NEED OCTOBER 30TH BY 9PM EST

(Please do not insert this into the attached paper but create a new document)

This is a continuation of a dissertation. APA FORMAT.

Chapter 1 has the needed information and additional track changes.The questions below need to be answered by a minimum of 2 pages. The topic is about workplace diversification and organizational culture. The study will take place in Charlotte, NC and will focus on Information Technology Organizations employees. 

Add more specific details to the methodology section from the attached document. 

Be sure to answer the following questions…

1. The question is what exactly do you plan on doing with the research data? What will you do with this established relationship information?

2. While gaining information on workplace diversity, how can this contribute to organizations and the overall research?

3. The overall aim of understanding is directed at who?

4. Who is it that you want to reach some sort of understanding? Then what?

Additionally, be sure to state why the qualitative method is best for the study and other methods are not. Also, be sure to cite Creswell and at least one other researcher.

Keep in mind that the research questions will be the following:

Research Question 1. What impact do workplace diversity and organizational culture have on a company?

Research Question 2. Does workplace diversity affect organizational culture?

Be specific on which company that you plan on researching or are you seeking individual participants? Are you looking in a specific area of the country, industry, etc. ***The answer to this question is above and underlined!***

Table of Contents

Page

Chapter 1: Introduction 1

Background of the Problem 1

Problem Statement 2

Purpose Statement 3

Nature of the Study 3

Significance of the Study 3

Research Question 4

Brief Review of the Literature 4

Contribution of the Study to the Literature 5

Contribution to the Context of the Problem 7

Similar and Related Studies 7

Gap in the Literature 8

Conceptual Framework 8

Factors 9

Assumptions, Limitations, and Delimitations 10

Assumptions 10

Limitations 10

Delimitations 11

Definition of Terms 11

Conclusion 12

Chapter 2: Literature Review 13

Historical Development of the Topic 13

Contemporary Perspectives 20

Historical Development of the Theory 26

Importance of the Study and Implication for Practice 28

Directions for Future Research 32

Contingency Theory 33

Goals Theory 34

Cognitive Resource Theory 35

Social Utility Theory 35

Psychology Organization Theory 36

Summary 36

Chapter 3: Research Method 40

Introduction 40

Research Design 40

Appropriateness of Design 41

Procedure 42

The Role of the Researcher 44

Population and Sample 45

Instrumentation 47

Data Collection and Analysis 48

Human Participants and Ethics Precautions 49

Validity and Reliability 49

Contribution to Social, Practice, or Organizational Change 50

Summary 51

ANALYZING WORKPLACE DIVERSIFICATION

ANALYZING WORKPLACE DIVERSIFICATION

Chapter 1: Introduction

While organizational cultures shape most companies, workplace diversity has also taken course and is quickly becoming a crucial part of the workplace components. The attitudes that are infiltrated into the work environment define most organizations, and determine how workers can contend with transitioning the composition of the society. Facing numerous changes in pursuit of efficiency and effectiveness, a corporation is delineated by its operations and how well it can affiliate with the current nature of the workplace. Furthermore, organizational culture affects the behavior of employees, because it shapes peoples’ values, assumptions, and beliefs and consequently how they act (Guillaume, Dawson, Otaye-Ebede, Woods & West, 2017). Workplace diversity is a critical aspect of an organization’s culture; thus, continuously evolving through interaction, however, proper incorporation is essential.

Background of the Problem

The modern working environment has experienced major transformation over the last jubilee due to increased globalization. Indeed, The workplace is comprised of diverse people from all over the world. Employees are usually hired to help organizations achieve their goals; however, the diverse nature of human beings brings about the inherent difference among employees that threatens to derail the achievement of organizational goals. According to a study by Barak 2016), these differences often tend to be cultural, intellectual, or gender-related and will impact an organization’s shared goal of achieving professional success through teamwork. Subsequently, a study by Dinesen and Sønderskov 2015) shared that the nature of social diversity will continue to increase as more people adopt different ways of life. This, therefore, means that the organizational culture will be impacted even more by forces of diversity. Therefore, there is a need for a better workplace diversity management plan that not only solves current issues at the workplace but also prepares for future changes in the current social structure. Comment by Bill Talboys: Too indefinite. A jubilee can be anywhere from 25 to 50 years and is always tied to a particular event or regime. Comment by Bill Talboys: Where is open parentheses? Comment by Bill Talboys: Where is open parentheses?

Problem Statement

Organizations continue to face conflicts between corporate practices and the increasing diversity of the workforce which significantly affects employee retention. Additionally, there is no doubt that diversity in the workplace is a booming reality as organizations continue to witness high rates of growth in the 21st Century which covers people of varying ages, genders, religions, ethnicities and educational backgrounds. According to Earl, Taylor, Roberts, Huynh and Davis, (2017), the current demographic trends indicate the changing nature of the workforce composition which calls for better acceptance, management, and utilization of diversity in the workplace. Comment by Bill Talboys: Value judegement Comment by Bill Talboys: Maybe use …involves people of….

According to Ramos, Kovalenko and Kovalenko (2016), diversity is and will continue to be a factor that contribute to the success or failure of any organization operating in the international space. According to Ramos et al. (2016) workplace diversity accounts for a significant percentage of organizational success, making a study on their relationship worthwhile. Indeed, some studies have focused on understanding the relationship between workplace diversity and organization performance (Boehm, & Kunze, 2015; Schwab, Werbel, Hofmann & Henriques, 2016; Bolli, Renold & Wörter, 2018; Rawat & Basergekar, 2016). Comment by Bill Talboys: What about local or national business? Comment by Bill Talboys: Who are they? Comment by Bill Talboys:

However, they only assessed how individual factors such as age and gender affect different aspects of the organization. They did not provide an in-depth analysis of how age, gender, education, and ethnicity impact organizational behavior all at once. Even so, their results revealed that workplace diversity has an implication on organizational behavior, which influences organizational culture and ultimately, performance (Greene & Kirton, 2015). Therefore, dedication to equality and diversity is what shapes different aspects of an organization by sending a clear message of value and reassurance to employees. Comment by Bill Talboys: Which aspects?

Purpose Statement

The purpose of this study is to establish the relationship between workplace diversity and organizational culture by analyzing how age, gender, education, work experience and ethnicity affects employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention. The overall aim is to understand how each variable affects the outcome of the other in organizations. This therefore means that the stakeholder groups that the study will focus on will be employees in various organizations that will be chosen to take part in the study. What will you do with this established relationship information? The over all aim of understanding is directed at who? Who is it that you want to reach some sort of understanding? Then what?

Nature of the Study

A qualitative research study will be conducted involving workplace diversity and organizational culture. According to Punch, (1998) a qualitative study is suitable where the data are not in the form of numbers. This kind of research technique is also critical when it comes to understanding the feelings, values, and perceptions that underlie and influence behavior of a particular target population towards a specific phenomenon. The researcher in this study will seek the views and opinions of employees from different organizations on how differences in age, gender, education, and ethnicity affect their organization’s employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention. This is why qualitative design was chosen because it will allow the researcher to collect real-time information from participants who are observed in a natural and unchanged environment (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). Questionnaires will be the main data collection tool. This is because data can be collected relatively quickly because the researcher would not need to be present when the questionnaires were completed. This is useful for large populations when interviews would be impractical. However, a problem with questionnaire is that respondents may lie due to social desirability. Participants will, therefore, engage in questionnaire filling sessions delivered to them on a drop-and-collect-later basis, intending to assess how factors of workplace diversity such as age, gender, education, and ethnicity affect organizational culture. Further, the study ensures the saturation and reliability of the data by applying relevant statistical techniques used in qualitative research analysis. STOPPED Comment by Bill Talboys: Are you questioning them or observing them? Comment by Bill Talboys: Unchanged from what? Comment by Bill Talboys: ARE – Watch the tense. Comment by Bill Talboys: What is social desirability and isn’t this a limitation to the study?

Significance of the Study

The structure of most organizations is complex, and most factors are determined by the interactive nature of persons that constitute a working environment (Greene & Kirton, 2017). In that case, conducting a study that connects work diversity, organizational behavior, and organizational culture might be relevant to organizations in understanding how they compare in the overall performance. By understanding the vital role each showcase, it will facilitate in creating an environment where diversity represents a culture, that embraces changes and dynamic rapidly changing work environment.

The contemporary organizations are defined by diverse aspects all of which can be attributed to such factors as globalization, technological revolution and internal migration. As a result of this intricate nature, workplace diversity has now become a platitude of high importance that inherently aligns with the organizational behavior and organizational culture. Therefore, examining the relationship between the mentioned factors gives an explicit outlook, on how the modern corporate world could manage diversity and create a work culture that encourages participation and sound results.

Research Question

The research question that guided this research is:

What impact do workplace diversity and organizational culture have on a company? Comment by Bill Talboys: “does”

The study identified four factors associated with workplace diversity including age (Boehm, & Kunze, 2015), gender (Schwab, Werbel, Hofmann & Henriques, 2016), education (Bolli, Renold & Wörter, 2018) and ethnicity (Rawat & Basergekar, 2016). Organizational culture will be represented by various concepts including employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention.

Brief Review of the Literature

The modern corporate world is facing numerous changes all in pursuit of efficiency and effectiveness. While organizational cultures shape most companies, workplace diversity has also taken course and is quickly becoming a crucial part of the workplace components. However, one thing is for sure, the attitudes incorporated into the work environment define most organizations. In response to this, the corporate world is compelled to assimilate diversity by restructuring the organizational culture and ultimately behavior to one that accepts diversity because it influences outcomes and most importantly employee satisfaction.

Having discussed the rationale for and the purpose of this study in the previous sections, the following section provides the extant literature concerning the diversity of workplace by other researchers, giving contributions by each researcher. Areas including the context of the problem, contribution of this study to the literature, similar and related studies as well as the gap in the literature will be of concern to this paper. This not only allowed the researcher to identify the current trends as far as the topic is concerned but also helped in identifying the gap that has not yet been covered. It will be designed in line with the research questions/objectives that the study intends to pursue.

