Change up!

Pick up your nametag & sit somewhere

different and with someone entirely
new today 
GMGT 2070 Class 04:
Diversity at Work

Wei Wang, Assistant Professor

wei.wang1@umanitoba.ca
Summary of Monday’s Class

 Employees’ personality can be described by multiple traits. Some of the

most important in a work context include: conscientiousness (most
strongly correlated with job performance across a wide range of jobs),
emotional intelligence, & locus of control.

 EMBRACE GROWTH MINDSET & BE LEARNING-ORIENTED !

Agenda

 What do we mean when we say

diversity?
 Why does diversity matter?
 What do we need to be mindful
of as managers of an increasingly
diverse workforce?
Trust Exercise – Part 1

Who do you trust most? Who do you consider most trustworthy?

(PS: no immediate family members)

With you new neighbors, discuss these
questions and be prepared to report out:

 What is diversity? What does it describe?

What are some examples of diversity?

 Why is diversity important for

organizations?
 What is diversity? What does it
describe?

What are some examples of diversity?

 What do we mean by diversity?

 Diversity
 a variety of demographic, cultural, and personal differences among an
organization’s members and customers.

 Core Components
Describes distribution of differences on a common attribute
Types of differences:
1. Separation: lateral differences (e.g., opinion, values)
2. Variety: category differences (e.g., race, functional expertise)
3. Disparity: vertical differences (e.g., pay, status)

(Williams, 2012; Harrison & Klein, 2007 - AMR)

 What do we mean by diversity?

Diversity
 a variety of demographic, cultural, and personal differences among an
organization’s members and customers.

Diversity ≠ Affirmative Action

 Affirmative Action
 purposeful steps taken by the organization to create
employment opportunities for underrepresented segments of
the population

(Williams, 2012)
Why is diversity important for
organizations?
 Diversity and the Bottom Line.
Business Case for Diversity + Inclusion
1. Diversity of opinions, experiences, + knowledge 
innovation., which  $$$
• Ex: DiversityInc’s Top 50 Companies for diversity and inclusion
outperformed competitors on the DOW by 22%, NASDAQ by 28%
2. Your workforce should reflect your customers/clients
to better understand their needs
• Ex: Women make 80% of purchasing decision on consumer goods
3. Mitigate & minimize legal risk
• Ex: $335,000,000 in U.S. discrimination lawsuits…last year
4. Less diversity, less talent (which = less revenue in long
term)
• Ex: U.S. Med schools = 48% women; Bachelor’s = 58% women
 Visibility of Differences

Surface-level Diversity: Deep-level Diversity:

Dissimilarity in observable, Dissimilarity in personality, and

unchangeable, and easy to measure attitudes communicated through
attributes verbal and non-verbal behavior

Examples: Examples:
 Gender  Personality
 Race  Preferences
 Ethnicity  Points of view and beliefs
 Physical capability  College Majors

(Society for Human Resource Management, 2011)

Examples: Perennial Issues in
Organizational Diversity

Surface-level Diversity: Deep-level Diversity:

 Women & minorities: pay and position disparity

 “Glass ceiling”: invisible, unbreachable barrier
Gender & Leadership: some data

Women are underrepresented in leadership

positions
Although women…
• Awarded 57% of undergraduate degrees (2011)
• Represent 47% US workforce
• Occupy a considerable portion of middle management positions
• Earn 51% of the bachelor degrees and 46% of all advanced degrees
They still hold…
• About 14% of top officer positions in Fortune 500 companies
• 8.1% of the most highly paid officer positions
• 4.6% of CEO positions (22 women CEO in Fortune 500 Companies)

Growing evidence links % of female top leaders to

firm performance (Note: data only from U.S. orgs)

(Carter et al., 2003; Dezo & Ross, 2013; Erhardt et al., 2003; Krishnan & Park, 2005;
Welbourne et al., 2007)
The global landscape

• Myth: western cultures are more advanced

with respect to women in senior leadership?
 Why is this?! The drivers…
1. Lack of sponsorship and mentorship
Challenging to find mentors
Ex: Data from 6500 business school professors

 Women less inclined to ask or aggressively pursue

mentors (compared with male peers)

 Senior leader pool (often) comprised of older, married

men
- Less equipped to handle or coach instances of sexism
- Concern for managing perceptions of the relationship

2. Unconscious biases
Ex: Professor Jill & Professor Joe
Ex:  (me, calling on you…sorry)

(Groysberg, 2012; Milkman, 2014)

 Why is this?! The drivers…

3. More competition from other women

 When leadership roles seem scarcer for female leaders,
some women behave competitively
 “Queen bee syndrome”
 Study of women in leadership roles:
- view high performing women as a competitive threat and;
- View moderately performance women as a collective threat

4. More “house work” -- family & office demands

 On average, women shoulder more family responsibilities
 Less steady career progression (i.e., time off)
 Shoulder more administrative and silent service roles at
work (i.e., mentoring, recruiting)

(Ellemers et al., 2012; Duguid, 2011; Hersby et al., 2011; Sandberg & Grant; 2015)
Some Progress …

Source: Grant Thornton

2023-10-09 I.H. Asper School of Business 19

Racial & Ethnic Disparity

• Yes, we have increasingly diverse workforces,

but…
– Pretending differences don’t exist between
individuals’ experiences allows biases to flourish
and ignorance to persist.
– Racism persists. (PS: Racism ≠ racist)
To Promote Racial Diversity
An approach to consider as you join organizations and
serve as a leader to all kinds of people:
1. Build awareness. Be learning-oriented.
2. “It’s ok to assume you don’t understand. Just ask. You
don’t have to relate or identify.”
3. Have thoughtful, uncomfortable, honest conversations
to understand others’ perspective and experience.

• Some reading resources:

Examples: Newer to the Diversity Dialogue

Surface-level Diversity: Deep-level Diversity:

Sexual orientation

 Age discrimination  Military’s “Don’t ask, don’t tell”

 40s = sweet spot policy – now repealed
 vs. “too young” for that role  Marriage = spousal work benefits

What about national culture? Regional norms?

Tools?

Sensitivity Training from ‘The Office’

What about national culture? Regional norms?

Trust Exercise – Part 2 & Discussion

Look at the list of people you trust. Now, open up the matrix
and complete it.

 What are the diversity implications of your trust

network?

 Do you surround yourself with a diverse group of

people?

 Embracing and investing in diversity is important—

morally and economically.
Reminders

 LRJ Chapter 2 pp. 53-64 about emotions

 Liz Fosslien TED Talk: How to embrace emotions at work
 SDP respondents – Questions?
 Think about teaming up for team consulting project: we will start builing up
teams after the deadline to drop the course (which is today)

2023-10-09 I.H. Asper School of Business 25

It is a Wrap …

See you on Thursday…