The term ‘Diversity’ has become widely used in many different types of organisations from the workplace to community groups. If you read internal communications within your employing organisation or you scan the recruitment section of local newspapers, you will see that organisations often describe themselves as ‘committed to diversity’.
Diversity refers to, in the context of society or organisations, the way in which groups or communities consist of people from all walks of life. Organisations acknowledging a commitment to diversity are reflecting the recognition that they represent a diverse community and are usually speaking positively about diversity and what it represents. A diverse community is all the richer for the people in it.
Diversity basically means celebrating differences to create coherent and happy communities.
Everyone has something to bring to a community, whether they are members of the biggest or the smallest group and diversity is about embracing all of these members. For a community to be truly diverse, everyone within the community must contribute to it and bring their own experiences to the group for a richer shared experience and the education of others
Increasingly businesses are recognising the value of diversity for their workforce and reaping the benefits of a varied workforce that makes the best of people’s talents whatever their backgrounds.
What differences constitute diversity?
Diversity encompasses visible and non-visible individual differences.
Diversity is about respecting individual differences, and people’s differences can be many and varied. These differences can include:
- Race
- Culture
- National origin
- Region
- Gender
- Sexual Orientation
- Age
- Marital Status
- Politics
- Religion
- Ethnicity
- Disability
- Socio-economic or class differences
- Family structure
- Health Values
- And more.
A positive approach to equality and diversity by an employer brings to an organisation a wide range of experience, ideas and creativity whilst giving the individual employee a feeling of being enabled to work to their full potential.
Employers are now encouraged to deepen and enrich their “equal opportunities” policies and strategies into an encompassing Equality and Diversity policy with a strategy and action plans that managers, workers and other stakeholders can contribute to and benefit from.
