Create and build your own diverse workforce

Attracting a diverse workplace means to identify, attract, retain and train individuals who can identify with a variety of culture or background.

The importance of creating a diverse workplace is becoming a pressing issue amongst multi-national companies who are aiming to achieve and become a diverse workplace.

Companies who are committed to achieving a diverse workplace are able to capture substantial value from the public and their own staff. There are many benefits of having a diverse workforce, including the sharing of ideas, establish better working relationships with global business partners and creating a culture of open-mindedness and acceptance.

The beginning of workplace diversity includes starts from identifying people from different backgrounds and culture and training the talent to maximise their full business potential and finally the retention of employees, along with effective incentive programs to motivate and maintain employee satisfaction.

Attracting a diverse workplace requires strong top management support, vision and guidance, who is directing the acceptance of employees from various backgrounds.  To achieve this, the role must be accurately defined and designed to be workplace inclusive. There are now many different tools and platforms that can help companies identify different people and build their diverse workforce including online search engines, social network sites such as Linkedin and job posting boards.

Diversity training is essential in helping management and company employees understand the different cultural norms and values in order to effectively manage the teams to their full potential. This understanding must then need to translate to building effective teams with adaptable mentalities that will help the teams be compatible. This applies to both the new employees and managers who need to be aware of the different culture and values of each individual.

Lastly, retaining their diverse workforce is critical as the costs associated with training and recruiting talent is high. Companies must have an accepting and conducive workplace in order to retain their employees with different ethnic bodies. Companies should incorporate and cater their workplace to best suit the needs of their staff. On top of this, attractive incentive and motivation programs will also help to engage their employees and maintain satisfaction in the workplace.

Keeping all this in mind, by combining all these steps will help you start your own diverse workplace. 

Being brought up in a typical Chinese family in Australia, Vivian takes pride as an ABC (Australia-born Chinese) where she happily embraces both the Chinese and Australian cultures. 

In high school, Vivian wanted to become a fashion designer, however she has developed a passion for running events after working backstage for multiple live shows. Prior to starting at Akolade, Vivian worked 4 years in the wine industry and she misses the wine tasting sessions and openly drinking on the job. As the Marketing Coordinator, Vivian enjoys using her creativity to design unique and fun campaigns for each event. In her spare time, Vivian loves to spend time with her two adorable pets; a cat and a dog.