SYNAPSE - 2014
SYNAPSE - 2014
The Paradox of Diversity Management: An Indian Scenario
- Dr. Uma Warrier
Dr. Uma Warrier is a faculty member of
Human resource management and
holds the Chief Counsellorship of the
Jain University of Bangalore. She
received her MBA in Human Resource
Management and her PhD
in Management ( Area of research Emotional Intelligence and career
success which is ab biter disciplinary
topic between Psychology and
Management ) from VTU .
Her research interests are in Strategic
HRM, Work place diversity , Work life
balance, Organizational psychology and
managing change. Uma has authored 2
text books in HRM and Organizational
psychology and has published articles in
varied international and national
research journals. Uma is currently
involved in an endeavor to promote
mental health of college goers and has
given series of sessions on national
television on topics connected to
improving mental health of campus
students.
New company law
passed in August 2013
stipulates that a specified
class of companies
should have at least one
woman member in the
board of directors.
Work place diversity is professed to be a key
driver for organizational advancement in the
future. More so, given the globalized business
scenario, people from diverse backgrounds,
culture and beliefs interact with each other to
ride the next wave. Diversity provides the
required competitive advantage by being the
source of creativity and innovation. It also
improves readiness to change. Organizations
that have a high level of workforce diversity
grow in the market place and addressing challenges like law suits and business continuity is
managed easily. Organizations world over are
therefore trying to increase the diversity in
their work force to achieve inclusive growth.
Diversity in the form of gender, age, race,
language/ region, disability and many more are
most often followed in organizations.
India is not far behind in diverse work force
management. The new company law passed in
August 2013 stipulates that a specified class of
companies should have at least one woman member in the board of directors. Companies like
Axis bank, Titan, Wipro and others boast of
women executives at the helm of affairs. Initiatives like Forum for Women in Leadership positions intend to generate 150 women to take up
board responsibility by 2014.A group of India
Inc. leaders are also grooming competent women
employees for board roles. Results are already
visible as there has been a steady increase in the
gender diversity of the workforce. The IT sector
shows gender diversity between 24% and 30%
and the BPO sector sees a higher proportion at
35% to 42%. Women executives hold top level
positions in nine banks, five FMCG companies
and close to ten IT / ITeS companies. According
to survey data from AVTAR Career Creators (a
firm that works in the areas of talent strategy
consulting), around 7% of top positions in Indian
listed companies are held by women. Poonam
Barua, founder-chairman of Forum for Women in
Leadership and CEO of WILL Forum India says,
"If you do not put women in top management,
you run the risk of not understanding the needs of
customers, suppliers, investors and stakeholders."
Indian work force consists of Baby boomers
(between 1946 and 1964),Gen X (people born
between 1965 and early 1980s) and Gen Y (post
1980).Each of these work forces reflects certain
characteristic work related attributes that are
different from each other and expectations from
the work place in return of the services rendered
vary widely. For example, baby boomers value
high level of responsibility. Perks, praise and
challenging work keep these types of employees
motivated. Gen X people are known to be ambitious and hardworking and value work life balance unlike baby boomers. In India, Gen X has
shown high level of entrepreneurial spirit. Gen Y
employees are smart, creative, achievement oriented, tech savvy individuals who are adept at
multi-tasking. They expect instant gratification
for the work done through immediate feedback