A recent article by consultant Denis Barnard argued that diversity programmes encouraged promotion of ‘the needy and the greedy’. In answer to this feature, Lauren Chesney, an HR professional working in Toronto for a top-five Canadian bank, argues that diversity is crucial for all organisations.
Racism. Prejudice. Ignorance. Those are three big dirty words that a diversity advocate or consultant probably won’t use when they try to sell you on diversity. They don’t want to scare you off, put you off or offend you. I understand why. Diversity can be a touchy subject and one from which we can’t afford to lose our audience. No one wants to be told that they are racist or prejudiced but the fact is our employees can be racist, prejudiced and ignorant and they bring this baggage to work with them and then they make hiring decisions.
Diversity plans have become necessary because of attitudes which have directly and indirectly barred the career paths of many intelligent and talented workers just because they don’t look, sound, worship, work or think like those with the power to recruit. Allowing this to continue is illegal, unethical and ultimately bad for business.
When business people talk about diversity in organisations they are talking, for the most part, about making an effort to recruit, retain and treat equitably employees of all genders; visible minorities; older workers and people with disabilities. These are all groups which have been discriminated against in the past. People who argue against organisational diversity are often unwilling to acknowledge this historical discrimination.
Smart business people now realise that, for several reasons, organisational diversity makes good business sense:
- In 2006 the Equalities Review Interim Report forecast that the ethnic minority population will reach 5.51 million by 2011 in England and Wales alone, and that ethnic minorities will account for more than half the growth of Britain’s working age population. Demographics are changing which means that labour pools are changing; immigration has generated a more ethnically diverse labour force and a more ethnically diverse customer base with new needs, wants and aspirations.
- Britain’s working age population is shrinking. Birthrates are low; children aren’t being born in large enough numbers to eventually replace older workers as they retire. The Office of National statistics reported fertility rates of 1.8 children per woman in England and Wales in 2005 – replacement levels are considered 2.1 children per woman. In addition, many areas in the United Kingdom are reporting a brain drain as large numbers of graduates emigrate for better opportunities.
- Business is ramping up in China and India bringing new opportunities for British businesses, but also bringing new competition. These countries are pegged as the economic superpowers of the future – if organisations wish to remain competitive they must be equipped to do business on a global scale, particularly within these countries.
In a time when traditional labour pools are shrinking it makes sense to seek out hitherto untapped sources of candidates. Organisational diversity doesn’t advocate recruiting unqualified candidates for the purpose of bolstering numbers or meeting quotas. Something entirely different is being advocated – recruiting qualified candidates. End of story. Meeting business needs. End of story. The only difference is an understanding that the traditional recruitment processes may have discriminated against certain groups either directly or indirectly.
I read an HRZone article last week that left me incensed: “The needy and the greedy”: Why diversity plans should be scrapped”. The author, Denis Barnard, insinuated that by hiring with diversity in mind businesses would end up with a second-rate workforce. The author employed a variety of smoke and mirror-type arguments all of which completely missed the point. A diverse workforce brings more skills to the table, in addition to their traditional qualifications of work experience and education. A diverse workforce understands more languages, more cultures, more customers, more business markets, more local customs and more special needs.
Employers must brand themselves and act as equal opportunity employers to remain competitive within the labour market and within the changing economy.
Recruitment processes and policies must be reviewed regularly to ensure that they are not intentionally or unintentionally screening out candidates who could make valuable contributions to the organisation. Job seekers are not immune to the tension over diversity. If they do not feel that they will be welcome or feel that their needs will not be accommodated they will not apply. Candidates and employees don’t want to be told that your organisation is an equal opportunities employer, they want to see it.
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Read ‘The needy and the greedy’: scrap diversity plans. By Denis Barnard
7 Responses
Quantifying the business impact of diversity
This is a very interesting and contemporary topic for discussion. Personally, two main factors have led to growing recognition of and interest in diversity. First, globalisation is bringing different categories of customers to the market place, prompting organisations to question whether they have the appropriate workforce to meet the needs of such customers. The second main factor is corporate restructuring which has led companies to focus on the creation of more vibrant cultures. In the past companies have had very little success in this area and many have recognised that this was very much the result of what Professor Amin Rajan [Chief Executive of the Centre for Research in Employment and Technology in Europe (CREATE)] describes as a predominantly ‘‘male, stale and pale’’ workforce.
While the moral dimension of diversity and inclusion is important, it is very much in the background. Diversity initiatives are market-driven, promoted by the need to have an innovative workforce. It is possible to quantify the business impact in specific situations. For example, in the case of retail banks that were surveyed, specific recruitment initiatives have been introduced to attract minority groups to bank branches. The banks were then able to compare the volume of business conducted prior to these initiatives with that after, revealing an increase of some 30 percent. In addition to such ‘‘before and after’’ comparisons, which are particularly applicable to the retail sector, other organisations have sought qualitative indicators, conducting customer perception and/or staff perception surveys to explore whether a diverse workforce contributes to productivity, morale, customer service and so on. In addition to such quantitative and qualitative assessments, it has to be said that in a majority of organisations it is very much taken as an article of faith that such initiatives bring benefits. I hope this helps Denis Barnard’s willingness to become a believer!!
