Diversity authors tend to deal with the issue of stereotypes in two ways. First, they criticize “stereotyping” others which they typically define in absolute terms. Here are Renee Bland and Sandra Slipp: “Stereotyping attributes to all individuals in a group the characteristics or tendencies of some." Source: Renee Blank and Sandra Slipp, Voices of Diversity (New York: American Management Association, 1994), p. 8. Here is Kay DuPont: “Stereotyping occurs when we apply our biases to all members of a group. If you were raised to think that all members of a particular ethnic group are lazy, you may still hold this stereotype…” Source: Kay DuPont, CSP (Stands for Certified Speaking Professional) Handling Diversity Issues in the Workplace West (Des Moines: American Media Publishing, 1997), p. 50.
I think we can recognize “all” as a loophole. It allows diversity authors to make lots of comments about individuals in groups and with the single caveat that these generalizations do not apply to every single member of the group, they apparently are not stereotyping. (I wonder if this sort of deep thinking impressed the reviewers at the American Management Association which published Blank and Slipp.)
And, Blank and Slipp and DuPont to engage in what to most people would look like stereotyping:
Bland and Slipp: “Women tend to have a more participatory, interactive management style than men. Latinos tend not to separate work and personal relationships as much as most non-Latinos do.” (p. 7) “Except for Filipinos…the Asian-American described here have strong Buddhist and Confucian backgrounds…” (p. 36)
DuPont: wants managers to know that with regard to business cards, “Native-Born Americans” do not automatically exchange them, “Mexican-Americans” prefer to exchange them at the beginning of a meeting and “Japanese Americans” prefer to exchange cards before shaking hands (or bowing.) With regard to negotiation style, the first group doesn’t worry about building relationships, the second will appeal to personal relationships and the third will try to build a personal relationship before a business relationship. This sort of stereotyping goes on and on without any sourcing (p. 73-74)
Sunday, October 28, 2007
The Diversity Movement – Is it Trite?, conclusion and transition
When Justice Powell opened up the door to factors other than race being relevant at to achieve diversity (see post on August 26, 2007) consultants raced through with their something-for-everyone approach. So we hear groups talking about their diversity in a manner that is nothing more that their individual personality differences – one likes baseball, not football; one grew up in a town and the other grew up in a mid-size city; one likes cats and the other dogs and on and on. One of the more popular diversity issues has to do with the “generational personality.
The generational personality is a view that the era into which one was born greatly affects and separates people. Baby Boomers are the most talked-about “generation.” This is deceptive because at one level it can sound like an interesting and relevant discussion about the difference between young people and middle age people. But that misreads the thesis. The point the advocates are making is that people born between certain arbitrarily set years gain a common personality that links them and that they carry throughout their life cycle. So, young people don’t mature into old people; rather, baby boomers take a trait – usually the example of supposed defiance of authority is conjured up - through life whereas the generation that proceeds (or follows) them might be more accommodating toward authority throughout the life cycle. Regardless of the merits of this unproven theory, the consultants hustling this notion claim that “It is Diversity management at its most challenging. The obvious markers of race and sex have less clear impact on differences and signal less in the way of differential treatment than do generational differences.” Source: Ron Zemke, Claire Raines and Bob Filipczak, Generations at Work (New York: American Management Association, 2000), p. 25.
The generational personality approach usually requires its promoters to twist reality. At the National Labor-Management Conference of 2006, Commissioners from the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service presented a workshop designed to help participants recognize the strengths and obstacles of their own age group (Traditionalists, Boomers, Xers and Millennials in dealing with others. Their promotional material has this come-on: “Can’t we all just get along? Well frankly, no.”
Source: http://www.fmcs.gov/internet/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=238&itemID=17866
This is nonsense. The generational personality literature written as late as 2000 defines these four groups as four generations with the “Traditionalists” typically World War II veterans. These four groups do not co-exist in the modern workplace because the war veterans would need to be 80 at the youngest. Even if the FMCS staff presented these generatons slightly changed from other varieties (Different presenters of the Gernational Personality theory change the years in a quite facile manner), Traditionalists would be born before 1946 but still young enough to be working in 2006, a dwindling slice of the workforce with alleged different needs that managers need to take into account from those born in 1947. Second, it is insulting to workers and managers to assume that they need to understand this generational personality pseudo-social science to get along. Finally, it is insulting to the Diversity movement to link this oddity to the purpose of Diversity.
