What is Diversity Management?

Diversity management is a strategy that is intended to foster and maintain a positive

workplace environment. Usually initiated by Human Resources professionals and
managed by department heads and supervisors, an effective diversity management
program will promote recognition and respect for the individual differences found among
a group of employees. The idea of this management style is to encourage employees to be
comfortable with diversity in the workplace and develop an appreciation for differences
in race, gender, background, sexual orientation or any other factors that may not be
shared by everyone working in the same area of the company.

Need of Diversity Management – Introduction

Diversity Management - 4 -
Idea in Brief
In today’s global marketplace, cultural diversity becomes a valuable asset. Until recently many
companies were not very much concerned about this point. Today it is realized that a more
diverse work force, will increase the organizational effectiveness. It became clear that workforce
diversity is the bridge, in other words greater diversity in workplace could help organization to
attract a more diverse customer set. It will lift morale, bring greater access to new segments of
the marketplace and enhance productivity.
Diversity is being considered as one of the key points in today’s business vision
statements and not just a philanthropically aspect.

Objectives
The report presents the finding of the analysis and survey executed on the ‘Managing Diversity –
The Challenges for India’ Inc as the topic. The key objectives of the research were to
• Evaluate the necessity of proper diversity management specifically for Indian
Organizations & market.
• Analyze the present scenario by conducting surveys.
• Evaluate the challenges and barriers for the proper diversity management based on the
outcome of the survey.
• Suggesting innovative solutions to overcome the challenges identified.

Challenges for Indian Inc.

Presented By
Ramesh Babu
Sinoy Cherian
Vivek Agarwal

Table of Contents
Introduction .......................................................................................................................
3
Idea in Brief .......................................................................................................................
4
Objectives ..................................................................................................................... 4
Rationale ....................................................................................................................... 5
Necessity of diversity management in India .................................................................. 5
Methodology Adopted for Analysis ....................................................................................
6
Methodology adopted for analysis ....................................................................................
7
Survey Analysis & Strategy Formulation ...........................................................................
9
Workforce Demographics ............................................................................................ 10
Leadership Development ............................................................................................ 13
Managing Diverse Workplace Culture/Climate ........................................................... 17
Developing Learning and Growth Strategies .............................................................. 20
Handling Diverse Customer/Community ..................................................................... 21
Market Place ............................................................................................................... 21
Strategic Initiatives ...................................................................................................... 22
Consolidation of the Strategies ................................................................................... 24
Diversity Management – .................................................................................................
26
In Practice .......................................................................................................................
26
Diversity management success through Indian Inc, .................................................... 27
Asian Paints ................................................................................................................ 27
Growth Strategies of Asian Paints Based on Diversity management in India ............. 28
b) Economic Diversity of People in India ..................................................................... 28
Diversity Management in Asian Paints International Business ................................... 29
Diversity Management – .................................................................................................
30
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................
30
Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 31
Bibliography ................................................................................................................ 31
ANNEXURE I .....................................................................

Need of Diversity Management – Introduction

Diversity Management - 4 -
Idea in Brief
In today’s global marketplace, cultural diversity becomes a valuable asset. Until recently many
companies were not very much concerned about this point. Today it is realized that a more
diverse work force, will increase the organizational effectiveness. It became clear that workforce
diversity is the bridge, in other words greater diversity in workplace could help organization to
attract a more diverse customer set. It will lift morale, bring greater access to new segments of
the marketplace and enhance productivity.
Diversity is being considered as one of the key points in today’s business vision
statements and not just a philanthropically aspect.
Objectives
The report presents the finding of the analysis and survey executed on the ‘Managing Diversity –
The Challenges for India’ Inc as the topic. The key objectives of the research were to
• Evaluate the necessity of proper diversity management specifically for Indian
Organizations & market.
• Analyze the present scenario by conducting surveys.
• Evaluate the challenges and barriers for the proper diversity management based on the
outcome of the survey.
• Suggesting innovative solutions to overcome the challenges identified.
Need of

Need of Diversity Management – Introduction

Diversity Management - 5 -
Rationale
Diversity and inclusion (D&I) are important topics for the 21 st century, but what do they mean why
should you care?
• Today’s workplace is extremely diverse and becoming more so. It’s really about strategic
people management of all employees.
• D&I are also about leveraging workforce diversity to capture external market
opportunities. Consumer markets are segmented very finely by marketers; the more a
firm can mirror its consumer markets the more likely it is to be able to ‘sense and
respond’ to consumer needs – a big potential competitive advantage.
• Plus, D&I mean benefiting from broad access to the best value, highest quality and most
competitive goods and services through supplier diversity.
In sum, diversity and inclusion are absolutely central to effectiveness. The talent that a
organization is able to attract , retain and support; the strength of employees’ commitment; the
strength of the organization’s position in the market place; indeed the organization’s overall
effectiveness, are all greatly influenced by how diversity is managed and underpin an
organization’s ability to deliver results.
Necessity of diversity management in India
India is known as “politically one country but socio-culturally many countries in one”. In India even
people from neighboring states are as different as trying to compare Karnataka to Italy when
considering language, style of dress, cultural dances, etc. As per studies in India the language
and culture changes ever 100 kilometers.
From a media planning perspective, there are 5,600 daily newspapers, 15,000 weekly
newspapers, and 20,000 magazines in 21 languages across the country that planners must
negotiate through when planning their media buys.
To keep in pace with the changing needs of the world and to succeed India Inc's should keep in
mind not only the demographics at their organization level, the challenge is also to have a broad
spectrum of thought to manage at the market place. It is like a two edged sword. An optimal
environment should be that which seeks to optimize the contributions of diverse workforce,
suppliers and the communities where they work. It should reflect both the market place and the

Diversity Management – Methodology Adopted for Analysis

Diversity Management - 7 -
Methodology adopted for analysis
As described above the diversity in the present Indian scenario (which is same in the global
aspects also) has been divided as two major categories:
1. Diversity in Organization
2. Diversity in Market Place
Figure – 1
The phase manner methodology was followed as described below:-
Phase 1 – Business Case Description
In this phase the problem areas were identified and an initial survey was conducted for coming up
with the factors on which the diversity management is based. These factors were considered as
the challenges being faced in the corporations to developing strategic initiatives.
Phase 2 – Assessment Development and Implementation
Based on the above factors a questionnaire was developed. Following were the intention of
conducting the survey.
• Understanding the feeling of the people in different organization in India
• Understanding key factors that people give more importance
• Understanding the way how companies have implemented the strategy or taking care of
the diversity internally
• Understanding the factors, which are to be improved/implemented in Indian organizations
and the challenges on the way?
The survey was conducted in the following major organizations in India that are focusing on
different domains like IT, Production and FMCG as listed below. The sample count of 100 was
taken for the analysis.
1. Intel
2. Infosys
3. Wipro
4. SAP

Management – Methodology Adopted for Analysis

Diversity Management - 8 -
5. Manhattan Associates
6. IBM
7. Larsen & Toubro
8. Coca Cola India
9. Maruti Suzuki
Phase 3 – Scorecard Measurement Evaluation and Functionality
After conducting analysis based on survey data using SPSS software a balanced scorecard was
developed which shall link the key strategies with the company growth and development. The key
components of the scorecard include
• Objectives – which list out the various objectives for a particular parameter?
• Measures – List out the measures for the various Objectives to evaluate the performance
• Initiatives – Lists out the various initiatives that need to be adopted to accomplish the
object.
• Targets – Are the company specific values which need to be achieved.