2017 Georgia Banking School University of Georgia Center for Continuing Education

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1 2017 Georgia Banking School University of Georgia Center for Continuing Education Human Resource Legal Issues Course #110 Tuesday, May 9, 2017 Presenter: Dawn D. Bennett-Alexander, Esq. Associate Professor of Employment Law & Legal Studies UGA s Terry College of Business Hi! I am Dawn D. Bennett-Alexander, Esq., and I will be presenting the Human Resource Legal Issues session for you. I have another handout prepared for you that we will actually work from, but it will be handed out to you in class. I prefer for you not to think about it beforehand, and giving it to you after saying that would make it just too tempting not to peek. ;-) Come prepared to learn a lot, be reminded of things you may have forgotten about, and to have lots of fun. I get just as much from you as you do from me, so come prepared to talk. This is not a straight lecture course!! See you soon--- Dawn D. Bennett-Alexander, Esq.

2 Human Resource Legal Issues/Diversity Workforce Diversity and Business Badi G. Foster, Gerald Jackson, William E. Cross, Bailey Jackson, and Rita Hardiman The organization that competes successfully in today's business marketplace makes it a priority to provide capital or responsive, market-oriented products and services to clients and customers. And the way an organization communicates these priorities is by tying them to the company's mission through a series of goals and action plans. Successful companies know that without such policies they fail to remain competitive. What American business isn't certain of, however, is how workforce diversity affects a company's competitive abilities. Will the ability to manage diversity become yet another factor in a company's success? The Transformation The United States is experiencing a major, if not radical demographic transformation. Some studies have projected that by the year 2020, white American will be in the minority, as their number is surpassed by Americans of Indian, Asian, African, and Spanish decent, to name a few. Despite continued discriminatory employment practices and the fact that poverty limits the future potential of many of today's minorities, demographic trends combined with certain progressive forces are beginning to result in the social mobility of more Asian-Americans, blacks, Mexican-Americans, Cubans, and other minorities. The combination of an older, shrinking white America and a younger, growing minority population means that industries that strive to remain white and maledominated will find their pool of competent workers falling short of demand. While the rise of ethnic population groups in the U.S. is dramatic, this trend will pale in comparison to the current and projected trends for women. In the nation's colleges and universities, women are already earning professional degrees at the same rate as men and in much of the same disciplines. Not long ago the New York Times reported that of all the new businesses begun between 1985 and 1986, 25 percent or more were headed by women. Obviously women are as much a factor to be reckoned with as other welltrained minority populations. And, let's not forget the changes occurring among white men. In some ways the liberation and changing status of minorities--especially women--has afforded white men the opportunity to redefine male roles, expectations, and lifestyles. New articles, texts, and workshops are focusing on the ways changing male preferences and career patterns are affecting industry. When we take into consideration all of the above factors, it becomes apparent that "diversity competence" in tomorrow's supervisors and managers will mean the capacity to effectively monitor and motivate differences across race, gender, age, social attitudes, and lifestyles. The future of American industry will rely in large measure on our human resource potential, and businesses will have no choice but to learn how to use workforce diversity constructively. Successful organizations will react to diversity as the important business issue it is by implementing proactive, strategic human resource planning. Short-term strategies designed to circumvent the situation will keep an organization from effectively positioning itself in tomorrow's world of cultural, gender, and lifestyle diversity.

3 New Markets The workforce is not the only recipient of demographic change. Diversity also has become a major factor in new domestic submarkets. Over the last 15 years a significant number of Asian-Americans, blacks, Mexican-Americans, and women have entered the middle class. Although self-interest and individual circumstances generally drive the purchasing and investment decisions of these groups, minorities do have special interest groups and investigative associations that monitor corporate employment practices. Given this fact, it is foolish for a company to maintain discriminatory employment practices if it plans to court the business of minority groups. A diversified workforce may also provide a company with greater knowledge about the preferences and consuming habits of minorities, and women, thus helping, the company develop new marketing techniques. In fact organizations may find that they can market items normally associated with a single ethnic group to a larger segment of society. Domestic markets aren't the only ones affected by demographic diversity. American industry is becoming involved in international markets at an ever-increasing rate. Gone are the days when only white male Europeans stationed in foreign lands negotiated large-scale business transactions with other white males. More commonly, the key actors in international trade represent a culturally diverse group. Industries that strive to remain white and male-dominated will find their pool of competent workers falling short of demand. American businesses that fail to employ and develop people representative of diverse communities and countries are, in effect, choosing to restrict severely their client and customer base. On the other hand, companies whose management validates and articulates a strong commitment to employee diversity--and competence in managing that diversity--have a business policy designed to position them for a greater market share at home and abroad. Added Benefits While some might argue otherwise, it is our experience that organizations that invite change and successfully manage diversity are more likely to detect and solve complex business problems that don't fit into the orthodox business models of yesterday. The solutions to these problems will call for unique, multiple perspectives that only diversity can generate. Organizations with competent and diverse points of view will be able to come up with more options. And the more options, the greater the likelihood of finding the best solution. Diversity and Organizational Change It is one thing for a select group of executives or board members to develop awareness and insight into diversity. It is quite another for that insight to become a part of an organization's culture. In the not-too-distant past, most American businesses were designed to guard against cultural diversity insofar as women and people of color were concerned. Consequently, preparing a company for the reality of diversity as a business issue can be anything from a grim task to a prospect with great possibility. Everything depends on the degree of diversity consciousness a company already has achieved. The research of Bailey Jackson and Evangelina Holvino has resulted in a model that describes the developmental stages an organization traverses as it moves from a monocultural organization to a diverse or multicultural one. In broad terms, the researchers claim we can describe organizations as being in one of the following three stages of development: Monocultural. This first level is characterized by either implicit or explicit exclusion of racial minorities, women, and other socially oppressed groups. In some cases this level may be characterized not by exclusion but by a desire to maintain a system that is rigged to the advantage of the dominant or majority "White male" group.

