CHAPTER 5

Issues in Human Relations

• Diversity
• Change Management
• Organizational Culture
• Globalization
 What is Diversity?
• Differences and Similarities
• Brought to or developed in
the workplace
• Includes everyone in the
Organization
• An inclusive process of
appreciating what
individuals with different
backgrounds bring to the
organization.”
 Diversity
• The ways we are different, the condition of having unique
characteristics
• Its about how we value and appreciate those that are unlike
ourselves.
• The ways in which we differ as individuals or organizations and
the similarities that justify and motivate diverse people and
entities to work collaboratively together, to achieve mutually
beneficial outcomes.”

• It includes attribute differences - age, gender, ethnicity and

physical appearance; as well as personal differences such as
thought styles, religion, nationality, socio-economic status,
belief systems, sexual orientation and education.
 Primary & Secondary
Dimensions of Diversity
Work
Background

Geographic
Income Location
Sexual
Orientation

Gender Ag
Parental e
Marital Status
Status
Physical
Race
Qualities
Ethnicity
Military
Education Experience

Religious
Beliefs
Secondary

Loden & Rosener, Workforce America/1991 Primary

 3rd dimension of Diversity?
i) Systems Diversity –organizational structure and
management systems, e.g. teamwork,
empowerment, school climate, and employee work
ethic
ii) Human Diversity – Characterized by physical
differences, personal preferences, life experiences,
eg. sex, race, & age
iii) Cultural Diversity – beliefs, values, and personal
characteristics, eg. cross-cultural
relationship/communication, workstyle, and
ethics/values
 How to Manage Diversity
Steps in Managing Diversity Effectively
– Secure top management commitment
– Strive to increase the accuracy of perceptions
– Increase diversity awareness
– Increase diversity skills
– Encourage flexibility
– Pay close attention to how organizational
members are evaluated

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 Diversity Awareness Programs
• Provide members with accurate information about
diversity
• Uncover personal biases and stereotypes
• Assess personal beliefs, attitudes, and values and
learning about other points of view
• Develop an atmosphere in which people feel free
to share their differing perspectives
• Improve understanding of others who are different

5-7
 Change Management
• Change - the adoption of a new idea or behavior by orgn
• Change management is an approach to
shifting/transitioning individual, teams & organizations
from a current state to a desired future state
• It includes the management of changes to the
organizational culture, business processes, physical
environment, job design / responsibilities, staff skills /
knowledge and policies / procedures.
• Organizational change management (OCM) is a
framework for managing the effect of the above
changes within an enterprise
 Types of Organizational Change

Structure

Technology Strategy Products

Culture/People

SOURCE: Based on Harold J. Leavitt, “Applied

Organizational Change in Industry: Structural, Technical,
and Human Approaches,” In New Perspectives in
Organization Research, ed.W.W. Cooper, H.J. Leavitt,
and Shelly II (New York: Wiley, 1964), 55-74. 9
 Organizational Change
• Today’s successful organizations
simultaneously embrace two types of planned
change
● Incremental change = efforts to gradually improve
basic operational and work processes in different
parts of the company
● Transformational change = redesigning and
renewing the entire organization

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 Model of Change
Sequence of Events
Environmental
Forces

Competitors,
technology, economic, Need for Initiate change Implement
customers, etc change change
Evaluate problems Facilitate search, Use force field
Internal & opportunities, creativity, idea analysis, Lewins 3
Forces define needed champions, venture phase model, tactics
Consider plans, changes in tech, teams, & idea for overcoming
goals, company products, structure, resistance, etc
problems, decision & culture

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 Resistance to Change
15% of the workforce is eager to accept it
15% of the workforce is dead set against it
70% is sitting on the fence, waiting to see what happens

 Self-Interest: fear of personal loss eg. status, comfort, power,

expertise
 Lack of Understanding and Trust: do not understand the
intended purpose of a change or distrust the intentions
 Uncertainty: lack of information about future events & fear of the
unknown future and about their ability to adapt to it
 Different Assessments and Goals: people affected by
innovation may assess the situation differently or have
competing commitment
 Defense mechanism caused by frustration and anxiety or perceived
unfairness
 Lack of top management support
 Tactics for Overcoming Resistance to Change
• Communication • Change is technical; users need
• education accurate information & analysis
• Participation • Users need to feel involved;
design requires information from
others; have power to resist

• Negotiation • Group has power over

implementation; will lose out
in the change
• Coercion • Crisis exists; initiators clearly
have power; other techniques
• Top management have failed
support • Involves multiple departments
or reallocation of resources;
users doubt legitimacy of
change
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 Managing Organizational Change

Widely communicate the potential need for change.

Get as much feedback as practical from employees- what
problems what should be
Plan the change.
Delegate decisions to employees as much as possible – give
authority and responsibility & let them decide
Give time & opportunities to change - acknowledge and
celebrate accomplishments.
Don't seek to control change, but rather expect it, understand it
and manage it.
Provide sufficient resources – material, training, support
Consider using a consultant - Ensure the consultant is highly
experienced in organization-wide change.
Create Learning Organization - An organization that has
developed the continuous capacity to adapt and change
 Kurt Lewins 3 Phase Model of Change

• Lewin's model for creating successful organisational change

identified three important stages.
– First : unfreezing of current organisational behaviour patterns in
order to make the organisation more receptive to
change(disapproval or create prob in current situation, etc).
– Second: identified the importance of movement, which involves
the carrying out of change or the reconceptualisation of the
organisation(communication, participation, opportunities).
– Third: refreezing the organisation to institutionalise the change (by
giving reward or punishment).
 Organizational Culture
• Culture is the soul of the organization — the
beliefs and values, and how they are manifested.
• The pattern of shared values, beliefs, and
assumptions considered to be the appropriate
way to think and act within an organization.
• Culture is shared & strongly influences
behaviour
 Culture’s Functions
• Boundary-defining
• Sense of identity for organization members
• Facilitates commitment to something larger than
self-interest
• Serves as a “sense-making” and control mechanism
– Guides and shapes the attitudes and behaviour of
employees
• Social glue that helps hold an organization together
– Provides appropriate standards for what employees
should say or do
 Globalization

Impact to Impact to
organization individual

Competitiveness
Knowledge
Borderless Workers
Global Workers Readiness for
Culture Change
Shorter Product Healthy
Lifespan Competition
World Class Orgz
GOOD LUCK FOR YOUR EXAM

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