Gender Diversity in the Workplace: Comparative Analysis

Running head: LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT
Leadership and management
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1LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT
Introduction
Gender diversity is one of the major and important for elements to be considered in the
current business scenario. This is due to the reason that business firms as well as the government
sectors are promoting the equal representation of the women in the workplace and it is also
considered as one of the key elements of ethical principles. However, the actual organizational
scenario is different to that of the expected results. This is due to the reason that needs of the
organization is different to that preferences of the employees and there are number of regulatory
limitations also contributing in the same. In this case, there are different authors who have given
different opinions regarding the evidence of gender diversity in the real world situation.
Windscheid et al. (2015) stated about the differences between the need of the organization and
the employee preferences and on the other hand, Dobson, Hensley and Rastad (2017) stated
about the differences in the effectiveness of the government quotas of gender diversity and
shareholder resolutions. Hence, further evaluation will be beneficial to have the holistic
knowledge and understanding about the issue.
This paper will do a comparative analysis and between these two articles and will
conclude a more concrete version of the gender diversity in the workplace. It is expected that a
few more important points can be identified from this comparative review.
Gender diversity comparative analysis
Prior to the analysis of the current trends and practices of gender diversity, it is important
to have the understanding about the benefits of promoting gender diversity and why it is
important. The most important benefit of gender diversity is the extensive and diverse sets of
opinions and viewpoints towards certain issues. This is due to the reason that men and women

2LEADERSHIP AND MANAGEMENT
are having different views towards any issues and comes up with completely different
approaches. Thus, the organizations with higher level of gender diversity are having the higher
potentiality of gaining diverse solutions against a certain issue. This should also be noted that
gender diversity can also be beneficial in optimal utilization of the human resources. This is due
to the reason that any regions will have the access to skilled and unskilled human resources and
this will comprise both the men and women. Thus, the companies with higher representation of
women will be able to tap the maximum utility in terms of both the genders. Moreover, apart
from the organizational benefits, gender equality is also directly related to the women
empowerment in the society. This is due to the fact that the more will be the representation of the
women in the workplace; the more will their empowerment in the society. Thus, it can be
concluded that equal representation and gender diversity should be maintained in the
contemporary workplace conditions.
However, it is stated by Windschied et al. (2015) that in terms of the gender diversity
needs of the organization differ with that of the employee preferences. This is due to the reason
that according to many employees, women can be recruited in the lower and middle level
sections but not to the upper level management because according to the common perception,
major sections of the employees will not accept the women in the upper level or leadership
position. Thus, the acceptance of the women in the top level management is less. In this case, the
authors tried to relate the holistic social problem with that of the challenges in maintaining the
gender diversity in the workplace. In this article, Windschied et al. (2015) stated that developed
economics such as Germany, United Kingdom and United States are also having lower rate of
women participation of the women in the top level management. This is contrary to the fact that
each of these countries is having more than 50 percent of the female participation in the labor