Saturday, 15 January 2005 - 10:00 AM

This presentation is part of: Cultural Diversity in Social Work Practice

Communicating Diversity: Exploring Differing Perceptions Among Human Service Personnel

Purpose: A major challenge facing human service organizations is the increased heterogeneity of both the social service workforce and client populations (author citation; Gutierrez & Nagda, 1996; Nagda, Harding & Holley, 1999). Managers are primarily responsible for creating and promoting an agency culture in which the benefits of diversity are realized, while staff often are directed to develop or improve their cultural competency skills (Asamoah, 1995; Green, 1995; Iglehart, 2000; Leigh, 1998; Menefee, 1997). Perhaps the most frequently used diversity-related intervention is staff trainings (author citation, 1998). At the crux of most diversity trainings is a focus on cross-cultural communication; the ability to verbally and non-verbally relate to others different from oneself in nonjudgmental and respectful ways (author citation, 2004; Hayes & Russell, 1997; Norton & Fox, 1997). Effective cross-cultural communication is viewed as essential to healthy staff and client relations. Less understood, however, are the factors that might affect such communication.

The goals of this paper are to (1) identify how individual, job and organizational attributes, members’ perceptions of diversity efforts, and members’ commitment to diversity goals relate to self-reports of personal communications about diversity; and (2) determine the implications of these perceptions and behaviors for agency-based diversity interventions.

Method: Data are from a self-administered diversity climate survey that includes individual (gender, race, age, education), job (position, time at agency, supervisory responsibilities) and organizational (size, type) attributes, and questions concerning members’ perceptions of diversity efforts, commitment to diversity-related goals, and personal communications in their agencies. The stratified random sample consists of 317 human service workers and managers in various sizes of nonprofit and public agencies in the mid-Atlantic region. In measuring perceptions of “organizational efforts,” “staff commitment,” and “personal communications,” questions from other organizational diversity questionnaires (Gardenswartz & Rowe, 1994; Hayes & Russell, 1997; Norton & Fox, 1997; Rasmussen, 1996; Roizner, 1996) were combined into scales because each question on its own did not adequately capture conceptualization of the variable. Principal Component Factor Analyses estimated the extent to which the individual survey items were related to each other in a way consistent with the conceptualizations. Descriptive statistics, t-tests, and multiple regression were used to analyze the data.

Results: There were several significant differences in organizational members’ perceptions of diversity efforts and staff commitment based on individual (i.e., gender), job (i.e., position) and organizational attributes (size). Yet these attributes, as independent variables in the regression model, were not significantly related to members’ day-to-day personal communications (dependent variable). Organizational efforts (p<.001) and members’ commitment (p<.001) were significant variables and explained 45% of the variance in members’ communications (Model F = 32.84, p<.001).

Implications: These findings have ramifications for human service agency personnel. Staff needs to be prepared to understand the reasons for and strategies to enhance diversity in their workplaces. Realizing that perceptions of diversity efforts and commitment to diversity initiatives, regardless of personal, job or organizational characteristics, may improve personal communications concerning diversity will make organizational members more effective advocates and strategists for needed agency changes.

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