- A researchable question that came to mind was the culture of workspaces and work areas where racism is highest. What does that say about the company? If organizational culture is driven by incentives and is adaptable to society, what does that say about society? I think it is interesting with the increasing diversity to analyze the deeper workings of companies who have employees who experience institutional racism. If organizational culture reflects the society surrounding it and adapts to culture in it, how come many are still made to feel left out. Another question it raises is why do many employers tolerate or try to excuse discrimination. Although it is clear and evident that many employees experience it, why do many workplaces fail to conduct diversity training. These are questions that I would be interested in exploring further as I am coming up on looking for jobs and internships. A moral standard that is important to me is how the workplace is conducted and if employees feel comfortable going to their employers with an issue. And if they do not feel comfortable, why is that so?
- In regards to the diversity article, there have been a few instances in my life where I have experienced a lack of ethnic diversity, but diversity in other identifications. In the past, I have worked at an assisted living home serving food to the elderly. In this job, I noticed that all of the wait staff were female while the kitchen crew was only male. For the waitstaff, majority were white females aged 16-30 while the kitchen crew ranged in age however they were predominantly white. Although each staff member came from a different economical background, we all shared the basic superficial traits. I thought this was interesting as the elderly who lived in the home were all white, creating no physical diversity in the workplace. I never had gone through a diversity training or having a job properly address workplace discrimination until I started working at the Syracuse Barnes Center as a lifeguard where the staff is more diverse. The team I am surrounded by at my job at the Barnes Center is more efficient and we are able to have an open dialogue with each other at any moment, while my other lifeguarding job at a country club yielded very little diversity and less comfortability with addressing issues. Although the lifeguarding staff at both jobs were predominately female, at my job at the country club we never had training on how to address if someone makes us uncomfortable, only if a woman was wearing a revealing bathing suit and how to address the situation. The difference in efficiency of the staff was clear to me once I started working at Barnes, which coincides with the points made in the article surrounding workplace diversity.
Writing and organizational cultures
I like the question you raise about institutional racism in your post. Your post got me thinking. Most companies with racism issues probably are somewhat aware of the racism going on within their organization. With that being said, in many of these cases, the issues of racism that arise are ignored. For these organizations, it probably is much easier to look the other way at the complicating issue that racism is, then to address it or deal with it.
Hi Jackie! Your response to the first question is a point of view I hadn’t even considered when I read the articles, but you’re absolutely right. What does the fact that women make up an average of just 16 percent of the members of executive teams in the United States say about society’s incentives? I really hope the article about why diversity matters will compel organizations to work harder at achieving diversity, but society needs to change as well.
You highlight an important area for further research–what kinds of training actually work? and what do we actually do? The fact is that an awful lot of workplace training is cursory, at best–online videos and multiple-choice quizzes, and maybe some in-person stuff when an employee first begins. That’s not to say that HR professionals don’t care, but rather that companies often under-invest in this area.