ANALYZING WORKPLACE DIVERSIFICATION 15

ANALYZING WORKPLACE DIVERSIFICATION 8

Contribution of the Study to the Literature

Workforce diversity is a component within human resources that should be addressed, as an increasing concern to Human Resource managers. It should never be separated from the strategies of the business. Diversity allows management to understand how best to invest in its people and therefore management should view it as an investment. Human resource managers should be able to provide guidance in managing diversity so that all potentials benefit that can bring difference are realized (Badalona & Marques, 2013).

In the workplace, diversity can be beneficial or a liability. However, the outcome of this diversity is the extent to which diversity practices could lead to positive psychological outcomes are engaged in an organization. Such outcomes include if the employees feel valued and/or the way they are encouraged to build rapport within the organization. Organizations that invest in resources to measure diversity climate will make wiser decision for their prosperity (Chrobot-Mason & Aramovich, 2013).

Consider Bond and Haynes’ (2014) contribution to the literature of this study, where they articulate the challenges in the current policies in the management of workplace diversity. The research also examined the relationships that could exist mutually among interpersonal processes in relation to workplace diversity. This reference concluded that policies should be attentive to issues at several levels of analysis, be considerate to the radiating effect of all the behavior in the organization, reconsider the role of the intent and bring in the attention to history as well as the current differences in access to relevant resources.

Also, according to Lambert (2016), the findings suggested that job satisfaction is positively impacted by religious commitments. Also, the findings showed that the satisfactions differ from religion to religion. Additionally, according to Guillaume, Dawson, Otaye‐Ebede, Woods and West, (2017) organizations that have a diverse population of employees are better suited to serve diverse external customers. This is because more diverse employees will provide management with the knowledge of the legal, social, political, economic and cultural environments.

This study also concluded that most employees are certain that they can cope with diversity. To increase inclusiveness, organizations should adopt such strategies as training of their employees so as they can easily cope with cultural differences, encouraging them to accept assignments overseas and offering them a foreign language training. This study also states that the main barriers to effective workplace diversity are discrimination, prejudice and, ethnocentrism.

Contribution to the Context of the Problem

According to Chrobot-Mason and Aramovich (2013), workforce diversity is like a double-edged sword; it can bring about both positive and negative impact to an organization. These researchers also concluded that the relationships between workplace diversity and employees greatly depends on the psychological outcomes. This will form a base for our current study which will be on the behavior culture with respect to workplace in an organization.

Taking a look at Babalola and Marques (2013), we find out that their research was concerned with human resource management and workplace diversity. Their findings show that whereas some organizations value diversity, others implement diversity requirements just to fulfill the legislation requirements. Babalola and Marques (2013), suggest that organizations should value workplace diversity and this should be reflected in their culture, policy, and design. This research will impact the current study by providing the information on the relationship between management and workplace diversity. To the current research this information will provide the guidelines, as the current research can extend this research further to obtain more information

Similar and Related Studies

Studies on workplace diversity have evolved for a long period of time. There have been numerous studies related to the current study. However, the objectives of all these studies are different. For instance, Chrobot-Mason and Aramovich 2013) focused on the psychological benefits of creating an affirming climate for workplace diversity while Bond and Haynes (2014) intended to find out a social–ecological framework and its policy implications. On the other hand, Knights and Omanović (2016) studied managing diversity in Management Information Systems. This study intends to find out the correlation between factors affecting workplace diversity and profitability.

Gap in the Literature

Diversity has been used to describe a workforce composed of different kinds of people. According to McGrath, Berdahl & Arrow, (1995), diversity is a characteristic group that refers to demographic differences among members. Over time, this has evolved to mean inclusion. All in all, its definition is largely associated with ethnicity and individual differences that exists among people working for an organization. In this case, ethnicity refers to the racial and ethnic backgrounds of individuals. Roberson (2004) indicated that diversity is a term, used to describe individual differences and how these unique differences define the ability to be productive at work. The differences can be in race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socio-economic status, age, physical abilities, religious beliefs, political beliefs or other ideologies.

Many previous researchers have brought to light important insights into organizational behavior and organizational culture and their relations to workplace diversity. This study will not only build upon the previous studies, but it will also extend them by closely looking at the dynamics that affect organizational ability to harness the positive promise of workplace diversity. Thereafter, this study will address the areas with potential problems.

Conceptual Framework

To find out the exact extent of workplace diversity and how it affects organizational culture, the researcher sought to establish the correlation between workplace diversity and organizational culture. From context, it was identified that several studies have investigated workplace diversity. Most of them dwelled on examining the connections between workers and understanding diversity climate perceptions and the resolve to turnover (Chrobot-Mason & Aramovich, 2013). Others were simply interested in an integrated approach to workplace diversity through human resource management (Babalola & Marques, 2013), workplace diversity and the absorptive capacity framework (Lambert, 2016), a social-ecological framework and policy implication of workplace diversity (Jones, 2018) and finally the potential barriers to workplace diversity (Guillaume, Dawson, Otaye‐Ebede, Woods, & West, 2017). What was noted is that no one connected workplace diversity and its impact on organizational culture. This study therefore will work towards establishing this relationship by considering some demographic factors about employees and what this means about how they answer specific questions regarding workplace diversity in their respective organizations.

Factors

Lančarič, Chebeň and Savov (2015) identified age, gender, education, work experience, and ethnicity as the main factors that determine workplace diversity. These factors will be used to determine the effect of workplace diversity on organizational culture.

Factor 1, Age. This factor determines the age of the respondent. It was arrived by taking the factors that affect workplace diversity as described by Lančarič, Chebeň and Savov (2015). Age differences affect the way an organization’s culture is, which in turn affect the way the organization adopts workplace diversity in their structure.

Factor 2, Gender. This factor describes the gender of the participant, who in this case is an employee. The factor was obtained by considering the variables that affect workplace diversity as explained by other studies including Lančarič, Chebeň and Savov (2015), who stated that gender is a determining factor when it comes to understanding workplace diversity. The factor behaves in such a way that a male employee will have different perceptions about diversity compared to a female employee.

Factor 3, Education. This factor describes the level of education attained by a respondent. It was also arrived at by taking the factors that affect workplace diversity by Lančarič, Chebeň and Savov (2015). The higher the level of education, then the higher the chance that an employee appreciates workplace diversity.

Factor 4, Work Experience. This variable describes the amount of time an employee has been enrolled at work. It was also obtained from Lančarič, Chebeň and Savov (2015) as a factor that affects workplace diversity. The variable changes positively with an increase in the number of years of experience.

Factor 5, Ethnicity. This defines the ethnic quality or affiliation resulting from racial or cultural ties. Lančarič, Chebeň and Savov, (2015) argued that ethnicity is an important factor when it comes to workplace diversity. Ergo, the following section describes the conceptual framework that will be adopted to make this possible.

The independent variables are described as age, gender, income, marital status, education, work experience, and religion. A change in these fixed characters about an individual affects their attitude towards workplace diversity, which is the dependent variable.

Assumptions, Limitations, and Delimitations

Assumptions

According to Creswell and Creswell (2017), assumptions are unexamined beliefs that researchers thinks without realizing that they are. From the conceptual framework, assumptions have been made. For instance, it was assumed that the inherent demographic factors identified i.e. age, gender, education, work experience and ethnicity will all result to attitude towards workplace diversity. This essentially means that no other factors do. Having a qualitative study means that the researcher assumes the methods used are inductive in nature and will thus be based on his own experiences while collecting and later, analyzing data.

Limitations

Limitations are the potential points of constraint within the study that cannot be controlled by the researcher even when they place restrictions on your methodology and conclusions. (Creswell & Creswell, 2017). Various limitations are bound to be experienced during this study. Given that the study is a qualitative analysis, the results will be based on the respondent’s assertions about workplace diversity as opposed to having a quantitative analysis that would quantify the results. The use of questionnaires would also not provide enough evidence that would help in the analysis of actual attitudes towards diversity in the workplace. Time will also be a constraint as it may not allow for as many organizations to be included in the study. Finally, given the existence of different types of organizations, it may not be practically possible to include every type in the sample population.

Delimitations

Delimitations on the other hand are limitations caused by the undertakings of the study The delimitations for this research: The study only chose to review studies that had been done within the last five years; because they will depict the most current information, that would easily identify the research gap that has not been identified yet. The population chosen for the study will also be subjected to the United States, and not the world. This will make it possible to collect the data necessary for its completion.

Definition of Terms

Cognitive Resource Theory refers to the scrutiny of how a leader’s intelligence and experience can be used to deal with day-to-day stresses associated with organization management. (Fiedler & Garcia, 1987)

Contingency Theory suggests that leaders are most effective when their dominant behaviors/styles are matched with the right situations (Northouse, 2018)

Executive Order 9981 refers to the Executive Order signed by President Harry Truman on July 26, 1948 that desegregated the U.S. military, and provided a pathway for the Civil Rights Movement.

Goals Theory refers to the effects of setting goals on subsequent performance. (Locke and Latham, 1991)

Learning Theory refers to someone absorbing, and retaining knowledge in organizations mainly as a result to the various interactions and inquiring within that setting (Shafritz, Ott & Jang, 2015).

Psychology Organization Theory refers to the interrogating of both mental and behavioral phenomena that take place when people belonging to organizations interact (Daft, Murphy & Willmott, 2010).

Social Utility Theory refers to smooth operations within any given setting, value must be placed on each member of that group (Kauder, 2015).

Summary

Chapter 1 included an outline of the entire study on workplace diversity and its effect on organizational culture. Chapter 2 follows with an in-depth review of the literature, which pointed out some of the significant developments in the study. It also allowed the researcher to identify the gap. Chapter 3 provides a discussion of the methodology and the procedures for data collection. The results of the analysis are provided for in Chapter 4, while Chapter 5 provides a conclusion as well as recommendations and suggestions for future studies.

