Workplace diversitymanagement in AustraliaWhat do manage.docx

Workplace diversity
management in Australia
What do managers think and
what are organisations doing?
Paul J. Davis, Yuliya Frolova and William Callahan
KIMEP University, Almaty, Kazakhstan
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to identify Australian
managers’ attitudes and understandings
regarding workforce diversity management (WDM) and the
practices and incorporation of WDM
in organisations.
Design/methodology/approach – Methodology is quantitative. A
questionnaire in the form of a
self-administered survey instrument was mailed to 650
managers (325 HR managers and 325 other
managers) in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.
Findings – The research found that workforce diversity is not
especially well understood or
appreciated; especially by non-HR managers. Organisations
appear generally not to prioritise WDM
and levels of senior manager engagement with the topic are
tentative. Statistical analysis highlighted
considerable divergence of opinion across the surveyed group.
Research limitations/implications – As an exploratory study,
further research is encouraged to
better understand cause and effect relationships pertaining to
the findings.
Practical implications – There are implications for HR managers

or those in related roles who
might design, implement and promote WDM initiatives. There
are implications for consultants,
employees and senior managers regarding education, awareness
and support of diversity objectives.
Originality/value – Addresses a gap in the literature by looking
at contemporary attitudes and
practices regarding WDM in Australian organisations. Provides
the first empirical comparison
between HR and other managers on the topic.
Keywords Australia, Diversity, Gender, Human resource
management, Managers,
Diversity management
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Over the past few decades workforce diversity management
(WDM) has evolved to
become an increasingly important part of human resource
management (HRM) in
organisations. It is arguably the case that academic and
practitioner interest in the
topic has grown owing to the benefits that diversity
management (DM) strategies can
deliver. According to McCuiston et al. (2004), for example,
properly implemented
policies to promote workplace diversity can result in an
improved bottom line;
increased competitive advantage; superior business
performance; higher levels of
employee satisfaction and loyalty; a strengthened relationship
with multicultural
communities, and attracting the best and the brightest
candidates. Indeed,
contemporary scholars concur: having and making use of a
diverse workforce is

beneficial to organisations (Stewart and Brown, 2010;
Ivancevich and Konopaske, 2012;
Dessler, 2013; Mathis et al., 2013; Mondy and Mondy, 2014;
Noe et al., 2014).
It is important that equal employment opportunities (EEO) are
embedded in the
firm’s routine business practices to ensure the success of DM
initiatives. This means,
for example, that firms must provide EEO throughout the
employee work life-cycle to
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion:
An International Journal
Vol. 35 No. 2, 2016
pp. 81-98
© Emerald Group Publishing Limited
2040-7149
DOI 10.1108/EDI-03-2015-0020
Received 27 March 2015
Revised 1 September 2015
1 December 2015
Accepted 7 December 2015
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is
available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2040-7149.htm
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prospective and existing employees. In essence, this mandates
treating all people
equally and impartially irrespective of their immutable
characteristics. Important
employee-employer interfaces where decisions most visibly
reflect equal employment
opportunity in action include recruitment and selection;
promotions and rewards;
recognition; career-pathing and access to professional
development opportunities such
as leadership development programs or coaching. Therefore, the
role of human
resource (HR) managers is critical and it is a focus of the
present study.
A review of recent literature reflected that relatively little
scholarly research on DM
programs has been conducted on Australian organisations.
Further, the literature that
does exist is somewhat dated now. The present research project,
therefore, was
designed as an exploratory study to survey current
understanding and attitudes
towards DM in Australian organisations. The broad objectives
were to discern the
extent to which Australian organisations are actively employing
DM principles and
practices and to identify managerial perceptions and opinions
regarding DM.

The study also sought to identify whether the best practices of a
few notable
Australian companies (highlighted in the literature review to
follow) were the norm or
the exception in Australia today. Through these objectives the
intention of the present
study is to raise interest among practitioners and academics in
this field to further
explore the issues raised in this study.
This paper is organised into five sections. The first section
provides a review of the
relevant literature including the pertinent Australian literature
and an historical
contextualisation of WDM. This is followed by an explanation
of the research design
adopted for the research and a justification for the approach
adopted. The third section
presents the findings of the research with an emphasis on
highlighting the most
significant findings as they relate to the objectives of the
research project. The fourth
section is a discussion of the findings providing commentary on
how the findings relate
to existing knowledge and add to this knowledge and our
understanding of WDM.
The paper closes with a section which draws several
conclusions from the research with
the aim of guiding practitioners and future research projects
concerned with WDM.
A review of the literature
The literature review has several objectives. First, it is provided
to situate
organisational WDM in an historical, social and cultural
context. The review sets

out the origins and evolution of WDM in Australia and globally.
The review also
describes some WDM practices, particularly in Australian
companies, to highlight how
legislation and policy (intent) has been realised in practice both
strategically and
operationally. The review also highlights the benefits
organisations can gain through
active implementation of WDM practices. The overall purpose
of the literature review
is to underscore the importance and value of WDM to
organisations and highlight that
this topic is deserving of the further attention and understanding
that this research
project has been designed to provide.
WDM in context
DM principles have their origins in the American Civil Rights
movements of the 1960s.
Most significant: the passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964
which made discrimination
unlawful. This Act was a watershed in that it provided the
momentum whereby common
effort has since been made to promote principles and practices
of equal opportunity
(Maxwell, 2004). Following the American example, equal
opportunity ideals spread to the
rest of the Western world. Today, legislation in most Western
countries protects
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prospective and actual employees against discrimination in the
workplace based upon
differences such as age, gender, race, national origin, sexual
orientation, marital status,
pregnancy, religion and disability. Differences among western
countries do, however,
exist and reflect in part countries’ unique national regulatory
contexts. In the UK,
for example, a distinct emphasis concerning DM has been on
voluntarism and
multiculturalism; in France national discourse concerning
equality has led to the pursuit
of an agenda of assimilation. In Germany, DM exists largely as
a voluntary strategy,
which is almost explicitly separated from the notion of
ethnicity, allowing other forms of
difference to be accommodated in workplaces (Tatli et al.,
2012). In Canada, employers
must not only prevent discrimination, but also take proactive
measures to eliminate
barriers to equity in the workplace. Canadian employers must
also ensure that aboriginal
people, persons with disabilities, visible minorities and women
are proportionately
represented in their workforce (Klarsfeld et al., 2012).
So, the literature suggests that workforce diversity resonates
differently across the
world. Patrickson and O’Brien (2001) contend that diversity
practices vary from country
to country due in part to geographic and historical reasons. This
results in different
approaches to issues of societal organisation, work and family,
resulting in diversity and
its management to take on varying forms. In Australia, until the

mid 1960s, the
workforce remained predominantly Anglo-Saxon due to the
“White Australian Policy” –
an official policy of racial discrimination (Lewis et al., 2000).
In 1975, anti-discrimination
legislation was enacted addressing discrimination on the
grounds of gender, race,
ethnicity, religion, family status and disability. This was
followed in the 1980s by
affirmative action (also known as EEO) legislation and policies
which sought to recognise
and reflect women’s increasing participation in the workforce
(Strachan et al., 2004).
Currently, Australia seems to be among the most proactive
countries with legislation
recognising a wide range of forms of diversity (Patrickson and
O’Brien, 2001). Australia
has substantive legislation that includes more than 12 Federal
and State Acts covering
both anti-discrimination and affirmative action (Burgess et al.,
2009). Thus, Australian
legislation requires organisations to remove discrimination and
create equal employment
opportunity workplaces (Syed and Kramar, 2010). That said,
Australian legislation
places only limited obligations on organisations to manage
cultural diversity (Syed and
Kramar, 2010). In the private sector, DM represents a voluntary
corporate strategy, which
is considered to be closely linked to a notion of increased
productivity and performance
(Bertone and Leahy, 2001; Coleman, 1995). For example, The
Diversity Works Policy
(previously: Productive Diversity) is aimed at promotion of
positive economic outcomes
resulting from managing cultural diversity (Syed and Kramar,