A more bizarre example of denying reality is the claim of Ron Zemke and his writing partners in Generations at Work. This book published in 2000 by the American Management Association makes the claim, more than once, that the American population shrank in the two hundred years or so before 1946 due to the hardship of life and the Civil War and the Depression of the 1930’s. Source: Zemke, et al , p. 14, 64. The population in the 1790 census was about 5 Million. It has grown in every decade. I have written on this topic elsewhere. Source: Jim Pruitt, Training January 2002. This criticism of a book published by the AMA is not hair splitting.
The Generational Personality theory is trite and it helps make the Diversity Movement trite because it can entice managers and workers into talking about non-threatening issues like the varying entertainment tastes of Baby Boomers and Millennials and thereby allows them to assert that they are committed to diversity. It reduces the need for hard choices and hard coversations about race, ethnicity and gender. It is not surprising that consultants would exploit this opening and it is not surprising that people would find it easier to talk about this topic than race relations. It is surprising (at least to me) that African Americans have allowed this notion to trivialize the Diversity Movement.
The point of the next posts is that this type of triviality leads to stereotyping people.
The generational personality is a view that the era into which one was born greatly affects and separates people. Baby Boomers are the most talked-about “generation.” This is deceptive because at one level it can sound like an interesting and relevant discussion about the difference between young people and middle age people. But that misreads the thesis. The point the advocates are making is that people born between certain arbitrarily set years gain a common personality that links them and that they carry throughout their life cycle. So, young people don’t mature into old people; rather, baby boomers take a trait – usually the example of supposed defiance of authority is conjured up - through life whereas the generation that proceeds (or follows) them might be more accommodating toward authority throughout the life cycle. Regardless of the merits of this unproven theory, the consultants hustling this notion claim that “It is Diversity management at its most challenging. The obvious markers of race and sex have less clear impact on differences and signal less in the way of differential treatment than do generational differences.” Source: Ron Zemke, Claire Raines and Bob Filipczak, Generations at Work (New York: American Management Association, 2000), p. 25.
The generational personality approach usually requires its promoters to twist reality. At the National Labor-Management Conference of 2006, Commissioners from the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service presented a workshop designed to help participants recognize the strengths and obstacles of their own age group (Traditionalists, Boomers, Xers and Millennials in dealing with others. Their promotional material has this come-on: “Can’t we all just get along? Well frankly, no.”
Source: http://www.fmcs.gov/internet/itemDetail.asp?categoryID=238&itemID=17866
This is nonsense. The generational personality literature written as late as 2000 defines these four groups as four generations with the “Traditionalists” typically World War II veterans. These four groups do not co-exist in the modern workplace because the war veterans would need to be 80 at the youngest. Even if the FMCS staff presented these generatons slightly changed from other varieties (Different presenters of the Gernational Personality theory change the years in a quite facile manner), Traditionalists would be born before 1946 but still young enough to be working in 2006, a dwindling slice of the workforce with alleged different needs that managers need to take into account from those born in 1947. Second, it is insulting to workers and managers to assume that they need to understand this generational personality pseudo-social science to get along. Finally, it is insulting to the Diversity movement to link this oddity to the purpose of Diversity.
A more bizarre example of denying reality is the claim of Ron Zemke and his writing partners in Generations at Work. This book published in 2000 by the American Management Association makes the claim, more than once, that the American population shrank in the two hundred years or so before 1946 due to the hardship of life and the Civil War and the Depression of the 1930’s. Source: Zemke, et al , p. 14, 64. The population in the 1790 census was about 5 Million. It has grown in every decade. I have written on this topic elsewhere. Source: Jim Pruitt, Training January 2002. This criticism of a book published by the AMA is not hair splitting.
