WINTER 2011
www.insightintodiversity.com36
improve results?” We believe there is.
It is called diversity management.
We define diversity management as
a strategy and a capability. Many suc-
cessful organizations may be practic-
ing the capability without establishing
the strategy. In other words, they are
getting the benefit of diversity man-
agement by accident rather than as
a deliberate discipline. How does this
happen? Every organization has great
managers hidden in its ranks; unrecog-
nized and often dis-
missed by key play-
ers. Great managers
seem to intuitively
understand the pow-
er of deliberate di-
versity and the pow-
er of effective people
management.
Most organizations
that have an active diversity plan do so
ased on a belief that diversity (alone)
will improve business performance. It
is a belief that seems logical and can
e easily accepted. It is an assumption,
and it is wrong.
Why Diversity Management
A fair amount of research has been
done to assess the value of D&I efforts
on organizational performance. Most
of this research was done by diversity
advocates for the purpose of validating
the efficacy of D&I as a policy or even
as a strategy. The results have been dis-
appointing at best. One simple conclu-
sion can be drawn from this research
– diversity (alone) has no positive im-
pact on organizational performance. In
fact, as the evidence shows, diversity
(alone) may create more tension and
discord which robs us of performance.
Yet, leaders continue to believe that
diversity improves performance even
though they have no evidence to sup-
port that belief.
I believe the research conducted by di-
versity practitioners (inside the field)
falls short because it does not ask the
ight questions, nor
does it focus on the
ight “performance
drivers.”
But hold on. Before
you decide to dis-
miss diversity as a
performance driver,
e aware that there
is an overwhelming,
compelling business case for diversity
when it is well managed (what we call
diversity management).
A Paradigm Shift
Fortunately, work “outside the field”
has produced some surprising and
encouraging results. The “outside the
field” work clearly demonstrates that
diversity is the main ingredient for in-
novation, decision making, ideation,
problem solving, prediction, and high
performance; but not just any diver-
sity, and only when that diversity is
properly managed. The researchers for
these works did not set out to prove
the efficacy of diversity management.
he (Obama) White House is close
to issuing an executive order
that proposes a Government-
wide Council on Diversity and
Inclusion. While the focus of the
order remains on traditional diversity
issues like compliance, representation,
and equal employment, it does suggest
an expanded view that “diverse per-
spectives help us overcome our great-
est challenges.” It also suggests that the
Federal Government has an obligation
to lead by example in this field.
This proposal creates an opportunity
for every federal agency to upgrade
their diversity and inclusion efforts
and support the mission of their agen-
cy by adding diversity management
to the agency’s capability. I hope to
demonstrate how you can add diver-
sity management to your toolkit and
use it as a strategy and as a capability
to make better decisions, produce high
performance teams, create more inno-
vation, solve more complex problems,
and deliver your mission with fewer
esources.
From Policy to Practice
Most federal agencies have an active di-
versity initiative focused on the social
and legal aspects of diversity and inclu-
sion (D&I) work. That work includes
EEO/AA, recruitment and retention of
non-traditional employees, workplace
inclusion efforts, and community in-
volvement. Many of them have ex-
celled at these efforts. But the question
emains, “Where is the value? Is there a
way to use diversity so that we actually
Diversity Management
in the Public Secto
By James O.
Rodgers CMC, MBA
T
“Is there a way to use
diversity so that we
actually improve results?
We believe there is.
It is called diversity
management.”
WINTER 2011
www.insightintodiversity.com 37
in a win-win spirit that all the parties
feel good about.
Relentless Execution – Results don’t
come from excitement about the plan.
They come from cooperative and re-
lentless execution. Once each person
feels that their perspective has been
heard and they have bought in to the
solution, you can expect that each will
enthusiastically work to achieve the
outcome that they all agreed to.
A Deliberate Strategy
We will not get the best from our peo-
ple by hoping. We have to have a delib-
erately developed and well-executed
strategy to ensure we are creating the
ight environment for every employee
to maximize his or her performance.
A diversity management strategy can
help focus our attention on attaining
that outcome.
