Workforce Diversity: Features and Dimensions

 Workforce diversity is the difference between the members of the organisations. It is the characteristic that makes one employee different from other employees. Management of these diversities includes the creation of such organisational climate which encompasses this diversity and uses this variety as its competitive advantage. It is a valuable asset for the organisation because it helps in surviving in the competitive global world. Diversity is found at two levels

Surface Level: These are the differences that are superficial such as gender, age etc. They do not share the perspective of the employees.

Deep Level: These are the variances in the work performances, personality, value of the workforce which determines the similarity between people in due course of time when they learn about each other.

Features of Workforce Diversity:

• It enforces the creation of an environment where heterogeneous groups work together in order to achieve organisational goals. Workforce diversity ensures that there is no discrimination in the organisation.
• It encourages people to work to their best political while being different. It helps the organisation in dealing with a diverse market.
• There is better decision-making as there is harmony and no discrimination in the organisation.
• Proper management of workplace diversity ensures better relations in the organisation. It helps in reducing labour turnover and best people stay with the organisation.

Dimensions of Workforce Diversity:

People differ on the basis of biological factors, intellectual ability and physical abilities. These are:

Age: The workforce comprises people of different ages. Young are hardworking, enthusiastic and healthy while the elderly are full of experience and maturity.

Gender: Organisation has both genders (males and females) as its workforce which causes diversity. Males are generally materialistic while females are more considerate towards the quality of life.

Education: There may be less educated  (lower level labours) to highly educated employees (Top-level management) who generally dislike the practice of discrimination.

Culture: it is an amalgamation of religion, caste, social, traditions, languages, values and beliefs. Different employees have different ethnic orientations. They may have favouritism towards religion or nation.

Psychology: Organisations deal with humans who has different perspectives and psychology. They can be timid, bold, pessimistic or optimistic.

Intellectual ability: It comprises a memory, deductive reasoning, verbal comprehension, some individuals have good instincts and skills to make decisions and perform mental activities, while some are good at following the decisions and physical work, number aptitude.

Socio-economic Status: AN organisation may have a diverse workforce on the basis of its economic status. An organisation has employees from low economic status (peon, helpers) and middle to higher strata (CEO, Managers).

Thus, in the previous section, we have seen that there is a difference in the workforce on the basis of gender, religion, caste etc. Workforce diversity is essential for an organisation. However, often individuals face discrimination on the basis of these differences, which demotivate them. Some of the forms of discrimination that are generally seen in the organisation are explained in the next section.