Chapter 2: Literature Review

Historical Development of the Topic

Adoption of workplace diversity is an initiative that has existed since the ancient times where various organizations and individuals took appropriate measures to enhance workplace diversity. A look into its timeline therefore goes way back to almost a century ago in 1948 when President Truman passed Executive Order 9981 (Truman, 1948). Further, in 1964, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 followed by swearing in of Thurgood Marshall as the first black Supreme Court Justice in 1967. In 1970, Frank Carr started the organization INROADS while in 1987, William Brock commissioned Workforce 2000. Fast forward to 2008, we saw Stu Rasmussen appointed as the first proclaimed transgender mayor.

Also, in 2011, the Obama administration included sexual orientation and gender identity in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and most recently in 2014, Google became the first major tech company to release its first diversity report (Harvey & Allard, 2015). Adoption of workplace diversity is an initiative that has existed since the ancient times where various organizations and individuals took appropriate measures to enhance workplace diversity (Paull & Omari, 2015). A look into its timeline therefore goes way back to almost a century ago in 1948 when President Truman passed Executive Order 9981. Further, in 1964, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 followed by swearing in of Thurgood Marshall as the first black Supreme Court justice in 1967 (Zapata-Barrero, 2015).

In 1970, Frank Carr started the organization INROADS while in 1987, William Brock commissioned Workforce 2000. Fast forward to 2008, we saw Stu Rasmussen appointed as the first proclaimed transgender mayor. Also, in 2011, the Obama administration included sexual orientation and gender identity in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and most recently in 2014, Google became the first major tech company to release its first diversity report (Barak, 2016). The timelines indicate the changing workplace demographics that are experienced in the current corporate world.

Numerous organizations are shifting their focus on workplace diversity to enhance effectiveness and efficiency. The initiative is gaining popularity as it is considered a significant component in the workplace (Luthans & Doh, 2017). Affiliation of an organization with the current work setting nature enhances the operation of such an organization and enhances teamwork. Such current settings include a changing organizational culture due to the adoption of workplace diversity (Luthans & Doh, 2017). Therefore, organizations’ managers have the mandate of adjusting the organizational culture to match the changing workplace diversity.

One of the earliest approaches to workplace diversity was advanced by President Harry S. Truman who passed the Executive Order 9981 in 1948. A committee of the president on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services was established through an executive order (Feng, 2015). The harsh treatment of the African American soldiers after World War II prompted President Truman to adopt the Executive Order (Feng, 2015). When the African American soldiers returned from the war, they received hostile treatment rather than finding a more equitable society.

One of such brutality was the mistreatment of Sergeant Isaac Woodward by a bus driver and a policeman in 1946. The police officer brutally blinded the soldier by extorting his eyes. The action impelled President Truman to address the Attorney General, Tom Clerk, to establish a civil rights commission to generate recommendations for such brutality (Feng, 2015). Later, the president created the President’s Commission on Civil Rights by Executive Order that provided the recommendations in 1947. The president then issued the Executive Order 9981, which was generated from the commission’s report. The focus of the Order on elimination of racial discrimination in the federal bureaucracy enhanced workplace diversity.

Later in 1964, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act that advocated for workplace diversity. President John F. Kennedy had spearheaded the passage of the new civil rights legislation, which led to his political victory (Act, 1964). However, he was assassinated when the civil rights legislation was still being debated by the Congress. The death of President Kennedy left the mandate of pushing for the enactment of the civil rights legislation to Lyndon Johnson. Johnson pushed for the enactment of the Act in 1964. The federal government, through the Act, acquired the power to protect the citizens against sexual, religious, and racial discrimination. The Act obligated the government to abolish the segregation that was experienced in the public accommodations.

Such facilities included swimming pools and parks, bus depots, and lunch counters. Besides, the federal government was obligated to ensure minorities at the workplace were treated equally through the establishment of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) (Act, 1964). The Civil Rights Act eliminated biased registration procedures and requirements to enhance equal voting rights. In addition, the U.S Office of Education was mandated to ensure that desegregation in schools was eliminated through the provision of aid. The Act was signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson on July 2, 1964, marking the establishment of workplace diversity (Gotsis & Kortezi, 2015).

The passage of the Civil Rights Act enhanced the nomination of Thurgood Marshall to become the first black justice of the Supreme Court. President Lyndon Johnson nominated Marshall to replace the Supreme Court Justice, Tom Clark, who had retired. The nomination triggered a heated debate in the Senate with some members opposing the move. However, the Senate confirmed the nomination with a massive vote against the opposition (Scaperlanda, 1994). Later, during the ceremony of the opening term of the Supreme Court on 2nd October, Thurgood Marshall was sworn in officially. His nomination had been rejected earlier by the Senate before the Civil Rights Act was passed. Marshall was appointed as the chief counsel of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

Thurgood Marshall successfully challenged numerous cases regarding racial segregation during the period he served as the chief counsel including the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case of 1954. President John F. Kennedy’s attempts to appoint Marshall to the U.S. Court of Appeals failed since the Southern Senators opposed the nomination. His appointment in 1967 marked the adoption of workplace diversity in the judiciary (Scaperlanda, 1994). Besides the efforts of Thurgood Marshall, particularly his success, indicated the ability of the minority groups. Ergo, implying that the corporate world should embrace workplace diversity to utilize the abilities of the minority groups.

Another approach of enhancing workplace diversity was spearheaded by Frank Carr who started the organization INROADS in 1970 (Hendricks, 1994). The primary purpose of the INROADS organization was to assist students from the minority groups to acquire employment (Hendricks, 1994). The Catholic priest, Rev. Frank Carr, established the nonprofit organization with an aim of enhancing ethnic diversity in the corporate sector of the United States of America (Hendricks, 1994). The Reverent Initiative was inspired by Martin Luther King speech “I Have a Dream.” He left his corporate job and focused on enhancing ethnic diversity in the corporate world (Conklin, 2003).

The mission of the organization was to enhance the talent of the minority youths by placing them in the industry and business opportunities. Carr began the organization with seventeen sponsoring organizations and only twenty-five student interns. The companies that offer internship to the minority students through INROADS pay the students at the actual rate. Besides, the organization offers training sessions for the interns regarding business skills (Conklin, 2003). In essence, the initiative of Rev. Frank Carr of establishing INROADS organization enhanced workplace diversity since students from the minority groups were able to join the corporate world in the United States of America.

Similarly, Secretary of Labor William Brock commissioned the establishment of Workforce 2000 in an attempt to enhance workplace diversity. Brock set up a study of demographic and economic trends by the Hudson Institute, which later acquired the name Workforce 2000 (Cheng, 2016). The study identified various demographic factors that would impact the labor market of the United States of America and would prompt the need for workplace diversity. The first factor was that the growth of the workforce and the population would decline since the 1930s.

The second factor was the shrinking of the pool of youths entering the labor market due to the rise in the average age of the workforce and population. Besides, the study identified that more women would enter the workforce. Still, the minority workforce would have a greater share of the new workforce entrants (Cheng, 2016). In addition, immigrants, both legal and illegal, will constitute the greatest share of the workforce and population increase since the World War I. The study triggered Industries to enhance diversity as an initiative to attract more workers and remain competitive. Therefore, the workforce 2000 initiative commissioned by William Brock enhanced workplace diversity in America.

The appointment of Stu Rasmussen as the first openly transgender mayor of Silverton, Oregon in 2008 was another instance of early workplace diversity. Rasmussen began his political career with the City Council in 1984 (Fitzgibbon, 2018). However, he decided to publicly declare his transgender identity making his political career a unique one. He further underwent breast surgery and shifted to putting on female clothing. Rasmussen first served as the mayor of Silverton in 1988. He was later re-elected to City Council in 1992; however, he took a break from politics until 2004.

Rasmussen was then elected to City Council in 2004 working under Mayor Ken Hector. The mayor was against Rasmussen’s dress code and went ahead to declare a dressing code that would prevent Rasmussen from putting on female dressing. However, the citizens elected Rasmussen as mayor of the city in 2008 despite his transgender nature (Fitzgibbon, 2018). His election expressed the view of the citizens regarding sexual orientation. Silverton, Oregon was the first city to elect a publicly declared transgender mayor. The city proved their acknowledgment of diversity in the society, which led them to embrace such a belief. The approach by the city of Silverton, Oregon should be adopted by the corporate world to enhance business performance. Therefore, the election of Rasmussen as the mayor of Oregon City indicates the adoption of workplace diversity.

In 2011, the Obama administration included sexual orientation and gender identity in the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which was an approach to enhance workplace diversity. The executive order had two parts regarding diversity. The first part made it illegal regarding harassing and firing of employees of the federal contract based on their gender identity or sexual orientation. The second part banned discrimination of the federal government employees who are transgender (Cahill & Makadon, 2014).

In 2014, President Obama signed the executive order regarding the LGBT employment discrimination. The approach was an amendment of the existing executive order that protects the federal contractors’ employees from national, religion, color and racial discrimination. The move by the president was an approach towards adoption of workplace diversity in the corporate world of the United States of America. Such an approach would ensure that the trends of the corporate organization will be in line with the global expansion regarding diversity. In addition, Google Tech Company became the first major tech company to release its first diversity report as a sign of acknowledging workplace diversity. The statistics were both at the operation level and management level of the organization. Google indicated that it had made progress regarding workplace diversity as it established the statistics on its diversity constituent (Brown, 2018). The goal of the organization is to explore the talent that is in the underrepresented groups regarding gender, race, and sexuality.

The approach taken by Google should be adopted by other organizations to enhance diversity. Statistics obtained from such surveys are essential to restructuring the organization and enhance diversity. The various timelines regarding workplace diversity indicate the efforts that have been put forward to achieve the goal. Additionally, it also indicates the acknowledgment of the diverse community since the ancient times. In the current corporate world, workplace diversity has become a challenging factor in many organizations as they strive to attain the diverse workforce. Such shift adopted by the organizations is a clear indication of the flourishing reality of workplace diversity (Lambert, 2016). Workplace diversity consists of multiple categories including education level, ethnicity, religion, gender, and age. Considering the worldwide demographic trends, it is essential for business organizations to put in place appropriate measures to adopt and sustain workplace diversity.

