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People are not alike. Everyone is different. Diversity therefore consists of visible and non-visible factors, which include personal characteristics such as background, culture,Â personality and work-style in addition to the characteristics that are protected under discrimination legislation in terms of race, disability, gender, religion and belief, sexual orientation and age.Â Harnessing these differences will create a productive environment in which everybody feels valued, their talents are fully utilised and organisational goals are met. CIPD defines diversity as valuing everyone as an individual â€“ valuing people as employees, customers and clients. But there is no single way of treating employees, as each one will have their own personal needs, values and beliefs. It follows that the notion of best practice, while helpful in a theoretical setting, will not provide all the answers in reality. There are multi-variables and many shades of grey â€“ a fuzzy and complex world that relies on approximate reasoning.
How the concept has developed
Changes in the social and economic landscape led to legislation covering equal pay, sex and racial discrimination in the 1970s, followed by disability laws in the 1990s. More recently, discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation and religion has been added to the list covered by the law, at least partly driven by European legislation. All these initiatives were grounded in developing a level playing field for disadvantaged groups; in other words, ending or reducing discrimination and improving social justice. They can therefore be described as being about equal opportunities rather than diversity, and by the 1990s it was being recognised that they had had limited success in achieving their goals. In the early 1990s, American writers argued for a shift from equal opportunities to diversity because the equal opportunities approach was insufficiently holistic in its attempts to eradicate discrimination (some disadvantaged groups were not represented, or were not adequately represented), and because those who were represented were regarded as homogeneous groups (although, for example, each disabled employee requires individual consideration). At around the same time, researchers were also finding that culturally diverse teams were more creative than homogenous teams and contributed more effectively to meeting organisational goals. Thus there was a business case for diversity, although coping with it would be much harder than simply managing equal opportunities to meet legal requirements.
Three separate commissions have promoted equality and monitored their particular aspects of the legislation: the Equal Opportunities Commission, the Commission for Racial Equality, and the Disability Rights Commission. From October 2007, a newÂ Equality and Human Rights Commission has been established to cover all equality issuesÂ as well as issues of human rights.
Some statistics
Unemployment is twice as high among people from ethnic minorities, although there are relatively more Chinese, Indian and Black African graduates than white graduates. Only 12 per cent of white men are in professional occupations, as opposed to 21 per cent of Chinese and Indian men.
White men have the lowest rate of participation in full-time education between the ages of 16-24 (37 per cent), followed by white women (40 per cent).
41 per cent of white wome