2010).
Benefits of WDM
Even though legal settlements with some international corporate
giants suggest that
ineffective management of a diversified workforce can be
detrimental to organisations
and their bottom lines (Friday and Friday, 2003), DM goes far
beyond the necessity of
adherence to legal requirements. DM is advisedly adopted on a
voluntary basis
whereby it represents a strategic response to issues of
workplace diversity (Klarsfeld
et al., 2012), which results in many positive work-related
outcomes. Diversity and
equality management has been shown to result in higher labour
productivity, higher
levels of employee innovation and lower voluntary turnover
(Evans, 2014; Armstrong
et al., 2010; Bridgstock et al., 2010). Furthermore, strategic DM
practices have been
positively correlated with improved work-group performance
outcomes and increased
levels of job satisfaction (Pitts, 2009).
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In other notable studies, employee perceptions of the diversity

climate have been
advantageously related with measures of employee loyalty (
Jauhari and Singh, 2013).
Racial diversity, when moderated by DM practices and team
processes, have been
noted to positively correlate with employee performance (Choi
and Rainey, 2010). More
directly tangible financial outcomes have also been observed to
derive from DM
(Labelle et al., 2009). According to Gotsis and Kortezi (2013),
for example, a DM strategy
that is based upon ethical concepts of organisational virtue, care
and human dignity
will result in financial benefits for the organisation. Indeed,
numerous studies have
found that top management diversity positively influences firm
performance and
financial results (Baixauli-Soler et al., 2015; Nielsen and
Nielsen, 2013; Talke et al., 2010;
Barkema and Shvyrkov, 2007; Caligiuri et al., 2004). Other
recent studies have
concluded that DM programs result in the development of
competitive advantage, the
ability to compete effectively in a global market, the leveraging
of multiple employee
talents and skills, the creation of an inclusive work climate, a
workforce that mirrors
the customer base and continuity of leadership and production
through an increasingly
loyal leadership team and workforce (McCuiston et al., 2004).
Competitive advantage is
further enhanced through DM, according to Jauhari and Singh
(2013), because it helps
to attract and retain talented employees.
WDM approaches

Effective DM practices must permeate the organisation more
deeply than merely being
non-discriminatory policies that make provisions for equal
opportunities. According to
Robbins and Judge (2013, p. 91) DM is “the process and
programs by which managers
make everyone more aware of and sensitive to the needs and
differences of others”.
Thus, following the introduction and establishment of greater
workforce diversity
through policies, the subsequent challenge becomes effectively
managing that diversity
(Maxwell, 2004). Hiring for a diversified workforce but failing
to consciously manage
that diversity could even be counterproductive (Sabharwal,
2014; Hur, 2013). Effective
management of a diversified workforce, according to Martín
Alcázar et al. (2013),
requires a holistic transformation of HR strategies. For instance,
it is not enough to
introduce “gender neutral” practices to increase gender diversity
since in reality
these practices may appear more “gender blind” and lead to a
declining number of
women employed in male-dominated organisations (Evans,
2012). To retain women in
such organisations, gender-biased organisational cultures have
to be changed
(Hanappi-Egger, 2012).
The need to transform organisational culture to achieve DM
objectives applies not
only to traditionally male-dominated industries such as
information technology,
electronics and computing. For instance, academia has been
shown to experience

difficulties realising DM programme objectives such as gender
equality. It has been
observed that women continue to be under-represented on
editorial boards of scholarly
management journals and in relation to their representation as
first-named authors of
articles published by those journals (Metz and Harzing, 2012,
2009). This appears to be in
spite of the fact that the accrediting body AACSB expects
business schools to prepare
students to deal with ethics and diversity issues in
organisational life (Nelson et al., 2012).
Furthermore, contrary to expectations that business students
who are exposed to a
curriculum that emphasises the importance of diversity will
exhibit fewer gender
stereotypes, some results indicate that upper-level business
students stereotype the
managerial role using male characteristics to a greater degree
than lower level and
general education students (Paris and Decker, 2012).
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According to Kramar (1998), the process of building a culture
that explicitly values
differences between individuals operates at three levels:
strategic, managerial and
operational. An example of this in practice is Australian Esso
(Kramar, 1998; Krautil,
1995, pp. 26-27). At the the strategic level Esso has linked DM

to its core business
through its mission statement and three of the six corporate
values (teamwork; concern
for the individual; and achieving business excellence by
maximising the productivity of
people which provides the means of linking DM and strategic
management). At the
managerial level, Esso used data from its cultural audit (an
assessment of
the perceptions of the extent to which the behaviour of
employees complies with the
organisation’s core values) to review HR policies. The policies
reviewed included
recruitment, training, working conditions, compensation,
benefits, termination, transfer
and promotion. As a result of the review, the following actions
were undertaken: first,
supervisors received assistance in creating a supportive
environment and in clarifying
which behaviours are unacceptable. Second, supervisors were
provided with additional
training aimed at increasing their understanding of their own
managerial style and
how to adjust to a style that better supports diversity. Finally,
the company’s
departments – together with staff from the employee relations
department – developed
diversity initiatives consistent with their business priorities.
WDM and the importance of managers
The previous section mentioned the importance of managers to
the success of WD
initiatives. Indeed, the main responsibility for effective and
meaningful DM in
organisations rests with senior management. In the view of Cole
and Salimath (2013),

organisational leaders can best demonstrate a commitment to
diversity by
incorporating it in the strategies and mission statements of their
organisations. It is
imperative that the execution and evaluation of a corporate
diversity strategy use a
planned change approach to not only acknowledge and value
diversity, but also
systematically include diversity into the organisation’s
corporate culture (Friday and
Friday, 2003). Leaders need to be proactive about learning from
diversity; committed to
establishing a climate of openness, equity, tolerance and
inclusion; demonstrate
excellent communication, facilitation and team building skills;
possess understanding,
humour, honesty and integrity (McCuiston et al., 2004).
It has been claimed that best practice DM also requires leaders
to focus on creating an
environment which supports internal communication (for
instance, through daily
meetings encouraging interaction and dialogue) since frequent
employee interactions are
beneficial to the social environment leading to more openness
towards and tolerance of
those dissimilar to themselves (Lauring and Selmer, 2012).
Communication and
interaction in the workplace can also improve workplace
performance by empowering
all employees with the information and resources necessary for
decision making,
self-expression and idea sharing, being listened to by
management and helping to
promote self-esteem (Sabharwal, 2014). According to the results
of research conducted by

Leveson et al. (2009) in a large Australian financial institution,
cultural DM practices – if
perceived by employees as a sign of care and support –
favourably affect employee
commitment. To achieve this objective, managers must invite as
many employees as it is
practical to participate in the formulation and implementation of
DM policies.
Managers can influence the success of WD initiatives through
poor behaviours as
well as positive behaviours. According to Bertone and Leahy
(2002), some long-
standing social attitudes, such as ethnic and racial stereotyping,
can indeed be difficult
to change. This can challenge the implementation and success of
DM in practice. It is
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noted that some senior managers perceive diversity policies as a
threat to their
positions and may resist diversity initiatives even when the
evidence suggests that DM
will benefit their organisations. In Australia, Bertone and Leahy
(2002) noted that only
a small number of companies recognised that in order to be
competitive in today’s

global marketplace, they need to have culturally diverse
employees to serve a diverse
customer base. Managers play an important role in encouraging
and building this
environment through recruitment and development of diverse
employees.
Organisations that have recognised this such as Australian
Digital discussed below,
however, have enjoyed benefits including greater employee
commitment, increased
market share, and higher levels of customer satisfaction. At the
National Australia
Bank, DM is important not only for attracting, retaining, and
developing staff, but also
for attracting, retaining and developing their customer base
(Beauregard, 2008).
WDM strategy and practice
An illustration of how workforce diversity policies can translate
in practice is provided
by Honeywell. At the managerial level, Honeywell in Australia
has included: “building
rapport”, “supporting development”, “acknowledging value” and
“recognising
individuality” dimensions into their selection, appraisal and pay
policies (Kramar,
1998). Another firm, Australian Digital, integrated managing
diversity into their
management practices by using performance appraisal and
reward systems that take
into account how well managers meet affirmative action and
EEO targets (Kramar,
1998; Hall, 1996, p. 15). Westpac Bank similarly requires their
managers to meet EEO
targets together with financial targets (Kramar, 1998).

In America companies have engaged employees with the
importance of workplace
diversity through the innovative step of establishing corporate
diversity councils.
These companies include: Sodexo, Marriott International, Bank
of America, Verizon
Communications, Coca-Cola, Starwood Hotels and Resorts
Worldwide, Health care
Service Corporation, MGM Mirage, HSBC – North America
Bank, Walt Disney
Company, JP Morgan Chase Bank, Kraft Foods, Target
Corporation and J.C. Penney.
Many of these corporate diversity councils include company
senior executives and are
chaired by CEOs. These councils are responsible for promoting
and centralising a DM
agenda and focusing management and staff attention on key
diversity issues and
actions being taken to realise DM outcomes (Madera, 2013).
There are numerous foci for targeted DM strategies available to
organisations
today. For instance, according to Gröschl (2011) and McCuiston
et al. (2004), in order to
attract and recruit differentiated talented employees,
organisations can incorporate DM
into their hiring strategies and communicate adherence to DM
via their websites.
To retain valuable employees and enhance their career
development, organisations can
ensure that all employees with leadership potential irrespective
of their immutable
characteristics have an opportunity to be mentored (Kalra et al.,
2009). This requires a
strategic focus on having diverse leaders in influential positions
because evidence

