Amazon's Diversity, Inclusion, and Gender Pay Gap Project

This research project investigates the impact of diversity inclusion and the gender pay gap on employee performance, focusing on a case study of Amazon. The project begins with an introduction outlining the research's rationale, aim, and objectives, followed by a literature review exploring existing research on diversity, inclusion, and gender pay disparities. The methodology chapter details the research philosophy (positivism), research methodology (quantitative), and data collection methods (surveys and questionnaires). The data analysis section then examines the findings, followed by conclusions and recommendations for Amazon to enhance diversity, inclusion, and address the gender pay gap. The project also includes a reflection on alternative research methodologies and provides comprehensive references and an appendix. The study aims to understand the concepts of diversity inclusion and gender pay gap, analyze their influence on employee performance, and evaluate strategies to enhance diversity and reduce the pay gap within the organization. The research uses random sampling to survey 40 Amazon employees to gather data on these issues.

ResearchProject

Table of Contents
Title of the Project...........................................................................................................................1
Chapter 1: Introduction....................................................................................................................1
Chapter 2: Literature Review...........................................................................................................3
Chapter 3: Research Methodology and Data Collection..................................................................6
Chapter 4: Data Analysis and Interpretation....................................................................................8
Chapter 5: Conclusion and Recommendation................................................................................19
Conclusion............................................................................................................................19
Recommendation..................................................................................................................19
Chapter 6: Reflection & Recommendation of Alternative Research Methodology......................20
References......................................................................................................................................22
Appendix........................................................................................................................................24

Title of the Project
An examination on diversity inclusion and the gender pay gap.
Chapter 1: Introduction
Overview of the Research
The present study initiates to examine the potential impact of diversity inclusion and the gender
pay gap over the performance of the employees. However, diversity inclusion and gender pay
gap are two important aspect of business which are widely considered by the businesses to aid
the operations in imperative manner. As businesses continue to move the needle and bring to the
forefront emerging focus for the diverse workforce, gender equality and the gender pay gap
(Cano, 2020). Diversity inclusion is a wider aspect which is effectively be considered by the
businesses for the intention to enhancing the operations at wider level, thus, diversity is all about
involving people from different culture, background, region, gender, age, perspective, skills and
background to amplify the operations of the business and also brings innovation and create a
broader connection to the world. In addition to this, gender pay gap is defined as the average
difference among hourly wages for men and women. It is mainly calculated via considering
several parameters used to the total number of employed members of both genders within a
business. Therefore, businesses in the modern era are concern over managing equality and also
enhancing diversity at workplace, as it is valuable for the businesses to enhance the approach at
wider level. In this present study, Amazon E-commerce is selected to explore better
understanding about the chosen subject. Thus, it is a large American multinational technology
company. The organisation is headquartered in Seattle Washington, United States. It was
founded in the year 1994 with Jeff Bezos. The company has its operation throughout the globe
and they have more than 10, 00,00 employees who are both male and female working at different
locations of the organisation successfully. The major focus of organisation is upon cloud
computing, digital streaming, e-commerce, and artificial intelligence and so on. It is also often
considered to be one of the big five companies in the United States. The organisation is often
counted between great technology company’s name which is Apple, Google, Microsoft and
Facebook.
Rationale of the Research
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The key rationale behind conducting an investigation over such a big area of diversity
inclusion and gender pay gap is that, these two are the major concern of the business and creates
a lot issue over the growth operations of the business. Therefore, the study is imperative in
providing suitable idea about the impact over diversity inclusion and the appropriate assessment
of gender pay gap over increasing performance of the employees at workplace (Fine, Sojo and
Lawford‐Smith, 2020). Thus, equality and diversity maintenance helps the business in aiding the
operations in right manner to enhance overall growth. However, the primary intention to execute
the analysis over this specific subject is that diversity and equality within pay gap are the widely
considered aspects of the business and needs appropriate recognition to manage the issue
effectively. The another reason for executing this analysis is the personal interest of the
researcher as the, investigator wants to explore own capability in relation to the specific aspect
(Pierszalowski, Vue and Bouwma-Gearhart, 2018).
Research aim
“The major aim of the report is to examine the impact of diversity inclusion and the gap in
gender pay upon the performance of employees in the organisation.” A case study on Amazon.
Research objectives
Below mentioned are the various objective of the following report:
 To understand and analyse concept of tigers city inclusion along with gender pay gap.
 To understand and analyse major influences of gender pay gap on performance and
productivity of employees in an organisation.
 To evaluate various strategies that can help organisation in order to enhance the diversity
inclusion and reduce gender pay gap to positively effect the performance of employees in an
organisation.
Research question:
Below mentioned are the various questions which are interconnected with different objectives of
the research:
 What are the major concept of diversity inclusion and gender pay in an organisation?
 How does gender pay gap and diversity inclusion affect the performance of employees in
an organisation?
 What are the different ways in which organisation confirm strategies in order to reduce
the gender pay gap and also enhance diversity inclusion in an organisation?