Diversity management requires more
than having a
oad mix of people. It
equires more than treating each per-
son as a valued member of the team.
Diversity management is the deliber-
ate strategy to use that diversity to full
advantage in achieving strong business
esults and competitive differentiation.
Like all other elements of organiza-
tional strategy, diversity management
matters only to the extent that it solves
a critical problem. It should be devel-
oped with a disciplined process, not a
guess. It begins by defining the prob-
lem to be solved. Applying diversity
management to specific business prob-
lems is the only way to realize the tan-
gible value that comes with diversity
when it is well managed.
Challenge
If you still don’t believe the efficacy of
diversity management can be proven,
ask yourself, “what if I’m wrong?” Make
the decision not to be “left behind.”
This article is excerpted from the Diver-
sity Management Handbook for Public
Sector scheduled for release in Fe
uary
2011. The author, James O. Rodgers CMC,
MBA is a leading strategist in the field
of diversity management. Mr. Rodgers is
also a member of the INSIGHT Into Diver-
sity Editorial Board.
Instead, they stumbled on this insight
while testing for the solutions to their
own problems in their own disciplines.
Diversity management can be the
eakthrough you need to achieve
management excellence and grow your
capacity to deliver on your mission.
Leadership and Management
I hope to give you some new ideas
about how you can be even more ef-
fective in managing all the resources
of your agency – especially your hu-
man capital. The role of managers
and leaders is increasingly important
to the success of any enterprise. Now
is the time to move toward complete
Management Excellence – including
excellence in leading and managing
people and teams.
The addition of diversity management
to your toolkit will require more per-
sonal time and attention from opera-
tions than in the past. It is not some-
thing that can be
elegated to the
diversity office and
a few senior lead-
ers. At the risk of
eing cliché, diver-
sity management is
everyone’s business.
But active involve-
ment does not
mean more work for you. In fact, after
a few months of practicing these new
skills, you may find that you work less
at managing your people because they
are more engaged and able to do more
on their own.
Why should you expect these ben-
efits? Not because I say so, but be-
cause these expectations are based
on documented research, experience,
and proven successes. I recommend
that you test this new capability with
a demonstration project of your own.
Just like you would test a new piece
of scientific gear to determine its im-
pact on your success patterns, diver-
sity management as a capability can
e tested with a simple Assessment –
Visioning – Learning – Measurement
process (more on this later).
The Practice of Diversity Management
Diversity management is remarkably
different from diversity (alone). What
does it mean to manage diversity? It
simply means managing people (all
people) well. It begins with clear inten-
tion – an intention to get the best from
all your people all the time. Managing
people effectively means integrating
the talent and perspectives of all your
employees while allowing each one to
e his/her best self.
Diversity adds a level of complexity to
people management. That is because
among the perspectives you have to
manage is your own (the manager).
It is important to develop leadership
skills that make diversity management
a clear expectation of all employees.
But leadership must be supplemented
with superior people management
skills. Here is a simple set of skills need-
ed to realize the efficacy of diversity
management:
Capable Selection (select the right di-
versity) – Every leade
manager must
learn to actively
search for and engage
the right diversity of
people for each team
and project.
Deliberate Team For-
mation (transparent
team dynamics) – Di-
verse teams are in-
herently inefficient
(at first). Managers and leaders must
e deliberate in identifying relevant
diversity and alerting team members
to expect and respect disagreements,
conflict, and vastly different perspec-
tives.
Masterful Facilitation – The art of driv-
ing people with diverse perspectives
to a point of consensus (necessary to
move ahead with a common direction)
is the primary skill of an effective di-
versity manager. The key is to allow the
messiness to persist, hear all points of
view, moderate reactions, and identify
points of agreement.
Consensus Validation – The value of di-
verse perspectives becomes clear once
we have consensus on an approach that
everyone can agree to and support.
That approach will seldom be the first
choice of any of the team members. It
will most likely be the “third alterna-
tive” or a cooperative solution reached
“Diversity management
can be the
eakthrough
you need to achieve
management excellence
and grow your capacity to
deliver on your mission.”
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