Current performance trends also indicate that there is a correlation between organization performance and workplace diversity. Workplace diversity has a direct impact on organization behavior, which in turn, impact satisfaction and retention of employees (Greene & Kirton, 2015). Therefore, organizations are required to acknowledge and embrace workplace diversity to enhance employee satisfaction and remain competitive.

Contemporary Perspectives

Work place diversity and organizational culture are key determinants in today’s organizational prosperity. They are issues that underlie the performance of an organization today. As much as the issues go hand in hand in determining how good an organization performs, they exert their influence separately. In that background, this section will first look at contemporary perspectives in work place diversity.

Diversity, in the broad sense, is simply the quality of allowing space for the existence of all aspects of a society in harmony. According to Bond and Haynes, (2014), diversity follows the natural law of justice which demands that as much as one might want to have their way, one must let others have their way too. This is especially important at the workplace where people of multicultural backgrounds meet. However, most critical is the fact that diversity is no longer an issue of gender and race (Kim, Lee & Kim, 2015). In the contemporary world, the environment is so dynamic that diversity conflicts have moved away from black/white tensions to a conflict spread across a continuum between two extremes.

In the early 20th century and the few decades that followed, diversity was pretty much a racial question, and less a gender question (Flory, Leibbrandt, Rott & Stoddard, 2018). At the workplace, over 60% of the employees were white males. This was because this group was the sole bread winner in the baby boomer period. Also, at that time, many organizations did not employ people of color. Prominent at that time, diversity issues revolved around race and whether organizations showed notice to black people or not. With the social awakening of women, the diversity issue at the workplace roped in the gender aspect (Bond & Haynes, 2014).

Flory, Leibbrandt, Rott and Stoddard (2018) observed that the question of diversity is very broad. At the workplace, the environment should be tolerant enough to support a peaceful co-existence between individuals from diverse backgrounds and cultures. This is more so important today as the world’s population is more enlightened. People are more aware of their rights and responsibilities. In that sense, the workplace is considered an important place to implement diversity policies.

Like noted earlier, employees all over the world are more aware of issues underlying diversity. They understand that it is incumbent on each organization to ensure that the workplace environment is conducive for a multicultural workforce (Flory, Leibbrandt, Rott & Stoddard, 2018). In this age of information, employees are aware that workplace diversity encompasses gender sensitivity, race, and people with disability. For that reason, organizations have put various measures in place to ensure that today’s workplace is properly constituted. In addition, more organizations today operate on an international basis. For instance, there are Japanese organizations that serve worldwide customers. To effectively cater to the needs of the wider customer base, they need to really understand the underlying principles of the expanded customer. This implies that the Japanese firm will have to employ a multicultural and multigenerational workforce. This way, the organization will be able to push more sales. Due to this international and cross border business model, organizations have to find ways of making their workplace more diverse.

A June 2006 report indicates that women, racial minorities and people with disability continue to miss out on opportunities at the workplace. They continue to be overlooked during appointments to positions of power within organizations, and even government agencies. In fact, the 2006 report by Diversity Inc notes that there is a disproportionate number of minorities in top positions among employees at the US Senate. The report notes that minorities make up 30% of the U.S. population as well as 34% of the labor force; however, only 6% of the minorities work as senior employees at the US Senate. This implies that the minorities do not play a significant role when it comes to affecting the policies that are formulated in the highest offices within the United States.

Today, Gotsis and Kortezi (2015) noted that many organizations acknowledge that diversity at the workplace is more financially successful. For this reason, majority of the businesses and even universities are putting money in programs that encourage diversity. Business leaders are aware that personnel diversity is in fact a driver of innovation. Heterogeneity at the workplace in terms of gender, race, socioeconomic background, and even sexual orientation has been proved to engender a community of motivated employees. Due to the efforts, a 2009 survey found that female employment at the workplace had jumped from 21% in 2001 to 29% in 2009 (Hakim, 2016). At the same time, the survey observed that minorities are at 22% of employment as at 2009. This percentage will continue to grow as many organizations realize what diversity brings to the workplace. Various studies have proved that diversity encourages multiple perspectives to problem solving. This way, an organization is more likely to arrive at the optimum solution to a problem in a diverse workplace environment.

Further, there is a concerted effort by organizations to introduce programs that ensure that all employees can work at their potential. For instance, there are organizations with diversity councils or officers that are tasked with ensuring that the hiring at the company is sensitive to diversity. In addition, Wingfield (2015) said that other organizations have introduced childcare grants that help women nursing children to be able to put their minds to their jobs. As far as child caring goes, some organizations offer free childcare services for mothers who need to be in meetings.

In fact, many organizations now organize their recruitment process to align with the principles of workplace diversity. In a study conducted to determine how organization incorporate the ideal of diversity in their hiring process, it was established organizations have their interviews well designed to pay attention to cultural components of employees. Further, the interviews consider the employees’ gender, sexual orientation and even race. This is in response to the new reality that today’s markets which the organizations serve are diverse. Therefore, organizations must ensure that their staff is representative of the market in order to drive up sales. Contemporary studies on workplace diversity conclude that diversity at the workplace correlates positively with sales or the service demand (Du, 2018). Further, the studies establish that more customers are sensitive to diversity issues and would flock to organizations that display a similar characteristic. Eventually, workplace diversity will lead to more profits for the organizations.

Murray (2014) observed that organizations today are evolved and represent a new and dynamic environment far different from say 30 years ago. Various studied indicate that the composition of workforce today is diametrically opposite to that of three to four decades ago. Today, the workforce is intergenerational and multicultural. Take for instance, the technology companies that are giant organizations today. One will find out that most of the employees are members of the Generation Y and a few millennials. Fewer in number are the members of the baby boomer generation who are all moving into retirement (Murray, 2014). As a result, there is a fundamental shift in dominant organizational cultures across organizations today.

Moreover, is important to note that many traditional organizations maintained an almost homogeneous workplace; the established culture was conservative, laid back, and with a very code of ethics (Withey & Gellatly, 2015). Most of the people in employment were white males on whom family responsibilities weighed. They had families to feed and they were sole bread winners. Due to general societal perceptions and perhaps excess doses of discrimination, women could not work to supplement their husbands’ salaries. Therefore, the white males had to keep with any working condition, however deplorable, so long as they were able to put a warm plate on the table. As Withey and Gellatly (2015) note, this also adversely impacted organizational culture since management could impose any culture and employees would follow without question. The entry of the Generation Y and the Millennials has made the contemporary organization complex due to its dynamic workforce.

Just like a unique personality trait, the culture of an organization is bound to be influenced by environment, the changing economic realities, shifting political ideologies and even the comprehensiveness of private lives (Benzer, Charns, Hamdan & Afable, 2017). Like aforementioned, the work place today is quite heterogeneous. A single organization could be home to more than three generations of employees. These employees might be from different cultures, hence with different dispositions to understanding subtleties of workplace politics. Subsequently, this implies that the organizational culture is changed.

Take for instance the technology giants of today like Google. This firm is a culmination of the internet revolution that took over the world in the 90s. With some good knowledge of how to use a computer and do basic programming, one could get a job at Google; young and old met at the same workplace. With the convergence of all ethnicity’s cultures, religions and sexual orientations made it to the Silicon Valley. This simply meant that a new culture had to be constructed from ashes. The tech phenomenon has completely altered the notion of culture at the workplace.

In conclusion, most of the Baby Boomers are aging and the latter generations are taking over the workplace. Having been born in a new time and age, their understanding of culture is quite different from that of the Baby Boomers. The new generations Even the fundamental principles of business models have changed (Benzer et al., 2017). For instance, take the issue of ethics. The latter generations are more radical in matters ethics. Most Millennials and Generation Ys are considered less ethical compared to the aging workforce (Greenwood & Gong, 2014). This is due to a general decrease in religiosity which is perhaps a consequence of enlightenment.

In this age of abundant information, one can easily get information that was initially difficult to come by. Employees are more aware of company strategy and the mechanics of business. Most importantly, as Murray (2014) observed, employees are more aware of their rights with regards to treatment and interaction at the workplace. One can summarize that this is a know-it-all workforce; a workforce that is restless and has no qualms changing jobs. This implies that today’s employees are less likely to be dictated on what to do. As a result, the dominant culture at such organization is largely determined by the employees.

Further, the structure of a typical organization today is far removed from the dominant structure of the 20th century. Most companies today employ flat structure where employees have a certain amount of autonomy as compared to the previously dominant line structure (Worley & Doolen, 2015). In a flat structured company, there are no “Bosses” but leaders. The level of interaction is high between line employees and the management. This way, the kind of culture that develops is different from the ancient one in both characteristics and form. One finds that the dominant culture tends towards the clan culture. In contrast, in traditional organizations, the dominant culture tends towards hierarchy culture since there is a behavior straitjacket in which an employee must fit.

In addition, the issue of a more diverse workplace has brought about a dynamic shift in organizational culture. Today, it is not uncommon to find a workplace spread across employees from various cultural backgrounds. Lin (2014) insisted that there have been deliberate efforts to incorporate all groups in the world into the workplace for the workplace to reflect the cultural reality of society. Organizations have initiated projects that are geared towards sensitizing employees on the importance of a diverse workplace. As a result, the culture at the given organizations has undergone a shift.

Conjointly, it is necessary to note that some labour market tendencies currently have rendered the indispensable culture useless. Since the rise of the internet, many opportunities have come about. As a result, new horizons have been availed. Important among them is the ability to telecommute (Hatch, 2018). This is the ability for employees to work from home. As a result, the prominence of organization culture has dwindled due to reduced person-to-person interactions. Employees can now hangout on social media sites removing the need for a physical meet-up. Consequently, organizational culture is now almost going to be extinct.

