Literature Review Assignment
ANDYXU666
Lecture5Slides2020.pptx
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion II Unconscious Bias and Gender/Age/Ethnic Stereotypes
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Overview
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What is unconscious bias?
How to manage the ageing workforce and age diversity in the workplace?
How can we practise inclusive leadership?
Unconscious Bias in Singapore
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zpz5iVhoI7Y
Unconscious Bias
Unconscious biases are:
attitudes beyond our regular perceptions of ourselves and others
reinforced by our environment and experiences
the basis for a great deal of our patterns of behaviour about diversity.
Research is proving that we are biased towards the world around us and use stereotypes all the time. Our brains are wired towards patterns and similarity, while difference is harder to accommodate.
Adapted from Queensland Government
Impacts of Unconscious Bias
Where there is bias (conscious or unconscious) in the workplace, we continue to recruit, promote, allocate work, and manage performance with filters on our thinking. We cannot change what we do not see or acknowledge, but we can change conscious attitudes and beliefs.
Unconscious bias in the workplace can mean:
talented people are left out of your workforce or not allowed equal opportunity for development and career progression
diverse voices aren’t heard in meetings and decisions can be impaired
your culture is not genuinely demonstrating inclusive workplace principles
employees are not able to fully contribute to your organisation
creativity and productivity of your team or organisation may be compromised.
Adapted from Queensland Government
How to Overcome Unconscious Bias
Recruitment and hiring: Increase local outreach (women, minorities, veterans). Ensure a mix of interviewers and have a diverse slate of candidates. Look for bias in job descriptions. Hire talent, not just experience.
Performance reviews: It’s important to consider different cultural styles and match diverse high potentials with an executive sponsor. Ensure performance is measurable where possible.
Retention: Make sure people get credit for their ideas and be careful not to ignore, dismiss, interrupt or talk over other. Build relationships with employees you don’t know much about.
Understand your role as a leader: Make it safe to take risks and empower team members to make decisions. Take advice and implement feedback—listen, talk, discuss and give actionable feedback. Share that credit.
Class Activity One
Read the article “How These 4 Tech Companies Are Tackling Unconscious Bias”: https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurencebradford/2018/09/19/how-these-4-tech-companies-are-tackling-unconscious-bias/
Identify the policies the tech companies are implementing to reduce unconscious bias.
Have you encountered unconscious bias before?
What can individuals do to reduce their own unconscious bias?
The Ageing Workforce
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Our assumptions/stereotypes about old workers are wrong!
It’s not just the young who are investing in new skills
It’s not just the young who are positive and excited by their work
Older people are working harder to keep fit
Older people are not more exhausted
Older people don’t want to slow down
Exploring is not just for the young
Gratton & Scott (2016), Harvard Business Review
Managing an Ageing Workforce
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Traditional model:
Many companies are still stuck with an antiquated model for dealing with ageing, which assumes that people should get pay rises and promotions on the basis of age and then disappear when they reach retirement.
Problems: The number of young people, particularly those with valuable science and engineering skills, is shrinking; governments are raising retirement age
Dealing with the problem – for example:
Construction companies such as Sweden’s Elmhults Konstruktions and the Netherlands’ Hazenberg Bouw have introduced mentoring systems that encourage prospective retirees to train their replacements
Managing an Ageing Workforce
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New model:
Break the age-pay link and treat retirement as a phased process
A few firms have introduced formal programmes of “phased retirement”
Some consultancies and energy companies have developed pools of retired or semi-retired workers who can be called upon to work on individual projects (project-based consultants);
Asda (British supermarket retailer) allows employees to work only during busy periods or take several months off in winter
Problem: The plethora of age-discrimination laws that have been passed over the past few years make it harder for companies to experiment and easier for a handful of malcontents to sue.
Managing an Ageing Workforce
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Ageing Workforce in Singapore
Ageing Workforce in Singapore
Class Activity Two
Read the articles:
Valuing and capitalising on an ageing workforce: https://www.straitstimes.com/opinion/valuing-and-capitalising-on-an-ageing-workforce
Call for a new ministry of ageing to deal with emerging challenges https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/manpower/call-for-a-new-ministry-of-ageing-to-deal-with-emerging-challenges
Identify the primary issue(s) older workers face in the workforce
Identify the suggestion(s) put forth to manage older workers in the workplace
Discuss their feasibility
Age Diversity
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ixEItXXlj0
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Engaging Millennials
Who are the Millennials:
A person reaching young adulthood in the early 21st century
- Oxford Living Dictionaries
Millennials consist, depending on whom you ask, of people born from 1980 to 2000.
