Research Ethics Approval Form

All students conducting research activity that involves human participants or the use of data collected
from human participants are required to gain ethical approval before commencing their research.
Please answer all relevant questions and note that your form may be returned if incomplete.

For further support and guidance please see your respective Unit Tutor.

Before completing this form, we advise that you discuss your proposed research fully with your Unit
Tutor. Please complete this form in good time before your research project is due to commence.

Section 1: Basic Details

Project title: Effect of Workforce Diversity on Employee Performance at IT Companies in Da Nang City
Student name (Group representative): Tran Thu Huong
Programme: Research Project
School: Greenwich University
Intended research start date: 5 August 2020
Intended research end date: 14 August 2020

Section 2: Project Summary

Please select all research methods that you plan to use as part of your project:
• Interviews: 
• Questionnaires: 
• Observations: 
• Use of Personal Records: 
• Data Analysis: 
• Action Research: 
• Focus Groups: 
• Other (please specify):

Section 3: Participants
Please answer the following questions, giving full details where necessary.
Will your research involve human participants? Yes

Who are the participants? Tick all that apply:

Ages 12-16:  Young People aged 17–18:  Adults: 

How will participants be recruited (identified and approached)?

Participants are employees working at IT companies in Da Nang City.

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Describe the processes you will use to inform participants about what you are doing:

In order to obtain the consent from the participants, I must ensure the confidentiality of their
data, any risks involved, and any other points that participants can reasonably expect. Besides
that, I also ensure that participants can withdraw consent at any time if they feel
uncomfortable without having to consult with me.

Studies involving questionnaires: Will participants be given the option of omitting questions
they do not wish to answer?
Yes:  No: 
If No please explain why below and ensure that you cover any ethical issues arising from this

Studies involving observation: Confirm whether participants will be asked for their informed
consent to be observed.
Yes:  No: 

Will you debrief participants at the end of their participation (i.e. give them a brief explanation of
the study)?
Yes:  No: 

Will participants be given information about the findings of your study? (This could be a brief
summary of your findings in general)
Yes:  No: 

Section 4: Data Storage and Security

Confirm that all personal data will be stored and processed in compliance with the Data Protection Act
(1998) Yes:  No: 
Who will have access to the data and personal information?

During the research:

Where will the data be stored? Yes:  No: 

Will mobile devices such as USB storage and laptops be used? Yes:  No: 

If yes, please provide further details:

After the research:

Where will the data be stored?
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How long will the data and records be kept for and in what format? Will data be kept for use by other
researchers?
Yes:  No: 
If yes, please provide further details:

Section 5: Ethical Issues

Are there any particular features of your proposed work which may raise ethical concerns? No
If so, please outline how you will deal with these:
It is important that you demonstrate your awareness of potential risks that may arise as a result of
your research. Please consider/address all issues that may apply. Ethical concerns may include, but
are not limited to the following:
• Informed consent.
• Potentially vulnerable participants.
• Sensitive topics.
• Risks to participants and/or researchers.
• Confidentiality/anonymity.
• Disclosures/limits to confidentiality.
• Data storage and security, both during and after the research (including transfer, sharing,
encryption, protection).
• Reporting.
• Dissemination and use of your findings.

Section 6: Declaration
I have read, understood and will abide by the institution’s Research and Ethics Policy:
Yes:  No: 

I have discussed the ethical issues relating to my research with my Unit Tutor:
Yes:  No: 

I confirm that to the best of my knowledge:

The above information is correct and that this is a full description of the ethics issues that may
arise in the course of my research.
Name: Tran Thu Huong
Date: 14 August 2020
Please submit your completed form to Nguyen Le Loc Tien

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 ASSIGNMENT 1 FRONT SHEET

Qualification BTEC Level 5 HND Diploma in Business

Unit number and title Unit 11: Research Project

Submission date 21 August 2020 Date Received 1st submission

Re-submission Date Date Received 2nd submission

Student Name Tran Thu Huong Student ID GBD18535

Class GBD0703B Assessor name Nguyen Le Loc Tien

Student declaration

I certify that the assignment submission is entirely my own work and I fully understand the consequences of plagiarism. I
understand that making a false declaration is a form of malpractice.

