The business case for diversity management

The Programme for the Practice of Diversity Management is a collaborative arrangement between the Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs (DIMIA) and the Australian Centre for International Business (ACIB) funded through DIMIA’s Productive Diversity Partnership Programme. It aims to meet the practical needs of business by developing a business case for productive diversity, providing business models for diversity management, and creating toolkits and checklists for assessing diversity. This major paper presents detailed discussions of the human resource management case, the knowledge case and the international business case for diversity management. The business case identifies how the costs of diversity in the workplace can be reduced and how the dividends of diversity can be secured. The knowledge case recognises the importance of knowledge as a source of competitive advantage and argues that work groups with a greater mix of cultural backgrounds, experience and functional levels will, under good management, produce more innovative products and services. The international business case proposes that organisations operating internationally must develop capabilities to navigate culturally complex environments and that an organisation’s culturally diverse workforce possesses the skills required to develop these capabilities. This paper is recommended as a good starting point for the study of diversity management in Australia. Show less