Cultural Diversified Workforce - Assignment Example

1. The working of an organization is affected in the environment where the business functions. Organizations while looking to plan their future business plan has to incorporate the manner in which the external environment will have an impact on their decisions. External environment as the name suggest is external to the organization and affects all organization in the industry in a similar way. Organizations that are unable to include the external environment in their planning process are not able to ensure efficiency in their operations which thereby has an effect on the business outcome. In addition to the external environment the general environment for the organization also comprises of the competitive environment. The competitive environment here consists of the competition that is prevalent in the market and industry. This is shown below (Dwight, Michael & Raynor, 2004) The external environment for a business consists of economic factors, political factors, legal factors, social factors, technological factors and environmental factors. All the factors are equally important and being unable to understand the external factors will have an effect on the working. The prime reason which has led towards increasing the importance of external environment is that it leads towards creating difficulties for the organization to work in the economy. For example, suppose a new regulation has been passed where they look towards ensuring that all organization has to comply with the environmental requirements where they have to preserve the environment and reduce carbon emission else they will be fine. This makes it important that business looks towards including those in their planning process as otherwise it could lead towards fines and other obstacles which will make it difficult to carry out the normal operations (Schermerhorn, Davidson, Poole, Simon, Woods & Chau, 2011). In addition to the external environment the general environment for the organization also comprises of the competitive environment. This makes the competitive environment having a direct and immediate effect on the performance of the organization as compared to the external environment which impacts the environment indirectly. This makes it important that the organization looks towards scanning the different risk and environmental effect that the business might be witnessing and based on it look towards developing strategies which helps to deal with the general environment in a better way. The most challenging element for an organization is both the external environment and the competitive environment because both of them impact the business heavily. Looking at both the factors competitive factors have a slight more influence on the external environment because of the fact that they impact the performance of the organization directly as compared to external environment which impacts the organization indirectly. This thereby requires that the organization is able to find out different tools and strategies through which the organization will be able to control the external environment as well as competitive environment and ensure that the general environment helps to improve the performance. Thus, the general environment has an impact on the business performance and requires to develop strategies through which they are properly identified and tools are developed through which the impact can be reduced. This will benefit the organization to ensure maximum opportunities of growth and ensure long term sustained performance. 2. Organization while looking to provide different products and services are driven by different motives and look towards presenting their business in a different manner so that they are able to ensure differentiation in comparison to the competitors. This has made organization look towards adopting strategies through which they focus on customers or on quality. This is done with the motive to ensure that a different direction is given and based on it a business model is designed which looks towards long term sustainable growth and meeting the objectives. A customer driven organization is one where customers are treated at utmost priority and steps are taken to ensure that customers are satisfied by providing them quality products and good services. This helps the organization to ensure that they have a set of loyal customers and are able to retain old customers and attract new ones entirely on services. This is a model which is usually employed by a service organization as they look towards differentiating them by providing good services and ensuring that the customers are retained for a longer period of time. An example in this direction is the hotel industry (Schermerhorn, Davidson, Poole, Simon, Woods & Chau, 2011). The customer driven organization further focuses on the customers and service is considered as a core constituent where quality is service is provided by ensuring that both the internal and external customers is looked at i.e. employees as well as the customers. This helps to ensure that the organization is able to provide quality service and transform the manner in which the business looks towards performing. This model also increases the role of managers and employees as they have to continuously provide feedback based on the customer requirements so that necessary changes can be done and quality service can be provided to retain customers (Feargal, 1996). Quality driven organization as the name suggest looks towards focusing on quality and is a business model which is mostly applied by manufacturing industry. The different organization in this model look towards ensuring that the products supplied by them are consistent in quality and looks towards adhering to the ISO and international standards. Some of the industry which is seen to be using this model is automobile industry. In this model the organization looks towards satisfying the customer by consistently supplying them with products which are of the highest quality. The organization using this model also looks towards improvement by making changes in the product but ensuring that the new developed products doesn’t fall below the standards that have been previously applied. In addition to it the organizations also look towards ensuring information from the customers and feedback is passed to the manufacturing units so that based on their requirements the business is able to develop products (Feargal, 1996). Thus, both customer driven organization and quality driven organization are different models that are used by different industry but the ultimate aim is to ensure that maximum customers are satisified. This has helped to ensure that organizations based on their requirements chose the model which fits them and looks towards continuous improvement to ensure better customer satisfaction. 