Diversity in the workplace is all about creating an inclusive environment, accepting of every

individual’s differences, enabling all employees to achieve their full potential and as a result,
allowing your business to reach its fullest potential. If you value each person’s differences
then you are allowing each person to contribute their unique experiences, which can have
an extremely positive impact on work, other employees, motivation, productivity and
customer experience. Workplace diversity isn’t just an inclusion fad, it’s something most
companies are trying to achieve. While it will serve to improve your reputation, there are
many more tangible benefits which can impact your business’ bottom line. So what are the
main benefits of diversity in the workplace?

Different perspectives and innovation

As employees will have different backgrounds and characteristics, it also means that their
skills, experiences and abilities are likely to be different as well which can mean you have a
very well-rounded team. This is also great from a learning perspective as they will have
access to these different perspectives and so will enable them to widen their experience
and learning. This also means that your employees are more likely to come together and
combine to come up with more innovative and creative ideas, because your teams won’t be
homogenous.

Problem-solving and decision-making

Again, because of the different perspectives of your teams, individuals can come together,
utilising their different perspectives to bring diverse solutions to the table. This means
decisions can be made quicker, making for an extremely competitive business in today's
marketplace. Research from Harvard supports this as it found that diverse teams are able to
solve problems quicker than cognitively similar individuals. In addition to this, when
employees from different backgrounds come together, they tend to come up with a wider
range of solutions as well.

Increased employee engagement

Research has shown that employee engagement is heightened through diversity and
inclusion. Of course this is only one element of employee engagement but it seems it’s an
important one. And it’s a no-brainer, because when employees feel more included, they are
automatically more engaged.

Increased employee retention

If you’re operating a diverse workforce, it means you are open to different perspectives and
characteristics. And, when employees feel accepted and valued they are less likely to stray
if another opportunity were to arise, and, less likely to hunt for new opportunities because
they are unhappy. As a consequence, your employees will be more motivated, will respect
you and the business and are far more likely to stay. Therefore, your employee turnover
rate will be far less than that of a non-inclusive nature. In addition, as we all know,
recruitment is extremely expensive and time-consuming and so if you can hold on to
valuable employees you will potentially be in a far stronger position than your competitors.

Better reputation
Your reputation will have direct impact on your sales and your recruitment and those
companies dedicated to creating and building diversity are viewed in a far more positive
way by investors, potential employees and potential customers. One of our latest blogs
talked about the importance of social media from an HR perspective and so if you can
demonstrate to these key stakeholders that you are a diverse employer and you use social
media and a mix of other channels to promote this, then you are far more likely to engage
with individuals of interest. There is more public awareness than ever of diversity in the
workplace and so key stakeholders and potential employees are actively searching for it.

Better understanding of your customers

With a diverse workforce in place, your business is a true representation of society. In life
we meet all kinds of people, from different countries, with different physical abilities and so
on.... Your business is selling to these people and so it makes sense to employ a diverse
range of employees, representing society today to enable you to have a better
understanding of your customers and essentially marketing and selling to them in a more
personalised way.

When you look at the above benefits, you can see that it’s imperative that you think about
how diversity is handled within your business. All of the aforementioned will have a
considerable impact on your profits and so it makes sense to include this as part of your HR
and people strategy. If you’re able to make decisions quickly, innovate, retain employees
and attract new employees with the right skills and experience to help drive your business
forward, then your figures will reflect this. It can take your business results and company
culture to a whole new level and people will aspire to be part of such an entity.