The Generational Personality theory is trite and it helps make the Diversity Movement trite because it can entice managers and workers into talking about non-threatening issues like the varying entertainment tastes of Baby Boomers and Millennials and thereby allows them to assert that they are committed to diversity. It reduces the need for hard choices and hard coversations about race, ethnicity and gender. It is not surprising that consultants would exploit this opening and it is not surprising that people would find it easier to talk about this topic than race relations. It is surprising (at least to me) that African Americans have allowed this notion to trivialize the Diversity Movement.
The point of the next posts is that this type of triviality leads to stereotyping people.
Saturday, October 27, 2007
The Diversity Movement – Is it Trite?, con't
Teachings and writings on diversity often lack content. In this post we will look at one of the catch-phrases of diversity, the so-called “platinum rule.” It’s a diversity “improvement” on Jesus Christ.
The Golden Rule by Jesus of Nazareth is rendered as follows: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” Source: Matthew 7:12.
“… (T) he Platinum rule…was described by Dr. Milton Bennet in the book Basic Concepts of intercultural Communications (Intercultural Press, 1998). This is an expansion of the Golden Rule, which has been a time-honored practice that permeates many religious beliefs. In telling us to ‘Treat other as you want to be treated,’ its intentions are sound. It was designed to prevent us from doing harm to others – things that others obviously would not like.”
“With the increasing complexity of our society, we can now add to the Golden Rule in order to account for people’s different and unique needs. This enables us to move beyond ‘one size fits all.’ By assuming that someone else wants what we do, we can’t take into account that person’s uniqueness. The Platinum Rule gives others permission to be different from us, and reminds us to honor that difference.”
“The Platinum Rule is to treat others as they want to be treated.” Source: Tina Rasmussen, Diversity Mosaic Participant Workbook: Developing Cultural Competence (San Francisco: John Wiley and Sons, published by Pfieffer, 2007), p. 19
Earlier, in 1994, Professor Norma Carr-Ruffino had identified the same improvement on Christianity. Source: Norma Carr-Ruffino, Managing Diversity: People Skills for a Multicultural Workplace (USA: Thompson Executive Press, 1994), p. 13
It is common to hear diversity trainers talk about the “platinum rule” (often without crediting Bennet, Rasmussen or Carr-Ruffino) without realizing their condescension toward the beliefs of tens of millions of Christians. The Golden Rule is not, as Dr. Milton Bennet opined, “to prevent us from doing harm to others.”
As the second president of the United States, John Adams wrote: “The precept …do as you would be done by, implies an equality which is the real equality of nature and Christianity...” Source: Russell Kirk, The Conservative Mind: from Burke to Eliot, Seventh Revised Edition (Washington DC: Regnery Publishing, Inc.: 1953, 1960, 1972, 1985, 2001 printing), p. 95
Isn’t it possible that Jesus was teaching understanding and empathy and equality rather than teaching people to impose their standards on others? (That itself would be a violation of the Golden Rule.)
The Golden Rule by Jesus of Nazareth is rendered as follows: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” Source: Matthew 7:12.
“… (T) he Platinum rule…was described by Dr. Milton Bennet in the book Basic Concepts of intercultural Communications (Intercultural Press, 1998). This is an expansion of the Golden Rule, which has been a time-honored practice that permeates many religious beliefs. In telling us to ‘Treat other as you want to be treated,’ its intentions are sound. It was designed to prevent us from doing harm to others – things that others obviously would not like.”
“With the increasing complexity of our society, we can now add to the Golden Rule in order to account for people’s different and unique needs. This enables us to move beyond ‘one size fits all.’ By assuming that someone else wants what we do, we can’t take into account that person’s uniqueness. The Platinum Rule gives others permission to be different from us, and reminds us to honor that difference.”
