Celebrating Diversity

Managing diversity in the workplace requires understanding and relating with coworkers who are different than you. The success of an organization is becoming increasingly dependent on the ability of employees and managers to deal with differentiations along diverse

identity lines. Diversity can be categorized in a number of ways. This includes stimulating our thinking about each other’s similarities and differences. Some dimensions of diversity are unchangeable (like gender, ethnicity and physical abilities), but other dimensions may change over time (income, marital status, work experience or religious beliefs).

High Performance organizations recognize the importance of diversity to success. These organizations value contributions of diverse employees and a multicultural approach to managing diversity. This multicultural approach includes three important points:

1. Avoiding the idea that we are all the same.
2. Identifying to the unique contributions of diverse individuals.
3. Striving to provide environments that challenge and support people from all cultural backgrounds.