suggests that mentors tend to select protégés similar to
themselves in background,
education, gender, race, ethnicity and religion (Robbins and
Judge, 2013, p. 427).
Alternate practices to achieving similar benefits include
focusing on deliberately
recruiting a workforce that reflects the cultural and ethnic mix
of the area in which the
organisation operates ((The) Aston Centre for Human
Resources, 2008, p. 339). Companies
might also or alternatively focus their DM strategy on creating
greater supplier diversity,
or diversity in their advertising, public relations, websites,
assessment, training, career
development, or compensation and benefits (Gröschl, 2011;
McCuiston et al., 2004).
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Whatever the strategic focus and particular practices adopted,
DM outcomes will be
achieved through action not intent; through meaningful
employee interactions and
through mutual understanding. To achieve these aims
organisations are advised to
encourage employees to congregate and communicate with each
other. Practices which
can facilitate this include establishing diverse teams, creating
cross-functional
committees and involving all people in social and ceremonial

activities. Effective
communication can be advanced, for example, through various
learning and
development activities. (McCuiston et al., 2004).
Research design
The research design was informed by the desire to investigate
several important
questions resulting from the literature review:
RQ1. Australia is a leading country in terms of legislation to
promote diversity and
protect against discrimination in the workplace. To what extent
has this
positively impacted awareness, attitudes and practice in
Australian
companies?
RQ2. WDM is essentially voluntary in Australia. To what extent
and in which ways
have Australian companies initiated and implemented workforce
diversity
activities?
RQ3. A few notable Australian companies have been proactive
and creative in
embedding WDM within the routine activities of their
companies. To what
extent are these companies the norm in Australia?
RQ4. A great deal of the success of WDM practices depend
upon the support,
encouragement and participation of managers and leaders in
organisations.
How active and positive are the managers in the surveyed
organisations

regarding WDM?
RQ5. WDM is most commonly introduced within HR
responsibilities such as
recruitment, training, performance appraisal and career
planning. To what
extent are HR managers particularly aware of and supportive of
the principles
and goals of WDM?
Research design adopted a quantitative methodology and a
questionnaire was
developed in the form of a self-administered survey instrument.
The survey comprised
three parts: Demographic questions (D1-5); Group A statements
soliciting the
respondents’ personal opinions and understandings regarding
WDM (A1-10) and
Group B statements soliciting respondents opinions of their
organisation’s engagement
with diversity (B1-10). Group A statements were designed to
discover respondents’
personal understandings regarding WDM and their personal
opinions regarding the
value of DM to the organisation. Group B statements sought to
reveal the value placed
on and status of WDM within the respondents’ organisation.
The statements were
informed by the literature review for this paper and from
current issues relating to
WDM found in recent editions of the national HR publications
of the American Society
for Human Resource Management and the Australian Human
Resources Institute.
Statements were open-ended and explanations of key terms were

provided along
with the survey itself. A five-point Likert scale was adopted to
capture the extent to
which respondents agreed with the statements on the survey.
The survey was mailed
to 650 mid-level managers in private sector organisations in
Sydney, Melbourne,
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Brisbane and Perth. The survey was targeted at large and mid-
sized businesses with a
minimum of 500 employees. Businesses represented a diverse
range of industries
including: oil and gas; utilities; mining; financial services;
pharmaceuticals; FMCG;
hospitality; logistics and transportation; media and
manufacturing. Half (325) the
surveys were sent to HR managers and the other half were sent
to non-HR managers
(managers in non-HR fields such as finance, marketing,
operations and logistics). The
survey was mailed along with an addressed, reply-paid envelope
in an attempt to
encourage a good response rate. Organisations were identified
through various online
business directories. Data collection was carried out over
November and December

2014. Data were analysed using Stata®, a statistics software
programme.
The authors acknowledge that the research approach adopted
has limitations. It is
less personal and investigative in comparison with focus groups
or semi-structured
interviews, for example. Therefore, it does not allow for the
researcher to establish trust
and rapport with participants which other research approaches
can accommodate. This
may limit the respondents’ engagement with the project and
might then influence the
time they give to considering their responses. The survey did
not ascertain the reasoning
behind respondents’ opinions and any explanations for their
opinions are not known. It is
also possible that misinterpretation or differing interpretations
of statements on a survey
can result in responses which may not be intended or consistent
among respondents.
Interviews and focus groups are able to clarify the information
sought from participants
to overcome this. A survey, however, is time efficient, focused,
can potentially garner
many more responses and is free from the common criticisms of
interviewer bias.
A survey ensures every respondent is responding to exactly the
same question with the
same information free from potential influences such as tone,
emphasis and volume
which can influence respondents participating in face-to-face
interviews.
Findings
Of the 650 mailed surveys, 198 (30.4 per cent) useable surveys

were returned. Of these
114 (57.6 per cent) were completed by women and 84 (42.4 per
cent) by men. Women made
up 61.4 per cent of the HR managers who responded. 162 (81.8
per cent) respondents were
employed in Australian-owned companies and 36 (18.2 per cent)
worked in foreign-owned
companies. In total, 53 (26.7 per cent) of respondents identified
their company as
a multi-national. In total, 116 (58.6 per cent) respondents were
HR managers and
82 (41.4 per cent) were other managers (Table I).
To avoid statement predictability and “marking down the
middle”, positively
phrased statements and negatively phrased statements were
interwoven on the survey.
After sorting, the sum of Group A statements and the sum of
Group B statements for all
respondents were as follows.
Table II reflects a significant difference between respondents’
personal views and
understandings regarding workforce diversity and how they
perceive their
organisations’ attitudes towards workforce diversity. In general,
respondents indicated
Number of employees Number (n ¼ 198) Per cent
o500 60 30.30
500-1,999 75 37.88
2,000-5,000 54 27.27
W5,000 9 4.55
Table I.
Respondents by

company size
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a positive personal view about the role and influence of
workforce diversity and claimed
a general understanding of what WDM is about. However, when
asked to reflect the
extent of their organisation’s commitment to diversity,
responses were far less positive.
Indeed 56.87 per cent of all responses to Group A statements
were strongly positive or
positive while only 13.53 per cent of responses were negative or
strongly negative.
Conversely, responses to Group B statements revealed that 38
per cent of all responses
were either strongly positive or positive and 35.39 per cent of
responses were negative or
strongly negative. It is especially noteworthy that just 16.1 per
cent of respondents
indicated that their workforce is not diverse yet over half of all
respondents (56.5 per cent)
said that WDM would not even rank in their company’s top ten
business priorities. This
was one of numerous disparities between the value of WDM
recognised by individuals
and the lack of apparent value placed on WDM by
organisations.
Table III illustrates another noteworthy finding from the data
analysis. It details

those statements which elicited the highest percentage of
neutral responses. Almost
one-third (29.1 per cent) of all responses to the statements were
“neutral” (partly agree;
partly disagree). In the context of the statements posed, this
would seem to reflect
uncertainty or on the part of respondents both in relation to
their own views and
understandings and the position of their organisations on the
issue of WDM (Table IV).
Group A statements Group B statements
Number Per cent Number Per cent
Strongly positive 474 23.94 Strongly positive 255 12.87
Positive 652 32.93 Positive 458 23.13
Neutral 586 29.60 Neutral 566 28.60
Negative 204 10.30 Negative 432 21.81
Strongly negative 64 03.23 Strongly negative 269 13.58
Total 1,980 100 Total 1,980 100
Table II.
Sum of responses for
Group A and Group
B statements
Statement n ¼ 198 No. %
I have a very good understanding of what WDM is designed to
achieve 64 32.3
I think WDM is good for all employees; even majority groups
88 44.4
I do not think that WDM creates a fairer/more equal workplace
68 34.3
I do not think that WDM discriminates/disadvantages majority
groups 75 37.8

Our company has clearly benefited from the workforce diversity
it has 69 34.8
Our workforce is not very diverse 74 37.3
Our employees do not care about nor value workforce diversity
74 37.8
Table III.
Statements with the
highest percentage
of neutral/non-
committed responses
Gender Other manager HR manager Total
Female 44 70 114
38.60 61.40 100.00
Male 38 46 84
45.24 54.76 100.00
Total 82 116 198
41.41 58.59 100.00
Table IV.
Respondents by
gender
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In general, there was not a marked divergence of views between
the male and female
respondents. Of the 20 statements, there was less than a 10 per
cent variance between
the views of men and women on 15 statements regarding
positive responses. Indeed,
even in these cases the variance was for the most part only a
little over ten per cent. The
five exceptions are shown in Table V. There was a much more
marked divergence in
views between HR managers and other managers. HR managers
expressed far more
positive views on behalf of themselves and their organisations
regarding workforce
diversity than did the non-HR managers. This was true for all
20 statements but
especially the case regarding personal views and understandings
of WDM. HR
managers indicated that they knew a lot more about the topic,
placed greater
importance on the topic, were more aware of the benefits of the
topic and considered
workforce diversity to be more important in their organisations
than did the non-HR
managers. Table VI highlights those statements where the
greatest divergence of
positive views was observed between the HR and other
managers.
The data in Table VI is revealing. It reflects quite a
considerable difference between
the responses given by the HR managers and those of the non-
HR managers. While it

might reasonably be expected that HR managers would know
more about WDM and be
Statementa
Strongly agree or
agree (F)
Strongly agree or
agree (M)
Difference
%
I believe companies should have WDM practices in
place 71.05 59.52 11.53
I disagree that WDM discriminates/disadvantages
majority groups 32.45 45.24 12.79
Our company measures the benefits/returns on
WDM initiatives 38.60 20.24 18.36
Our employees care about and value workforce
diversity 41.23 30.95 10.28
Our company in some way celebrates the diversity
we have in our workforce 36.85 26.19 10.66
Note: aFor the purposes of constructing the table, all statements
have been positively phrased
Table V.
Greatest divergence
of views by gender
(positive responses)
Statementa
Strongly agree or
agree (HR)