‘‘Harnessing workforce diversity to raise the bottom line’’ by Professor Amin Rajan,
Barbara Martin and Jenny Latham is the first study of its kind to assess the business benefits of diversity. The study was conducted by CREATE (Centre for Research in Employment and Technology in Europe)with funding from the London Central Learning and Skills Council, the London Human Resource Group, Deutsche Bank and Allen & Overy. CREATE can be contacted on +44 (0) 1892 526757 or visit http://www.create-research.co.uk
Vijay Pereira
Tell that to the Canadian Indians
Lauren,
“Recruiting qualified candidates. End of story. Meeting business needs. End of story.” You don’t say whether you are part of the “brain drain” but I do wonder how up to date you are on the topical equal opportunities issues being debated in the UK.
Equality of opportunity may bring business and social benefits but meeting diverse needs and expectations without creating the perception that there are winners and losers isn’t easy. One persons equality is anothers favouritism. For example most UK employers give “bank holidays” for Christmas and Easter but other faiths have to take annual leave for their religious festivals – that’s not equality but how can we change it without giving even more holidays (which hardly meets business needs) or making the majority feel that they have lost out?
Recent developments in the UK include a senior civil servant setting “targets” for the number of women managers in the civil service. Faced with this target will male candidates believe that they have been treated fairly and won’t even the best female candidates be thought of as only getting the job because they are a woman – just as happened to black police officers under the US quota system?
Recent “research” has suggested that we need “positive discrimination” and some polititians and senior figures in the EO industry are promoting this idea. How is this “recruiting qualified candidates. End of story. Meeting business needs. End of story?”
Our Disability Discrimination Act made “positive discrimination” legal – people who are not disabled have no protection – and the Disability Equality Duty requires public sector organisations to “take account of disabilities even where that involves treating disabled people more favourably”. How is that “recruiting qualified candidates. End of story. Meeting business needs. End of story?”
“Equal opportunities” may be best practice but our current EO industry isn’t helping us to achieve this which is why many people feel we would be better off letting business need drive diversity rather than legislation and quangos.
Where’s the logic?
Denis,
I’m not sure that there are any ‘figures’ that would convince you of anything other than what you already believe.
When you mention, in your first comment, that the figures in the article are cherry-picked, what are you insinuating? Do you believe that Britain isn’t experiencing a demographic shift? Do you dispute that the birthrate is below replacement levels? Logic dictates that diversity awareness in recruitment practices is a valid business approach.
The article you posted is interesting, but I fail to see the logic in throwing the baby out with the bath water. Should we all forget about diversity because some organizations get it wrong?
Quite, Rauf…and quite so….
but where are the figures? Let’s not talk social agenda here, let’s talk solid business figures!!
..and worse, where such sentiments that you express will founder in the public domain are situations such as this : http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=406385&in_page_id=1770
SPOT ON LAUREN!!
The article/reply from Lauren Chesney was spot on the mark. It encapsulated teh key issues of Diversity very well. The benefits of diversity are often overlooked and replaced by the negative, often neo-xenophobic,gloom & doom scenarios by some comentators. Indeed, they deliberately ignore that many from ethnnic minorities suffer direct and indirect discrimination daily and are prevented from taking an active part in the economy. They are not greedy or scroungers-but Needy for equal treatment. Well done Lauren! Perhaps you could drop me a line on rauf@onetel.com
Rauf Mirza
All very well….
…and I promise that the sooner I see some hard and relevant (not cherry-picked)figures proving causality between the currently postulated Diversity utterings and increased profits, the sooner I will willingly become a believer!!
Perhaps we should be looking at why “many areas in the United Kingdom are reporting a brain drain as large numbers of graduates emigrate for better opportunities”
This seems to be a far more urgent priority; why are the opportunities not here in the UK, and are we to understand that in fact the remaining jobs on offer are not such good opportunities? If that is the case, then clearly we don’t need such good candidates? Or have I got this wrong?
The tories change tactics
Interestingly, the Conservative party has just announced that it is shelving its key A-list policy, which aimed to ensure more female and ethnic minority candidates.
David Cameron now wants to change the way that candidates are selected, allowing a greater choice of candidates. This is apparently due to pressure from local parties, which objected to having their choice of candidates restricted.
However, they will still need to ensure that half the candidates they are considering at every stage of the process are women, culminating in a shortlist of two men and two women. It’s interesting that diversity is a selling point of political parties – would it influence your vote?