“The Platinum Rule is to treat others as they want to be treated.” Source: Tina Rasmussen, Diversity Mosaic Participant Workbook: Developing Cultural Competence (San Francisco: John Wiley and Sons, published by Pfieffer, 2007), p. 19
Earlier, in 1994, Professor Norma Carr-Ruffino had identified the same improvement on Christianity. Source: Norma Carr-Ruffino, Managing Diversity: People Skills for a Multicultural Workplace (USA: Thompson Executive Press, 1994), p. 13
It is common to hear diversity trainers talk about the “platinum rule” (often without crediting Bennet, Rasmussen or Carr-Ruffino) without realizing their condescension toward the beliefs of tens of millions of Christians. The Golden Rule is not, as Dr. Milton Bennet opined, “to prevent us from doing harm to others.”
As the second president of the United States, John Adams wrote: “The precept …do as you would be done by, implies an equality which is the real equality of nature and Christianity...” Source: Russell Kirk, The Conservative Mind: from Burke to Eliot, Seventh Revised Edition (Washington DC: Regnery Publishing, Inc.: 1953, 1960, 1972, 1985, 2001 printing), p. 95
Isn’t it possible that Jesus was teaching understanding and empathy and equality rather than teaching people to impose their standards on others? (That itself would be a violation of the Golden Rule.)
Sunday, October 21, 2007
The Diversity Movement – Is it Trite?
In the 1948 presidential campaign in the US, Republican nominee Thomas Dewey said: "The highest purpose to which we could dedicate ourselves is to rediscover the everlasting variety among us." Source: David E. Johnson and Johnny R. Johnson, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the White House: Foolhardiness, Folly and Fraud in Presidential Elections, from Andrew Jackson to George W. Bush (New York: Barnes & Noble, 2007), p. 109
Dewey was criticized for the banality of this statement. But was it more banal than the jargon of the modern Diversity movement?
Here is Kodak: “The more diverse the points of view, the broader the vision.” Source: DiversityInc. May 2006, p. 57
Here is Staples:
“Diversity is in our soul.” Source: Diversityinc. June 2006, p. 83
Here is the University of Nebraska:
“Diversity is the multiplicity of people, cultures and ideas that contribute to the richness and variety of life. Diversity broadly encompasses the mixture of similarities and differences along several dimensions: race, national origin, ability, religion, sexual orientation, age and gender. It includes values, cultures, concepts, learning styles and perceptions that individuals possess. By its very nature, diversity fosters inclusiveness, encourages the exchange of new ideas, improves decision-making, and broadens the scope of problem-solving.” (The Strategic Plan for Diversity At The University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2006-2011)
This is jargon and jargon typically deludes people into thinking they are saying something meaningful.
We will next go to another example of jargon. Then we will look at how this leads to stereotyping.
Dewey was criticized for the banality of this statement. But was it more banal than the jargon of the modern Diversity movement?
Here is Kodak: “The more diverse the points of view, the broader the vision.” Source: DiversityInc. May 2006, p. 57
Here is Staples:
“Diversity is in our soul.” Source: Diversityinc. June 2006, p. 83
Here is the University of Nebraska:
“Diversity is the multiplicity of people, cultures and ideas that contribute to the richness and variety of life. Diversity broadly encompasses the mixture of similarities and differences along several dimensions: race, national origin, ability, religion, sexual orientation, age and gender. It includes values, cultures, concepts, learning styles and perceptions that individuals possess. By its very nature, diversity fosters inclusiveness, encourages the exchange of new ideas, improves decision-making, and broadens the scope of problem-solving.” (The Strategic Plan for Diversity At The University of Nebraska-Lincoln 2006-2011)
This is jargon and jargon typically deludes people into thinking they are saying something meaningful.
We will next go to another example of jargon. Then we will look at how this leads to stereotyping.