- Time
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Engaging Millennials
Why Millennials warrant attention by employers
They are now entering the workforce and are a larger generation than the Baby Boomers with great potential
They will require targeted techniques for recruiting, managing, motivating, and retaining them
They have expectations that are higher than the generations before them because of the times they live in
They have different values, needs, and ways of doing things than other generational cohorts in the workplace
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Engaging Millennials
How to engage Millennials
Create a deeply compelling vision of what the company or team is contributing to society
Train managers and supervisors to communicate openly, effectively, and frequently
Embrace technology and make collaboration a way of doing business
Building an entrepreneurial environment that encourages employees to research and develop their ideas
Loosen up the notion of the career ladder
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Millennials Generation Z
“But for analytical purposes, we believe 1996 is a meaningful cutoff between Millennials and Gen Z for a number of reasons, including key political, economic and social factors that define the Millennial generation’s formative years.” – Pew Research Center
Generation Z
A report on Generation Z
Challenges of Managing Age-Diverse Teams in Asia
Adapted from: https://www.humanresourcesonline.net/do-your-teams-prefer-working-with-older-managers/
Class Activity Three
Refer to the tables in the previous slide.
Discuss why:
Employees might prefer an older person to be their manager?
In Asia, more employees prefer an older person to be their manager?
A manager might treat employees from various generations differently?
Discuss how organisations/managers might approach age diversity positively?
Building Inclusive Leadership
What is inclusion?
Seeking out, valuing, and using the knowledge and experiences of diverse employees for business benefits;
Recognising, understanding, and respecting all the ways we differ, and leveraging those differences for competitive business advantages;
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Summary of findings:
The more included employees felt, the more innovative they reported being in their jobs.
The more included employees felt, the more they reported engaging in team citizenship behaviors—going above and beyond the “call of duty” to help other team members and meet workgroup objectives.
Perceiving similarities with coworkers engendered a feeling of belongingness while perceiving differences led to feelings of uniqueness.
What is inclusive leadership?
Treating people and groups fairly—that is, based on their unique characteristics, rather than on stereotypes
Personalizing individuals—that is, understanding and valuing the uniqueness of diverse others while also accepting them as members of the group
Leveraging the thinking of diverse groups for smarter ideation and decision making that reduces the risk of being blindsided
Inclusive leadership: The views from six countries (2014)
Building Inclusive Leadership
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What can leaders do to help employees feel included?
Empowerment: Enabling direct reports to develop and excel.
Humility: Admitting mistakes. Learning from criticism and different points of view. Acknowledging and seeking contributions of others to overcome one’s limitations.
Courage: Putting personal interests aside to achieve what needs to be done. Acting on convictions and principles even when it requires personal risk-taking.
Accountability: Demonstrating confidence in direct reports by holding them responsible for performance they can control.
Inclusive leadership: The views from six countries (2014)
Building Inclusive Leadership
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Inclusive leadership: The views from six countries (2014)
A full inclusive leadership model
Building Inclusive Leadership
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Who is an Inclusive Leader?
References and reading list
Benson, T, ‘Motivating Millennials takes more than flexible work policies’, Harvard Business Review, February 11, 2016
https://hbr.org/2016/02/motivating-millennials-takes-more-than-flexible-work-policies
Prime, J & Salib RE. 2014, ‘Inclusive Leadership: The view from six countries’, Catalyst, viewed 23 February 2017
http://www.catalyst.org/knowledge/inclusive-leadership-view-six-countries
Gratton, L & Scott, A 2016, ‘Our assumptions about old and young workers are wrong’, Harvard Business Review, November 14, 2016
https://hbr.org/2016/11/our-assumptions-about-old-and-young-workers-are-wrong
Diversity Council Australia – Think you know what it takes to be an Inclusive Leader?
https://www.dca.org.au/gettinginclusive/
Robert Half – Hiring and Managing Gen Z
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