Historical Development of the Theory

Diversity in the workplace and organizational culture play significant roles in shaping the business environment and determining outcomes in the long run. The first factor is evident where organizations with employees from diverse cultures strive to host them in the best possible ways for effective productivity within their organizations (Greene & Kirton, 2015).  Also, workplace diversity is encouraged because it helps in enhancing both creativity and innovation within the workplace. Employees with diverse cultures share ideas which increase levels of creativity in the organization (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). The second factor is an essential aspect of an organization because it guides functions and coordination of activities. For a significant period, many scientific researchers have studied organization culture and diversity to determine their impacts on a workforce. Most times, they yield positive outcomes to most businesses.

The study of workplace diversity is important because it helps employees in exercising mutual respect and building the reputation of a business entity. In the first case, having sufficient knowledge about diversity and studying it is effective in creating respect among employees (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). Significant differences in race, ethnicity and thought within the business environment are studied and appreciated which leads to respect. In the end, employees’ value each other as they respect their cultural and ethnic differences. The second factor presents a significant importance in the study of workplace diversity because it promotes commitment during recruitment of staff (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). Also, the study is essential because it facilitates profitability when a business values the diversity of a workforce. In the end, the image of the business is impacted positively because the employees strive to give their best.

Studying diversity in the workplace is essential because it yields potential professional and social contributions to a business through various ways. In the first case, the study impacts an organization professionally through innovations and creativity (Luthans et al., 2015). An entity that embraces a diverse workforce stands to gain professionally because the collaboration existing between different employees provide a favorable environment for the exchange of ideas. In doing so, there is gain of knowledge and skills which impacts the company positively. The social contributions of studying workplace diversity entail increased exposure among the employees. Through the practice, the study remains important because it facilitates learning between co-workers who have different values and attitudes (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). In the end, the staff relate well as they ensure that they do their best to produce the best outcomes for the organization.

The implications for practice in this study present effective ideas to individuals in the field of study and provide the impact of the findings on their work. In the first case, Kirton and Green emphasize on the necessity of embracing diversity as a measure of the theoretical perspective (Greene & Kirton, 2015).  In this case, this study impacts practice in that it stresses on human difference other than the primary concept of human sameness. Basing on this factor, the concept of diversity influences those within the area of study through ideas used. Individuals in the area of study are impacted because they learn to accommodate differences within themselves and others other than trying to find similarities. Unlike Kirton and Green, Fred, Beth and Kyle Luthans emphasize on organizational culture and behavior. By doing so, practice is influenced through cultures that value appreciation and commitment in the work environment (Luthans et al., 2015). Through this method, the findings of the study impact practice by making employees hardworking and committed to their work. Ultimately, a company benefits largely from the course.

Importance of the Study and Implication for Practice

The researcher’s primary aim in this study contributes to literature in that the researcher examines workplace diversity using a perspective that is new. The research study is significantly aimed at illustrating the concept of diversity in the work environment using perspectives that are new and unique compared to definitions given by other authors (Cummings & Worley, 2014).  The study contributes to literature through new models and concepts embraced regarding the subject matter. In this case, the concept of diversity in an organization is studied using the labor market and gender as primary factors. Through these concepts, there is a contribution to literature because the element of difference is used basing on gender representation in the labor market. Also, there is a contribution to literature in that Cummings and Worley (2014) describe the primary issue using change within organizations.  Through dynamic changes, workplace diversity is described in that organizations adjust their policies as a way of accommodating difference within the workforce. Through these ways, there is significant contribution to the literature.

The study also contributes to literature by providing a sneak peek into what the future holds. Indeed, the directions for research in future are evident in specificity roles and technological information. The first aspect guides the process of research through elements that relate closely to the topic of study. Regarding the issue, factors and concepts that share a close link with both organization culture and diversity in the workplace shape the direction of research in future (Lyons & Kuron, 2014). In this case, the idea of specificity plays a role in determining the particular direction in which the research will take place in future. In the second case, Lyons and Kuron (2014) explain how technological knowledge and skills impact directions taken regarding research in the future. From the facts presented, having adequate knowledge regarding technology and the possible advancements gives an upper hand to organizations that strive to give the best to their employees. In this case, both workplace diversity and the culture within an organization impact values within the workforce for better outcomes.

Interactions and institutions are determining factors that affect the future directions of research in significant ways. In the first case, the study of workplace diversity provides relevance in that it guides organizations on how to manage and coordinate activities in an environment having different people (Greenhow & Gleason, 2014). Therefore, interactions within such entities shape the direction of research in future. This factor is evident because frequent meetings among individuals provide unique ideas that play critical roles in establishing facts. The second factor influences the direction of research in future through cultures and practices within organizations. Most times, institutions that widely embrace science remain accommodative to research activities in future (Greenhow & Gleason, 2014). By engaging in such practices, the direction of research is shaped in significant ways. Through these methods, research direction in future is influenced as many scientific activities are facilitated.

The research study conducted is practice-led which contributes to practice in significant ways. In the first case, practice is impacted in that the study provides considerations to the nature of practice which leads to operational significance (Cummings & Worley, 2014).  Essentially the study will effectively work in elaborating the practice and influencing operations within an organization. In this case, operational significance is achieved where a business entity gains more insight and uses change as a primary factor that guides operations within the business (Cummings & Worley, 2014). Notably, there is a contribution to practice because the organization culture is affected in positive ways that facilitate change for better outcomes. In the end, there is much contribution to practice because the activities influence organizational operations positively.

The study contributes to practice through the advancement in knowledge about practice and within practice itself. In this case, there is a contribution to practice because the study leads to advancement of knowledge for effective outcomes (Greene & Kirton, 2015).  In this case, the ideas and concepts embraced are critical for the study which is beneficial to an organization. The knowledge regarding practice remains essential in making the study beneficial within an organization. Due to this factor, the adoption of effective strategies that address the diversity that exists within the work environment is embraced. Many a time, organizations do their best to formulate policies that focus on diversity and ways of creating equalities within the working environment (Greene, & Kirton, 2015).  Through such approaches, the study contributes to practice as it provides maximum gain to organizations. Ultimately, positive results are yielded from the course.

The question of the study sought to determine the importance of diversity in the workplace and contribution to practice. The findings indicate that the study of workplace diversity facilitates mutual respect among employees as it builds the reputation of an organization. The authors embrace different approaches that answer the study question using the facts presented. The study of diversity impacts both individuals and organizations in unique ways basing on the approaches used (Greenhow & Gleason, 2014).

In other cases, the study enhances creativity and innovations among employees. Implications for study provide ideas as the findings influence individuals. The study contributes to literature through new and unique perspectives used by the researcher. There is contribution to practice through the practice-led approach and knowledge advancement. The directions for research in future are influenced by roles in specificity and technological information. Additionally, future research direction is influenced by interactions and institutions.

Diversity in the work environment is a primary factor that influences interactions and activities within organizations. Various authors research the topic of diversity and use different methods to explain the concept. The study questions presented determines the importance of diversity in the place of work and its contributions to practice. Mutual respect, good reputation, innovations and creativity are advantages from the study. Literature is influenced through new perspectives that are unique. Contributions in practice entail the practice-led approach. Directions in future research are influenced by specificity, information regarding technology, institutions and interactions.

Directions for Future Research

Workplace diversity and organizational culture are emerging fields in the management of organizations. Therefore, there is the need to have in place theories, teachings and researches that guide practice within these organizations so that there is inclusivity in the pursuit of the set objectives of these organizations. Consequently, the role played by diversity management is crucial especially when aligning the purpose, methods, values and outcomes within the organization (Guillaume, Dawson, Otaye‐Ebede, Woods, & West, 2017).

For a long time, there has been discrimination based on gender, race, sexual orientations of people and other visible human differences. These theories of diversity are meant to not only eliminate such differences, but also ensure positive change and overall stability within organizations (Guillaume et al., 2017). Once everything is in place, there is a sense of respect for existing human differences further resulting in effectiveness in reaching the established goals. The purpose of this paper is to determine the historical development of history theory management by looking at how behavioral scientific methods and research can be used in organizations to develop and sustain diversity and organizational culture.

In order for diversity to be managed well, it is vital that the social environment within the organization cannot be ignored. Factors such as laws, rules, and regulations, social and professional norms are further paramount in determining how diversity is handled and the overall culture of the organization (Greene, & Kirton, 2015). Therefore, since the law stipulates that organizations must become diverse, they must consequently strive to prove to individuals within and outside the organization that they are conforming.

We have to have resources in place so that organizations can implement diversity successfully. The types of resources that must be available for diversity to really take root and become acceptable include physical capital, human capital, finances and even corporate capital (Barak, 2016). As a result, success can only come when all these resources complement one another despite the many differences among them. Some of the theories that explain workplace diversity and organizational culture include (Bolman, & Deal, 2017) Contingency Theory, Goals Theory, Learning Theory, Resource Theory, Social Utility Theory and Psychology Organization Theory.

Contingency Theory

Contingency Theory was developed during the 1950s by the Ohio State University, the University of Chicago and the University of Michigan Survey Research Center to foster effective leadership (Northouse, 2018). Through numerous questionnaires, the research teams wanted to find out the leadership behaviors that were most common in various organizations. The results were that most leaders employed both consideration and an initiating structure to not only build rapport and good relationships with their subordinates, but also to ensure objectives are completed on time and well. By 1958, Joan Woodward had formulated broad generalization that would benefit from the application of the contingency theory in their day-to-day operations. Therefore, this is an organization theory that believes there is no best available way to lead, organize or make decisions within any given organization because the best course of action is highly dependent upon unexpected external and internal conditions, therefore, it is important to ensure that every situation is respondent to uniquely using a fitting style of leadership.

Goals Theory

Goals Theory was proposed in the late 1960s by American researcher and psychologist Edwin Locke. By 1990, he had fine-tuned the theory and together with a colleague, Dr. Gary Latham, published a book called “A Theory of Goal Setting and Task Performance”. In their book Locke and Latham (1991) explained that within any organization, the people who had specific and difficult goals performed better compared to their counterparts that only set general and easy goals. This drove them to have in place effective goal-setting principles to help individuals become more productive hence prosperous organizations. The principles included: clarity, challenge, commitment, feedback and task complexity. This means goals should be well defined or measurable with specific timeline for completion, difficult enough to motivate the individual to work harder toward their achievement, demand commitment and deliberate effort, they should also have a means of evaluating progress and finally give an individual an opportunity to learn what is supposed to be done in order to guarantee success.