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Chapter 2: Literature Review
Literature review is imperative in enhancing understanding in relation to a specific subject;
therefore, it is effective in developing in-depth analysis to explore idea and recognition.
Therefore, this section of exploration is relay over secondary sources of information
(Richardson, 2014). In this information accumulation is based over books, journals, articles and
so on.
Diversity inclusion and gender pay gap within an organisation
According to Bush (2020), diversity inclusion and gender pay gap are necessary for every
organisation. Diversity as well as inclusion is two points which are interconnected in an
organisation. There are number of different individuals in an organisation who belong to
different religion, ethnicity, gender, age, origin and sexual orientation. Diversity refers to making
a human resource department which consist of all the different people with different values and
beliefs and of different culture. Inclusion refers to contribution and presence of different type of
people within the working of an organisation. Pay gap is the perspective in an organisation where
the wages that are paid to men and women are different. Usually the problem of gender pay gap
arises when the woman in the organisation is paid less than the men in an organisation. In order
to follow diversity the pay between women and men in an organisation or also required to be
equal. Incorporation of diversity and inclusion along with reducing gender pay gap is a practice
that will help organisation to successfully acknowledge over its problems and work towards a
healthy working environment.
Different influences of gender pay gap and lack of diversity inclusion on performance of
human resource in organisation
According to Skye Schooley (2019), gender pay gap and lack of diversity inclusion are the two
imperative challenge of the business and has direct negative impact over the performance of the
employees and the entire business as well. Therefore, the gender pay gap can aid to transform in
the working environment, involving a diminish in satisfaction (and retention) from female
workers and a discriminatory attitude in other areas that could aid to other types of
discrimination claims. Gender pay gap and the lack of diversity inclusion has decreases the
operation of the business, affects the morale of employees working, reducing the collaborative
working, issue in taking effective decision and so on (Post and Byron, 2015). However, Amazon
is operating at a large level and has its major concern over developing the operations of the
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business and for this, it is imperative for the business and its management to manage gender pay
gap issues and also promoting diversity inclusion within the business practices, therefore, the
suitable assessment of both the aspects will help the business in enhancing the operations at
wider level.
Various strategies which can used by an organisation in order to enhance the diversity and
reduce the gender pay gap in order to increase performance and productivity of employees
According to the Pierszalowski, Vue and Bouwma-Gearhart, (2018), in the modern business
era the key motive of each businesses is to attaining higher growth and success and lack of
diversity inclusion and the gender pay gap, inequality and so on are the key issues which are
widely affects the operations of the business. Amazon is a large multinational e-commerce
company which is working with a large range of employees and the employees has facing the
issue of lack of diversity inclusion and the gender pay gap. Thus, there are assorted measures that
will help Amazon e-commerce organisation to enhance diversity inclusion and overcoming
gender pay gap issues in order to enhance performance of organisation and its employees.
However, the use of inclusive work model is termed to be the best strategy which is widely
implement by the business to attain higher growth and success. Acknowledge and honour
multiple religious and cultural practices, providence of diversity training, suitable
implementation of diversity and inclusive practices are the major ways which can also be
implement by the business to attain higher growth and success (Marinova, Plantenga and
Remery, 2016).
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Chapter 3: Research Methodology and Data Collection
Research methodology is combination of multiple approaches and the applications that are
imperative to aid an investigation in right manner with providing suitable and systematic
guidance. In the present research context based on the aspect of examine the impact of diversity
inclusion and gender pay gap on performance of employees, suitable selection of methodology
helps in aiding the project in right manner (Christy and Fox, 2014).
Research Philosophy: Research philosophy is an appropriate system of the investigation thought
that are following over the reliable knowledge in relation to the research objective that are
obtained from the others. The philosophical belief is mainly relay over two aspects i.e.
positivism and Interpretivism research philosophy. Therefore, in the context to this present
investigation work, positivism philosophy is being implemented by the researcher, as it is
imperative in rendering descriptive evaluation over the aspect of diversity inclusion and the
gender pay gap and how these influences the performance of the employees (Gupta, Goktan and
Gunay, 2014). However, positivism philosophy is appropriate to execute quantitative analysis as
in this information is being gathered over statistical norms.
Research Methodology: The suitable selection of methodology is the fundamental aspect to be
considered by the researcher at the initial stage of start the project. Therefore, the selection of
methodology is mainly relay over qualitative and quantitative research methods. The selection of
research is based on the information accumulated over a specific subject. In performing the
existing project based on the aspect of determining the impact of diversity inclusion and gender
pay gap on performance of employees, quantitative research is being considered by the
researcher, thus it is imperative in conducting descriptive evaluation as in this information
accumulation is relay over actual facts and figures which are interconnected with the selected
subject area (Karimi and et. al., 2016). Quantitative research is imperative in providing suitable
descriptive evaluation an helps in drawing valid and reliable outcome.