4 Nondiscriminatory. The second level is characterized by a sincere desire to eliminate the majority group's unfair advantage. The organization does this, however, without significantly changing its dominant culture. In most cases the organization is fixated on making sure that there is the right numerical symmetry of people of different races and genders in the organization. In other cases, the organization goes beyond minimal representation goals for racial minorities and women and attempts to influence the climate of the organization so that it is not a hostile place for the new members of the workforce. Multicultural. This level describes the organization that is either in the process of becoming or has become diverse in the most visionary sense of the term. Our vision describes an organization that reflects the contributions and interests of the diverse cultural and social groups in the organizations, mission, operations, products, or services; commits to eradicate all forms of social discrimination in the organization; shares power and influence so that no one group is put at an exploitative advantage; follows through on its broader social responsibility to fight social discrimination and advocate social diversity. Each of the organization types described above represents a different challenge to an organization's executive leadership. It is critical that those in charge of change know how to diagnose the organization's consciousness in order to identify appropriate change goals, as well as prescribe the appropriate intervention based on these levels. Diversity and Individual Change The increasing diversity of a company's client and employee base is not only played out through organizational change, it can be monitored by the attitudinal and identity shifts experienced by key actors in the scenario. While groups such as white males, blacks, Hispanics, and women are often considered homogeneous groups, there is much diversity within such categories. Research has shown we are all members of social identity groups, or referent groups, based on race, gender, social class, religion, or sexual orientation. But people differ from other members in their referent group in how they experience their social status and deal with the treatment they get from the larger environment based on their social group. For example, not all women think alike about feminist issues, and not all blacks identify strongly with their "blackness." The research of Bailey Jackson, Rita Hardiman, William Cross, and Gerald Jackson has pointed to generic stages of development that individuals experience in grappling with their social group membership. There appear to be five stages of development. Naive to social consciousness. This first stage, which occurs during early childhood, comprises the period before the individual understands he or she is a member of a racial, ethnic, or gender group. Acceptance. The second stage refers to the individual's acceptance of the social roles assigned to his or her group. The individual's acceptance of the social roles assigned to his or her group. The individual buys into the prevailing social definitions of the group, which may be influenced by racist and sexist beliefs and even stereotypes. For example, whites at this stage would believe they are superior to racial minorities or more "normal" than other races. Blacks, Hispanics, and Asian-Americans at this stage are likely to believe to some degree in the negative stereotypes about their own groups and to adopt an exaggerated assimilationist posture. Males at this stage would support male dominance, and females at this state would accept their fate as second-class persons in a male-dominated world. White males in this stage have great difficulty in working with minorities and females in anything other than subordinate or stereotypic roles, and they fail to see the benefits and strengths.

5 Successful organizations will react to diversity as the important business issue it is by implementing proactive, strategic human resource planning that can develop from increasing racial and gender diversity in the organization. Minorities and females at this stage are unlikely to challenge racism and sexism in their organizations and are more likely to want to assimilate into the corporate culture defined by the white males. Resistance. The third stage of development occurs when the individual recognizes he or she has accepted a definition of him or herself that is based on prevailing racist and sexist notions about social groups. During this stage the individual develops an awareness of and sensitivity to racism and sexism, both within his or her personal attitudes and behaviors and within the larger environment. Because they frequently challenge racist and sexist attitudes and practices in the workplace, racial minorities and women at this stage of development are often termed "hostile," "militant" or "oversensitive" to issues of oppression. Similarly, white males also through a stage of resistance when they begin to be aware of and sensitive to racism and sexism which, in the extreme, can lead to a "save the world" complex. Redefinition. In the fourth stage each category of person redefines himself or herself in ways that transcend the negative stereotypes of the past. Building Bridges. Finally, in stage five, individuals find ways to build bridges between themselves and other persons and organizations around them. Rather than acting as barrier against communication, the new identities are open to diverse and multicultural social discourse, especially in the workplace. There are a few reasons it s important to remember that stages of individual identity change around issue of diversity. First is the fact that if an organization wants to become more multiculturally oriented, it probably will have to play out interventions at the unit and subunit level; it is important at these levels to diagnose the personalities and individual identities of key workers or clusters of workers. In units that are the focus of planned diversity change, trainers and consultants must be able to assess "where people are" in terms of identity development. Otherwise, training can create more problems than it solves. Second, the identity-stage models should remind executives that not every minority is an expert on minority affairs. Depending on their stage of development, some minorities resist being classified as a minority. Not recognizing this, some companies make such people change agents within the organization. For example, a black who had developed to stage four or five probably will provide more effective leadership concerning diversity issues than someone positioned in one of the earlier stages. Training and Development Journal Dawn D. Bennett-Alexander, Esq. dawndba@uga.edu