Learning Theory

Argyris and Schon (1974) are the two biggest contributors to the organizational Learning Theory. They believe that learning in organizations is mainly due to interaction and inquiry within that setting (Shafritz, Ott & Jang, 2015). This means that when the expected outcomes are different from the actual outcome, individuals must analyze the whole process in order to find out what was done differently leading to such results (Hatch, 2018). This, therefore, involves an extensive interaction with other members of the organization that were in pursuit of similar objectives, hence, learning takes place.

There are three types or levels of learning that are expected during the inquiry process. They are: single loop learning which involves modifying strategy in response to a given feedback loop that resulted to unexpected outcomes; double loop learning takes place when there is a complete change of the theory in use (Hatch, 2018). So that there is efficiency in reaching set objectives, all the values, strategies and assumptions that had previous caused unwanted outcomes are changed in favor of more capable environments that will minimize fluctuations in future. Deuterolearning insists on improving the learning system itself (Taylor, 2017). This means having better structural and behavioral components in place so that people will be able to comprehend information better so that future outcomes are within expectations.

Cognitive Resource Theory

Developed in 1987 by Fred Fiedler and Joe Garcia as a reaction to Fiedler’s Contingency Model, the Cognitive Resource Theory (CRT) involves scrutiny of how a leader’s intelligence and experience can be used to deal with day-to-day stresses associated with organization management. It is evident that stress affects rationality and the ability of these leaders to think logically and analytically, therefore, the need to depend on intelligence, experience and other relevant cognitive resources in dealing with difficult situations.

Given the above, the CRT predicts that the cognitive ability of the leader will only contribute to effective performance within the organization only when their approach is directive (Bratton & Gold, 2017). It also predicts that stress is a major stumbling block primarily affecting quality decision making and overall intelligence, experience can be affected by high stress and finally the theory mentions that both intelligence and experience are irrelevant when handling simple tasks.

Social Utility Theory

Social Utility Theory states that for smooth operations within any given setting, value must be placed on each member of that group (Kauder, 2015). Identifying with each person will motivate them and promote their self-esteem which will directly impact the organization’s performance (Kauder, 2015). This is a theory in management that is based on the assumption of rationality and believes all outcomes of any decisions made are due to the value or utility that the individual places on them. Therefore, in order to succeed, managers and every stakeholder in the decision-making process must place a lot of value on their decisions. According to Bazerman (2001), there is a certain process that must be adhered to so that decisions made have the greatest value placed on them. The process commences by first and foremost defining the problem, then identifying the decision criteria, weigh that particular criteria against other available options, generate the alternatives, ensure you rate each alternative on each criterion, then finally compute the optional decision.

Psychology Organization Theory

The Psychology Organization Theory focuses on interrogating both the mental and behavioral phenomena that take place when people belonging to organizations interact (Daft, Murphy & Willmott, 2010). Are the practices in such relationships complicated or characterized by simplified rules and procedures? The components of this theory can be applied in all positions and in every organization.

Summary

It is evident that the notions of every theory are geared towards the satisfying the growing need by organizations to manage diversity. Ensuring that people from different backgrounds can co-exist and work together has become an essential part of all organizations’ strategies. All these efforts are due to the economic and social international changes that have dominated the business field in recent years. Diversity must be managed on both levels. Managing the virtual level will includes putting in place parameters that will ensure people within the organizations can work well together despite their age, sex, culture, race or educations level. While the deep level involves guiding their beliefs, values, attitudes and personalities so that every individual is of equal importance in the decision-making process.

All these issues considered; the sections that follow will look at the future direction of workplace diversity. Particularly, the section will highlight potential pitfalls, how organizations will uphold diversity at the workplace, and what diversity will mean in future. Furthermore, the sections will highlight the future directions of organizational theory as affected by organizational culture. In the sections, it will be discovered that workplace diversity and organizational theory affect each other in a self-reinforcing cycle.

As well to clarify at the outset that workplace diversity and organizational theory are two separate concepts but deeply intertwined. As Im and Hong (2016) note, it is impossible to speak about organizational theory without a mention of workplace diversity. This is for the reason that the employees that make up the workplace are the same elements that form and manipulate the culture of a workplace, hence the culture of an organization. Whether it is classical organizational theory or the scientific management theory, the basic elements of focus are the people that make up the organization.

In their research, Davis, Frolova and Callahan (2016) established that there is a positive correlation between organization culture and the nature of the workplace. If the workplace is populated with people from one homogeneous group, the organization is bound to be a frequent victim of group think. Unsurprisingly, such an organization will make a lot of losses from poor decision-making processes at the workplace. The authors also note that most of the future workplace will include virtual employees, thanks to the internet. Organizations will have to create innovative ways to leverage the benefits of virtual workers. In fact, studies indicate that there will also be many intelligent machines performing tasks that are handles by humans today.

As a result, the new workplace will fundamentally shift the notion of organizational culture to something unseen or not heard today. Subsequently, studies will have to develop new organizational theories. As Im and Hong (2016) noted, most if not all of the existing organizational theories are grounded in economic principles are truths long past. Today, as technology takes over most of the economic production, the basic nature of an organization is changed. Therefore, with the changes, organizational theory may be rendered obsolete.

Charles Darwin once observed that only the fittest species can survive the unforgiving life of the jungle (Kauder, 2015). The analogy cannot be more poignant and the organizational environment of today can be compared to a jungle. Competition is ruthless. An organization that fails to innovate falls by the roadside and disappears into oblivion. Now more than ever, organizations must find ways of making the best out workplace diversity (Davis, Frolova & Callahan, 2016). Guillaume, Dawson, et al. (2017) also urged that organizations today must initiate programs that will prepare their employees for the future of the workplace. This is because employees are the first barrier to any changes that an organization might want to institute. Employees are the soldiers on the ground. How they receive the realities of the shifting norms and culture will determine the level to which an organization survives. Therefore, suitable programs should be put in place to identify potential barriers and find ways to deal with them. Proactive actions will save organizations a lot of precious time in future.

Furthermore, organizations can start today to prepare their hiring programs to be focused on diversity. Regardless of the industry an organization operates, the workplace is similar across the continuum. Entities that will find innovative ways to handle the diversity will enjoy the benefits. Most importantly, entities will have to find fresh ways of looking at the organizational theories that help in the smooth run of their business. A workplace that includes intelligent machines is definitely not something the classical theory of organization anticipated (Lee, Kusbit, Metsky and Dabbish (2015).

Following the discussion, it is apparent that the future of organizations will change; this refers to structure, workplace diversity, and organizational theory. What this means is that organizations have to find means to get ahead of the curve. It implies that entities have to find innovative ways to select and appropriately train a diverse team of employees that promise optimum work ethic. In addition, organizations will have to find ways to integrate intelligent machines in the workplace. Subsequently, the new workplace will affect culture at the workplace. What follows is either a fundamental shift in principles and connotations of organizational theory or an absolute replacement of the theories. An organization of the future will be different from that of today in form, structure and culture.

Chapter 3: Research Method

Introduction

While in pursuit for efficiency and effectiveness, most modern organizations have found the need to incorporate individuals from various backgrounds a necessity. This has therefore led to a workplace that is diverse, further calling for the need to establish strong organizational cultures to withstand the massive division among employees. Based on this, therefore, this study seeks to establish the relationship between workplace diversity and organizational culture by analyzing how age, gender, education, work experience and ethnicity affects employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention. To achieve this feat, the researcher will adopt a scientific research method that would allow the collection of data. This data will be collected by obtaining specific information on how various factors of work place diversity affect employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention in organizations. This chapter contains a step by step procedure of the methodology that will be used to collect, analyze and present the data collected.

Research Design

This research study intends to investigate how age, gender, education, work experience and ethnicity affects employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention. It will therefore focus on analyzing factors affecting workplace diversity, organizational behavior, and organizational culture. A research design is a chronological outline of the methods that will be used in the process of collecting and analyzing the variables involved in a research study (Creswell, & Poth, 2017). It provides the framework on which the research questions can be answered. Therefore, it is through this framework that the researcher will be able to gather an accurate assessment of cause and effect relationships between independent and dependent variables (Creswell, 2013).

The researcher, therefore, proposes to adopt a qualitative research design to accomplish the objective of the study. By definition, this is a research design that uses data to describe the features, attributes and characteristics of a phenomenon (Creswell & John, 2009). This study will adopt a qualitative research design approach to answer the qualitative research question that was formulated. A qualitative research design makes use of qualitative data to help a researcher make inference about the study population’s characteristics, features, attributes etc. so that they can be interpreted thematically (Silverman, 2016). The method is not only effective for describing, but also easy to use when unexpected results arise from a prior study. Furthermore, the method is helpful in designing and validating an instrument.

Appropriateness of Design

This study will adopt a qualitative research design approach to answer the qualitative research question; to establish the relationship between workplace diversity and organizational culture by analyzing how age, gender, education, work experience and ethnicity affects employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention. A qualitative research design makes use of qualitative data to help a researcher make inference about the study population’s characteristics, features, attributes etc. so that they can be interpreted thematically (Silverman, 2016).

The method is not only effective for describing, but also easy to use when unexpected results arise from a prior study. Furthermore, the method is helpful in designing and validating an instrument. An effective research design has to be able to be appropriate for a given study if the desired results are to be achieved. This study will adopt a qualitative study in its quest to find out the effect of workplace diversity on organizational performance. The study also requires understanding the organizational culture and workplace behavior of various individuals in many different organizations so as to compare the result and provide a valid conclusion regarding its impact. This method is effective because other methods would not allow data can be collected as quickly as using questionnaires would. Additionally, it should be considered that the process of collecting data would not need to be present when the questionnaires were completed.