Student’s signature Huong

Grading grid

P1 P2 M1

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 Summative Feedback:  Resubmission Feedback:
5.1

Grade: Verifier’s Comments:

Internal Assessor Signature: Date:

5.2

Signature & Date:

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 Table of Contents

1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................................................................5

1.1 Background and the reasons to choose the topic ......................................................................................5

1.2 Objectives ..................................................................................................................................................................6

1.3 Research questions ...............................................................................................................................................6

1.4 Scope .................................................................................................................................................................................6

2. Literature Review ...........................................................................................................................................................6

2.1 Concept of Variables .............................................................................................................................................6

Workforce Diversity ......................................................................................................................................................6

Gender Diversity .............................................................................................................................................................7

Age Diversity ....................................................................................................................................................................7

Educational Background Diversity ..........................................................................................................................8

Employee Performance ................................................................................................................................................8

2.2 Hypotheses and Conceptual Framework ......................................................................................................9

Hypotheses ........................................................................................................................................................................9

Conceptual Framework ................................................................................................................................................9

3. Activities and Timescale ........................................................................................................................................... 10

4. Methodology .................................................................................................................................................................. 11

References ............................................................................................................................................................................... 12

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 Table of figures
Figure 1: Conceptual framework .......................................................................................................................................................... 9

Figure 2: Activities and timescales of Assignment 1...................................................................................................................10

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 Effect of Workforce Diversity on Employee Performance at
IT Companies in Da Nang City

1. Introduction
1.1 Background and the reasons to choose the topic
In recent years, workforce diversity has come to play a vital role in organizational life because of
increased globalization, growing technology, and the increasing complexity of jobs (Anjiri, 2018). In
some countries, it has become government legislation to ensure fairness in the sharing of jobs
available because of high levels of unemployment (Gacheri,2012). Workforce diversity is encouraged
primarily to enhance the availability of equal opportunities at workplace. This is aimed to eliminate
the prejudices that may exist due to, language differences and cultural insensitivity, increasing
numbers of disabled and women in the workforce, thus enabling equal opportunity for all (Anjiri,
2018).

Like other developed and developing countries, Vietnam is ethnically heterogeneous and
experiences managerial challenges related to workforce diversity. As a developing country, Vietnam
has 54 ethnic groups, which are deeply rooted in their traditions, culture, and customs (Chinhphuvn,
2020). This demographic and cultural diversity is manifested in most of the business organizations
in Vietnam today.

Nevertheless, from the web search about workforce diversity, it was found that very little
researches on workforce diversity and its effect have been conducted in Vietnam precisely Da Nang
City. Some researches that exist, concentrated more on the effect of diversity on organizational
productivity or performance, not so much have been conducted to inspect the effect and
relationship of workforce diversity and employee performance. Due to there are very few of such
researches that exist, it is not possible to give a detailed view of the workforce diversity in Vietnam
now. For this reason, the topic “Effect of Workforce Diversity on Employee Performance at IT
Companies in Da Nang City” is implemented to examine the relationship between workforce
diversity and employee performance of IT firms in Da Nang City.

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 1.2 Objectives
The specific objectives of this study will be as following
1) To examine the relationship between workforce diversity and employee performance in Da
Nang IT companies.

2) To determine whether workforce diversity has a positive influence the employee’s job
performance.

3) To give appropriate recommendations in order to enhance the workforce diversity in IT

companies.

1.3 Research questions

The assignment will answer the following question:
What is the impact of workforce diversity on employee performance in Da Nang based IT
companies?

1.4 Scope
This survey was conducted on 150 people with 100% online method. The survey participants
are employees who are working at 3 big IT companies such as FPT Software, RikkeiSoft, and
LogiGear in Da Nang City, and most of them are aged 22 to 40. In spite of 100 people is not an
enormous number, it still indicates a clearer of the workforce diversity in IT companies now.

2. Literature Review
2.1 Concept of Variables
In this sector, the researcher will define and explain the concepts of variables based on previous
studies.

Workforce Diversity
In the words of Kundu and Turan (1999), workforce diversity is a group of people working
together within the organization from different socio-cultural backgrounds. It means the difference
between people in an organization concentrated on gender, age, culture, ethnicity, race, religion,
educational background, and other socio-economic class (Sikalieh, 2012). Greenberg (2004) also
defines the workforce diversity as the variety of differences among people in an organization
consisting of personality, style, cognitive, organizational function, education, background, and more.

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As a result, workplace diversity means coexistence of employees from several socio-cultural
backgrounds within the organization.

Workforce diversity has become fundamental and inevitable to the sustainable organizational
performance (Kumar and Suresh, 2018). Today, organizations are investing an enormous money in
recruiting and managing a diversity workforce due to they believe that owning a diversity
workforce delivers a lot of benefits to them in many ways.

Gender Diversity
Gender is regarded as a description of femininity or masculinity of people (McDowell, 2018). The
diversity among two are closely related and when gender diversity is applied in an organization, it
has frequently led to enhanced business competitive edge and increase in productivity. There are
many researches support the argument that gender diversity has a positive effect on the
organization and employee performance. According to Qasim (2017), he perceived that gender
diversity makes greater individual performance in the workplace. Chew et al (2011) also argued
that gender diversity in different positions can provide a business with competitive advantage.

