um potential (Steorts, 1995, p. 31). This goes back to some of the things mentioned earlier (Bloch, 1998, on-line); on going training programs for the entry level employees, well-developed internship and coop programs that emphasize diversity, company support by financially contributing to cultural and ethnically diverse organizations, sponsoring diverse associations via memberships, partnerships, conferences, scholarships, co-ops, advisory services, job fairs, loaned executives, and mentoring programs to name a few. Ways to accustom management to workplace diversity must be found. This can be done by including people with differences in meetings, and by giving best assignments to a diverse group of people. You should even go out of your way to do this. Then there should be a way to measure this. An effective reward system should be established. And organizations should become increasingly intolerant of failures to respect or manage diversity. Once again, most importantly is that management must walk the talk (Wheeler, 1997, 495).A final area to be aware of is that of collusion. Collusion is cooperation wit others, knowingly or unknowingly, to reinforce stereotypical attitudes, prevailing behaviors, and norms. Types of collusion include; silence, denial, and active participation. This is probably still the widest form of exclusion. Collusion is common because of the way we are socialized as children. We all had to modify our own behavior to fit in: to expectations of parents, teachers, friends and society. However, as adults, we are now able to make our own decisions about what we do and do not believe, and how to act on those decisions, rather than continuing the habit of fitting in (Rasmussen, 1996, p. 173).Tools to Aid in Achieving DiversityEffectively managing work force diversity is an issue that organizations are addressing with increasing frequency. This is a challenge to be contended with on a daily basis. Going b...