Procedure

This section illustrates how the study will be performed. The section provides all the details of the procedures that will be used to recruit the respondents that will be involved in the study, establish the data collection environments, conduct interviews or answer questionnaires, gather as well as organize documents for analysis. This basically sets out all the actions required to carry out the study. The study intends to cover several organizations in Charlotte, North Carolina, with emphasis on organizations within the legal sector. This is the most populous city in North Carolina with an estimated 500,000 employees in various organizations. According to the USA Census in 2010, the largest industries in Charlotte, NC are Finance & Insurance (52,474 people), Health Care & Social Assistance (50,311 people), and Retail Trade (49,159 people).

The first step of the research will be to identify the geographical location that the target population will come from. In this case, the target geographical location is Charlotte, NC. Organizations in the city operate under Charlotte Regional Business Alliance oversees a dynamic and diverse population and workforce in Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, and its surrounding 16-county region. A total to 589 companies older than 10 years exist in this region. Therefore, identifying the names of the companies will be the first thing to do.

After identifying the names of the companies, the researcher will then get the IRB approval from school, after which he will contact the individual administration organizations within Charlotte. This will include relevant personnel such as the HR managers. Afterwards, they will be issued a letter of introduction (See Appendix) stating the researcher’s name, and the request to include the organization’s employees for an academic research. After acknowledging the requests, personal consent letters will also be sent to all individuals seeking their help in either fling questionnaires or having interviews conducted.

Silverman (2016) highlighted the importance of maintaining high ethical standards during research. This also includes having a research instrument that is ethical. In this case, the instruments to be used will be designed to reflect all ethical concerns that may be raised. Both questionnaires and interview questions will be framed in a manner that is simple and does not disrupt much time of the respondents. Furthermore, the researcher felt the need to familiarize with the geographical area of study, identifying the general behavior of the respondents, for example, finding the best time to schedule for interviews and to issue questionnaires. By studying these demographic characteristics of the area before administering the questionnaires and the interviews, the researcher was certain that the process will not interfere with the daily routine of the respondents.

Another ethical concern that Silverman (2016) highlighted regards the credibility of the data. All researchers are expected to handle data in the right manner to ensure that the results obtained are not biased in any way. This includes its storage, analysis and reporting. A qualitative method requires the researcher to use a non-numerical analysis to confirm if the collected information was accurate. This includes verifying any secondary sources used to make sure that the raw data including the details of the procedures and instruments were up to the required standards. Additionally, no piece of publication was duplicated and a complete proof of compliance with ethical issues and lack of conflict of interest was also presented with the data storage.

The Role of the Researcher

According to Moon (2015), the researcher plays an important role in the process of conducting any given research. In most cases, the researcher acts as the primary data collecting instrument. This therefore means that personal values, assumptions, and biases during the study site may play a major role in determining the outcome of the research. However, the researchers are ones responsible for recruiting the participants and choosing the appropriate method for data analysis. Furthermore, it is the researcher who uses the instruments for the collection and the analysis of the data.

For this study, therefore, the researcher will ensure that all these ethical considerations regarding researcher bias are kept in check. Such considerations include the establishment of a good relationship between the researcher and the participants, disclosing every truth to the participants and never lying to them in order to obtain information, making sure that all the relevant authority is aware of the research and have provided permission for the research to be carried out, and also avoiding plagiarism and conflict of interest among many other ethical issues.

Research Question

The research question that guided this research is:

What impact do workplace diversity and organizational culture have on a company? Comment by Bill Talboys: Impact – as measured how? Way too open ended and subjective. Comment by Bill Talboys: does Comment by Bill Talboys: How are you defining culture? Too vagie Comment by Bill Talboys: What company?

The study identified four factors associated with workplace diversity including age (Boehm, & Kunze, 2015), gender (Schwab, Werbel, Hofmann & Henriques, 2016), education (Bolli, Renold & Wörter, 2018) and ethnicity (Rawat & Basergekar, 2016). Organizational culture will be represented by various concepts including employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention.

Population and Sample

For this study, the recruited participants had to be employees from various organizations under various capacities. The study intended to cover all organizations in Charlotte, North Carolina. This is the most populous city in North Carolina with an estimated 500,000 employees in various organizations. According to the USA Census in 2010, the largest industries in Charlotte, NC are Finance & Insurance (52,474 people), Health Care & Social Assistance (50,311 people), and Retail Trade (49,159 people). To further narrow down the target population, the researcher will choose companies operating under the Charlotte Regional Business Alliance.

This is the governing body that oversees a dynamic and diverse population and workforce in Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, and its surrounding 16-county region. The membership directory indicates that members are divided into Investor Level Members (203), Minority Owned Businesses (180), Women Owned Businesses (197) and Veteran Owned Businesses (9), bringing the total to 589 companies. This will be the target population for this study, and the 4 subcategories will be used as Strata. The type of business run by the organization was only used to classify the employees for purposes of collecting a representative sample. Additionally, all these organizations had been in operation for at least 10 years and will be considered since they are believed to have been in operation long enough to have a firm organizational culture in place.

The study will use a proportionate stratified sampling technique. This sampling technique ensures that subgroups (strata) of a given population are each adequately represented within the whole sample population of a research study (Taherdoost, 2016). The sample size of each stratum in this technique is proportionate to the population size of the stratum when viewed against the entire population. This means that each stratum has the same sampling fraction (Alvi, 2016).

The procedure is that the researcher will divide the entire population into different subgroups or strata, then randomly selects the final subjects proportionally from the different strata. The strata used in this case will be the 4 groups (strata) identified by the Charlotte Regional Business Alliance (2019) which are Investor Level Members (203), Minority Owned Businesses (180), Women Owned Businesses (197) and Veteran Owned Businesses (9). A proportionate sampling design requires that the sample size of each stratum in this technique is proportionate to the population size of the stratum when viewed against the entire population. This means that each stratum has the same sampling fraction.

In this case, the sampling fraction will be determined by one tenth taking of the population. Essentially this means 20 companies will be selected randomly from the investor level members, 18 from the minority owned, 20 from women owned and 1 from the veteran owned companies. This means the total population will be 59. The geographical location of the study is Charlotte, North Carolina. Several organizations were selected in the city and were used for the study. These organizations were chosen due to their diverse organizational culture which would indicate that they contained employees from diverse backgrounds.

North Carolina has an estimated 500,000 employees in various organizations. These are distributed as follows: Finance & Insurance (52,474 people), Health Care & Social Assistance (50,311 people), and Retail Trade (49,159 people). There are a total of 589 companies in the region under the Charlotte Regional Business Alliance. These are further divided into Investor Level Members (203), Minority Owned Businesses (180), Women Owned Businesses (197) and Veteran Owned Businesses (9), bringing the total to 589 companies.

According to Peretz, Levi and Fried (2015), organizations that exhibit a diverse organizational culture are more likely to hire individuals from different cultural backgrounds. These employees will therefore be best suited to participate in the study as they understand the study’s objectives. Since the researcher will not conduct a census on all participants, a systematic stratified sampling technique will be used to determine the sample that will partake in the study.

Instrumentation

This study will use questionnaires as the only data collection instrument. A questionnaire is a research instrument that consists of a series of questions for the purpose of gathering information from respondents. Rowley (2014) indicated that questionnaires are efficient tools of data collection when the study uses a descriptive research design. He also stated that they are also efficient because they give the researcher a larger scope under which to objective responses to research questions. They will be designed with closed ended questions only to regulate the amount of demographic information respondents provide while at the same time maintaining their answers to the issues related to the topic of study.

There are three types of questions that can be presented in questionnaires; structured questions, semi-structured and unstructured questions. For structured questions, the respondent is engaged in standard and predetermined questions that were set in line with a particular topic sought by the researcher. The respondent is also provided with a set of options from which they are to select their response. Semi-structured questions involve the researcher setting pre-determined questions but allows the respondent to respond with their own answers in their own words. Finally, the unstructured interview has no specific list of questions and neither does it have specified guidelines on how to answer the questions. This study will only use structured questions to gather demographic information such as age, working experience that need to be uniform across all participants as well as questions will be used to collect information regarding organizational structure and workplace diversity on employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention.

The questionnaire is a research tool that is used by researchers to assess opinions, feelings and thoughts of respondents. The strategy was selected by the researcher because it is not only cost effective but is also largely reliable, generalizable and versatile (Nardi, 2018). This will prove to be a useful feature in this research considering that the study will involve a wide population with diverse characteristics, which is essential to meeting the objective of this study. Therefore the results obtained from the survey, will reflect the diverse nature of the respondents and hence allow the researcher to determine whether this diversity affects organizational culture on employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention.

Data Collection and Analysis

The data collection procedure involves the distribution and collection of data from the questionnaires. The procedure is dependent on all the respondents getting the chance to fill the questionnaire that will be presented email via Google form. The researcher will first seek Permission and obtain informed consent from all participants and respondents before carrying out the research. The next step will involve administering questionnaires to the respondents, which will then be picked later in about 2 weeks’ time for further analysis. This process will be timed, and only questionnaires filled after two weeks will be included in the study analysis. The purpose of the study as well as the objectives will be communicated to the respondents on time, prior to the process. The researcher will then apply various statistical methods to analyze the data and then create a report based on the findings. This report will include tables and graphs reporting frequency distributions as obtained from the research instruments.

Human Participants and Ethics Precautions

The researcher put into consideration all the ethical matters necessary from the onset of the project to the end. For instance, the researcher will consult all the human participants to ascertain that there will be no conflicts of interest and that all the necessary prior information has been provided. Furthermore, the researcher will also ensure that all the participants are treated equally and with respect, put in place measures to cater for demographic differences, and provide guidance as to how to answer questions that seemed difficult.

Validity and Reliability

Christensen, Johnson and Turner (2011) defined the validity of a research instrument as its ability to measure all the variables chosen for the study. This therefore is determined by the kind of questions included in the research questionnaire. They should be able to measure one element at a time, be clear and precise on the nature of their inquiry. This was done through appraisal and verification by the supervisor and other experts during proposal defence. Reliability was also described by Christensen, Johnson and Turner (2011) as the level of consistency indicated by the scale of a research instrument. Consistency means that if the study is conducted again, say twice of three times, then the results obtained will be similar.

