Workplace Diversity and Organizational Behavior: A Detailed Report

This report examines the multifaceted aspects of workplace diversity within an organizational behavior context. It begins with an introduction defining organizational behavior and workplace diversity, emphasizing the significance of understanding, accepting, and valuing differences among div...Read More

Running head: ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR
Organizational Behavior
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author’s Note:

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Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction...............................................................................................................................2
2.0 Article Summary........................................................................................................................2
3.0 Article Analysis...........................................................................................................................4
4.0 Recommendation......................................................................................................................7
4.1 Clear Communication............................................................................................................7
4.2 Employee Inclusion................................................................................................................7
4.3 Proper Corporate Governance..............................................................................................7
4.4 Diversity Training...................................................................................................................7
5.0 Conclusion..................................................................................................................................8
References.......................................................................................................................................9

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1.0 Introduction
Organizational behavior deals with employee behavior and employee interaction in an
organization. Workplace diversity deals with understanding, accepting and valuing the
differences of diverse employees employed in an organization (Downey et al., 2015).
Organizations can lead to high level of organizational innovation through implementing
effective diversity practice at the workplaces. This study will select three journal articles on the
topic of workplace diversity and summarize the key points of all three journal articles.
Furthermore, the study will also analyze the three articles by finding different similarities and
differences among them. Depending on the findings of the articles, the study will also suggest
some suitable recommendations for the managers of organizations towards better harnessing
workplace diversity.
2.0 Article Summary
Workplace diversity benefits the organizations through fostering innovation and better
decision making. The organizations can get access to large talent pools through hiring diverse
set of employees having different demographic backgrounds. Guillaume et al. (2017) opined
that workplace diversity set double edged nature, which can affect the organizations both
positively as well as negatively. Moreover, the organizations can get diverse set of innovative
ideas from the diverse employee set, but it can also lower the moral of the employees through
conflict among the employees. The Categorization-Elaboration model has defined diversity as
the differences among the employees that lead to different perception among the employees.
As per this theory, diversity undermines the well being, social integration and performance of
the employees because of intergroup biases. The most common moderators of workplace
diversity are like relational diversity, work group diversity and organizational diversity.
Guillaume et al. (2017) also stated that workgroup diversity deals with diverse work-relevant
knowledge from different educational backgrounds, tenure and functional backgrounds. Hence,
such diversity leads to share of diverse work knowledge among each other. On the other hand,

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relational diversity leads to interdependence of employees upon each other leading to
increased employee collaboration.
Contemporary business organizations must realize the increasing importance of
workforce diversity for gaining high level of competitive advantage. However, the
organizational managers must ensure effective diversity practice for proper diversity
management. Downey et al. (2015) pointed out that inclusion and trusted organizational
climate leads to better employee engagement in diverse organizational culture. Successful
diversity program should always communicate the organizational goals to the diverse
employees. It fosters fair diversity climate within the organization, which enhance the
organizational commitment of the employees. On other hand, effective cultural communication
among the employees also reduces the cultural clashes among diverse employees leading to
trusted organizational culture. The supervisors should also be supportive to the employees for
helping them in overcoming the diversity challenges. In this way, the employees feel valued at
their workplace that ultimately enhances the engagement level with their job roles.
Furthermore, Downey et al. (2015) mentioned that inclusion of employees is highly significant
for managing the diverse employees of the organization. Moreover, with proper inclusion, the
employees feel valued and part of the decision making system of their organizations. Hence,
the employees become engaged with the overall goals of their organization, which can even
include diversity programs.
According to Triana et al. (2015), perceived racial discrimination at the workplace is
directly related to the negative job attitude, psychological health and physical health of the
employees. On the other hand, diversity climate is positively associated with the coping
behavior and increased employee outcome of the employees. As per this article, women and
minority employee groups feel more deprived at their workplace as compared with other
minority group. Hence, such minority groups always want to protect themselves from the
workplace discrimination through the changes in large scale employment laws. Moreover, legal
changes in the employment law act the moderator of employee-level prejudice at their
workplace. As per interactional model of cultural diversity (IMCD), fair treatment for diverse