Gender diversity is one of the largest factors affecting employee performance either in a positive
way or negative. According to Hoffman (1965), the combination of cognitive abilities of women and
men may increase the organization’s overall innovation and creativity. Similarly, Hoogendoorn,
Oosterbeek and Van Praag (2013) also shared that the groups with equal mix of both genders
perform much better than either all-male or female dominated groups, the group achieve higher
result in terms of enhance in sales and profits. This is due to a reduction of conflicts, an in increase
in learning, and training of each other through the sharing of experiences and knowledge.

Age Diversity
According to Kumar and Suresh (2018), the increasing age diversity has become one of the key
characteristics of a modern organization. However, there are many various studies point out that
age diversity has both advantages and disadvantages. The disadvantage of age diversity in view of
Mwatumwa (2016) is that it causes communication problems and conflicts among employees. It
also shows that due to clashes and conflicts among different age groups, the productivity gap of
employees diminishes frequently.

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 The advantages of age diversity in view of Gellener and Stepen (2009) that when employees of
different ages work together in a group it improves productivity than working alone due to different
people have different perspectives, skills, personality traits and figure out how to solve problems
faster. Another advantage of age diversity is that an age heterogeneous workforce can create a huge
number of intellectual styles, multiple skills, increase morals that may result in increased
productivity. In short, having an age-diversity environment creates better working relationships
strengthens social cohesion for all.

Educational Background Diversity

According to the research of Tracy and David (2011), employers often hire employees with
education, training, and experience is adequate for specific job or position. Also in this research,
Tracy and David claimed that education is extremely important to employees due to without
sufficient educational background, employees cannot get a job and perform well. They also assume
that an employee will work more effectively depending on his or her education level.

Khan et al. (2019) stated that educational background diversity has a positive impact on
employee performance as it fosters a broader range of cognitive skills. Besides, the diversity of
education levels and backgrounds among employees can lead to broader awareness and knowledge
as it promotes their mutual learning to achieve greater work efficiency. As a result, educational
background diversity is one of the factors that significantly influence employee performance.

Employee Performance
According to Cascio (2006), performance as working effectiveness means the way in which an
employee performs a job, judging by efficiency. Performance is extremely essential for any
employee. It is nothing but how better an employee can fulfil the requirements of the job (Rue and
Byars, 2009). Sarmiento et al. (2007) observed that job performance is often results of 2 aspects,
namely the skills and abilities that an employee has, and her or his motivation to use then to do a job
better. Therefore, effective performance can be a key element in order to achieve the organizational
objectives while maximizing employee contribution.

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 2.2 Hypotheses and Conceptual Framework
Hypotheses
According to the basis of the above discussion, the following hypotheses have been developed.

H1: Gender diversity has a positive impact on employee performance in Da Nang based IT
companies.

H2: Age diversity has a positive influence the employee performance at IT firms in Da Nang City.

H3: Educational background diversity has a positive effect on the performance of employees in IT
firms of Da Nang City.

Conceptual Framework

Conceptual framework shows the central process, which is useful to point out the direction of
the research. Therefore, the conceptual framework of this research includes the independent
variables of workforce such as gender, age and educational background, and the dependent variable
is employee performance. These relationships are represented in the figure below.

Independent Variables
Dependent Variable
Gender diversity

Employee
Age diversity
Performance

Educational
Background
diversity

Figure 1: Conceptual framework

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 3. Activities and Timescale

Display
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4
Project Start Date: 8/5/2020 Week: 2
Project Manager: Huong 3 Aug 2020 10 Aug 2020 17 Aug 2020 24 Aug 2020

3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

% Work
WBS Task Lead Start End Days M T W Th F Sa Su M T W Th F Sa Su M T W Th F Sa Su M T W Th F Sa Su
Done Days
Wed Fri
Assignment 1 Huong 9 100% 8
8/05/20 8/14/20
Search journals
Wed Fri
1 and articles Huong 3 100% 3
8/05/20 8/07/20
online
Identify the Fri Fri
2 Huong 1 100% 1
research topic 8/07/20 8/07/20
Search theories
Sat Mon
3 related to Huong 3 100% 1
8/08/20 8/10/20
research topic
Analysis,
evaluate, and Mon Wed
4 Huong 3 100% 3
compare those 8/10/20 8/12/20
theories
Propose Wed Thu
5 Huong 2 100% 2
hypotheses 8/12/20 8/13/20
Project Fri
6
completion 8/14/20
Figure 2: Activities and timescales of Assignment 1

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4. Methodology
In order to answer the research questions, this study made use of both primary data and
secondary data.

The primary data made use of information gathered from IT companies in Da Nang City through
a questionnaire survey within a positivistic approach prepared by the researcher. The reason for
using the questionnaire survey due to it is only possible way to reach a large number of respondents
and it ensures consistency and completeness of the information collected for the research. The
survey questions will focus on finding out employees’ perspectives on workplace diversity, and the
effect of workforce diversity on their performance. The questions posed in the survey are phrased
clearly as closed ended questions so that the participants can easily read and understand.
Additionally, the research will also conduct a Reliability analysis, EFA, and Regression in order to re-
evaluate the reliability and accuracy of the data to make the most objective conclusion.

The secondary data are gathered from articles, journals, books, research findings, and other
reports regarding workforce diversity. These data are collected by surfing the internet, reading
books, and other related academic documents to get hold of relevant information for the study.
Thus, the deductive approach was chosen to this study due to the theories were inherited from
previous researches and eventually confirmed them.

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References
1. Anjiri, V., 2018. Effect Of Workforce Diversity On Performance Of Information Technology Firms In
Nairobi County. KCA UNIVERSITY, p.1.

2. Backes-Gellner, U., & Veen, S. (2009). The impact of aging and age diversity on company performance

3. Boehm, S. A., & Kunze, F. (2015). Age diversity and age climate in the workplace. Aging workers
and the employee - employer relationship (pp. 33 -55)

4. Cascio, W., 2015. Managing Human Resources: Productivity, Quality Of Work Life, Profits. 10th ed. New
York: McGraw-Hill Education.

5. Chew, E. W., Lee, K. M., Tan, S. C., & Tee, S. F. (2011). The effects of workforce diversity towards the
employee performance in an organization. UTAR.

6. Chinhphuvn, 2020. Ethnic Groups in Vietnam. [online] Chinhphu.vn. Available at:

<http://www.chinhphu.vn/portal/page/portal/English/TheSocialistRepublicOfVietnam/AboutVietnam/
AboutVietnamDetail?categoryId=10000103&articleId=10002652> [Accessed 8 August 2020].

7. Davis Mkoji Dr. Damary Sikalieh (2012). The Influence of Personality Dimensions on Organizational
Performance. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, Vol. 2 No. 17.

8. Gacheri, M. M. (2012). Effect of Workforce Diversity Management on Employee Performance in The

Banking Industry in Kenya.

9. Gowrishankar, K., Kanagaraj, D. and Gokula Krishnan, D., 2017. AGE DIVERSITY OF THE WORKFORCE
AND EMPLOYEES’ PERFORMANCE - A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY. International Journal of Marketing &
Financial Management, 05(10), pp.03 - 04.

10. Hoffman, L. R. (1965). Group Problem Solving. Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 2, pp. 99 -
132)

11. Hoogendoorn, S., Oosterbeek, H. and Van Praag, M., 2013. The Impact of Gender Diversity on the
Performance of Business Teams: Evidence from a Field Experiment. Management Science, 59(7), pp.1514-
1528.

12. Khan, F., Sohail, A., Sufyan, M., Uddin, M. and Basit, A., 2019. The effect of Workforce Diversity on
Employee Performance in Higher Education Sector. Journal of Management Info, 6(3), p.03.

13. Kumar, D. and Suresh, B., 2018. Workforce Diversity and its Impact on Employee
Performance. International Journal of Management Studies, V(4(1), p.49.

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 14. Kundu, S C and Turan, M S, (1999). Managing Cultural Diversity in Future Organizations. The Journal of
Indian Management and Strategy, Vol. 4 (1), pp. 61-72

15. Qasim, M., 2017. Effect of Workforce Diversity on Employee’s Job Performance: The Empirical
Assessment of Education Sector, Jalalabad, Afghanistan. International Journal of Economics & Management
Sciences, 06(05), p.02.

16. Rue, L. and Byars, L., 2009. Supervision: Key Link to Productivity. 10th ed. Chicago: McGraw-Hill Education.

17. Sarmiento, R., Beale, J. and Knowles, G., 2007. Determinants of performance amongst shop‐floor
employees. Management Research News, 30(12), pp.915-927.

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 Index of comments

5.1 Strengths

- The student produced a research proposal with sufficient parts compared to the requirements (P1 achieved).

- Primary and secondary research are carefully described in the proposal (P2 achieved).

- The methodology part was well-written with critical explanations of the methods chosen (M1 achieved)

Improvements

- Pay attention to the citations.

5.2 Yes. I agree with the lecturer's assessment!

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