Managing Cultural Diversity: Implication on Organization Competitiveness

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DEPARTMENT OF BUSINESS

Master of Business Administration (General)

A RESEARCH REPORT BY:

Full names: Leah Tekumwenzo Mpondela

Student ID:  MBAGEN1511561

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TITLE: “MANAGING CULTURAL DIVERSTY: IMPLICATION ON ORGANIZATION COMPETITIVENESS”

E-mail: leahmpondela@yahoo.com

Lmpondela@gmail.com

Date of submission: 15th Apri, 2016

LECTURER: MR CHISUPA

Table of Contents

CHAPTER ONE        

1.0 INTRODUCTION        

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY        

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM        

1.3 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES        

1.3.1 GENERAL OBJECTIVE        

1.3.2 SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES        

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS        

1.5 RATIONALE OF THE STUDY        

CHAPTER TWO:        

2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW        

2.1 BENEFITS OF DIVERSITY IN THE WORKPLACE        

2.2 IMPLICATIONS OF A CULTURALLY DIVERSE WORKFORCE        

2.2.1 Disadvantages of a Culturally Diverse Workforce        

2.2.2 Advantages of a Culturally Diverse Workforce        

2.3 CROSS-CULTURAL CONFLICT        

2.4 THEORETICAL AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK        

2.4.1 The Cultural Competence Continuum        

2.4.1.1The Five Elements of Cultural Competence        

2.4.2 Cox Model of Interaction        

CHAPTER THREE:        

3.0 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY        

3.1 RESEARCH DESIGN        

3.2 SAMPLE SIZE        

3.3 DATA COLLECTION        

3.4 PRETESTING OF DATA COLLECTION INSTRUMENTS        

3.5 ETHICAL CONSIDERATION        

CHAPTER FOUR: PRESENTATION AND INTERPRETATION OF FINDINGS        

SECTION A: BENEFITS OF CULTURALLY DIVERSE WORKFORCE        

4.1 Introduction        

SECTION B: IMPLICATIONS OF CULTURAL DIVERSITY ON ORGANISATION COMPETITIVENESS.        

B1: Cross tabulations        

Figure 7: Challenges of working with a multicultural team        

Figure 8: Solutions to challenges of working with a multicultural team        

CHAPTER FIVE: DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS        

5.1 INTRODUCTION        

5.2 DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS        

5.3 CONCLUSIONS        

5.4 RECOMMENDATIONS        

APPENDIX A: TIME TABLE        

APPENDIX B: QUESTIONNAIRE        

APPENDIX C: REFERENCES        

CHAPTER ONE

1.0 INTRODUCTION

In modern societies around the world, many organisations and workplaces have taken cultural diversity a serious issue than ever before. It can be said that cultural diversity has emerged as a key concern at the turn of the 21st century due to the belief that if managed well, a culturally diverse organisation can yield some advantages such as developing employee and organisation potential, improving customer service and business growth, and also enhancing creativity and problem solving. But it should also be noted on the onset that a culturally diverse organisation can present its own challenges for an organisation. Diversity can generally be defined as recognising, understanding and accepting individual differences irrespective of their race, gender, age, class, ethnicity, physical ability, and race (Cox, 1994). Grobler (2002:46) also supports this view by adding that each individual is unique but also share any number of environmental or biological characteristics. Diversity can be a problem to an organisation but could also be a solution, it also comes with its disadvantages but also benefits and dangerous but also constructive. The challenge then is to extract the very essence of diversity and tactically manage it for the improvement of the people and the organization

The increase in globalisation has made interaction among people from diverse cultures, beliefs and backgrounds in the recent past than ever before. This has resulted in organizations no longer restricting their operations or businesses to within their national boundaries, as they are free to extend beyond their borders. People no longer work in a confined workplace but are now part of the worldwide economy with competition coming from nearly every continent. It is for this reason that organisations need diversity to become more creative and open to change. As a result of this willingness to become creative and open to change, maximising and capitalising on workplace diversity has become an important aspect of organisations today.