How Can Diversity Inclusion Bring A Change In The Organization

How Can Diversity Inclusion bring a Change in The Organization

[Name of the Writer]

[Name of the Institution]

How Can Diversity Inclusion bring a Change in The Organization

Introduction

First of all, what is “Diversity” in the workplace? A diverse workplace is one that believes in giving respect and recognition to every single individual from all across the border, it projects equality. An individual should be appreciated for their culture, religion, ethnicity and social group that they belong to. This brings richness in the work environment and helps people learn from one another. Diversity in the workplace is essential. In fact, it brings the change in an organization that is necessary to flourish both financially and in terms of productivity as well. The firm McKinsey documents in its “Why diversity matters” report; that the organizations which had high diversity flourished more as opposed to the companies that did not. Further, even when the employees are dealing with the consumers, diversity is required. When the employee is more aware in regards to diverse cultures and religions they can deal with the customers from different backgrounds better (Barak, Findler & Wind, 2016). It also instills the skill of understanding what the client wants and what they are looking for in the product or service. So, diversity inclusion can aid a company to grow both internally as well as externally. In this paper, the main thing that will be discussed is the fact that how diversity inclusion can bring about change in the organization.

Discussion

When an organization inculcates strong diversity inclusion strategy deep in the roots of the organization, it helps attract top-notch talent, drive innovative results and bring sustainability to the workplace (Benn, Edwards & Williams, 2018). Word of mouth is everything when it comes to the world of business. When a workplace is diverse it automatically makes the employees comfortable. The comfort level is what makes employees more productive and shine in the company. The employee's productivity level is what will make the company skyrocket. When there is diversity inclusion the company will change in the most positive manner. It will be recognized by both the employees, new talent and the employees. Today, the main topic of discussion amongst the majority of the people is inclusiveness. The business can be of anything. The example of Victoria's Secrets can be taken into consideration here. The models that they were using were mostly white and very thin. Apart from the lack of body type representation their sizes were not the best either. Over time they brought diversity and that changed their organization. The fact that they started including women of color made the company grow because of the appreciation from different ethnic groups. Further, recently they did a shoot with a model who is considered plus size (Barak, Findler & Wind, 2016). This also helped the organization grow through change. All the people that thought they were not inclusive ended up changing their opinions. The company is a large name, they needed to instill diversity and change the image of their brand. Further, they made a mark by tapping the Asian market. They have a few models who walk and do shoots for the brand, which further changed the organization’s image in the market.

The example of “Dove” can be taken as well, their campaign for real women was taken as an example to be shown to Victoria’s Secrets and other brands. They focused on women of all sizes and color when making their campaign. There are companies who instilled Diversity as their main goal form the very beginning that is why they are such huge success. Rihana’s brand Fenty Beauty can be taken into consideration (Theodorakopoulos & Budhwar, 2015). She hired women of all sizes and color for her makeup brand as well as her clothing line. She also made sure that there were male models as well in her makeup campaigns so it can indicate that her brand is for all genders. Change is not just internal it is external as well. If a company is inclusive, the customers from all diverse backgrounds are attracted towards the brand as well. This increase the sales of the products, which in return benefits the company financially (Theodorakopoulos & Budhwar, 2015). Further, when it comes to the internal change, when the culture is diverse the CEO is inclusive the employees work with great harmony and coordination. This again aids in the productivity and financial stability of the company.

Kotter’s Eight Steps

These eight steps can be beneficial for every organization which wants to bring a change. These days the main change that all the businesses are aiming for is to make their brand diversity inclusive. Let us explain how change can be implemented via these steps. The example of a clothing company can be kept under consideration to get a rough idea of how the model works. Carl is the owner of a clothing company, he is seeing that the revenues are going down the hill recently (Salman & Broten, 2017). After thorough observation and going through the comments on the pages of his brand on social media, he can see that the customers are complaining that the brand is not inclusive enough. The plus-sized women and men can never find clothes, the brand only caters to people who are thin. There are other people who complain that the brand does not have any women and men of color representations in their shoots and campaigns. There are some people who say that the brand is targeted only for white people. Carl is also in the belief of the fact that he needs to be more inclusive.

Sense of Urgency

So Carl decides to hold a meeting with his employees. He tells them that the company is not doing well financially, and because of this issue the employees might lose their jobs. Carl assures that closing the clothing company is the last thing that he wants to do (Salman & Broten, 2017). He shares the fact that the company needs to go through a change in order to secure the jobs of all the employees. All the workers after hearing this are determined to do whatever it takes to make the change a reality. Carl tells the employees that how they are having problems sustaining since society and the target audience is not happy with their products. They need to have diversity inclusion in order to make an impact on society and show them that their brand is inclusive and is for “EVERYONE.”

Creation of the Guiding Coalition

Now that Carl has instilled the urgency of the problem, he needs to decide who his guiding coalition will be. He selected 4 employees for that. Maria to find more diverse models from all ethnicity, Carol to work on the new size range, Adam to come up with attractive new pricing and Sarah to market the new take of the brand (Salman & Broten, 2017). These employees will help implement and bring about the necessary change.

Creation and Communication of the Change Vision

In this step, Carl needs to assure all the employees how the steps that are being taken will aid in the sustainability of the company. This new change will make sure that the employees get to keep their jobs and the company further flourishes. Further, he will be communicating the new change and the vision that is associated with this change to everyone in the company. Carl will talk about the company becoming diversity inclusive and its impact on the long-term sustainability of the organization.

Generation of Short-term Wins

Carl suggests to make short-term wins the company needs to market and advertise how they will be catering to plus size customers as well. He believes that a photo shoot is the best way to do this. The thing with clothing brands is that the more they are marketed the better the results. The models that will be used will also be of diverse culture (Salman & Broten, 2017). They will be dressed in the samples of the new clothes sizes that the company has created. This will indeed make a stir in the target audience.

Further, Build on the Change

Carl says that the company has to build on the change further as well. They cannot stop here, they need to assure the people that they are an inclusive organization. So, they will start more projects on this motto and have the same objective when hiring new employees as well.

Incorporation of Change in Culture

The most important thing is that Carl incorporates this change in the organization as well. Appreciate every milestone that has been achieved. Further, the employees should be shown that the culture is more diverse now and the change is not just external it is internal as well.

Conclusion

It is good to see that the majority of the business leaders are acknowledging the fact that cultivating equality in the organization is not just the right move but the smart move. Different surveys and data have made it evident that people both employees and customers have actually started to expect equality in all regards when a new business emerges. Equality has a tangible impact on the bottom line Salesforce (Benn, Edwards & Williams, 2018). After surveying around 1500 business professionals it was found out that 80% of them have a belief that organizations have the responsibility to go and look beyond profit. Now, impacting society is also part of the job. As research by McKinsey proves that the companies that have more gender diversity have a 21% more chance to outperform other businesses.

References

Salman, Y., & Broten, N. (2017). Leading Change. Macat Library.

Benn, S., Edwards, M., & Williams, T. (2018). Organizational change for corporate sustainability. Routledge.

Barak, M. E. M., Findler, L., & Wind, L. H. (2016). Diversity, inclusion, and commitment in organizations: International empirical explorations. Journal of Behavioral and Applied Management, 2(2), 813.

Theodorakopoulos, N., & Budhwar, P. (2015). Guest editors' introduction: Diversity and inclusion in different work settings: Emerging patterns, challenges, and research agenda. Human Resource Management, 54(2), 177-197.