3. Organization for their smooth functioning has to ensure that they have a proper mix of people from different culture, sex, ethnic and races so that there is proper diversity in the workforce. Ensuring a balance by having people from all regions and sections ensures that the decisions taken by the management is supported by all. This also helps to ensure that a positive brand image of a company is created and ensures that all the different sectors and people belonging to different regions have been considered. This makes the organization compact and provides the required opportunity through which better performance can be delivered based on different parameters. This helps to identify multicultural organization as one which has people from diverse background, sex, culture, race and groups. This organization ensures that there is no discrimination between the employees and the recruitment strategy of the company is dictated by quality and culture has no role to play in the selection of employees within the organization. Having an environment which looks towards ensuring that the different requirements of workforce diversity is considered will help to ensure that the organization is able to create conducive environment through which the organization will be able to ensure maximum efficiency (Butler, 2009). This will also ensure that the overall strategy is developed through which the organization is able to manage their workforce better. Using a strategy where organization looks towards having a multicultural organization will ensure that the overall environment created by the organization is such that it looks towards providing maximum advantage to the organization. This will help to find a mechanism through which the overall strategies will be better managed and the organization will find a continuous flow of employees. This helps to create an environment where every people are able to ensure that a work environment which is all inclusive of the work force diversity will allow the different employees to work to their full potential and provide an opportunity through which maximum opportunity for growth are provided (Schermerhorn, Davidson, Poole, Simon, Woods & Chau, 2011). This has made organization especially those working on the global arena to look towards finding out strategy through which they are able to ensure cultural diversity. This makes them look towards employing employees from the local areas and looking towards having a cultural mix. This helps organization to acquire knowledge about the different culture and ensures that overall efficiency and chances of development of the strategy increase (Jakob & Selmer, 2012). This thereby ensures that the organization is able to gain maximum efficiency in managing the workforce and ensure that the goals are achieved. Thus, the different factors have made organization to look towards a multicultural environment where there is adequate representation of people belonging to different culture and races so that an environment which looks towards having proper mix of people. This helps to work towards a common purpose and ensures that the organization is able to achieve its objectives in a better way and ensure maximum efficiency from its workforce. 4. Glass Ceiling is a term which is used to describe the barriers that prevent women and minorities from moving ahead in carrier due to the different legal and restrictions that is prevalent in the organization. This was witnessed when the representation of women and minorities was very low especially in position for higher responsibilities within the organization and corporations. The terminology helped to understand the manner in which glass ceiling had an effect on the working culture especially for women and minorities. This helped to develop a mechanism through which organization were able to understand the manner in which different factors had an effect on the performance of women and provided an opportunity through which the actual situation was highlighted (Schermerhorn, Davidson, Poole, Simon, Woods & Chau, 2011). This helped to provide an opportunity through which strategies were developed through which organizations were able to ensure equity within the employment culture. This helped to bring out actual situation and helped the economies to develop strategies through which there was proper respresentation of employees i.e. both women and minorities in the working culture (Schermerhorn, Davidson, Poole, Simon, Woods & Chau, 2011). This thereby helped to provide an opportunity for the minorities as they were able to clearly highlight the manner in which their roles were determined in the organization. This also showed that the organization instead of looking towards hiring people based on the merit the organization was culturally sensitive and looked towards having people within the organization only based on culture. This thereby ensured that they were able to use the system and looked towards ensuring that they were able to look into the different factors based on which employment was provided (Tibus, 2010). The minorities based on it were able to ensure that they were able to develop a startegy through which they will be able to provide an opportunity to move up higher up in the hierarchy and take responsible position within the society. This has ensured that the minorities and the women were provided an opportunity through which they were able to ensure that they were provided an opportunity to