Benefits of Diversity

Leadership Essentials: Appreciating Diversity

Diversity means having people within your team who broadly reflect the population. Inclusion means taking active steps to attract, develop and promote people from diverse backgrounds. Groups of people who are all the same tend to think and act alike. The differences between diverse members result in the generation of more creative ideas, encouraging innovation in what you do and how it’s done - an essential characteristic of ongoing improvement.

‘Leadership Essentials: Appreciating Diversity’ provides an overview of why an appreciation of diversity is essential for leadership capability and includes ‘Top Tips’ on how diversity can help you become a better leader.

The Essentials leaflet is supported by three Spotlights that look at diversity in more detail to help you improve your leadership skills:

Inclusivity
Social Sensitivity
Unconcious Bias

Leadership Essentials

Leadership Essentials: Appreciating Diversity

09 February 2018

Spotlights

Spotlight on Inclusivity

"Inclusion concerns achieving the right amount of contact between people. Some people like a great deal of inclusion. Other people prefer to be alone. We all differ as to how much we desire to be with other people and how much we wish to be alone – how much we want to be in groups and how much we want to avoid groups"

Will Schutz (1992)

Spotlight on Social Sensitivity

"Research has shown that group or collective intelligence is less dependent on how intelligent individuals are, and more on their social sensitivity, their ability to take turns speaking, and the number of women in the group"

Chandler Macleod Group (2016)

Spotlight on Unconscious Bias

"Unconscious bias at work can influence decisions in recruitment, promotion, staff development and recognition and can lead to a less diverse workforce. Employers can overlook talented workers and instead favour those who share their own characteristics or views"

ACAS (2018)