Consider you as a junior task force working for an auditing and consulting organization which has been chosen to review the National Australia Bank (NAB) company’s policy on diversity and inclusion. Use various methods of research to collect information on the company’s policy related to diversity and inclusion.
Introduction
The contemporary business era needs effective diversity management strategies. The company may identify diverse issues early in an organization and enhance collaboration at the workplace. This study revolves an around the national bank of Australia along with a comprehensive analysis of the company’s policy to face diversity. The policy document of the bank seems a case for the junior task force. Being a junior task force, the intention is to navigate the case of the national bank of Australia and derive some key issues. After deriving issues, some solutions are to be presented to the company to create the pertinent work culture. The firm aims to make diversity a key strength in the internal business environment.
Synopsis/Executive Summary
· Purpose of the case study
The purpose of the case study is to find some solutions to eliminate issues, which are associated with the diversity and inclusion in the national bank of Australia. By using different sources, course material, and pertinent theories, the purpose is to contain a well-structured document that streamlines the best solutions for the national bank of Australia.
· Field of research: Overview of the Company
The National Bank of Australia (NAB) is largest financial institution. It is the fourth largest bank in this region. Regarding the market capitalization, the bank ranked 12th in work. However, the firm is struggling to manage diversity and inclusion regarding employees. The study is related to diversity management in the global business environment. Interestingly, the firm is quite capable of adopting the best strategies or shaping a better policy to manage people despite having differences. The revenue of the firm is $ 20.176 billion, according to 2015 financial reports.
· Issues and Findings
Key issues, which have been derived from the case study, are cross-cultural conflict. It is an underlying issue in the case. Other associated issues are lack of participation, lack of productivity, and struggle to win together. These solutions have been evaluated or examined by illustrating some advantages and disadvantages. Based on these advantages and disadvantages, two prominent solutions have been proposed to this financial institution to eliminate the issues and create a good impact.
Findings
After a comprehensive analysis of the case of the national bank of Australia, some issues or problems have been identified, which are associated with diversity and inclusion. NAB is looking to contain an effective diversity and inclusion policy to eliminate these prominent issues.
Diversity indicates some human differences, which are triggered by race, gender, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, social class, age, origin, beliefs, and ethical values. On the other hand, inclusion is the involvement of employees in different work activities or business processes despite having these differences. Respect for values, talent, background, and beliefs is necessary to form a pertinent work culture. All identified problems in the case of the national bank of Australia ate linked with these aspects.
Problems in the Case
Cross-Cultural Conflict
People in this bank come from different cultures. It has been observed that many employees work in these companies, which are not Australian nationals. Cross-cultural conflict exists when people refuse to work in a collaborative culture. For Instance, many people in the firm may come from the individualistic culture. On the other hand, one group of employees may come from a culture, which is triggered by collectivism. It is a big difference that this form is facing, and therefore the appropriate policy is needed to make the difference (Greenhill & Davis, 2013). NAB has failed to enhance the visibility of intercultural communication at the workplace. For Instance, people came from the individualistic culture, are not sharing information, ideas, and opinions. Thus, a lack of intercultural communication has created a big gap. It is a fact that nationals in the company contain different cultural values. They seem extrovert at the workplace because they are energetic, optimistic and open to communication. However, the conflict in the NAB usually occurs when immigrants depict the introvert behavior. Apart with these cultural differences or aspects, employee background is also a key factor that hinders intercultural communication and demonstrates cross-cultural conflict (Aquino & Robertson, 2017).
Lack of Participation
Lack of participation in the National bank of Australia is in the limelight. For Instance, the company wants employees to emerge as a team to meet goals and objectives of the organization in the competitive financial industry. However, many people in the company are looking to contain personal growth. Thus, despite having diversity regarding skills, experiences, background, and qualifications, the firm cannot justify the inclusion. Effective management of the diverse needs the effective inclusion of employees in different business processes such as operational management, decision making, and strategic thinking (Bennett, 1998).
Lacking Innovation and Driving Productivity
The cross-cultural management in the company always intends to streamline creative ideas and shape the creative and innovative culture. NAB is struggling to gather people on the same agenda and streamline creative thoughts to come up with some creative outputs for customers. Without emerging in the organization as a team or group, it seems tough for the company to maximize productivity. The underlying issue is the cultural diversity, which restrains people from working as a team in the firm (Browaeys & Price, 2016).
Struggling to Win Together
NAB has struggled to win together in the competitive market. For Instance, due to the different cultural values, races, ethnicity, and origin, it is tough to create a win-win situation. Everyone is triggered by the individual goal due to diversity, and interestingly, it is associated with the underlying issue such as cross-cultural conflict.
Discussion
Summarizing Problems
The underlying issue in the case is cross-cultural conflict. Interestingly, other issues or problems are associated with this underlying problem in the organization.
For Instance, the management of the company intends to hire people of different cultural background to integrate with global business trends. However, perceptions of people are changed due to these values. Due to the immense difference, people are not ready to work in teams and depict the intercultural communication. Thus, without intercultural communication, the firm cannot make the difference.
Lacking collaboration is a major concern for the company. With the diversity and inclusion strategy implementation process, the firm aims to enhance the participation of all employees. People are not streamlining and collaborating regarding skills and experience because they try to push cultural values (Dumetz, et al., 2012).
People at NAB are not included in the process. For Instance, every employee in the departments is making decisions at his end. The immense contradiction usually occurs, which is also a big threat to business and process sustainability.
Winning together is a big concern. However, the firm is still finding a way to match employee needs and create a pertinent culture. It is to be done through an effective solution.
