In yesterday’s message, I wrote about the social and political issues that are currently polarizing society and the potential for those to show up in and disrupt the workplace. Back when I started as an HR leader, racial, gender and age issues were new in the workplace and we had to educate managers how to navigate them. More recently, the multi-generational workforce represents a new set of diversity issues that managers are struggling to understand and manage, and training is most likely needed for that too. It’s probably safe to assume that communities and businesses are always going to be faced with issues relating to all kinds of diversity. That’s why tolerance and the Golden Rule are so important in religious and early childhood education, and why they need to be stressed in workplace hiring standards, policies and orientations, in new hire and management training programs, and in corporate communications and recognition practices. Companies rely on teamwork and can’t expect employees to leave their differences at the employee entrance – those need to be discussed and managed by supervisors and leaders who probably are feeling ill-prepared to deal with them. In these uncertain times, make diversity training a priority for your business and be prepared to explain the why behind that mission. Because the workplace, with its shared values and objectives, just might be the place where we can address our differences and begin to heal today.
Girish Pancha: CEO of StreamSets, a data integration company
No comments:
Post a Comment