TEAM Assignment: Annotated Bibliography for Scientific Blog/Article Project

By Pacific Solutions Inc.

Research Question: How to be inclusive manager in a diverse workforce? 

Knowing how to be an inclusive manager in a diverse workforce is highly important for a variety of reasons. This allows and encourages creativity, profit, representation, cultural perspective and exposure to differing values and mindsets. Employees, customers and co-workers are impacted by the manager’s ability to be inclusive in a diverse workforce. The manager needs to understand and implement inclusivity to smoothly and efficiently create a better working environment for everyone. Due to the expansion of technology and media globalization, managers more than ever need the training and knowledge to bring and lead their team to better achieve intended business or organizational goals. 

Bourke, J. & Espedido, A. (2019). Why Inclusive Leaders Are Good for Organizations and How to Become One. Harvard Business Review,
3/29/2019, p.2-5. 4p. http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wwu.edu/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=25&sid=f3ccf8d3-6fd6-4bc6-a115-740cee41feed%40sessionmgr103

Most organizations utilize teams to accomplish goals, but problems arise when employees don’t feel apart of the group or team they are on. Teams and work groups with effective management or leadership create and ensure a collaborative work space where everyone feels safe to participate and contribute. Becoming an inclusive leader and manager is a skill that directly contributes to team and individual performance. This paper delivers specific skills and competencies to become an inclusive leader and to implement strategies to increase employee involvement and team inclusion.

Fostering team inclusion is an incremental step to creating an inclusive culture in an organization. Studying inclusive management practices can be implemented on an organizational level once mastered/understood on the micro level. This material is new and is directly applicable to our research question, albeit on a leadership perspective rather than organizational strategy.

Das, A. (2019). Diversity Intelligence for Inclusive Leadership: A Conceptual Framework. Global Journal Of Management And Business Research, . Retrieved from https://journalofbusiness.org/index.php/GJMBR/article/view/2832

In this article, Das focuses on the idea of diversity intelligence which is a new concept that can assistance in  inclusive leadership practices. According to the article, managers and leaders alike must focus on diverse management to accomplish wanted outcomes. The author argues that for a business or organization “to feel valued for their uniqueness” diversity management is key. The author states that, “Diversity Intelligence (DQ) is the capability of individuals to recognize the value of workplace diversity and  to use this information to guide thinking and Behavior (Huges, 2018).” 

For our group, we find this extremely helpful with examining new concepts. With our particular topic, I think it’s important to look at several key factors, such as determining definitions and exploring different concepts or ideas.

 

Downey, S. N., van der Werff, L. & Thomas, K. M. & Plaut, V. C. (2015) The Role of Diversity Practices and Inclusion in Promoting Trust and Employee Engagement. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 2015. 45. p.35-44.  https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/jasp.12273?casa_token=H0mTCJWvw8MAAAAA:-28TDoSmpcyTxurj3c1sHPskoHTd5BjO6yG3NSq5xcva5hM8DMOTpBmccJmsSZXViYFjBCS3qXUPU8Wc

In this research paper starts off with the following quote: Downey, van der Werff, Thomas, and Plaut research the connection between diverse business practices and employee engagement, with a sample of 4597 health sector employees, providing insight into important topic.

This research paper is applicable to our topic, and could give us more insight, along with the appropriate data to substantiate that diverse and inclusive environments that lead to a more engaged and productive workforce. Downey et al. also provide other sources that we may find useful as we sort through our collective material. 

Heath, K. & Wensil, B. F., (2019). To Build an Inclusive Culture, Start with Inclusive Meetings. Harvard Business Review, 9/6/2019. p.2-5.
https://hbr.org/2019/09/to-build-an-inclusive-culture-start-with-inclusive-meetings#comment-section

Creating an inclusive culture, as a manager, requires understanding how to facilitate an environment that fosters and develops inclusive behaviors. One way for the manager to accomplish, and also demonstrate this, is by conducting inclusive meetings. Wensil and Heath address this important topic in a practical manner, supporting their article with numerous sources. The authors discuss using meeting facilitation strategies like “gracious authority,” managing the tempo, setting clear ground rules, dealing with dominant personalities and interruptions in an effort to make to meeting participants feel included, but also sets the tone for those employees and managers as to what is expected of them. 

This article is applicable to our research question by providing guidance on one component of leadership, which is hard to measure, yet has the ability to permeate an organization. The ability for managers to conduct inclusive meetings, that reinforce the organization’s cultural norms, is extremely valuable, and worthy of our consideration. 

Jones, K. (2019). The Numbers Game and What it means for Diversity & Inclusion (D&I). Workforce Solutions Review, 10(2), 38–40. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=138167701&site=ehost-live

The author of this article uses statistics as a foundation of her arguments. With these statistics she emphasizes how companies can use diversity to their advantage and how a lack of diversity could be a company’s downfall. This article also highlights the importance of having an inclusive workplace environment. She goes on to say how an inclusive environment can decrease employee turnover and benefit the company over all.