Strongly agree or
agree (O)
Difference
%
I have a very good understanding of what WDM
is designed to achieve 62.06 42.68 19.38
I believe WDM principles and practices are
important 77.59 50.00 27.59
I believe companies should have WDM practices
in place 74.14 55.50 18.64
I think WDM stimulates a more innovative and
creative workplace 65.52 39.03 26.49
Our company has written WDM policies 55.17 31.70 23.28
Our company has clearly benefited from the
workforce diversity it has 51.72 24.39 27.33
Table VI.
Greatest divergence
of views by job type
(positive responses)
90
EDI
35,2
more positively inclined towards the topic, this factor alone
might not adequately
account for the extent of the difference. For example; HR

managers agreed by a margin
of more than 26 per cent over other managers that WDM
stimulates a more innovative
and creative workplace. It would seem that there are likely to be
other factors
contributing to the differing opinions other than just awareness
or knowledge.
Irrespective of this issue, it would seem that HR departments
have a considerable
opportunity to better promote the virtues of a diverse workforce
than currently appears
to be the case.
The second observation arising from the data in Table VI is that
a significant
proportion of HR managers are also not well informed about or
supportive of the ideals
behind WD. For example; only 62 per cent of HR managers
agreed or strongly agreed that
they had a good understanding of what WDM is designed to
achieve. Only half the HR
managers could say that their organisation had benefited from
the diversity it has. Nearly
a quarter of HR managers did not mostly agree that WDM
policies and practices are
important and a quarter could not decisively agree that
companies should have WDM
practices in place. This would appear to be a significant finding
in the context of the study.
Tables VII and VIII display statistical data for all statements for
the purpose of
comparison. The mean was calculated from responses on a five-
point Likert scale
where 1 represents strongly agree and 5 represents strongly
disagree (after all

Group A statementsa Mean SD CV
I have a very good understanding of what WDM is 2.06 1.04
50.47
I have a very good understanding of what WDM is designed to
achieve 2.42 1.10 45.48
I have a very good understanding of why WDM is considered
important 2.45 1.12 45.54
I believe WDM principles and practices are important 2.16 1.01
46.94
I believe companies should have WDM practices in place 2.15
0.95 44.36
I think WDM is good for all employees, even majority groups
2.65 0.96 36.24
I think WDM creates a fairer/more equal workplace 2.53 1.05
41.61
I think WDM stimulates a more innovative and creative
workplace 2.41 1.04 43.10
I disagree that WDM discriminates/disadvantages majority
groups 2.80 1.06 37.98
I disagree that WDM is a waste of money 1.91 0.82 43.01
Table VII.
Statistical data for
Group A statements
Group B statementsa Mean SD CV
Our company has a formal, active and planned WDM strategy in
place 3.11 1.27 41.06
Our company has written WDM policies 2.76 1.25 45.42
Our company promotes WDM awareness through things like

employee inductions
or seminars or trainings or workshops or team building 2.64
1.22 46.25
WDM would be one of our company’s top 10 business priorities
3.66 1.15 31.51
Our senior management talk about WDM issues 3.21 1.22 38.07
Our company has clearly benefited from the workforce diversity
it has 2.80 1.15 41.12
Our company measures the benefits/returns on WDM initiatives
3.17 1.25 39.56
Our workforce is very diverse 2.57 1.08 42.16
Our employees care about and value workforce diversity 2.91
1.05 36.06
Our company in some way celebrates the diversity our
workforce has 3.13 1.21 38.63
Table VIII.
Statistical data for
group B statements
91
Workplace
diversity
management
in Australia
responses were positively phrased for the purposes of reporting
results). Also shown in
the table is the standard deviation (SD) from the mean and the
coefficient of variation

(CV) describing the amount of variability relative to the mean.
The interpretation of the findings of the data represented in
Tables VII and VIII
suggests several things. In general respondents’ personal
understandings and views
regarding WDM were positive and reflected some appreciation
of the benefits of WDM
as highlighted in the literature review. However, understandings
and opinions were not
strongly positive and WDM principles and ideals were not
strongly endorsed by
participants. Indeed, the average mean for Group A statements
of 2.35 would indicate
little more than tentative support for and endorsement of WDM.
The SD for Group A
statements of over 1 SD on average across the statements
signifies an observable
degree of disagreement among respondents. In essence, the data
reflects a considerable
lack of consensus among the group on some fundamental points.
The two statements
with the highest SD from their respective means relate to
fundamental understandings
about what WDM is. This disagreement might be cause for
concern among advocates
and managers of WDM initiatives in organisations. The point is
further endorsed by
the observation that the statement with the greatest spread of
opinion relative to its
mean as measured by the CV is the first statement. The finding
here is that there is
considerable difference among the surveyed group regarding
their understanding of
what WDM is about.

The data displayed in Table VIII leads to several interesting
observations. Most
noticeably, especially in comparison with Table VII, is that the
average mean for Group
B statements is higher at almost 3 (2.996). On the Likert scale
used for this study,
3 represented ‘partly agree and partly disagree’ which can
indicate uncertainty or lack
of knowledge pertaining to the statements. It can be said that in
relation to Group B
statements, respondents were less assured regarding their
organisation’s position on
WDM than on their own personal views. Perhaps most striking
is the finding that the
least endorsed statement of all with a mean of 3.66 reveals that
WDM has a low priority
in organisations. This discovery would appear to correlate with
the statement with the
next least positive mean indicating that senior management in
the surveyed
organisations, according to the respondents, are not advocating
much for WDM.
A second finding is that the SD for the statements pertaining to
the respondents’
organisation is greater on average than for Group A statements.
This signifies that the
divergence of opinion among respondents relating to their
organisation and WDM is
greater even than the observable deviation previously
commented upon regarding
respondents’ personal views and understandings. The statements
with the greatest
spread of opinion relative to their mean as measured by the CV
reflect an apparently
significant difference between respondents’ organisations
regarding the practice of

WDM. Most notably, whether the organisation has written
WDM policies and whether
WDM is actively promoted by integration with key employee
educational and
informational activities.
Discussion
The percentage of useable questionnaires returned (30.4) was a
pleasing response rate
which was likely aided by the inclusion of a reply-paid,
addressed envelope and a
relatively short questionnaire. Of the 198 questionnaires
included for data analysis,
there was a satisfactory spread across the demographic
alternatives with the exception
only of Australian-owned (81 per cent) vs foreign-owned (19
per cent) organisations.
As the research project was limited to Australia, this outcome
might have been
92
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35,2
expected. In terms of gender, organisation size and manager
classification (HR and
other managers) there was sufficient variation within the sample
group to validate the
comparisons presented in the previous section and the general
conclusions forwarded
in the following section.
Respondents reported more positively on their own views

regarding WDM than on
their organisation’s approach to WDM. For example; only 16
per cent of respondents
said that their organisation was not diverse while 56.5 per cent
of respondents
indicated that workforce diversity was not in the top ten
business priorities for their
organisation. Yet even the respondents’ personal views and
understandings were
tentative. WDM was not well endorsed as an entrenched and
valued ideal or practice in
the findings of this study. It was found that in response to many
statements,
a significant proportion of respondents (a third or more) were
selecting the “partly
agree/partly disagree” option on the questionnaire. This lack of
commitment or
certainty reflects the widespread relative invisibility of WDM in
organisations
compared with, arguably, more integrated or promoted HR-led
programs such as talent
management, performance management or reward management.
Many respondents
could not say with certainty whether their organisation has a
WDM strategy or WDM
policies. If WDM was well promoted and integrated it seems
likely that more
respondents would have been able to be certain.
This study did not find especially significant differences
between respondents’
questionnaires based upon gender. In almost all instances the
difference between men
and women in terms of knowledge about or support for WDM
was less than 10 per cent.
In the few instances where this was not the case, these