move up higher up in the hierarchy. The topic of glass ceiling provided the required direction through which they were able to find out a method through which they were able to find the different aspect based on which recruitment was done. This enabled them to ensure that higher responsibilities were taken up within the system. This enabled to ensure that the entire process of recruitment can be developed which allows better representation of the employees especially women and minorities so that they are able to move up higher in the hierarchy. Thus, the terminology of glass ceiling has helped to understand the manner in which minorities and women were prevented from moving up in the organization and had to carry out the jobs and responsibilities for lower position. This helped to break down the barrier and ensure that more and more opportunities were provided to both women and minorities to move up higher in the hierarchy and ensure that they are able to perform higher responsibilities within the organization. 5. A diverse workforce contributed towards the goal of the organization as it helps to achieve better efficiency through which the resources can be better managed and the goals of the organization can be achieved. Dealing with diversity in workforce is a vital issue for management as being unable to deal with it could de-motivate the employees and would make it difficult for the employees to accomplish the task in hand. To ensure that the problem is dealt and understood by the employees it is important to make them understand the manner in which workforce diversity will benefit them. I will look towards making the employees understand the benefit of workforce diversity and present before them different scenarios where they have looked towards improving the workforce diversity. Even giving them an opportunity to work on similar situations where different people from different culture is required will help them understand the importance of diversity in workforce and will help them to deal with the situation in the most effective manner (Schermerhorn, Davidson, Poole, Simon, Woods & Chau, 2011). The work culture shows that the business instead of looking towards developing a series of steps which will help to multiply the satisfaction level of both employees and customers’ looks towards accomplishing the task at all cost. The organization has people with different personality traits and the incompatibility that exists between the leaders to achieve the task in hand. To ensure that the staff understands the important of having en effective workplace where there is cultural integration and a procedure for customer satisfaction it is important to clearly demonstrate the same to the employees. The foremost important thing here is to make the employees understand the manner in which the changes will benefit them both in personal and professional life. Along with it the management has to ensure that they effectively depict the employees the manner in which the changes will facilitate them for advancement in carrier and will also brighten their future prospects for tougher roles (Kersten, 2000). To ensure the smooth transformation it is important that the required training is provided to the employees. For this the management has to look for both off the job and on the job training so that employees are able to visualize the changes in actual practice. This will also help them to understand the manner in which the changes will benefit them and based on it will be able to make key changes in the manner in which the work culture needs to be changed. This will help to understand the manner in which the business will be able to gain effectiveness and ensure that the training program provides them the skills to deal with it. This thereby ensures that having a cultural diversified workforce ensures that the business is able to make changes easily and develop strategies based on which the organization will be able to perform better. This provides the required direction and platform through which overall efficiency within the organization is improved and the organization is able to ensure that the workplace contributes positively towards the organizational culture and helps to achieve the goals. References Butler, C. (2009). Leadership in a multicultural Arab organisation. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 30 (2), 139 – 151, viewed on November 27, 2012 from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?issn=0143-7739&volume=30&issue=2&articleid=1775714&show=pdf Dwight, A., Michael, E. & Raynor, P. 2004 (1980). Preparing for a new global business environment: divided and disorderly or integrated and harmonious?, Journal of Business Strategy, 25 (5), 16 – 25, viewed on November 27, 2012 from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=874354 Feargal, Q. (1996). Becoming a customer-driven organization: three key questions. Managing Service Quality, 6 (6), 6 – 11, viewed on November 27, 2012 from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=842519 Jakob, L. & Selmer, J. (2012). Positive dissimilarity attitudes in multicultural organizations: The role of language diversity and communication frequency. Corporate Communications: An International Journal, 17 (2), 156 – 172, viewed on November 27, 2012 from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm/journals.htm?issn=1356-3289&volume=17&issue=2&articleid=17030924&show=pdf Kersten, A. (2000). Diversity management: Dialogue, dialectics and diversion. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 13 (3), 235 – 248, viewed on November 27, 2012 from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1411066 Schermerhorn J, Davidson P, Poole D, Simon A, Woods, P & Chau So Ling (2011). Management foundations and applications - value pack, (1st edn AP). Milton, Qld, Australia: Wiley. ISBN: 978 0 471 43570 9 Tibus, C. (2010). Leadership beyond the glass ceiling: does ownership matter?. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 31 (8), 743 - 757, viewed on November 27, 2012 from http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?issn=0143-7739&volume=31&issue=8&articleid=1891500&show=pdf& Read More