Analyzing Hewlett Packard's Dandelion Program for Diversity Management

This report provides an in-depth analysis of Hewlett Packard's (HP) Dandelion Program, a case study focused on diversity management and the inclusion of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) within the workforce. The report examines the program's structure, including the use of 'pods' f...Read More

Running head: DIVERSITY MANAGEMENT IN HEWLETT PACKARD
DIVERSITY MANAGEMENT IN HEWLETT PACKARD
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Executive Summary
The report is based on the analysis of the case study of Hewlett Packard’s Dandelion
Program. The case study is discussed and analysed in detail and the issues of the case are also
examined in the report. The major issue of the case study is related to the inclusion of the
people who belong to the Autism Spectrum into the processes of the organization. The talent
of these people are used for the improvement for the organizations. The organizations in
Australia have a low rate of inclusion of the people of Autism Spectrum and this program can
further help in increasing the rate of autistic people.

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Table of Contents
Introduction....................................................................................................................3
Identification of the key people......................................................................................3
Identification of the key issues.......................................................................................4
Solution to the issue in the case.....................................................................................7
Recommendation............................................................................................................7
References......................................................................................................................8

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Introduction
The case study is based on Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s “Dandelion Program” that
mainly introduces a new service for the clients of the company so that they can draw special
talents from the people with autism. Pods have been deployed by the organization for 8 to 9
employees who are suffering from autism, which are mini-ecosystems with high performance
are much more effective as compared to normal service teams.
The main subject of the case study is related to the ways by which diversity and
especially neurodiversity can be converted into competitive advantage. The ways in which
people who were considered unsuitable for the job can become major part of the service
offering which is in high demand (Barak, 2016).
The important aspect of the Dandelion program is to understand the advantages of
diversity and way it affects the operations of an organization. The case study is related to the
analysis of these advantages and the ways of using these for the organization.
Identification of the key people
The Dandelion program had started in the year 2014 and the program was announced
by Minister for Human Services, Senator the Han. The program was established with the help
of a partnership between the Australian Human Services department, DXC Technology
Australia and Specialisterne. The program is mainly based on the employment of disabled
who suffer from autism. The Dandelion program has employed more than 55 people on the
spectrum on autism in the areas of data analysis, cyber security and software testing. These
areas are mainly related to the delivery of services to the departments like, the Australian
Department Human Services, Department of Immigration and Border Protection, Department
of Defence (Currie et al. 2017). The participation rates of the disable employees in the
organizations of Australia is 53%, which is less than the 60% participation of the other

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partner countries. The Dandelion program has experienced a retention rate of 96%, which is
above than the Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
Identification of the key issues
The major issue that is being addressed in the case study is the non-participation of
the employees who suffer from autism in the organizational operations. Autism Spectrum
mainly affects the ability of the individuals which can help them in interacting socially. The
people who are affected by this disorder face major problems in understanding the degrees of
communication which include verbal and non-verbal communication as well. They are not
able to connect properly by the usage of the reflexive signals related to attentiveness which
mainly includes eye contact during conversation (Goffin & Mitchell, 2016).
These people mainly lack the confidence during social interactions and also
experience anxiety while connecting with people in the social situations. Some of them are
over sensitive to different stimuli like light or noise, some have the problem of limited
imagination, they can also resist to the changes that can occur in their routines and further
exhibit repetitive behaviour. The people or the employees in the Autism spectrum can also
possess some gifts or special abilities along with the different challenges. The gifts that can
be possessed by the employees of this spectrum are the ability related to focus, strong
memory and impressive diligence (Goodman & Dingli, 2017).
Some of these people are also capable of exhibiting exceptional behaviour, which are
detecting or memorising subtle mistakes and noticing patterns or errors that are not visible to
others. The enhanced ability of these people to focus on different tasks can help them in
completing monotonous tasks which can be difficult for the normal people. More than 50%
of the total people who belong to the autism spectrum have abilities of higher or average
levels. However, in spite of these factors the rates of unemployment are more than 86% in

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this sector. The studies conducted by Peter Maskell who is the President of Autism Asperger
ACT and also a partner at PwC state that the people belonging to the spectrum of autism is
50% and the people who are employed is around 34% (Jain et al. 2017).
According to the estimates, it is suggested that around 200,000 of the Australians
suffering from autism and are of working age are unemployed or under-employed. The major
reason behind the under employment or unemployment of the people suffering from autism is
mainly social difficulties that they face for being a part of the Autism spectrum. The main
goal of the Dandelion program is therefore to surpass these social problems so that they can
deliver quality services to the customers and further improve the competitive advantage of
HPE. This is turn can also generate high profits for the participants of the program and
Australian society as well. The image of the Dandelion program was established by an
employment enabling organization who have the aim to provide more than one million
employment opportunities to the people belonging to the Autism spectrum (Kirton & Greene,
2015).
The organization is named as Specialisterne and it originates in Denmark. Hewlett
Packard has been partnering with this organization in Australia to implement the Dandelion
program in the organizations. The other departments that are connected with Hewlett Packard
to implement this program in the Australian organizations are, Human Services department of
Australia, Defence department, Immigration department. The program was elevated to an
international or global stage in December, 2015 in an annual meeting of the company under
the “Living Progress” program of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (Linkedin.com., 2018).
The main focus of the Dandelion program is build the career, independence, resilience
of the individuals who are a part of this program. The focus of this program is not only on the
technical skills of the employees, they are also focussed on the ways to build the executive or