This article would allow for a strong numbers-based foundation to be made. Having these strong statistics would help drive our point home to the readers. Knowing the numbers would provide managers not only with proof but provide motivation for managers to dedicate themselves to fostering a diverse and inclusive environment. 

Mazur, B. (2014). Building diverse and inclusive organizational culture-best practices: A case study of Cisco Co. Journal of Intercultural Management, 6 (4), 169- 179. DOI 10.2478/joim-2014-0043

In this article, the author does an excellent job at defining important key terms such as “diversity” and “inclusion.” The paper examines the CISCO corporation, a networking hardware company, as an example of developing a diverse culture and being successful at it. This article also takes about best ways and practices for cultivating inclusion and diversity through the lens of this case study.

We think this article as a good find. For our group, we think it would be useful and important to cite different organizations have done well with diversity and inclusion. Also the definitions provide a backbone to our paper. 

Myers, C. (2018). Inclusion in Practice: Takeaways from the DMI Conference. Design Management Review, 29(3), 18–22. https://doi.org/10.1111/drev.12131 

This article enlightens the reader on how diversity and inclusion are essential to today’s’ businesses. The author goes on to explain some of the vital benefits inclusion and diversity can provide that can put a business ahead in today’s market. Many companies have recognized the value of diversity and have.  Today we see a lot of companies hiring to diversify their workforce but are only talking about how to make their company inclusive with no real steps taken. The author also touches on how to go into a work environment that is not inclusive and how to nurture it into becoming an inclusive space.

This source provides a great baseline of what should be on our radar. The article highlights what we as managers should be aware of and offers advice on how to improve. Using this source we would be able to delve deeper into the broad topics this article mentions as well as use the more detailed points on how to fix a non inclusive environment to create a better understanding on how to cultivate and maintain a diverse and inclusive work environment.

Parker, P. (2018). The Art of Gathering – How We Meet and Why it Matters. Random House, p.80-95. 

Priya Parker discusses the purpose and importance of how we meet, both in social and in business situations. Her guidance and advice helps create an inclusive and effective meeting space that allows for safe passage, with defined purpose and expectations.

Pless, N. M. & Maak, T. (2004). Building an Inclusive Diversity Culture: Principles, Processes and Practice. Journal of Business Ethics, Pt 1, Vol. 54 Issue 2, p.129-147, 19p. http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wwu.edu/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=18&sid=f3ccf8d3-6fd6-4bc6-a115-740cee41feed%40sessionmgr103

Diversity initiatives have become commonplace as globalization of the business industry continues. The issue is that these “diversification methods” only satisfy the quantitative approach, and ignore the culture of the work environment. Creating a culture of inclusion is the heart of what makes a diverse workforce more profitable and engaging for employees. Creating inclusion is a step further than inviting diversity, where members of protected/underrepresented classes feel recognized and respected among their colleagues. The following paper presents a “conceptual framework of inclusion based on moral theory of recognition and introduces the founding principles of reciprocal understanding, standpoint plurality and mutual enabling, trust and integrity”. The paper further highlights barriers to creating a culture of inclusivity, and how Human Resource (or Relation) Management can create long-lasting change within a diverse organization. 

This material lends to our topic because as management majors we need to learn how to implement change in people to create better working environments. Organizational behavior management is the key to improve performance on an individual and group level, and in diverse work forces, inclusion is key to making a diverse workforce within an organization effective. This paper is older, but gives key insights to management concepts that can encourage interpersonal (and group) relationships to flourish within a workplace. 

Sherbin, L., & Rashid, R. (2017). Diversity Doesn’t Stick Without Inclusion. Harvard Business Review Digital Articles, 2–5. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=121272865&site=ehost-live

We often hear “diversity” and “inclusion” used together, however; they are not the same. This article articulates how they are different but need each other in order for them to work at their peak. With supporting evidence from numerous studies, including in-house research by done by the writers through Center for Talent Innovation (CTI), the authors’ findings reveal that there are four main pillars that initiate inclusivity. Authenticity, networking and visibility, inclusive leaders, and clear career paths are the four main points that are supposed to create a real difference in the workplace. This article is a great introduction for our blog/research on how inclusivity and diversity work together. A little more detail on the research process and how they the data came to be would be interesting but all together this is a solid article.

Vohra, N., Chari, C. V., Mathur, P., Sudarshan, P., Verma, N., Mathur, N., … Gandhi, H. K. (2015). Inclusive Workplaces: Lessons from Theory and Practice. Vikalpa: The Journal for Decision Makers, 40(3), 324–362. https://doi.org/10.1177/0256090915601515

According to this article, more diversity within a company actually has been shown to yield a higher return and create more profitability than those who are less. This article is very detailed and highlights several key topics that align directly to our topic. The text highlights skills you need and how diversity and inclusion have shown to make a difference. The authors even share their own experiences and relate them to their findings. This could be a very useful resource to the creation of our blog.

Additional Sources: 

Weiss, M., Kolbe, M., Grote, G., Spahn, D. Grande, B. (2018). We can do it! Inclusive leader language promotes voice behavior in multi-professional teams. The Leadership Quarterly, 29 (3), p. 389-402. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1048984317306367