Managing Diversity Policy

Introduction

An organization’s human resource management function focuses on the people aspect of management. According to Lawrence Kleiman said, any organization’s success depends on how it manages its resources and a business cannot succeed without managing its human resources. Thus, people determine the organization’s objectives, and people run the operations that allow the organization to reach its objectives.

Demographic changes in the population have led to changes in the labor pool in which the public sector selects its workers. As we enter the third millennium, America's workforce looks markedly different than it ever has before. In a way, it can be described as polytypic. Compared with the workforce of even twenty years ago, more white women, people of color, disabled persons, new and recent immigrants, gays and lesbians, and intergenerational mixes (i.e., baby boomers, Generation Xers, and Generation Nexters) now work in America. To say that this has created challenges for managing the workplace is an understatement. The way in which government employers embrace this opportunity of diversity will clearly distinguish effective and efficient organizations from those that are unproductive and unable to meet the demands and necessities of the American people in the twenty first century.

In short, workforce diversity will prevail in public and private sector organizations in the twenty first century. To the extent that the demographics of the

workforce reflect that of the general population that it serves and it is effectively managed, the delivery of public services will be greatly enhanced.

Predictions and estimates over the past twenty years or so suggest that because of demographic changes to this nation's population, the composition of public and private sector workplaces is contemporaneously changing. The workforce changes that have already begun to occur include:

• Increases in the number of women

• Increases in the number of people of color

• Increases in the average age of workers

• Increases in the number of foreign-born or immigrant workers

• Increases in the number of contingent workers (e.g., part-timers, temporary workers)

Changes to the labor force and workforce go well beyond race, ethnicity, gender, and age. As noted, there will be greater diversity based on such characteristics or factors as ability, sexual orientation, foreign born status, and so forth. For example, greater protections offered to disabled persons under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 have increased their representation in public and private sector workforces. And the ADA has relatively strong provisions requiring employers to make "reasonable accommodations" for disabled persons.

The nature of public and private sector workforces has undergone considerable change in the last several decades, and it will continue on this trajectory into the twenty-first century. Public sector employers are challenged to seize the opportunities presented by the new workplace in order to better serve the American people.

The managing diversity policy will focus on recruitment and selection as well as training. Every effort should be made to attract applications from all sections of society and to ensure fair treatment throughout the recruitment process. In the area of training, managers should gain the skills needed to ensure that they focus on the development needs of individuals and not show preferential treatment to one specific group of people.

Historical Overview of Recruitment and Selection

At every level of government, HRM systems are criticized as being inflexible, unresponsive, slow, rule-bound, and user-unfriendly. Civil service systems are criticized for not meeting the needs of their customers – both the customers within the organization that personnel exist to support and the citizens government exists to serve. Too often, HRM processes are viewed as hindering, rather than helping public sector organizations attract, motivate, and retain the talented people government must have to provide responsive service to its citizens.

Traditionally, public sector hiring practices have focused on the testing process, to identify the best-qualified candidates. It is indisputable that written civil service exams used by many jurisdictions are valid and reliable and therefore work well to identify the

best-qualified candidates. Jurisdictions have amended civil service laws, expanded recruiting activities, developed more competitive alternatives to traditional written exams, and applied