Thursday, October 4, 2007
The Two Views of Diversity , conclusion and transition
What we have seen is that the definitions of diversity, when developed in organizations, all tend to mean something very ordinary – that people are different in different dimensions. This is a concept that people can readily accept and, in fact, enjoy. It has been taught in human resource circles long before the modern diversity movement. Here is a typical statement from a personnel book in the early 1960s:
“Effective personnel management is to a great extent based on the premise that people differ significantly from one another in many respects.” Source: Wendell L French, The Personnel Management Process: Human Resource Administration (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1964), p. 22
Here is another from a section in a personnel book on communications:“(In addition to other factors having to do with organizational level and role), there may be overlapping of political, racial, religious, color, and job groupings. It is unwise to group all employees as being under the political influence of Democrats, Republicans or labor unions. To address communications in terms of one grouping alone will certainly antagonize the others. And similarly, it is unwise to assume that all employees hold the same views on race, color, and creed – even those of the same race, color, and creed.” Source: Michael J Jucius, Personnel Management (Homewood: Richard D. Irwin, Inc, 1977, seventh edition, 1971) p. 316)
But the modern diversity movement means something different.
First, some differences are far more important than others: One major book on diversity reports without irony that “Bailey Jackson was one of the first people to identify that some differences matter more than others. Those that make the biggest difference are ethnicity, gender, marital status (and children), race, sexual orientation, language, physical ability, socioeconomic status, religion and mental ability.” Source: Frederick A. Miller and Judith H. Katz, The Inclusion Breakthrough: Unleashing the Real Power of Diversity (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2002), pp. 3-4)
Really. Read the first sentence in the previous paragraph again and ask how anyone could believe that in some recent time someone was the first to make this “discovery.”
Second, the focus should be on change. Here is Fredrick Miller in 1994: “There is a belief that diversity should be about individual differences. We might call this the Individual Differences perspective. But there is also the belief that diversity should be about correcting the injustices visited upon people and groups. We might call this the Social Justice perspective.” (Source: Ellie Y. Cross, Judith H. Katz, Frederick A. Miller and Edith W. Seashore, eds. The Promise of Diversity (New York: Irwin 1994)
We will next cover the broad view of diversity – the Individual Differences perspective. We have previously questioned the claim that somehow “diversity” is good for business. Now we will ask:
1. Is it trite?
2. Does it lead to sterotyping?
3. Is it polarizing?
4. Is it good for Blacks?
5. Does it leave out issues?
“Effective personnel management is to a great extent based on the premise that people differ significantly from one another in many respects.” Source: Wendell L French, The Personnel Management Process: Human Resource Administration (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1964), p. 22
Here is another from a section in a personnel book on communications:“(In addition to other factors having to do with organizational level and role), there may be overlapping of political, racial, religious, color, and job groupings. It is unwise to group all employees as being under the political influence of Democrats, Republicans or labor unions. To address communications in terms of one grouping alone will certainly antagonize the others. And similarly, it is unwise to assume that all employees hold the same views on race, color, and creed – even those of the same race, color, and creed.” Source: Michael J Jucius, Personnel Management (Homewood: Richard D. Irwin, Inc, 1977, seventh edition, 1971) p. 316)
But the modern diversity movement means something different.
First, some differences are far more important than others: One major book on diversity reports without irony that “Bailey Jackson was one of the first people to identify that some differences matter more than others. Those that make the biggest difference are ethnicity, gender, marital status (and children), race, sexual orientation, language, physical ability, socioeconomic status, religion and mental ability.” Source: Frederick A. Miller and Judith H. Katz, The Inclusion Breakthrough: Unleashing the Real Power of Diversity (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2002), pp. 3-4)
Really. Read the first sentence in the previous paragraph again and ask how anyone could believe that in some recent time someone was the first to make this “discovery.”
Second, the focus should be on change. Here is Fredrick Miller in 1994: “There is a belief that diversity should be about individual differences. We might call this the Individual Differences perspective. But there is also the belief that diversity should be about correcting the injustices visited upon people and groups. We might call this the Social Justice perspective.” (Source: Ellie Y. Cross, Judith H. Katz, Frederick A. Miller and Edith W. Seashore, eds. The Promise of Diversity (New York: Irwin 1994)
We will next cover the broad view of diversity – the Individual Differences perspective. We have previously questioned the claim that somehow “diversity” is good for business. Now we will ask:
1. Is it trite?
2. Does it lead to sterotyping?
3. Is it polarizing?
4. Is it good for Blacks?
5. Does it leave out issues?
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