Report finds lack of experience in diversity

MOST OF the experts working in diversity roles have little experience and many organisations are in only the early stages of tackling workplace diversity, a new report has found.

Korn/Ferry, with survey partners Futurestep and Diversity Council Australia, released The Diversity and Inclusion Study on Wednesday.

It finds one-third of Australian and New Zealand diversity managers had no previous experience in diversity, while 40 per cent had less than three years’ experience working in diversity roles.

The report is based on responses from 103 Australian and New Zealand diversity managers working in medium and large organisations. It found 81 per cent of respondents believed senior leadership was critical to the success of a diversity and inclusion strategy.

However, most senior level managers were only ‘‘somewhat involved’’ or ‘‘not very involved’’. The most common reporting relationship for a diversity manager was to report to a people leader function, while one-fifth

‘Many organisations have not benefited from experiences gained over the twoand-a-half decades’

reported to the chief executive.

Jacqueline Gillespie, a senior partner at leadership and recruitment consulting firm Korn/ Ferry International, said ‘‘the implications from our survey are that many organisations have not benefited from experiences gained over the two-and-a-half decades, and there is a sense that many are starting over rather than building on previous efforts’’.

Gillespie said that many of the companies which were focusing on diversity at work were not yet being strategic.

They were ‘‘generally focused on headcount diversity, not inclusion’’, she said.

She added many companies still had a narrow definition of diversity (such as gender), at least in terms of any programme or metrics focus.

In the Global Gender Gap Report 2012, Australia rated 25 out of 135 countries in its global diversity index. New Zealand did much better at sixth.

DCA chief executive Nareen Young said many organisations and leaders saw diversity as marginal to their main business, despite emerging research to the contrary.

However. leading diversity employers in Australia, such as consulting giant Deloitte, structured human resources and diversity roles as senior strategic roles which report directly to the chief executive, she said.