Team and Diversity Management

Team and Diversity Management

1. What is a TEAM?

   • A team is a group of people organised to work together interdependently, whilst cooperating with one another to meet a common goal

2. What is Diversity

   • Diversity refers to any perceived difference among people: age, race, religion, functional specialty, profession, secual orientaion, geopraphic origin, lifestyle, tenure with the organisation or position, and any other perceived differences.

3. Benefits of being in a team

   • Reduced Staff Turnover Rate
     • Employees feel less stressed in a team, due to workload distribution and relationships.
   • Efficiency
     • A team that functions well together can accomplish more than what individuals can alone, due to the diversity amongst the group
   • Idea Generation
     • A team would be made up of diverse members, hence they would see things differently. This difference can lead a better ideas being generated.
   • Support
     • The sense of support a team would provide would help employees improve productivity, as well as be more motivated to work
   • Sense of accomplishment
     • When members of a team accomplish a certain goal,there would usually be this greater sense of accomplishment. This would lead to a closer knit team, boosting productivity and morale.
   • Feeling recharged
     • As employees work day in day out doing the same things, they would start feeling stress and burnt out. Working together with friends in a team would help to alleviate some of this stress, thus allowing the employees to feel more refreshed and recharged.
   • Motivation
     • Employees within a team would have this sense of responsibility to each other, and accountability. Thus, members of a team would want to do their best for each other, serving as a form of motivation.

4. Characteristics of an effective team

   • Common Purpose
   • Clear Performance Goals
   • Diverse Skills and Personalities
   • Good Communication and collaboration
   • Trust and Commitment
   • Task Orientation

5. Diversity Barriers

   • Language Barrier
     • Language diversity simply means the language barrier that one would face when there are different people who speak different languages. In today’s diverse workforce, odds are employees would face other coworkers who do not speak their primary language. This makes it difficult to share expectations or give feedback or information with one another.
   • Disabilities
     • Differences in abilities would often create difficulties in communication and emotional interaction. Be it a disability of being deaf, or a disability of not being able to walk, people would often undermine the abilities of them, and would cause them to talk to them from a higher position.
   • Age Barrier
     • Age can be a concern for some people, for example, is someone too young or old for a job? A large difference in age can also create the possibility of communication problems, based on different levels of experience, and for unfair treatment based on age.
   • Cultural Barrier
     • Culture refers to the different perspectives that people have of social interaction, different issues in the workplace, responsibilities, and beliefs. Different cultures would have different perspectives on how things should be done, such as respect for authorities, time management, and many more.
   • Race Barrier
     • Race refers to a group of people, often of a common geographic origin, that shares genetically transmitted physical characteristics. Some people may already have prejudiced opinions against certain races, and in the workplace, this would lead to issues within the department.
   • Gender Barrier
     • Gender biases is quite a huge barrier in some countries, as well as in the organisation. These biasedness would lead to gender communication issues, which would harshly impact team interactions. This can range from communication styles and perceptions of the other gender, opportunities, and many more.

6. OverComing the Barriers

   • Cultural Diversity
     • Provide mentors cross-culturally.
       • the leadership within the company would be able to relate and understand people of other cultures, as well as providing them with an experienced guide. However, assigning a mentor is not enough, the mentoring relationship must be active. Senior leaders are not always comfortable with mentoring, and may lack the motivation, hence, provide training to both mentors and mentees to institute a regular process for monitoring their progress.
     • Hold team bonding sessions based on Positive view of cultural Diversity
       • By holding team bonding sessions, employees who are in the session would be able to interact and familiarise themselves with one another, and thus, potentially break through a little of the diversity barrier. However, these sessions must be based on cultural diversity, so for example, ask the participants to introduce themselves as a descendant of their particular cultural group/ stories from their parents or grandparents.
   • Work Experience Diversity
     • Hold team bonding sessions
       • Team bonding sessions are meant to get the teams together, and this would potentially help to overcome the work experience diversity. By bonding together, employees would become closer, and would tend to mind less about each others’ work experience.
     • Gaining experience
       • This means sending the employee to classes, to better themselves and make them all reach a certain level of experience level.
   • Language Diversity
     • Provide Language Classes
       • Provide basic language classes for your employees, teaching them work words, phrases warnings, and other critical communication elements that are necessary for them to perform to the company’s standards. Teaching them the basics would allow them to understand things that are happening around the company, allowing them to “thrive” in the workplace.
     • Use more Visual methods of communication
       • Whenever possible, use visual methods of communication more than audio, and this means to show more than tell. Explain with pictures if possible, and a good example would be airlines, in which they convey their safety instructions. Of course, this cannot be applied to all organisations.