Leaders have a crucial role in developing an inclusive and diverse workplace and know the value of doing so. A diverse workforce is essential to achieve organizational and financial goals and be competitive in the market. A bulk of evidence has shown that businesses committed to diverse leadership and inclusive culture become more successful.
Features of Transformative Diversity and Inclusive Organizational Culture
Organization’s and People’s Readiness
Culture has a strong driving force and can offer significant competitive advantages. However, a diverse and inclusive culture has a transformation readiness, meaning there is a true desire to improve and address areas of opportunity.
Such readiness allows organizations and companies to understand and assess the potential gaps and strengths in their processes and is ready to allocate the resources and budget necessary to address these gaps.
When they have the readiness to change, leaders, managers, and other employees can improve their skills, adding further value to the organizational culture.
New Innovation and Perspectives
Transformative diversity refers to a new vision, one that’s related to diversity development. It typically seeks to transform or improve the existing diversity program using an infusion or combination of intercultural perspectives.
The new vision of diversity takes the old approach beyond gender and race to propose a shift from conventional race-gender to the integration of minorities and synergy performance problems. Specifically, there is a significance of integrating minorities with varied cultural backgrounds into corporate cultures. This is different from the regular focus on diversity.
That is why a company with transformative diversity and inclusive culture has a higher chance of receiving fresh ideas and perspectives from a diverse group. A study published by the Harvard Business Review found a significant relationship between innovative outcomes and diversity.
The more diverse culture an enterprise has in terms of career path, age, education, and gender, the more innovative perspectives it will receive. The researchers measure this via the levels of profitability. All diversity dimensions correlate with innovation and improve profits.
Improved Performance
One significant feature that demonstrates diversity and inclusion in organizational culture is improved performance and increased productivity. A diverse culture is a competitive differentiator. According to McKinsey, organizations with more ethnic and racial diversity can outperform their competitors by 3.5 percent
Better Decision Making
Transformative diverse and inclusive culture promotes better decision making. A virtual decision-making platform, Cloverpop, assessed 600 decisions of 200 teams in different organizations. The results showed a significant improvement in decision-making. Mainly, gender-diverse teams make better decisions compared to individuals that set them apart from the rest.
Increased Employee Trust and Engagement
A diverse and inclusive culture makes employees feel trusted and included. And when employees are highly engaged, they won’t mind going the extra mile to perform for the organization. This higher engagement increases team morale, confidence, and employee retention. Inclusive workplaces have healthier environments as they promote better mental and physical health.
Summing Up
All in all, a transformative diversity and inclusive organizational culture promises positive changes. It involves and engages employees from diverse backgrounds to contribute to company success. Thus, leaders need to implement smart strategies to use assets and talent beneficially. The new approach is designed to create increasingly multicultural workplaces. Thus, transformational diversity includes an imperative focus on “inclusion” of highly diverse talent. It visibly contributes to performance and an inclusion-oriented system for all.
Links
https://www.servicefutures.com/diversity-nothing-without-inclusive-workplace-culture
https://www.futureseriesfuse.com/insights/transformative-culture