researchers could identify no
discernable pattern upon which to draw any robust conclusions.
In contrast, however,
the findings did observe a significant general variation between
the responses provided
by HR managers and those provided by other managers. As
WDM is most commonly
associated in organisations with broad HRM, this finding might
have been reasonably
predicted in that HR managers would be expected to know more
about topics
closely associated with their role compared with managers for
whom WDM is not
role-associated. Indeed, HR conferences, magazines, trainings,
text books and professional
associations generally give space to WDM.
Less foreseeable was the finding that although HR managers
were more aware of
WDM issues and more informed regarding documented benefits
of WDM, even they
were not overwhelmingly enlightened. A significant proportion
of HR managers could
not endorse the benefits of WDM, agree that WDM was
important or even say with
certainty what WDM was about. Notwithstanding the point
made in the final sentence
of the preceding paragraph, clearly WDM has not been as well
promoted in HR forums
as other topics. Perhaps because organisations generally might
not consider WDM as
important to the business as other HR topics such as talent
retention, it is the case that
the HR community has not shown as much interest. Ultimately,
organisational decision
makers tend to take interest in things that make or save them

money. Talent
management has been well promoted as something that does
both and consequently
has enjoyed a great deal of attention from practitioners and
academics for many years.
WDM has no such popular reputation and may suffer from a
lack of a money-making
identity. The critical question here is whether HR is leading and
influencing discourse
on what organisations should be prioritising regarding employee
management or
whether the HR industry is reacting to what business thinks it
wants from HR and then
providing it. Certainly there seems to be a need for the HR
community, in Australia at
least, to educate its own professionals to a more sophisticated
degree on WDM.
93
Workplace
diversity
management
in Australia
Therefore, in terms of the five core research questions this
project sought to address,
the following can be said based in light of the literature and the
research findings.
There appears to be a disconnect between legislation and policy
in Australia that
supports and encourages workplace DM and the practice in

Australian organisations.
The literature review highlighted that Australia is one of the
most legislatively
progressive countries regarding diversity and equal opportunity
(Syed and Kramar,
2010; Patrickson and O’Brien, 2001) yet the survey responses
do not strongly support
reflect this. It might reasonably be expected given Australia’s
significant, long-standing
social cultural diversity and progressive legislation that
managers in mid-sized and large
companies might have perceived WDM in a more positive light.
The voluntary nature of WDM policies in Australian
organisations would seem to
have not worked to encourage most organisations to priorotise
WDM. The literature
found that in Australia only a small number of companies
recognised the importance of
a diverse workforce to competing in a global marketplace
(Bertone and Leahy, 2002)
and the present research suggests little advancement has been
made. The survey
results found that WDM is not a business priority in Australian
organisations whereby
a significant proportion of organisations are doing little to
actively promote WDM.
This is in spite of the findings of this paper’s review of the
literature that a meaningful
commitment to workplace diversity begins with the organisation
and its strategy,
vision and mission statements (Cole and Salimath, 2013).
The survey results suggest that the Australian companies cited
in the literature
review as actively engaging their workforce with WDM

practices in strategic and
operational ways are not typical. While further research is
required, the survey results
indicate that those companies cited in the literature review such
as Honeywell, Esso
and National Australia Bank are more exceptions than the norm.
While these
companies are actively developing practices that facilitate
diversity through both
strategic and practical initiatives including employee selection,
pay, appraisal and
development, the research indicates that a similar commitment
among Australian
organisations at large is not widespread.
The research findings tended to endorse the findings of earlier
studies as discussed in
the literature review in regards to managerial attitudes about
workforce diversity. Earlier
studies found that managers can be ignorant of their own biases
that hinder the progress
of diversity advancement (Robbins and Judge, 2013) and
ingrained social prejudices can
lead to some managers resisting diversity initiatives (2002).
According to the participating
respondents of the present study, managers are not particularly
enthusiastic about
promoting WDM and they are skeptical of the value and the
benefits WDM offers. This is
significant because the literature review found that the
commitment and active
involvement of managers in diversity initiatives is paramount to
the success of those
initiatives (Lauring and Selmer, 2012; Leveson et al., 2009;
McCuiston et al., 2004).

The literature review highlighted the importance of HR
managers to the fortunes of
WDM initiatives. The literature showed that the promotion of
diversity is inextricably
linked with the organisational activities that influence employee
attitudes and
behaviour such as, for example, recruitment (Gröschl, 2011),
mentoring and career
development (Kalra et al., 2009) and learning and development
(2004). The survey
found that while HR managers report being significantly more
supportive, informed
and personally active regarding WDM than other managers, they
are not
overwhelmingly so. The data indicates a sizable minority of HR
managers do not
consider WDM especially important and do not personally adopt
practices that would
advance diversity objectives through their work.
94
EDI
35,2
Conclusion
This study was designed as an exploratory investigation and, as
such, the primary
conclusion is that the findings warrant deeper examination
through further research.
That said, what is apparent from the present study is that WDM
is far from universally
understood and appreciated in contemporary organisations in
Australia and that

includes by HRM professionals. There appears to be sufficient
lack of clarity on key
points such as the purpose and benefits of WDM to encourage
practitioners to review
their WDM strategy and practices if they have them or to design
and implement them if
they do not. Prioritising WDM and aligning it with other
business objectives could help
raise the profile and importance of WDM and in so doing
improve employee
understanding of and appreciation for workforce diversity.
Organisational leaders also
need to talk about WDM as their attitudes serve as indicators of
what the organisation
values and tend to influence the attitudes of employees
generally. The present
study found that managers are not talking much about WDM
which serves to render
the topic invisible.
The notable divergence of opinion and understanding
concerning workforce
diversity might indicate that the messages are not being
communicated clearly or
succinctly, if at all. Organisations could consider reviewing
their communications
channels and measuring the impact of workforce diversity
messages. Reviewing the
content, clarity, timing and delivery of diversity information
provided to employees
might reveal possible reasons why understandings appear to
differ so much. Clearly
this study must conclude that the most significant implications
of the findings are
practical and they impact most directly on HR professionals,
organisations and their

employees.
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About the authors
Dr Paul J. Davis is a Professor of Management and Head of the
Department of Business, School of
Business, at the Kazakh British Technical University in Almaty,
Kazakhstan. Dr Paul J. Davis is
the corresponding author and can be contacted at:
[email protected]
Dr Yuliya Frolova is an Assistant Professor and Chair of
Management and Marketing
Department at the Bang College of Business, KIMEP
University, Almaty, Kazakhstan.
Dr William Callahan is an Assistant Professor of Finance at the
Bang College of Business,
KIMEP University, Almaty, Kazakhstan.
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permission.
Factor analysis of global trends in
twenty-first century leadership
Craig Perrin
AchieveGlobal, Tampa, Florida, USA
Paul B. Perrin
Department of Psychology, Virginia Commonwealth University,
Richmond,
Virginia, USA
Chris Blauth and East Apthorp
Ryan D. Duffy
Department of Psychology, University of Florida, Gainesville,
Florida, USA, and
Michelle Bonterre and Sharon Daniels
Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to examine whether the
nature of leadership in the early years
of the twenty-first century as conceptualized in the research
literature is valid among real
organizational leaders across four global regions.
Design/methodology/approach – A literature review of recent
scholarly articles suggested that
today’s leadership best practices can be sorted into six
categories, or zones: Reflection, Society,
Diversity, Ingenuity, People, and Business. These six zones
became topics for focus groups of
organizational leaders that tentatively supported the six-zone
structure and provided qualitative data
used to create a 42-item measure, the AchieveGlobal Leadership
Scale (AGLS). The AGLS was then
employed to examine the degree to which 899 leaders in Asia,
Europe, Latin America, and the USA felt
that each zone was important in meeting their organizational
challenges.
Findings – The data from the 42 items were analyzed using a
confirmatory factor analysis, which
suggested that the six zones all triangulated on and comprised
the larger construct, Leadership in the
twenty-first century. Regional differences emerged in the
importance that leaders attributed to the
zones, in the degree to which leaders effectively demonstrated
the zones, and in the order in which
leaders ranked their organizations’ top business challenges.
Originality/value – The six-zone model of leadership and its
differences by geographic region hold
potential to help leaders examine and improve their own
leadership abilities.

