Diversity in Public Organizations

In the context of public organizations, diversity is inclusion of different people in the
workforce of the organization. In particular, diversity involves inclusion of minority groups,
such as people of color, women, and Muslims in the workforce. Unlike their private
counterparts, public organizations have a long history of implementing policies that promote
workplace diversity (Ashikali & Groeneveld, 2015). However, most of these policies have
been implemented as a response to changing demographics, in recent times that have seen a
significant increase of minority groups in the workforce. Additionally, the policies have been
a response to constant calls among politicians, civil rights groups, and other parties for
affirmative action to help achieve social equality.
While all these rationales for increasing diversity in public organizations make sense,
I believe that they are not the only reasons why public administrators should be committed to
diversity at the workplace. Public administrators and public organizations should be strongly
committed to workplace diversity because such diversity promotes legitimacy of the
organization, increases innovation and creativity, and enhances the quality of decision-
making (Ashikali & Groeneveld, 2015). In addition, workplace diversity increases morale
and productivity of employees and also allows the organization to attract talented and skilled
employees from diverse backgrounds. The net effect of these benefits is a significant increase
in the effectiveness, efficiency, and overall performance of the organization.
Given these benefits of promotion of workplace diversity, many public organizations
are likely to embrace this concept. Increased workforce diversity is likely to have a major
impact on the functioning of the organizations in future. One of the impacts will be increase
in the focus of diversity management in human resource management in organizations. Even
though workplace diversity has many benefits, it also has challenges. These challenges

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include increased conflicts among employees resulting from differences in racial, religious,
and ethnic backgrounds. Thus, to accommodate diversity, organizations will have to change
their practices in order to ensure that the diverse workforce works effectively.

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References

Ashikali, T., & Groeneveld, S. (2015). Diversity management in public organizations and its
effect on employees’ affective commitment: The role of transformational leadership
and the inclusiveness of the organizational culture. Review of Public Personnel
Administration, 35(2), 146-168.