As indicated by Cho and Kim (2015), the best way to achieve reliability is to have a consistent scale measuring all the question included in the questionnaire. There are several scales that can be used including two point yes or no scale, three, four, five and seven-point Likert Scales. In this case, the five-point Likert scale that will be adopted by this study to give the respondent a wider range of answers on which to provide their view about a statement or question. Once this has been achieved, the scale will be verified using Cronbach’s alpha derived from SPSS (Version 22) to determine its suitability. A Cronbach’s alpha of 0.6 and above will indicate that the scale is reliable (Cho & Kim, 2015).

Contribution to Social, Practice, or Organizational Change

The primary reason of conducting a research is to find answers to phenomena that take place in the wold. This is done by adopting a scientific methodology that would validate the results and make the conclusions made reliable. This section provided the contribution to social, practice and organizational change that this study would have. Indeed, the findings of this research will enable any organization to understand the evolution of workplace diversity. Consequently, the organization can predict future workplace diversity and its possible consequences on culture and organizational behavior. The organization can then plan its future goals in a manner that would accommodate possible future workplace diversities. Additionally, the findings of this research explain not only the limitation and the benefits of workplace diversity, but it has also described the possible ways top management can improve the same and make them more effective.

Summary

This study is designed to investigate workplace diversity and organizational culture. The main research objective is to establish the relationship between workplace diversity and organizational culture by analyzing how age, gender, education, work experience and ethnicity affects employee attraction, selection, inclusion and retention. To achieve this, the researcher proposes to adopt a qualitative design because this will allow the researcher to collect qualitative information from employees in various organizations and analyze their responses in order to establish the correlation between factors affecting workplace diversity and organizational culture. A sample will be obtained from the proposed population of organizations from Charlotte, North Carolina, using a systematic sampling technique. Additionally, questionnaires will be used as the main tools of data collection. Once all the data has been collected data will be analyzed and a report of the results compiled. These results will then be used to draw conclusions and subsequently make recommendations.

References

Abbott, K. W., Green, J. F., & Keohane, R. O. (2016). Organizational ecology and institutional change in global governance. International Organization, 70(2), 247-277.

Babalola, S. S., & Marques, L. (2013). Integrated approach to workplace diversity through human resource management. Journal of Social and Development Sciences, 4(9), 435-445.

Barak, M. E. M. (2016). Managing diversity: Toward a globally inclusive workplace. Sage Publications.

Benzer, J. K., Charns, M. P., Hamdan, S., & Afable, M. (2017). The role of organizational structure in readiness for change: A conceptual integration. Health services management research, 30(1), 34-46.

Boehm, S. A., & Kunze, F. (2015). Age diversity and age climate in the workplace. In Aging workers and the employee-employer relationship (pp. 33-55). Springer, Cham.

Bolli, T., Renold, U., & Wörter, M. (2018). Vertical educational diversity and innovation performance. Economics of Innovation and New Technology, 27(2), 107-131.

Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2017). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and leadership. John Wiley & Sons.

Bond, M. A., & Haynes, M. C. (2014). Workplace diversity: A social–ecological framework and policy implications. Social Issues and Policy Review, 8(1), 167-201.

Chrobot-Mason, D., & Aramovich, N. P. (2013). The psychological benefits of creating an affirming climate for workplace diversity. Group & Organization Management, 38(6), 659-689.

Creswell, J. W., & Creswell, J. D. (2017). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Sage publications.

Cummings, T. G., & Worley, C. G. (2014). Organization development and change. Cengage learning.

Davis, P. J., Frolova, Y., & Callahan, W. (2016). Workplace diversity management in Australia: what do managers think and what are organizations doing? Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, 35(2), 81-98.

Dinesen, P. T., & Sønderskov, K. M. (2015). Ethnic diversity and social trust: Evidence from the micro-context. American Sociological Review, 80(3), 550-573.

Du, M. (2018). Workplace diversity disclosure by global companies: An exploration (Doctoral dissertation, Auckland University of Technology).

Earl, C., Taylor, P., Roberts, C., Huynh, P., & Davis, S. (2017). The workforce demographic shift and the changing nature of work: Implications for policy, productivity, and participation. In Age diversity in the workplace: An organizational perspective (pp. 3-34). Emerald Publishing Limited.

Flory, J. A., Leibbrandt, A., Rott, C., & Stoddard, O. (2018). Increasing Workplace Diversity: Evidence from a Recruiting Experiment at a Fortune 500 Company (No. 7025). CESifo Group Munich.

Gotsis, G., & Kortezi, Z. (2015). Workplace Diversity: A Resource or a Source of Conflict? In Critical studies in diversity management literature (pp. 1-12). Springer, Dordrecht.

Greene, A. M., & Kirton, G. (2015). The dynamics of managing diversity: A critical approach. Routledge.

Greenhow, C., & Gleason, B. (2014). Social scholarship: Reconsidering scholarly practices in the age of social media. British Journal of Educational Technology, 45(3), 392-402.

Guillaume, Y. R., Dawson, J. F., Otaye‐Ebede, L., Woods, S. A., & West, M. A. (2017). Harnessing demographic differences in organizations: What moderates the effects of workplace diversity? Journal of Organizational Behavior, 38(2), 276-303.

Hatch, M. J. (2018). Organization theory: Modern, symbolic, and postmodern perspectives. Oxford university press.

Im, C. H., & Hong, Y. G. (2016). Organization theory.

Jones, R. G. (2018). Rosemary Hays‐Thomas. Managing workplace diversity and inclusion: A psychological perspective. New York, NY: Taylor and Francis, 2017, 350 pages, $160 hardback. Personnel Psychology, 71(2), 289-291.

Kim, H. K., Lee, U. H., & Kim, Y. H. (2015). The effect of workplace diversity management in a highly male-dominated culture. Career Development International, 20(3), 259-272.

Knights, D., & Omanović, V. (2016). (Mis) managing diversity: exploring the dangers of diversity management orthodoxy. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, 35(1), 5-16.

Kundu, S. C., & Mor, A. (2017). Workforce diversity and organizational performance: a study of IT industry in India. Employee Relations, 39(2), 160-183.

Lambert, J. (2016). Cultural diversity as a mechanism for innovation: Workplace diversity and the absorptive capacity framework. Journal of Organizational Culture, Communications and Conflict, 20(1), 68.

Lančarič, D., Chebeň, J., & Savov, R. (2015). Factors influencing the implementation of diversity management in business organizations in a transition economy. The case of Slovakia. Economic research-Ekonomska istraživanja, 28(1), 1162-1184.

Lee, M. K., Kusbit, D., Metsky, E., & Dabbish, L. (2015, April). Working with machines: The impact of algorithmic and data-driven management on human workers. In Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1603-1612). ACM.

Lin, L. H. (2014). Organizational structure and acculturation in acquisitions: Perspectives of congruence theory and task interdependence. Journal of Management, 40(7), 1831-1856.

Luthans, F., & Doh, J. P. (2018). International Management: Culture, strategy, and behavior. McGraw-Hill

Luthans, F., Luthans, B. C., & Luthans, K. W. (2015). Organizational Behavior: An Evidence Based Approach. IAP.

Lyons, S., & Kuron, L. (2014). Generational differences in the workplace: A review of the evidence and directions for future research. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 35(S1), S139-S157.

Mercer, K. L. (2017). Roundtable—Workplace Diversity. Journal‐American Water Works Association, 109(8), 56-63.

Murray, P. A. (2014). Organizational structure and strategic control.

Nardi, P. M. (2018). Doing survey research: A guide to quantitative methods. Routledge.

Peretz, H., Levi, A., & Fried, Y. (2015). Organizational diversity programs across cultures: effects on absenteeism, turnover, performance and innovation. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 26(6), 875-903.

Peters, K., & Halcomb, E. (2015). Interviews in qualitative research. Nurse Researcher (2014+), 22(4), 6.

Ramos, F. F., Kovalenko, O., & Kovalenko, S. (2016). Cultural diversity and growth of international firms. Экономический вестник Донбасса, (4 (46)).

Rawat, P. S., & Basergekar, P. (2016). Managing Workplace Diversity: Performance of Minority Employees. Indian Journal of Industrial Relations, 51(3).

Richard, O. C., Stewart, M. M., McKay, P. F., & Sackett, T. W. (2017). The impact of store-unit–community racial diversity congruence on store-unit sales performance. Journal of Management, 43(7), 2386-2403.

Schermerhorn, J., Davidson, P., Poole, D., Woods, P., Simon, A., & McBarron, E. (2014). Management: Foundations and Applications (2nd Asia-Pacific Edition). John Wiley & Sons.

Schwab, A., Werbel, J. D., Hofmann, H., & Henriques, P. L. (2016). Managerial gender diversity and firm performance: An integration of different theoretical perspectives. Group & Organization Management, 41(1), 5-31.

Wingfield, N. (2015). Intel allocates $300 million for workplace diversity. The New York Times.

Withey, M. J., & Gellatly, I. R. (2015). Organizational Structure, Situation Strength and Employee Commitment: Test of a Process Model. In Academy of Management Proceedings (Vol. 2015, No. 1, p. 14587). Briarcliff Manor, NY 10510: Academy of Management.

Worley, J. M., & Doolen, T. L. (2015). Organizational structure, employee problem solving, and lean implementation. International Journal of Lean Six Sigma, 6(1), 39-58

Appendix A: Tables

Table A1

Stratum	Investor Level	Minority owned	Women Owned	Veteran owned
Population Size	203	180	197	9
Sampling Fraction	1/10	1/10	1/10	1/10
Final Sample Size	20	18	20	1

Source: Charlotte Regional Business Alliance (2019)

Appendix B: Figures

Figure B1. This is an example APA figure using the APA Caption Style. Neo meets the Architect while seeking the Source. Notice the caption is not emphasized!