Keywords Global leadership, Organizational challenges, Zones
of leadership, Leadership,
Corporate strategy
Paper type Research paper
The corporate world has experienced profound changes in the
early years of the
twenty-first century. Countless challenges in a rising global
economy have forced
leaders worldwide into uncharted territory and have perhaps
redefined what leaders
must do in order to navigate their organizations toward success.
Given these corporate
realities, leaders may have to adapt their past understandings of
what effective
leadership means, and need renewed focus on the issues
confronting leaders and the
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is
available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0143-7739.htm
Global trends in
leadership
175
Received November 2010
Revised February 2011
Accepted February 2011
Leadership & Organization
Development Journal

Vol. 33 No. 2, 2012
pp. 175-199
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0143-7739
DOI 10.1108/01437731211203474
skills that make successful leadership more likely. These issues,
along with
considerations from earlier research on leadership qualities and
principles, provided a
foundational conceptualization for the current study.
The purpose of this study was to examine the nature of
leadership in the early years
of the twenty-first, century given the backdrop of a dynamic
corporate climate. Two
research questions guided this study:
(1) What specific practices constitute effective twenty-first
century leadership?
(2) How effectively do twenty-first century leaders apply the
identified practices to
meet their organizational challenges?
The first component of this study was to review the published
research on leadership
primarily over the past several years in order to paint a
comprehensive picture of how
the current literature sees leadership as a construct. The second
component of this

study was to determine whether real organizational leaders
worldwide agree with the
notions of leadership espoused in the research literature. The
strength of this research
design was that it allowed inclusion of participant feedback at
every phase of the
investigation, therefore building a discursive definition of
leadership in the twenty-first
century, allowing multiple voices to contribute to the final
understanding of the
challenges and practices involved. This research was guided by
the belief that analysis
of twenty-first century leadership concerns among real-world
organizational leaders
could aid in developing a model highlighting the key focus
points for other leaders.
Literature review
The literature review involved using Elton B Stephens
Company’s (EBSCO) Host
search engine and Google Scholar to identify articles in
leadership, management, and
organizational journals over the two years (2007-2008) before
the current study’s data
collection that addressed the distinct qualities embodying the
construct of leadership.
A citation map approach was used, whereby a small number of
the references in
articles from this time period were also used to inform the
current model of leadership.
Through this literature review, a number of key business and
leadership themes
emerged, forging conceptualizations of the major business
issues affecting leaders and
of the skills that leaders need to address these issues. This
review formed the basis for

a provisional leadership model composed of six zones of
leadership (see Figure 1),
which are each addressed in turn in this literature review. It
should be noted that the
six-zone model of leadership in this article is not new in the
sense that it articulates
novel aspects of leadership. This literature review purposely
draws from the published
(primarily recent) literature to discuss what theorists and
researchers have already said
about the various dimensions of leadership. The six-zone model
is new, however, in
that it integrates the various and disparate facets of leadership
already articulated. The
names of these zones may be different from those of aspects of
leadership identified in
the early stages of leadership theory’s history, but the
terminology in this article better
reflects the terminology in the current literature, especially in
articles published from
2007-2008.
Reflection
In this zone, leaders assess their own motives, beliefs, attitudes,
and actions. Reflective
leaders look within and ask, “How can I make sure my own
blind spots and biases
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don’t cause me to make poor decisions?” and “How can I

leverage my strengths to
become a better leader?” Reflection helps leaders avoid pitfalls
in other zones, make the
most of honest feedback, recognize the limits of their
knowledge, and avoid repeating
their mistakes. When leaders see their mistakes as a chance
learn and grow, they gain
the ability – and credibility – to help others adopt the same
attitude and related
practices.
A number of recent scholarly articles have highlighted the
importance of reflective
thinking. Nelson (2008) used a historical and literary approach
to this topic and
analyzed the types of leadership represented in the character
Odysseus in Homer’s the
Iliad and the Odyssey, and the character Aeneas in Virgil’s the
Aeneid. Although
Odysseus is often portrayed more positively in popular culture,
Nelson notes that
Aeneas achieved greater success by providing a safe passage for
most of his followers
(all of Odysseus’s 600 men perished) and by successfully
working to establish a new
home for his people on arrival in Italy. Along with elevating
public responsibility over
his personal preferences and cultivating subordinate leadership,
Aeneas’s greatest
strength was his ability to reflect on his role as leader and on
how his style negatively
affected those around him.
Being a reflective leader is likely composed of emotional
intelligence and a sincere
motivation to examine oneself. Emotionally intelligent leaders

tend to achieve greater
career success and display greater leadership ability and better
adaptability in an
unpredictable workplace ( Jamali et al., 2008). Those who self-
reflect may be more likely
to identify negative self patterns, such as hubris, stubbornness,
and unwillingness to
seek new knowledge (Ford, 2006). Additionally, individuals
with reflective capability
and motivation will likely achieve greater success during career
transitions, such as
entering the second half of one’s work life (i.e. after age 45;
Buford, 2007). The reflective
leader, who has the emotional intelligence to reflect and the
motivation to do so, may be
able to achieve what Crossan et al. (2008) label “leadership of
self.” As one component
of “transcendent leadership,” the leadership of self involves
knowing oneself,
remaining open to change, and obtaining a high level of
cognitive and moral
complexity. Reflection seems to be a critical skill for achieving
this state.
Figure 1.
The six zones of
leadership
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177

Society
In this zone, leaders apply principles such as fairness, respect,
and “the greater good”
to balance individual and group welfare. Here, leaders attend to
economic,
environmental, and ethical matters that affect the larger society.
Recent unethical
business practices with worldwide consequences highlight the
need for leaders to serve
and encourage others to serve a larger good. While every leader
must achieve
short-term goals, socially aware leaders know that some short-
term goals sabotage the
long-term health of the organization, the society, and the
environment.
Evidence is mounting that organizations that emphasize social
responsibility reap a
host of benefits, including more productive and satisfied
employees, stronger ties to the
community, and greater corporate visibility (McWilliams and
Siegel, 2001).
Conversely, destructive work environments often reflect leaders
who exhibit a
selfish orientation (Padilla et al., 2007). For these reasons, the
complete global leader
will likely seek out opportunities to serve the greater good. This
effort may include, but
is not limited to, providing needed services to those in the local
community,
collaborating with other organizations to promote social justice,
establishing
educational programs for potential future employees, and
incorporating the needs of
society into long-term corporate goals (Edersheim and Wynett,
2008; Hesselbein,

2008a; Vail, 2007). Blake (2006) discusses the ideal journey of
social responsibility
taken by corporations, moving from protecting their own
company, to building the
greater community around them, and finally being an innovator
in managing
long-term, permanent bonds with the community.
Diversity
In this zone, leaders value and leverage human differences,
including gender, ethnicity,
age, physical and mental ability, culture, beliefs, and work
styles. Here, leaders prove
their ability to work with diverse people and appreciate cultural
perspectives. This
ability to derive value from human differences is a core skill for
twenty-first century
leaders. A global workforce requires a leader’s awareness of
cultural nuances; a
dispersed workforce requires structured yet flexible leadership;
a diverse workforce
requires tailored collaboration and coaching. All these tasks
require leaders to balance
their own strong identity with their daily effort to understand
people very different
from themselves.
The importance of a leader’s ability to navigate and thrive in a
diverse work
environment cannot be over-estimated. Most organizations
provide diversity training,
which can result in increased diversity self-efficacy and
intentions to pursue diversity
initiatives (Combs and Luthans, 2007). Scholars have proposed
a number of factors that
allow for greater diversity-related leadership. These include an

authentic curiosity
about those different from oneself, an openness to cultivate
diverse relationships, a
recognition of similarities and differences among individuals,
self-awareness of one’s
own cultural background, and a belief in the positive outcomes
associated with a
diverse workplace (Abbott et al., 2006; Handin and Steinwedel,
2006). Researchers have
also encouraged leaders to promote activities that lead to
feelings of inclusion among
diverse employees, including a central focus on trust-building
and a commitment to
quick and effective resolution of racial conflict (Byrd, 2007;
Wasti et al., 2007). Leaders
skilled in diversity issues provide much needed value to the
ever-globalizing
marketplace.
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Ingenuity
In this zone, leaders offer and execute practical ideas, and they
help others do the same
by creating a climate in which innovation thrives. Ingenuity is
the currency of success
in a capricious global economy. Closely allied is the ability to
manage the changes on
both business and human levels implied in every innovation.
Ingenuity is vital as well
to helping groups develop a motivating vision of future success.

As a category of skills and attitudes, ingenuity is often
associated with some of the
most successful business leaders, such as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs,
and Warren Buffett.
Ingenuity involves an ability to be forward thinking and
creative, developing business
ideas before others do, or solving business problems before
most even knew they
existed. The Leader to Leader Institute, which works to train
emerging young leaders,
heralds innovation as a key to effective management
(Hesselbein, 2008b). In his book
chapter on creativity and leadership, Simonton (2008) notes that
the most innovative
individuals tend to be in the top 10 percent of intelligence, tend
to be able to easily
integrate complex tasks and ideas, have expansive imaginations,
are highly open to
new experiences, and have some early experience with
influential mentors. The ability
for business leaders to demonstrate ingenuity seems particularly
important as models
of organizational practice evolve and as leaders are confronted
with increased
challenges, such as a more diverse workplace and a greater need
for employees to
balance work and family commitments (Dunford et al., 2007;
Forsyth and
Polzer-Debruyne, 2007).
People
In this zone, a leader’s ability to connect with others on a
human level realizes
enormous benefits, including improved communication of every
kind. Leadership in

