October 16, 5:19 am
Is your diversity training doing more damage than good?
Over the years, diversity training has been conducted with the impression that we’re all supposed to get along. I’m all for that. What I have a problem with is the phrase “strength through diversity.”
With all due respect, that won’t work. Diversity is differences. If you doubt me, just check your dictionary, or visit yourdictionary.com, dictionary.reference.com, and/or merriam-webster.com.
The phrase “strength through diversity” is akin to saying “strength through having differences.” Not good enough. Think about companies in which everyone has different agendas. Departments see other departments as the enemy. Energy flows in different directions. Momentum is no where near optimal. Productivity and profits suffer.
Don’t misunderstand. I fully understand the purpose behind so-called diversity training. We can even look at Wikipedia’s overview of diversity in several contexts, such as encouraging tolerance for people of different backgrounds and including people of diverse cultural and religious backgrounds.
Well, no kidding. The problem? Most diversity training stops right there.
My point is this:
For diversity training to be truly effective, we must go farther than simply being aware of or tolerating people of different backgrounds. We must VALUE the differences, looking for the strengths each person brings to a team.
Then, once we identify those strengths, we must focus on them and capitalize on them.
In other words, our strength will not come simply from having diversity or even being aware of it. Our strength will come from valuing the strengths of each aspect of diversity in our organization.
If our diversity training is not doing that, then it may simply be pointing out the differences among people, building moats and walls in the process. In my opinion, such training usually does more damage than good.
Filed in Training, Motivation, Management, Teambuilding, Workplace, Corporate Culture
I’m not the biggest fan of diversity training for the very reason that it points out differences and doesn’t do much to bring people together. Besides, if you haven’t learned how to get along with people by the time you left kindergarten then you shouldn’t be in business.
Hey Justin –
I’m thinking I was a slow learner, because it took me a bit beyond kindergarten to learn how to “get along” (as Rodney King might say).
But I agree w/ you that most of what is labeled ‘Diversity’ training is just pointing out differences. Perhaps the worst kind of ‘Diversity’ training is when they try to get people to full out endorse lifestyles and cultures different from their own.
To that I say “valuing the differences” is one thing, but a full-out endorsement steps over the line. People should not have to endure that kind of “training.” (Actually, it’s kind of an insult to the word ‘trainnig.’)
- Dan
Diversity training basically consists of a) teaching white people to hate themselves and b) teaching non-white people to hate white people. I still have huge emotional scars from the diversity training course that I took 14 years ago, in which I was prodded to express my hatred of and contempt for white men while a group of white men watched and weren’t allowed to defend themselves. If my current corporation ever makes me attend a diversity training course I plan to bring legal action against them, arguing that it is against my religious beliefs to paticipate.