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adaptive functional skills. The jobs that are performed by the teams of the Dandelion program
are analytics, cyber security and analytics. The reports suggest that the program has been able
to hire as well as place many employees in the organization who are a part of the Autism
spectrum. The employees have been hired into the pods that are mainly used for the purpose
of software testing within the Human Services department of Australia (Liu et al. 2017).
The rules and regulations that are implemented by the Department of Human Services
of Australia were complex in nature. The consequences of not following these rules were
huge for the employees. The detailed focussed work process of the department was fit for the
operations, however, the department required support of the political leaders or the executives
so that they can move forward. The department was readily supported by the different
political leaders in all the levels of the ministry. Hewlett Packard mainly engaged with
another organization externally which is named as Autism South Australia and the many
other groups as well. The major innovation that was in the Dandelion program within Hewlett
Packard is the way of organising the employees who suffer from autism within pods that are
mainly designed so that it can be placed into the client organizations (Mor Barak, 2015).
The changes in the composition of pods were quite less, however, the ratio of the
number of employees in the pods were maintained. The major concept of the pod was to
provide the structure and support with the help of the different phases related to on-boarding.
The people who are part of the Autism Spectrum have the ability of focussing in a strong
manner, extreme level of thoroughness and excellent memory mainly related to the repetitive
tasks that are considered as monotonous. The participants of the program are able to detect
the errors between a huge number of outputs and also notice many patterns that are not
visible to others (Sabharwal, 2014).

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Solution to the issue in the case
The main issue that is addressed in the case is the usage and advantages of disability
in the organizations of Australia. The approach of the different organizations related to the
utilisation of the talent from the non-traditional sources is also a major issue in the case study.
The major areas that are addressed in the case study are innovation management, diversity
management, accommodating disable employees and the advantages related to disability. The
solution to this problem is also discussed in the case study (Syed & Ozbilgin, 2015). The
Dandelion program is related to usage of the people belonging to the Autism spectrum in the
organization. The main motto of the program is that untapped potential can lead to a terrible
waste of talent. This is the sad reality of the people who are a part of this spectrum. The
Dandelion program is mainly responsible for including these people on-board so that they can
be included in the competitive jobs and this is opening opportunities for these people as well
(Wrench, 2014).
Recommendation
The main recommendation that can be given in this case study is that all the global
organizations need to implement this program so that the people belonging to the Autism
spectrum can be included in the mainstream business environment. This will help in utilising
the abilities and potential of these employees. The major effect of this program will be to
bring these people in all the operations of the organization and help fight against the different
problems related to the society.

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References
Barak, M. E. M. (2016). Managing diversity: Toward a globally inclusive workplace. Sage
Publications.
Currie, D., Gormley, T., Roche, B., & Teague, P. (2017). The management of workplace
conflict: Contrasting pathways in the HRM literature. International Journal of
Management Reviews, 19(4), 492-509.
Goffin, K., & Mitchell, R. (2016). Innovation Management: Effective Strategy and
Implementation. Palgrave Macmillan.
Goodman, M., & Dingli, S. M. (2017). Creativity and Strategic Innovation Management:
Directions for Future Value in Changing Times. Taylor & Francis.
Jain, A., Dediu, V., Zwetsloot, G., & Leka, S. (2017). Workplace Innovation and Wellbeing
at Work: A Review of Evidence and Future Research Agenda. In Workplace
Innovation (pp. 111-128). Springer, Cham.
Kirton, G., & Greene, A. M. (2015). The dynamics of managing diversity: A critical
approach. Routledge.
Linkedin.com. (2018). Retrieved 14 January 2018, from
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-hpe-dandelion-program-now-harvard-business-
school-fieldhouse
Liu, D., Gong, Y., Zhou, J., & Huang, J. C. (2017). Human resource systems, employee
creativity, and firm innovation: The moderating role of firm ownership. Academy of
Management Journal, 60(3), 1164-1188.

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Mor Barak, M. E. (2015). Inclusion is the key to diversity management, but what is
inclusion?. Human Service Organizations: Management, Leadership &
Governance, 39(2), 83-88.
Sabharwal, M. (2014). Is diversity management sufficient? Organizational inclusion to
further performance. Public Personnel Management, 43(2), 197-217.
Syed, J., & Ozbilgin, M. (Eds.). (2015). Managing diversity and inclusion: an international
perspective. Sage.
Wrench, J. (2014). Diversity management. Routledge International Handbook of Diversity
Studies, 254.