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employees enhance of the outcome of the employees at the workplace. The changes in the
political, social and legal context can influence the threshold of the employees for feeling
deprived of fair treatment. Furthermore, Triana et al. (2015) pointed out that the organizations
may face millions of legal expenses and irreparable damage of public image, when employees
file racial discrimination lawsuits. Hence, the organizations must adhere with the changes in the
laws related to employee discrimination for enhancing employee outcome.
3.0 Article Analysis
Guillaume et al. (2017) pointed out workplace diversity has double edged nature that
can have both positive as well as negative impact on the outcome level of the employees.
Diverse workgroup can foster rich and diverse information for leading organizational
information. However, intergroup bias of diverse employee set undermines information
elaboration among the employees. Moreover, the managers should foster workgroup diversity
for shared knowledge and experience among the employees. Furthermore, this article has also
focused on the relational diversity for enhancing the interdependency of diverse employees on
one another. On the other hand, Downey et al. (2015) has focused on creation of trusted
climate for better diversity practice and proper diversity management in organizations.
Moreover, fair diversity climate enhances the organizational commitment of the employees. As
per this article, the managers of organizations significantly focus on the inclusion of all
employees equally for effective diversity management. This information this article is highly
credible and it can be effectively applied in real work scenario because of its practical
implication. Furthermore, Triana et al. (2015) stated that changes in employment law can affect
the perceived racial discrimination among the employees. However, this article is not much
focused on discussing the strategies to be followed by managers in managing workplace
diversity. Hence, it may not be much application to real workplace scenario.
As per Guillaume et al. (2017), workplace diversity benefits the organizations through
better decision making, more innovation, larger talent pool and wider customer base. Diverse
and unique set of ideas from diverse employee groups leads to organizational innovation.
Furthermore, Downey et al. (2015) also focused on increasing significance of workplace

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diversity in today’s contemporary business organizations for fostering high level of competitive
advantage. However, just like the previous article, this article has also suggested that the
organizations must be focused on proper diversity practice for effective utilization of workplace
diversity and harnessing their advantage in organizational outcome. Both the articles have
suggested several diversity practices through workgroup diversity, inclusion, trusted work
climate and organizational diversity for better diversity management. Furthermore, Triana et al.
(2015) has highlighted the importance of workplace diversity on organizational outcome
through positively perceived racial discrimination. As per this article, the employment
discrimination enhances the ability of the employees towards recruiting qualified employees,
retaining top talents and improving employee performance. This article has highlighted the
changes in the employment laws for better managing racial diversity in organizational settings.
The article written by Guillaume et al. (2017) has demonstrated several moderators of
workplace diversity for better managing the diversity. The relational diversity enhances the
interdependence of the employees among each other that minimize the distance among
diverse employee set. The work group diversity leads shared knowledge and experience among
the employees for maximum utilization of diversity advantage. All the diversity practices
mentioned in this article is indirect on the employees for leading proper diversity management.
On the other hand, Downey et al. (2015) has suggested direct practices of diversity
management to the employees for effective management of employee diversity. Hence, such
strategies can better be implemented in real workplace scenario towards managing diversity
workgroup in organizations. Such article has suggested establishing trusted workplace climate
for leading fair perception of diversity climate with the diverse workgroup of organizations. The
article has also suggested direct inclusion of the diverse workgroup in the organizational
decision making process. Hence, such employees feel equally valued and respected at their
workplaces that lead to increased employee outcome. On the contrary, Triana et al. (2015) just
focused on the changes of social, political and legal perspective for better leading workplace
diversity. However, this article has not provided any direct strategy to the managers of the
organization towards managing workplace diversity effectively. It is just concerned about