Data collection tools: There are two different kind of aspects included in the data collection
which are primary as well as secondary sources through which the data can be collected by an
organisation. It is necessary to execute a project in order to make sure that there are various data
present in the research to reach out to a conclusion. When taking the following research into
consideration the project is majorly based upon determining what are the impact of gender pay
gap and diversity inclusion on the employees working in Amazon. The help of both primary as
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well as secondary tools are taken in order to support the research in sufficient manner. Some of
the data is collected with the help of secondary tools on the other hand major data for the report
is collected using surveys and questionnaires which will help to gather information about the
employees in the organisation.
Data sampling: Data sampling refers to sampling of the people who are present in order to
decide the population on which research is conducted. There are two aspects of samples which
are probabilistic and non-probabilistic sampling tools. When taking the present investigation into
consideration in order to determine the influence of diversity inclusion as a less gender pay gap
on performance of employs the sample of probabilistic tool used is random sampling. Random
sampling has helped to analyse 40 employees of the organisation through which the information
regarding the topic is collected.
Ethical Consideration: In the execution of an investigation work, ethics are required to be
recognised by the investigator as it is the primary obligation of the investigator to follow all the
research ethics and norms for the purpose of better execution of the work without facing any sort
of issue and hazardous (Maiorescu-Murphy, 2020). In the present research context, both primary
and secondary research are executed and for this research needs to receive consent of the
participants in the form of consent form , thus the researcher needs to follow all the ethics
implemented by the government in taking approval from the participants. In addition to this, the
researcher also needs to avoid miss behave which affected the emotions and sentiments of the
participants as people are very conscious about their private data, so participants also ensure to
not asking any personal information. In the execution of secondary investigation researcher also
needs to ensure to gather data from the authentic sources and taking prior approval from the
online sites and web pages to gather suitable data (Meyers and Vallas, 2016).
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Chapter 4: Data Analysis and Interpretation
Data analyses can be successfully defined as a procedure in which inspection, cleansing,
transforming as well as modelling of various information is done in order to analyse and discover
various conclusions using the data which is available. In the following aspect of investigation the
data which is present provides good assistance while evaluating the information successfully. In
the context of following research the information is majorly based upon thematic analyses and
the themes for the research are developed with the help of different questions present in the
questionnaire. Along with this a frequency table is also showing the representation of different
information which is collected during the questionnaire.
Frequency Table
Q1) Do you have an appropriate recognition about the conceptual framework of
diversity inclusion and gender pay gap in the context to business?
Frequency
Yes 39
No 1
Q2) What do you think, the suitable assessment of diversity and the gender pay
gap is imperative for the businesses to improvise the working of employees at
workplace?
Frequency
Yes 38
No 2
Q3) According to you, the suitable management of equality in pay or the diversity
aspects are effective for Amazon in increasing employees working?
Frequency
Yes 37
No 3
Q4) As per your perspective, what are the major reasons of managing equality
and diversity at workplace?
Frequency
Competitive edge 8
Promoting equality 7
Developing innovation 8
Better decision making 7
Retaining talent and energies 10
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Q5) What do you think, are the major benefits gained by Amazon via the suitable
assessment of equality in pay or diversity inclusion at workplace?
Frequency
Increasing business performance 10
Faster problem solving 10
Enhancing coordination and collaboration 10
Developing productivity 10
Q6) According to your opinion, what are the major issue of inequality and
diversity are faces by the businesses?
Frequency
Unequal pay 12
Inequality among employees 8
Higher employee turnover 10
Unconscious bias 10
Q7) As per your view, what challenges are faced by Amazon due to the issue of
gender pay gap and diversity inclusion?
Frequency
Lower productivity 12
Non-inclusive workforce 8
Accuracy of reporting 10
Decreasing employees morale 10
Q8) According to you, in what manner the assessment of diversity and equality
influences the operations of Amazon?
Frequency
Positive 36
Negative 2
Neutral 2
Q9) What do you think are the potential measures which can be implement by
Amazon e-commerce organisation to enhance diversity inclusion and overcoming
gender pay gap issues in order to enhance performance of organisation and its
employees?
Frequency
Use of inclusive workplace model 8
Acknowledge and honour multiple religious and cultural practices 7
Providence of diversity training 10
Equal Pay 7
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Suitable policy of equality and diversity 8
Thematic Analysis
Theme 1) The conceptual framework of diversity inclusion and gender pay gap in the context to
business.
Q1) Do you have an appropriate recognition about the conceptual framework of
diversity inclusion and gender pay gap in the context to business?
Frequency
Yes 39
No 1
Interpretation: The following research is executed to determine the recognition of individual in
relation to the conceptual framework of diversity inclusion and gender pay gap in the context of
business therefore, analysis is being executed with the support of conducting survey and this
survey is taking place in between 40 participants out of which 39 are well known about the
concept as well as importance of the conceptual knowledge of gender pay gap as well as
diversity inclusion in an organisation. On the other hand only one employee in the sample is not
aware about the following fact.
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