part is getting work done through others – a real challenge
without the skill and zeal to
engage people in a team effort. Leaders effective in this zone
inspire trust and loyalty,
weather difficulties through a wide support network, soften the
human impact of hard
decisions, and encourage shared commitment to business goals.
Of the six zones uncovered through the literature review, this
was the most
researched and discussed. In today’s global marketplace, it is
absolutely essential to
work effectively with others. When leaders are asked about
challenges in the
workplace, relationship issues with other employees tend to be
the most noted concern
(Brotheridge and Long, 2007). These relationships form the
basis for the
leader-member exchange (LMX; Graen and Uhl-Bien, 1995;
Piccolo et al., 2008),
which in its best form is characterized by trust, respect, and a
sense of mutual
obligation (Hui et al., 2008). Indeed, LMX tends to be
correlated with lower turnover
intentions, greater employee satisfaction, work obligation, job
commitment,
satisfaction with supervision, and job performance and
competence (Gerstner and
Day, 1997; Golden and Veiga, 2008; Piccolo et al., 2008; Sparr
and Sonnentag, 2008).
The LMX is particularly dependent on the ability of a leader to
be fair and
trustworthy. Employees who perceive their leaders and/or
organizations as having
these qualities are more satisfied with their jobs, are more

committed to their work,
have better job performance, display more behaviors reflecting
organizational
citizenship, view management as more effective, and display
fewer deviant behaviors
(Caldwell and Hayes, 2007; Everton et al., 2007; Ilies et al.,
2007; Janson et al., 2008;
Mayer et al., 2008; Suliman, 2007; van Knippenberg and De
Cremer, 2008;
Global trends in
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van Knippenberg et al., 2007). To display fairness and gain
trust, leaders are
encouraged to maintain open lines of communication, be
transparent and consistent, be
courteous about employee concerns, and have a set system of
rewards (Caldwell and
Hayes, 2007; Everton et al., 2007; van Knippenberg and De
Cremer, 2008). When leaders
are able to combine these activities with other people-related
characteristics such as
charisma, empathy, and emotion management, they will be best
prepared to lead in the
global marketplace (Campbell et al., 2008; Hartel et al., 2008;
Zimmerman et al., 2007).
Business
In this zone, leaders develop strategies, make and execute plans
and decisions, organize
the work of others, and guide effort toward predicted results.

Yet twenty-first century
challenges demand more than textbook formulas. Beyond the
hard skills of analyzing
data and managing costs, leaders must respond quickly to
threats and opportunities, a
skill that requires close attention to key trends and events. Still
vital is a leader’s ability
to shape the customer’s experience, but also to cultivate that
customer’s lifetime value.
Simply put, a leader needs a high level of business acumen. In
today’s business
environment, this acumen is not static knowledge, but rather the
ability to help the
organization adapt and grow in the face of uncertainty
(Plowman et al., 2007). Leaders
with business acumen will be knowledgeable about the past in
order to set a vision for
the future and anticipate potential roadblocks (Boal and Schultz,
2007). Leaders will be
up to date on trends in the global workforce (Van Horn, 2006)
and work diligently in
spite of adversity. In studying successful CEOs, Wood and
Vilkinas (2007) noted that
these individuals tend to be empathic, achievement-oriented,
and optimistic.
The current study
It was vital that the six zones of leadership identified in the
research literature be
empirically tested with real-world organizational leaders across
several major global
regions. The purpose of the current study was to examine
whether the six-zone model
of twenty-first century leadership accurately captured the nature
of real-world

leadership.
Method
Participants
The sample was composed of 899 organizational leaders from
four global regions: Asia
(100 participants from China, 99 from India, and 100 from
Singapore), Europe (98
participants from Germany and 100 from the UK), Latin
America (102 participants
from Mexico), and the USA (300 participants). Participants’
industries appear in
Table I. These participants were recruited by contracting with a
company specializing
in international survey administration. Participants recruited in
the targeted global
regions were paid a nominal fee by this organization to
participate in the current study
by completing a quantitative survey.
Participants described their organizational role: 27.3 percent
had no formal direct
reports, 28.1 percent managed first-line associates, 12.5 percent
managed first-line
managers or supervisors, 9.5 percent managed the managers of
first-line managers or
supervisors, 12.8 percent managed one or more major areas of
the organization, and 9.9
percent managed the entire organization. Though 27.3 percent
of the sample reported
having no direct reports, it should be noted that direct reports
are not a requirement to
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be a leader, and informal leaders without direct reports exist in
all organizations. In
terms of number of supervisees, 21.7 percent of participants
reported supervising 0
employees, 26.8 percent supervised one to five employees, 13.3
percent supervised six
to ten employees, 12.9 percent supervised 11-20 employees, 6.8
percent supervised
21-30 employees, 5.6 percent supervised 31-40 employees, and
12.9 percent supervised
more than 40 employees. Participants reported the amount of
time they had been
working at their current level: 24.6 percent had been working
there for fewer than two
years, 39.8 percent for two to five years, 20.8 percent for six to
ten years, and 14.8
percent for more than ten years.
Participants described their organization with respect to the
scope of operations:
36.8 percent were from organizations with a domestic scope
(only one country), 17.6
percent with a regional scope (one global region), 20.6 percent
with a multi-regional
scope (several global regions), and 25.0 percent with a global
scope (all major world
regions). In terms of organization size, 36.8 percent of
participants were from
organizations with fewer than 500 employees globally, 13.2
percent with 500-999
employees, 21.2 percent with 1,000-9,999 employees, 11.2
percent with 10,000-24,999

employees, 5.1 percent with 25,000-49,999 employees, 4.9
percent with 50,000-100,000
employees, and 7.5 percent with more than 100,000 employees.
Participants reported
their organization’s approximate 2008 worldwide revenue: 43.6
percent were from
Industry Percent of sample
Education 8.5
Health care 7.7
Retail 5.9
Government 5.0
Computer software 4.9
Computer services 4.7
Business services 4.4
Industrial manufacturing 4.3
Construction 4.1
Financial services 4.1
Banking 3.3
Transportation services 3.0
Telecommunications services 2.6
Chemicals 2.1
Consumer services 2.1
Electronics 2.1
Automotive and transport 2.0
Energy and utilities 1.7
Consumer products manufacturers 1.6
Computer hardware 1.4
Media 1.4
Real estate 1.4
Aerospace and defense 1.3
Insurance 1.1
Notes: Thirty-six industries were represented in the sample, but
only industries that comprised at

least 1 percent of the sample appear in this table. Of
participants 12.2 percent indicated “Other” for
their organization’s industry
Table I.
Industries of leaders in
sample by percent
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181
organizations that had earned less than $50 million, 20.5
percent that had earned
$50-250 million, 15.0 percent that had earned $250-500 million,
8.6 percent that had
earned $500-1 billion, and 12.3 percent that had earned more
than $1 billion.
Procedure
The sample of global leaders completed the survey online. They
first entered a code
that they had received in their invitation email in order for them
to receive their
incentive. This code was not linked to the rest of the data, so
their responses were
anonymous. They then provided information on their
organization’s industry,
geographic scope of operations, number of employees globally,
and approximate 2008
worldwide revenue. They reported the country in which they
worked, their current

leadership role within the organization, the length of time they
had been at their
current level, and the number of employees they supervised.
In order to prime participants, they were then asked to select the
top five most
pressing challenges that their organization would face over the
next one to five years
from a list of 27 potential organizational challenges that had
been generated from two
focus groups with two dozen organizational leaders. These
focus groups are detailed in
the “Measures: AchieveGlobal Leadership Scale (AGLS)”
section which follows.
Participants then completed the AGLS twice, once rating how
important they thought
the six zones of leadership were and once rating how effectively
leaders in their
organizations demonstrated those zones.
Measures
AchieveGlobal Leadership Scale (AGLS). In order to test
whether the six-zone model of
leadership derived from the literature review was applicable to
real-world leaders, two
focus groups were conducted. Focus-group participants were 21
managers and senior
managers, representing a range of private industries and public
agencies in Florida.
Focus-group participants were recruited by a commercial
research organization and
received an incentive for their involvement. The two focus-
group events, each 2 hours
in length, were conducted in commercial focus-group facilities
in Jacksonville, Florida,
and Tampa, Florida. Participants were not informed that the

research was conducted
under the auspices of AchieveGlobal. A member of the
AchieveGlobal research team
followed a detailed moderator’s guide to conduct group
discussion of the themes
extracted from the literature review in the current study. These
themes included, but
were not limited to, complex adaptive systems, cross-cultural
leadership,
decentralization, fairness, introspection, leadership types,
organizational citizenship,
organizational climate, organizational justice, social
responsibility, storytelling, and
teams.
During each focus-group event, a multi-media presentation was
shown to
participants to summarize a preliminary model composed of the
six zones of leadership
that emerged from the literature review. After the multi-media
presentation,
participants responded through group discussion to three
primary questions:
(1) What current challenges are you facing as a leader in your
organization?
(2) What knowledge, skills, and abilities do you think leaders
need in order to
address these challenges?
(3) How accurately does the six-zone model describe effective
leadership in the
twenty-first century?
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Some representative participant responses from the focus-group
discussions on the
six-zone model of leadership included:
. On Reflection:
A person really needs to have a personal perspective on how
they look at leadership.
There’s layers of a person’s character, their behaviors, or their
attributes that make
them an effective leader. Not just one attribute is going to do it.
. On Diversity:
I like that because [. . .] my management style with people from
the United States might
be effective, but if I were to go to a different cultural setting,
their expectations of my
style might be different. I’ve got to be aware that somehow I’ve
got to make sure that
my style doesn’t get in the way of being effective in different
cultural settings.
. On Ingenuity:
Being creative is to get the people out of their comfort zones.
Try to encourage them to
think outside the box [. . .] and support them in doing that.
. On Ingenuity:
Creativity is more of a dynamic environment [. . .] where you
explain that it’s not just
being creative, i.e. artistic, but it’s being dynamically creative

