Diversity - is it a dirty word?
Diversity – Is It a Dirty Word?
Politically charged and hotly debated, the idea of “diversity” divides the political left from the right and many friends from their enemies. As defined in the Oxford Dictionary, diversity is “a range of different things”. This vague and rather innocuous definition has sparked enormous unrest in recent years. I suggest that this unrest arises due to the blanket nature of the term.
A Different Kind of Diversity
Putting the politics and personal views aside, I have observed a growing trend in the business and management literature around a new kind of diversity – diversity of thought. Diversity of thought focuses on the utilisation of people. It involves recognising employee’s full potential, creating an organisation where they feel comfortable contributing ideas and seeking out knowledge from those around them. This evidence suggests that diversity of thought leads to increases in business performance through employee optimisation.
What Does Diversity of Thought Look Like?
Diversity of thought goes beyond race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality – it involves understanding how people think. It seeks to utilise an individual’s strengths and weaknesses to determine their optimal contribution to the businesses’ common goal.
McKinsey (2018) suggest identifying a mix of inherent traits which are most relevant to the organisation’s business and industry through using advanced business and people analytics.1 Take for example a retail business where the core function of the employees is to engage customers and sell products. Unsurprisingly, research suggests that a retail employee’s personality is closely linked to their revenue generation and their customer’s satisfaction.2 Most people would assume that retail staff who are characterised as outgoing and friendly would maximise organisational performance. However, the evidence suggests this is not the case. Instead, there is a close correlation between an employee’s ability to minimise distractions and their performance. Moreover, there is no evidence that the length of an employee’s service leads to better management. Rather, organisations should seek to analyse what “good” managers do so that newer managers can be trained to emulate them.
Where to Next for Diversity of Thought?
Born out the advancement in neurological research, diversity of thought is expected to continue its unprecedented levels of growth. In the not too distant future, the onus will shift to managers to better connect their diverse talent, with the goals of the organisation. Business leaders and executives will also face challenges around creating an inclusive culture and creating structures and procedures which simplifies recruiting for diversity of thought.
Article written by anonymous
This article appeared in the Torts Illustrated Diversity (2019) Publication