Introduction

In today’s modern workplace, a wide pool of talent from different cultural backgrounds is often
brought in. This leads to cultural diversity which is reflected through the existent demographic,
social and cultural differences on a societal level (Gotsis & Korte, cited in Mateescu 2018). This high
level of cultural diversity further carries a greater potential for tension and conflict (Nguyena &
Selvaraj, 2017). However, the relationship is unavoidable as culture directly influences how people
communicate and understand others. Therefore, for managers to effectively manage the issues
stemming from cultural diversity, they must implement strategies and adopt certain significant
attributes to succeed.

Challenges arising from a Culturally Diverse Workforce

People around the world are similar and different concurrently. They share common characteristics
yet differ as every individual has been brought up in different cultures, resulting in everyone having a
different set of values and ideologies. Hence, differences in cultures stemming from self-worth can
easily override how people from that culture think, act and evaluate themselves and that of others
(Brett, 2017). Furthermore, cultural prejudices and stereotypes tend to arise in a multicultural
workplace which could lead to racism. As reflected in a research into Australian workplace racism in
terms of gaining employment opportunities and receiving unpleasant treatment as an employee
(Dunn, Loosemore, Phua and Ozguc; Mapedzahama, Rudge, West, and Perron, cited in Nguyena &
Selvaraj 2017). However, a culturally diverse workplace brings tremendous benefits to an
organization as it is found that ‘racially diverse teams out perform non-diverse ones by 35%’
(Mahdawi, 2016). Hence, it is essential that managers address issues arising from cultural diversity.

Diversity Management and inclusion in workplaces

Managers can implement cross-cultural training to increase cultural awareness and enhance the
cultural competence of employees while encouraging feedback. In addition, ensure that serious
issues revolving around cultural diversity in the workplace are brought to the attention of the
powerful authorities and addressed by the leader (Dahanayake, Rajendran, Selvarajah and
Ballantyne, 2018). This will show importance placed on resolving issues thus giving employees the
confidence to speak up instead of letting the issue exacerbate. Furthermore, since experts often
classify culture as a mix of many different components, including values, espoused beliefs, basic
assumptions, ideals, norms, customs, rituals, artefacts, symbols, relationships, structures and
processes, along with other components (Okros; Schein, cited in Coutts 2021). It is important that in
managing the issues concerning cultural diversity, the solutions should not target a specific culture
but focus on embracing and understanding cultural differences.

Essential Attributes of an Effective Manager

Since the issues in workplace diversity can reach the personal level, managers need to possess
interpersonal and stress management skills so that they are able to respond appropriately to the
tensions and conflicts arising from a diverse workplace and display higher multicultural competence
(Chrobot-Mason and Leslie, cited in Clark and Polesello 2017). This skill allows the manager to
understand the impacts of underlying cultural differences and gather information of the root cause
before coming up with any solutions. On top of that, managers need to have high competence in
emotion management behaviors would be able to manage workplace conflicts and the emotions
that arise effectively. When the manager is able to regulate his/her own emotions and
that of others, the parties in conflict will be able to refocus on the important problem at hand
(Salovey and Mayer, cited in Ayoko and Conrad 2012). Therefore, it is important for manager to be
aware of their own emotions and that of others while using these emotions such as empathy
appropriately. Those who are able to do so tend to be more adaptable and innovative resulting in
being able to work out apt solutions for issues as they are able to merge alternatives and emotions
when coming to a decision (Clark and Polesello, 2017). Hence, effective managers must be capable
of managing diversity to maintain behavioural standards in an organization and to better lead and
motivate the employees. In doing so, work productivity and effectiveness will increase while work
environment will become more conducive for all employees too

Conclusion

As the world has evolved tremendously and will continue to, diversity has become the new normal
(Mahdawi, 2016), thus the roles of manager in a modern and diverse workplace evolves too. For a
manager to be effective in managing issues in a culturally diverse workforce, the manager must be
able to adapt and tackle the arising tensions and conflicts. Not only so, the manager needs to
reinforce diverse cooperation between employees while integrating all the different cultures in the
workplace as well.