Alternative Solutions to Major Problems
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Cross-Cultural Conflict
For cross-cultural conflict, the pertinent solution is to come up with the effective group diversity and inclusion policy. Interestingly, cross-cultural conflict is associated with diversity and inclusion. The policy or strategy is to be executed by the executive leadership. The strategy or policy is to promote the right of favorable values and behavior in the bank to support the workplace as a whole (Hcamag.Com, 2018).
Employee segmentation is also the pertinent solution to this problem. The company can create several business divisions to justify these employee segments. It will also separate cultural values, and ultimately, it will also eliminate cross-culture conflict.
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Lack of Participation
The lack of participation is a prominent issue in this company. However, it can be tackled by retaining the culturally diverse staff. It is a key solution because it opens ways and creates space for people to have a good time with each other to understand cultures and enable the element of respect (Nab.Com, 2017).
Creating the structure for success is the best thing that the company can do to enhance the participation of employees despite having different values. Making the effective structure can enable people to work together and know each other. It depends on the executive leadership to make it happen effectively. Structural changes are required (Syed & Ozbilgin, 2015).
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Lacking Innovation and Driving Productivity
The appropriate solution for this issue, which is integrated with the prominent underlying issue, is the creation of cross-culture teams. These teams have to meet goals and objectives. Enabling skill diversity is a better approach, which can hide diversity related to values.
The talent management strategy is a fine solution to increase innovation and enhance productivity. By ignoring bias or differences, the firm must contain the sustainable development of talented people. Instead of keeping cultural and other differences in the loop, the talent must be streamlined to make the difference.
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Struggling to Win Together
Building personal bonds is the best way to win together. Creating bonding with people will streamline emotional and sentimental attachment. People or employees will conceive the business and people like a family.
It can also be tackled from the start. For instance, the firm can eliminate all biases in the recruitment and selection process; It seems the basic step that can be taken as a key solution to manage further things in the company effectively.
Advantages and Disadvantages
Conclusion
In the end, it is to conclude that the national bank of Australia contains the capability to eliminate all these issues and implement effective solutions or strategies. The case helped to derive different issues such as cross-cultural conflict, lack of participation, lack of innovation and productivity and struggling to win together. Several solutions along with some key advantages and disadvantages have been elaborated. Each solution is presented separately along with the advantage or disadvantage. Now, the most important thing for the management of the company is to find the best alternative or solutions to justify effective diversity and inclusion.
Recommendations
Solutions to Adapt and justification
The underlying solution, in this case, is cross-cultural conflict. Thus, instead of obtaining each solution for each problem, it seems better to navigate the big picture and derive only two solutions. These are the two best solutions that can help to eliminate all issues derived from the case.
For Instance, the best solution, which is to be adopted by the management of NAB, is the effective group diversity and inclusion policy the bank must look to leverage the full potential of employees or people in the workplace. The policy can help the company to attain an innovative culture through diversity and inclusion. The resource-based theory of diversity management comes to life when making this policy. NAB must navigate or examine the impact of diversity on the internal and external resources. Employees are key internal resources of the company. Thus, the effective diversity and inclusion policy will be applied to create a positive impact on this particular resource.
Another good solution that can reduce the visibility of issues such as cultural conflict, production, collaboration, winning together is the effective talent management strategies. It is not just developing people and support to utilize talent. It seems purposeful. For Instance, the company, despite streamlining the difference may create diversity regarding work skills and talent. Different employees may have different skills and approaches to perform work. Thus, prioritizing the talent in the company initiates the work focus, enhances collaboration, enables the team, work, and increases productivity. The institutional theory of diversity management can be aligned with this solution. For Instance, despite streamlining the talent of people to enhance the inclusion, the NAB management cannot be separated from the social environment. It has to keep the culture that is to be aligned with the norms and values of the people as a whole. To meet this purpose, respect is a key factor, which will be generally accepted by all internal stakeholders, including employees.
Implementation
What should be done?
It seems the change process by the company to take benefit of diversity and inclusion. However, Kotter ‘s eight steps are highly recommended to the company. For Instance, it is necessary for the company management to create the urgency and communicate the vision to all key stakeholders. The top executive leadership team of the company must empower some actions to depict some short-term wins., Instead of taking drastic steps to implement solutions and produce results, some baby steps are to be taken first to investigate the impact on employees and the organization in an effective manner.
References
Aquino, C. T., & Robertson, R. W. (2017). Diversity and Inclusion in the Global Workplace: Aligning Initiatives with Strategic Business Goals. Springer.
Bennett, M. J. (1998). Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication. Nicholas Brealey Publishing.
Browaeys, M.-J., & Price, R. (2016). Understanding Cross-Cultural Management. Pearson.
Dumetz, J., Trompenaars, F., Belbin, M., Covey, S. M., Hampden-Turner, C., Saginova, O.,. . . Schmitz, J. (2012). Cross-cultural management textbook: Lessons from the world leading experts in cross-cultural management Paperback – Student Edition, September 5, 2012. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.
Greenhill, L. M., & Davis, K. C. (2013). Navigating Diversity and Inclusion in Veterinary Medicine. Purdue University Press.
Hcamag.Com. (2018, August 6). Why NAB’s diversity team focuses on mature workers. Retrieved from https://www.hcamag.com/hr-news/why-nabs-diversity-team-focuses-on-mature-workers-253210.aspx
Nab.Com. (2017, March 18). Can diversity deliver? Absolutely, says Australia’s first ‘social bond’ promoting workplace gender equality. Retrieved from https://business.nab.com.au/nabs-new-social-bond-lets-individuals-invest-firms-gender-diversity-matters-23129/
Spencer-Oatey, H. (2012). What is culture? A compilation of quotations. GlobalPAD Core Concepts, 1-21.
Syed, J., & Ozbilgin, M. (2015). Managing Diversity and Inclusion: An International Perspective. SAGE.
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