Changes in the demographic structure of the modern workforce and strategies for increasingly globalized business are resulting in a multitude of questions about cultural diversity and its management within organizations. Cultural Diversity Management in Organizations focuses on the status quo of empirical and theoretical research within the demesne of cultural diversity management, providing a topical insight into research in that field, describing the consequences of Diversity for organizations and the psychological variables targeted in cultural diversity management initiatives, and highlighting the possibility of influencing individual-level psychological variables to produce beneficial organizational outcomes.

Text Sample: Chapter 3.2.1.2, Attitudes Towards Diversity: A type of attitudes particularly interesting in connection with organizational management of cultural diversity is attitudes towards diversity (ATD). The definition of attitudes towards diversity is given by Van Oudenhoven et al. (2009, p.259): ‘generalized lasting evaluation of diversity in groups’. The general question of the research area of attitudes towards diversity seems to be: what role in producing diversity outcomes do ATD play in workgroup dynamics. Social identity theory postulates that compositional characteristics of groups (minority/majority arrangement, degree of heterogeneity) are decisive for the productive outcomes of such groups. However, according to Van Oudenhoven et al. (2009) outcomes of diverse groups do not only depend on compositional characteristics, but also on an individual’s tendency to expect positive or negative consequences from diversity, in other words: on individual’s attitudes towards diversity. This insight raises the issue of attitudes in the workplace and accentuates the usefulness of cultural diversity practices in form of trainings, which aim at changing the attitudes and attitudes towards diversity. Van Oudenhoven et al. (2009) argue that the question on positive/negative outcomes of diversity (see 2.4.3. Individual-Level Outcomes) seems to be dependent on the nature of outcome dimensions. McLeod et al. (1996) direct specific attention to the degree of diversity, group process, and nature of tasks as variables, which possibly influence diversity outcomes. Further, Van Oudenhoven et al. (2009) notice that the most commonly found result in the literature is negative affective reactions in highly culturally diverse (noncohesive) workgroups. (Work)group cohesion traditionally has its roots in structural connectedness, demographic similarity, and psychological identification, so it is not surprising that diversity in workgroups seems to come with lower work satisfaction, commitment, as well as with higher levels of emotional conflict (Van der Zee, Atsma, & Brodbeck, 2004 Van Knippenberg, De Dreu, & Homan, 2004). Such outcomes are easily explained by the similarity attraction hypothesis (see 3.1.1. Social Identity Approach) according to which there is a general human tendency to positively react to similarity and negatively to dissimilarity as well as roughly categorize the social environment into us and them, thereby creating subgroups, membership in which could be of importance if intergroup processes come into play. Despite the assertions of the similarity attraction hypothesis, empirical exploration of the link between expected outcomes of diverse workgroups and attitudes towards diversity (Nakui, 2005 Nakui et al., 2008 Van Oudenhoven-Van der Zee, et al., 2009) supports the adverse suggestion that diversity of workgroup composition (for effects of group composition in training groups see 4.4.4. Trainee/Trainer’s Characteristics) in terms of ethnicity and language background leads to generating higher quality of ideas, more varied perspectives, and more elaboration for group work (McLeod & Lobel, 1996 Watson et al., 1993). Likewise, empirical results of real (not only expected) group outcomes by van Dick, van Knippenberg, and Hägele (2008) support the information-processing approach (see 3.1.2.). The researchers found in two longitudinal studies of project teams of postgraduate students that the relationship between subjective diversity and identification is more positive in ethnically diverse workgroups when their members hold pro-diversity beliefs (i.e. positive attitudes towards diversity). The authors additionally find that group identification is positively related to student’s desire to stay in a group and to their information elaboration. Similarly, Homan, Greer, Jehn, and Koning (2010) postulate that the way in which group members construe group’s diversity is shaped by group members’ beliefs about the value in diversity. With their research of groups with distinctive objective subgroups they show that the more group members value diversity (positive attitudes towards diversity), the more likely they are to construe their identity in terms of individual differences and the less likely – in terms of subgroups (see contact hypothesis in 3.1.3. Intergroup Contact Theory for theoretical explanation). The theoretical argument explaining such results is that positive ATD come along with a tendency to exchange work-related information (see 3.1.2. Information-Processing Approach for theoretical explanation) instead of categorizing fellow group members as an out-group (Van Oudenhoven et al., 2009). Based on the assumption that group members with positive attitudes toward diverse workgroups adjust and function better in such groups than members with a negative attitude Nakui (2005) conducted a series of studies. The effects of attitude toward diverse workgroups on task performance, psychological reactions, and perception of group diversity were studied. Nakui was able to show that group members with a positive attitude toward diversity showed higher motivation to work, less sensitivity to cultural diversity at the initial stage of group interaction, and better quality of ideas than those with a negative attitude toward diverse workgroups. Another important variable in this connection is the level of dogmatism. The survey conducted by Chattopadhyay (2003) researched the effects of demographic dissimilarity on organization-based self-esteem of employees, levels of trust in and attraction towards their peers. The results suggest moderating effects of the level of dogmatism on the effects of demographic dissimilarity concerning the attitudes of women and minority employees. It turns out individuals with different (higher and lower) levels of dogmatism perceive organizational status hierarchies (sex- and race-based) as differently legitimate. Thus, lower levels of dogmatism resulted in higher trust and higher attraction towards peers. Yet, not all studies render unambiguous evidence. For example, Strauss (2007) researched the link between attitudes toward diversity and minority status and found no correlation between the perceived minority/majority status (in ethnicity) and attitudes toward diversity. Her results showed that perceived minority status in gender positively correlates with attitudes toward diversity. In particular, women who considered themselves to be of a minority gender were very likely to have positive attitudes toward other cultural groups than women who did not perceive themselves as a minority. Such studies open up a new and relatively unexplored chapter in diversity research – the area of diversity faultlines.

• cultural diversity

• diversity management

• cultural diversity management

• diversity training

• organizational commitment

• psychological variables

• attitudes towards diversity

Alena Romanenko was born in 1985 in Minsk (Belarus). After graduating from a linguistic gymnasium at the top of her class with a major in humanities, she spent 6 semesters on a performance scholarship at the Faculty of Philosophy and Social Sciences at the Belarusian State University in Minsk (Belarus), where she majored in social psychology and carried out two annual projects on cross-cultural communication. Pursuing her research interests, which lay at the intersection of psychology and intercultural communication, she went on to continue her degree at the University of Vienna faculty of Psychology (Austria), where she majored in business and organisational psychology, establishing a research focus within the area of Cultural Diversity Management in Organizations with special emphasis on the importance of psychological variables in organizational contexts. During the course of her studies, Alena completed her internship at the international market research institute YouGovPsychonomics AG in Vienna, and went on to take the project assistant role at vieconsult GmbH, the company which specializes in international organizational consulting. This helped to extend her competence in organizational research and provided invaluable insights into the world of human resource management. Alena graduated from the University of Vienna with a Master’s degree, passing the final examinations with honours.