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changes in legal aspects for leading fair treat of employees at their workplaces regardless of
their racial background.
The article written by Guillaume et al. (2017) has discussed the workplace diversity
including the employees, who are different from each other in terms of their age, race, gender,
ethnicity, religion, culture, physical structure and other factors. The relational demography
moderator explained in this article has highlighted the social integration and interdependence
of diverse employees on each other. However, the article written by Triana et al. (2015) is
mainly focused on racial diversity, where the employees, who are different in terms of other
demographic factors, are not included in the research. As per this article, racial and women
minority groups mostly feel deprived at their workplace. This statement contradicts with other
two articles, which are concerned with workplace diversity including all kinds of demographic
factors. The research of this article is much specified to the racial discrimination and not on
others. Hence, the diversity practices mentioned in this article may not be applied to real
workplace scenario, which is consisted on employees, who are diverse in terms of other
demographic factors.
Guillaume et al. (2017) have conducted research on 35 organizations for assessing the
work group diversity at the workplaces. The primary information collected from the employees
and managers has proved that social integration among the employees leads to well being and
increased performance level of the employees. Downey et al. (2015) have conducted research
on 4597 diverse employees of a large healthcare organization. Hence, the outcome of the
article is highly authentic can be perfectly applied to the real workplace scenario. On the other
hand, Triana et al. (2015) have conducted researched based on secondary information collected
from different secondary sources. Hence, it may not provide actual discrimination scenario of
the workplace.

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4.0 Recommendation
4.1 Clear Communication
The managers of the organization should clearly communicate the organizational goals
among the employee irrespective of their backgrounds. It will help the employees to
understand the actual purpose and diversity benefits on the organization. In this way, the
employees will feel highly valued at their workplace, which will lead them to accept the
organizational diversity. Furthermore, clear communication of organization goals will encourage
the diverse employees to work in collaboration with each other for achieving the common
organizational goals.
4.2 Employee Inclusion
Employee inclusion is one of the most significant ways of managing workplace diversity
at the workplace. Moreover, the managers of organizations should include the all the employee
equally in the organizational decision making process. In this way, the employees will have a
feel of fair treatment at their workplaces. Hence, all the employees irrespective of their
demographic backgrounds will be willing to work in collaboration with each other.
4.3 Proper Corporate Governance
Proper corporate governance is extremely important for the managing workplace
diversity and harness the diversity advantage in organizational outcome. Moreover, the
managers of organizations should adhere with all the employee discrimination laws before
making the employment policies for diverse set of employees. In this way, the adherence with
the discrimination laws would lead to perception of fair treatment among the diverse set of
employees.
4.4 Diversity Training
The managers of contemporary business organizations must implement diversity
training programs for better managing workplace diversity. In such training, the managers will
train the employees for enhancing their cultural understanding for different culture of the

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diverse employee set. It will ultimately encourage the employees to respect each other
irrespective of their different backgrounds.
5.0 Conclusion
While concluding the three articles, it can be said that organizations can effective harness
workplace diversity for leading organizational innovation. However, the managers of the
organizations must be able to manage workplace diversity through proper diversity practices.
Relational demographic and inter group diversity leads to interdependence and shared
knowledge among diverse set of employees. On the other hand, trusted diversity culture leads to
perception of fair employee treatment irrespective of their demographic background. Proper
employee inclusion also leads to effective diversity management in organization. Furthermore,
changes in employment laws always foster perception of fair treatment for diverse set of
employees in organizations.

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References
Downey, S. N., Werff, L., Thomas, K. M., & Plaut, V. C. (2015). The role of diversity practices and
inclusion in promoting trust and employee engagement. Journal of Applied Social
Psychology, 45(1), 35-44.
Guillaume, Y. R., Dawson, J. F., Otaye-Ebede, L., Woods, S. A., & West, M. A. (2017). Harnessing
demographic differences in organizations: What moderates the effects of workplace
diversity?. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 38(2), 276-303.
Triana, M. D. C., Jayasinghe, M., & Pieper, J. R. (2015). Perceived workplace racial discrimination
and its correlates: A meta-analysis. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 36(4), 491-513.