based on the situation or
problem you’re trying to solve.
. On the connection between People and Ingenuity:
In today’s twenty-first century you create an environment where
you allow people to be
open, allow them to present ideas [. . .] Throw a 100 ideas on
the table, maybe you can
get five of them that’s really going to work.
. On the six-zone leadership model:
I think it’s a good bridge from traditional leadership to more
modern leadership. When
you think of leadership in the basic sense, you’re thinking of
someone who has been in
that role for a long period versus someone relatively young.
You’re taking those archaic
traits and trying to mold them to today’s workforce, moving
your strategic plans into
the workforce [. . .] So, the static organizational chart, which
we’re so familiar with,
that’s not really the way it works anymore. [This model] gives a
greater understanding
for moving that leadership role into a more modern
environment, and addressing the
world issues at hand.
The challenges and skills identified in the focus groups were
then combined with
themes under the six zones from the secondary literature review
to create a 42-item
measure of leadership in the twenty-first century, with six
subscales pertaining to each
of the six zones (see Table II). Seven items were generated for
each zone and refined to
map more precisely to each zone. In the quantitative component

of the study, the 899
participants read the following directions before responding to
the 42 items of the
AGLS using a 1 (Not at all Important) to 7 (Very Important)
Likert-type scale: “You will
see a total of 42 statements grouped under six ‘leadership
dimensions.’ Each statement
describes one ability that a leader might possess. Please rate the
importance of each
leadership ability in meeting the business challenges of the next
three years.” After
responding to the 42 items, participants then read the following
directions, before
responding a second time to the 42 items of the AGLS: “You
will see a total of 42
statements grouped under six ‘leadership dimensions.’ Each
statement describes one
ability that a leader might possess. Please rate how effectively
leaders in your
organization now demonstrate each of these abilities.” All items
within a subscale were
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183
Dimension 1: Reflection
1 Model lifelong learning
2 Treat failure as a chance to learn and grow
3 Accept responsibility for their own mistakes
4 Seriously consider views that challenge their own views
5 Seek the knowledge needed to make sense of the big picture
6 Look within yourself for possible causes of your challenges as

a
leader
7 Speak with others frankly to learn, build trust, and know
yourself
Dimension 2: Society
8 Act ethically to obey the law and serve the larger good
9 Openly challenge unethical decisions and actions
10 Exhibit fairness and self-sacrifice in your decisions
11 Advocate steps to reduce environmental harm.
12 Help shape values and vision in the organization
13 Encourage others to take socially responsible action
14 Take action to benefit others, not just yourself
Dimension 3: People
15 Adapt to the leadership needs of different groups
16 Consider the human impact of your decisions and actions
17 Build and maintain a cross-functional task network
18 Show sensitivity to a range of emotions in others
19 Build the self-esteem of people at all levels
20 Help employees resolve issues of work-life balance
21 Inspire the trust within the organization and among
customers
and partners
Dimension 4: Ingenuity
22 Create an environment in which innovation can thrive
23 Help groups develop a shared picture of a positive future
24 Help people adapt quickly to change
25 Develop sustainable competitive strategies
26 Tell stories to guide change and reduce conflict
27 Trim bureaucracy to promote speed, flexibility, and
innovation
28 Develop yourself with the goal of improving group
capabilities
Dimension 5: Diversity

29 Effectively lead cross-cultural groups
30 Accept and collaborate with diverse people
31 Create and implement sound global business strategies
32 Appreciate the business practices of other cultures
33 Strive to meet the needs of global customers.
34 Adapt to other cultures during any assignments abroad
35 Manage virtual teams with explicit customer-centric goals
and
practices
Dimension 6: Business
36 Add clarity to the strategic vision of future success
37 Manage the costs of operation
38 Manage customer acquisition, retention, and lifetime value
39 Adapt to rapidly-changing business conditions.
40 Analyze data, including metrics, to achieve results
41 Acquire knowledge and skills to make the business
competitive
42 Represent the values and vision of your team and
organization
Table II.
AchieveGlobal leadership
scale items
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straight-summed to produce subscale scores within the
“Importance” and
“Effectiveness” versions of the AGLS. “Importance-

Effectiveness Discrepancy”
scores were also calculated by subtracting each “Effectiveness”
subscale score from
the respective “Importance” subscale score.
The Cronbach’s a’s for the “Importance” component of the
Reflection, Society,
People, Ingenuity, Diversity, and Business AGLS subscales in
the current study were
0.92, 0.92, 0.92, 0.92, 0.93, and 0.94 respectively, with a total
“Importance” score a of
0.98. The Cronbach’s a’s for the “Effectiveness” component of
the Reflection, Society,
People, Ingenuity, Diversity, and Business AGLS subscales in
the current study were
0.94, 0.93, 0.95, 0.94, 0.95, and 0.94, respectively, with a total
“Effectiveness” score a of
0.99.
Challenges Checklist. In order to prime participants, they were
asked to select the top
five most pressing challenges that their organization would face
over the next one to
three years. The checklist was composed of the following
challenges that emerged from
the literature review for this study: cost pressures, competitors,
improving customer
satisfaction, technology challenges, driving sales growth,
employee productivity, and
product/service innovation. The checklist also contained the
following challenges that
surfaced as discussion themes in the focus groups: velocity of
change, resource
management, diversity in the workforce, lack of trust between
management and
employees, finding talent (the right people), creating virtual

workplace structures,
boosting quality and morale levels based on current conditions,
ethical issues in the
workplace, performance management appraisals, gaps in
leadership development, job
risk management, lack of creativity and problem solving,
generational gap integration
in the workforce, global cultural problems, and resistance to
change.
Data Analysis Plan
Confirmatory Factor Analysis. To determine whether the
theorized six-factor structure
of the AchieveGlobal Leadership Scale (AGLS) fits the patterns
in the data, a
confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) will be performed on the
“Importance” AGLS
responses from the 899 participants.
MANOVAs. Three multivariate analyses of variance
(MANOVAs) will be run in
order to examine whether global regional differences exist in
the importance that
participants attribute to the six zones of leadership, in the
degree to which leaders
effectively demonstrate the six zones of leadership, and in the
magnitude of
discrepancy between the degree to which participants attribute
importance to a
particular zone of leadership and the degree to which
participants feel that other
leaders in their organizations effectively demonstrate that zone
of leadership. In these
MANOVAs, the predictor variable will be global region (four
levels ¼ Asia, Europe,
Latin America, and the USA) and the criterion variables will be

either the six AGLS
“Importance” subscale scores (MANOVA 1), the six AGLS
“Effectiveness” subscale
scores (MANOVA 2), or the six AGLS “Importance-
Effectiveness Discrepancy”
subscale scores (MANOVA 3). If the omnibus F-statistic in any
of the three MANOVAs
is significant, follow-up Bonferroni-corrected t-tests will be
employed to determine the
precise locations of mean differences among the different global
regions.
For the MANOVAs, the statistical software G *Power was used
to compute the
sample size needed in order to have sufficient statistical power.
With a MANOVA
containing 1 predictor variable (four levels) and 6 criterion
variables, a sample size of
Global trends in
leadership
185
226 participants would be needed to detect a small (Cohen,
1988) multivariate effect, 95
for a medium, and 63 for a large effect. Therefore, if the
omnibus multivariate effect is
small, medium, or large, the current sample size will be
sufficient.
Correlations. A number of exploratory Pearson product-moment
correlations will be
run among the six “Importance” AGLS subscale scores and

several demographic
variables: organizational geographic scope of operations,
number of employees
globally, approximate 2008 worldwide revenue, participant
current leadership role
within the organization, length of time at current level, and
number of employees
supervised. The purpose of these exploratory analyses will be to
determine whether
leaders at different roles in an organization or in organizations
of different size and
scope attribute different degrees of importance to the six zones
of leadership.
Results
Factor Structure of Leadership in the twenty-first century
A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was conducted using
AMOS 7.0 to test the fit of
the AchieveGlobal Leadership Scale’s (AGLS) six-factor
structure. These data were
from the “Importance” component of the AGLS. The manifest
variables in the CFA
were the 42 items from the ALGS, whereas the seven latent
constructs were the six
subscales of the AGLS and the one higher-order construct
“Leadership in the
twenty-first century.” The model was composed of 97 variables
(97 estimated
parameters), of which 42 were observed, 42 were uniqueness
terms, six were
disturbance terms, and seven were factors. The factor loadings
(standard regression
weights) for this model appear in Figure 2. All of the scale
items loaded significantly
Figure 2.

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