Reflections and Growth in the Psychology of Diversity Introduction During my time enrolled in Psy 3325: Stereotypes, Prejudice Discrimination, taught by Dr. Tay Hack, we explored several topics concerning social differences. Using the textbook ‘ Understanding the Psychology of Diversity’ second Edition, I gained a deeper understanding of how the mind groups individuals together both consciously and unconsciously thus influencing the way we treat a person. In this course we covered racism, classism, homosexism, weightism, ageism, and the stigmas that come with these titles.
This paper explores diversity and emotional intelligence in the workplace. An article form Kerby and Burns (2012) shows increasing diversity from minority, women, and transgender that have an impact on the workplace. Also, the paper examines the importance for the business to adapt to changing environment by hiring diverse group so they can gain different point of view which can impact there bottom line. The paper discuss Griffin & Moorhead (2014) point of view of management system build based on stereotype and prejudice can fail a company. Article from Deleon (2015) and Merkey (2010) discuss 5 importance pillar of emotion intelligence which are self-awareness, self-management, motivation, empathy, and social awareness. Business has a
Diversity in the organization can affect the employees and their behavior in many ways. The effect can be positive and negative in the same time. The positive effect is, it will wider employee knowledge, skills, and attitude which will allow the organization to become more competitive globally. Higher diversity of employees mean higher diversity of knowledge, skills and abilities. Sharing experience inspires innovative thinking (Claudia Quaiser-Pohls, 2013, p. 41). Today in the modern workplace, most organizations will have
4.3, 4.4, 4.5 Diversity within a team is beneficial as each person brings together their own unique views and ways of working. When managed effectively this can help bring together different ideas and build a strong team. By having a diverse team there is opportunity for views / ideas to be seen that could help make the business better. This is due to each person seeing the task/ result from a different light. By listening to all people you can gage a better understanding of the end result.
Diversity is a wonderful asset to an organization and brings with it many benefits. Employees bring in their own personal experiences and knowledge to the team (Burns & Kerby, 2012). Having diverse teams allows for the possibility to fix a problem or perfect a process by using different employee’s experiences and past knowledge to find solutions. A diverse workforce can drive economic growth and capture a greater share of the consumer market (Burns & Kerby, 2012). With diversity as a core value, the recruitment pool is widened to find the most qualified candidate and reduces employee turnover as a result. An organization can be highly competitive with a diversity initiative by adapting to a changing environment (Burns & Kerby, 2012).
Diversity in culture and demographic characteristics can be a negative impact or be one of the team's greatest strengths, depending on how the team as a whole functions and applies these different “routes to success”. A group can become a high performing team by understanding how cultural and demographic differences influence group behavior. The groups must realize that they can benefit from their diversity to their advantage and into a high performance team.
If your company actively assesses the handling of diversity, and develops and implements diversity plans, your organization will reap the benefits. Benefits of diversity can range from small to enormous, depending on how your organization plans, implements and manages diversity. Your company may increase its ' adaptability with your organizations ' diverse workforce supplying a greater variety of solutions to problems such as service, sourcing, and resources allocation. A diverse workforce
The positive impact of cultural diversity on group behavior can contribute creativity to a high-performance team. Membership diversity offers a rich pool of information, talent, and varied perspectives that can help improve team problem solving and increase creativity (Hunt, J., Osborn, R., Schermerhorn, J., 2005). Cultural diversity contributes various group input and group dynamics to the team. These two factors are essential in the high performance of a team. Cultural diversity can develop a high-performance team by allowing the diverse potentials of a team to operate. The negative impact of cultural diversity on group behavior can develop numerous of conflicts between team members. Conflicting interaction can limit or decrease the effectiveness and efficiency of productivity. There should be an awareness of the diverse culture values in order to prevent these conflicts.
As I reflect over my life, I appreciate the many diverse experiences I’ve came to encounter. My experience with diversity dates back to birth. I am from a small rural town, Moss Point, MS. and notably the last state to abolish slavery. The town currently has a population of 13,704 people and consists of 73% Blacks or African Americans, 23% Caucasian, 1% Hispanic or Latino and 1% bi-racial.
Benefits of a high workplace diversity environment is it not being stuck to conformity in group thinking, or being narrow-minded with similar thoughts and having preference to only be around people who think like you do which is known as the “diversity paradox”. According to a quote stated from Friedrich Nietzsche, Hackett (2014) “The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently” (p. 415). Instead, it reiterates the importance of having a diverse workplace because it constructs better ideas, coming from different minds, and build upon each other through brainstorming. However, a poor workplace diversity can also adversely affect one’s motivation, which leads to overall job dissatisfaction and demotivation. When there is poor workplace diversity, you can see less communication barriers and cultural resistance, but it also makes it harder for individuals to get used to working with others that aren’t the same as them. This can become a form of adversity for businesses if their employees cannot develop a strong skill set to adapt with not only coworkers but also customers in the environment. Therefore, better communication and interaction skills are essential to promoting a business and making it successful.
Deep-level diversity promotes team performance by giving opportunities for authentic interaction with different personalities, learning styles and character traits that would provide opportunities for optimal team performance. To begin, a definition of surface level diversity is helpful; surface-level diversity is a dynamic that people are keenly aware of in our
Three affective outcomes of diversity would be “receiving, responding, and organization” (Wilson, 2017, p.2). By having this three affective diversity you will have the potential to grow as a team. Receiving means getting new information; Moreover, you need to be open-minded about the information giving to you. Furthermore, you need
In today's age everyone wants to stand out to prove their individuality. Even in this essay I'm writing I want to prove that I stand out compared to other applicants. But diversity is what really makes you feel different. Whether it be ethnicity, race or religion you never feel like you fit in with the majority. Even today I don't feel like I fit in with the majority of my peers due to my ethnicity and religion.
Diversity is what makes people different, not just culturally but in human differences. Having a multitude of differences in the workforce gives an organization the ability to use many ideas to reach a common goal. A person could say that a diverse group of people together in one room can
From our research, we identified three different perspectives on workforce diversity that people embrace, each with different implications for a work group’s ability to realize the benefits of its cultural diversity. We use these observations here to examine critically some of the themes and basic assumptions of previous research and to propose new directions for both researchers and practitioners interested in diversity (Ely &Thomas, 2001). When organizations have a diverse economy, it makes the company strong. Once our nation has embrace the changes from the demographics that reap the economic benefits of a diverse and inclusive workforce. Burns et al. (2012) stated in their investigation that: