Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Jimena Aguilar Gutiérrez Gabriela Morgado Gómez María Fernanda López Huitrón
Jimena Aguilar Gutiérrez Gabriela Morgado Gómez María Fernanda López Huitrón
2 categories.
• Individual characteristics over which people have little or no control.
2. Characteristics that people can adopt, drop or modify during their life
(work background, income, marital status, education, ubication).
• Assuming that group tendencies are true for each and every memeber of that group.
• To survive and prosper in an increasingly heterogeneous society.
Homogeneous group: “Groupthink” = Wrong solutions because of the same mentality
Heterogeneous group: Experiences and different cultural perspectives = Less chance of
“groupthink” occurring.
• The diversity of employees can cause conflicts if there is distrust and lack of respect between
the groups.
• This means that as organizations become more diverse, they face greater risks that employees
will not work together effectively. Interpersonal friction rather than cooperation may become
the norm.
• Shared experiences are often strongly reinforced by segmented communication channels in
the workplace.
• Whereas women and minorities may view a firm’s “cultural diversity policity” as a commitment
to improving their chances for advancement, white men may see it as a threat.
• One side effect of forced compliance has been the reinforcement of a belief among some
managers and mainstream employees that organizations have to compromise their standards
to comply with EEO laws.
• Some have seen EEO laws as legislation of a “forced diversity” that favors political solutions
over performance and/or competence. This belief presents two problems.
1.- Women and minorities in positions of authority and responsibility may not be taken as
seriously as white men are.
2.- The belief that white men are getting the short end of the stick may provoke some of them
to vent their frustration against those employees (women and minorities) whom they believe
are getting an unfair advantage.
The intangible barrier in an organization that prevents female and minority
employees from rising to positions above a certain level.
• Lower job satisfaction translates into higher resignation rates, with a resulting loss of valuable
talent and greater training costs because of high turnover.
• As minorities grow both proportionately and absolutely competition for jobs and opportunities
is likely to become much stronger.
• There is, however, one principle that managers should always keep in mind:
“Treat employees as individuals, not as members of a group.”
DIVERSITY IN ORGANIZATIONS
• The elements of diversity—such as
race, ethnicity, and sex—tend to
have a profound impact on how
people relate to one another.
Many people still view people with disabilities with suspicion, even scorn, feeling that those who are
physically impaired should stay away from the work world and let “normal” people assume their duties.
People with disabilities are often seen as being less capable than others
Many employers are afraid to hire people with disabilities or put them in responsible positions for
fear that they may quit when work pressures mount
Many employers have overestimated the costs of accommodating employees with disabilities
The Americans with Disabilities Act, passed over 20 years ago, has succeeded in opening accessto buildings and
providing legal protection, yet significant employment barriers remain.
Approximately 13 percent of the U.S. population is foreign born, although in some areas, such as California,
southern Texas, southern Florida, and in New York City, the proportion reaches close to one-third of the population.
As of 2012, there are probably about 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States, compared
with 8.4 million in 2000 and 3.5 million in 1990.
Mexicans account for about 57 percent of undocumented immigrants, with an additional 24 percent coming
from elsewhere in Latin America.
The number of deportations has increased almost 50 percent from 2001 to 2006, although the total number of
deportees is a minuscule percentage of the total number of undocumented workers.
HOMOSEXUALS
LATINOS (HISPANIC AMERICANS)
• Latinos include people of European descent and African descent (there are at least 25 million living in the Spanish-speaking Antilles and
the Caribbean basin), as well as Latin Indians (who make up a very large proportion of the Mexican and Andean population), Asians (there
are probably 10 million Asians of Hispanic descent), and a very large number of people of mixed origin.
• There are at least 46 million Latinos in the United States, with some estimates as high as 50 million.
• Many Latinos are professionals and entrepreneurs; others are unskilled laborers and farmers.
• Latinos face a number of problems in the U.S. workplace.
One is language
Some Latinos see non-Latino North Americans as unemotional, insensitive, self-centered, rigid, and ambitious. Meanwhile, non- Latinos
often complain that with Latinos “punctuality, absenteeism, planning, and scheduling can be a lot more loose than one would expect.
Third, Latinos of African or Latin American Indian descent (many of whom migrate to the United States because of their extreme
poverty at home) often face an additional hurdle: racial discrimination because of their skin color.
Latinos in the United States have become the target in recent years of anti-immigrant feeling, which is often fueled by politicians who
see this as an issue that can get them votes
First, the United States is a youth-
OLDER WORKERS
The average U.S. worker is close oriented culture that has not yet come
to age 39, expected to reach to terms with its changing
close to 43 by the year 2020, and demographics. Starting around the age
of 40, but particularly after the age of 50,
45 percent of employees are employees encounter a number of
currently over the age of 40. stereotypes that may block their career
advancement.
RELIGIOUS MINORITIES
Islamic, Hindu, Taoist, or other non-Christian beliefs.
• In Western Europe, the Muslim population represents the largest
minority group, hovering somewhere between 6 and 15 percent of
the population
• A survey by the Society for Human Resource Management revealed that so-
called “ethnic religions” such as Islam now come just after race and gender
in U.S. perceptions of “otherness.” 110 A 2010 survey conducted by Time
magazine in the United States revealed
•Diversity must be large enough to include everyone: young and old, homeless and rich, immigrants and natives, whites and
blacks and go beyond race and gender.
•No one should be blamed for past or present inequalities. All human beings have been socialized to behave in certain ways
and all at some point we can be guilty and in other victims of discrimination and stereotypes.
•Human beings are ethnocentric - they see the world from their perspective and judge the world from what they It is familiar to
them.
•The human species resists change. This means that the constant adaptation required for diversity is difficult for people who are
already overwhelmed by the amazing transitions that occur in organizations of nowadays.
•Human beings consider comfort and trust to be similar concepts. There is a tendency to look for company of those that are
more similar to us..
•People find it difficult to share power; history shows that it has rarely been done voluntarily and without a reason that somehow
benefits those who dominate wealth
DIVERSITY TRAINING PROGRAMS
• Programs that provide diversity awareness training and educate employees
on specific cultural and sex differences and how to respond to these in the
workplace.
• Supervisors need to learn new skills that will enable them to manage and
motivate a diverse workforce.
• Diversity training “is a fundamental component of a diversity initiative and
represents an opportunity for the organization to inform and educate senior
management and staff about diversity.”
The training may have If employees perceive If the training poses if diversity is seen as Although increasing
Third
Second
Fourth
Fifth
First
come at a time when that external forces, some as perpetrators the domain of a few resources are
employees were such as a court order and others as victims, groups everyone else available for teaching
preoccupied with or a politician’s those who feel may feel left out and diversity, some
more urgent priorities decree, have blamed may be view the initiative as experts suggest that
prompted the defensive being for others, not the materials
training, they may for them provided are less
resist. than effective in
eradicating
stereotypes
Support Accommodatio
n of Family
Groups Needs
Senior
Mentoring Apprenticeships
Diversity
Programs Audits
Management
Responsibility Communication
and Standards
Accountability
SUPPORT GROUP
A group established by an
employer to provide a
nurturing climate for
employees who would
otherwise feel isolated or
alienated.
ACCOMMODATION OF FAMILY
NEEDS
Day Care Security Home office
PATTERNS
ALTERNATIVE WORK
Extended leave: A benefit
Opportunity to that allows an employee
work to take a long-term leave
from the office, while
Increase the retaining benefits and
the guarantee of a
achievement comparable job on
return.
SENIOR MENTORING APPRENTICESHIPS
PROGRAMS
A support program in which Apprenticeships are similar to
senior mentoring programs, except
senior managers identify that promising prospective
promising womenand minority employees are groomed before they
employees and play an are actually hired on a permanent
important role in nurturing their basis.
career progress.
COMMUNICATION STANDARDS
• Certain styles of communication may be offensive to women
and minority employees. Examples are the use of “he” when
referring to managers and “she” when referring to
secretaries, inadequately representing or ignoring minorities
in annual reports, failure to capitalize ethnic groups’ titles
(Asian, Latino, etc.), and using terms, such as protected classes
and alien.
• To avoid these problems, organizations should set
communication standards that take into account the
sensitivities of a diverse employee population.
DIVERSITY AUDITS
A review of the
effectiveness of an
organization’s diversity
management program.
MANAGEMENT RESPONSIBILITY AND
ACCOUNTABILITY
Management of diversity will not be a high
priority and a formal business objective unless
managers and supervisors are held accountable
for implementing diversity management and
rewarded for doing so successfully. At the very
minimum, successful diversity management
should be one of the factors in the performance
appraisal system for those in positions of
authority