, 1996). Organizations that are lacking diversification and which are also being exposed to the general approach of minimizing the discrimination and injustice will unfavorably affect both customer and employee while diminishing the relationships with both parties (Kundu, 2001). Peters et al. (1982) conveyed that OC should create a diverse body of employees, customers and stakeholders that are being valued and integrated in to all dimensions of the work where that particular company may learn from the people they serve, by listening internally and externally to them.
Prejudice can be defined as the judgement of a group or an individual based mainly on group association. Prejudice is not necessarily negative. Ethnocentrism is an example of positive prejudice towards one’s in-group. Discrimination can be defined as the negative or positive behaviours towards individuals based on their group association. Discrimination may be obvious or subtle, either way both can be damaging. Although discrimination and prejudice often go hand in hand, there is a difference between the two. Prejudice is just the negative or positive view of others, whereas discrimination is putting prejudice into action. An example of prejudice would be that of ordinary racist remarks whilst an example of discrimination would be the execution of the caste system in India. This question assumes that prejudice is common in this world, and that this problem needs to be solved.