by Kelly Nelsen

Created on: July 01, 2009

Over time, yes.

I've decided to take the unpopular side of this debate in order to give it its due.

Encouraging no, mandating workplace diversity has gone a long way towards ensuring equality amongst all employees. Look at how far we've come over the past fifty years. Fifty years ago, working women's careers were relegated to low-paying assistant roles for men. Fifty years ago, African Americans were relegated to the same roles, or even worse as menial laborers who weren't considered competent enough to deserve a better paying job with more responsibility. There were no options for promotion and growth.

In addition, those in leadership roles hired people they easily identified with people who looked just like them. It's part of the human condition: we identify with those who are most like us. Fifty years ago, the people who were in a position to hire others were overwhelmingly white males. As such, they tended to hire other white males that is, until they had to start accounting for the demographics of those they hired.

At that point, they had to step out of their comfort zone and hire other people people who looked or sounded different from them. Over time, attitudes towards these other people have softened as people with different skin colors and different sexual organs and different accents have proven that they, too, are competent people worthy of decent jobs, decent pay, and promotion opportunities.

Slowly, people of more diverse backgrounds have moved up the ladder and are occupying roles that give them the opportunity to hire others. It has become easier for them to hire other diverse people, and the lonely voices of the others are stronger and more confident now. As they've gotten to know each other, workers of different backgrounds have begun to accept and respect each other, and fear of the unknown is giving way to familiarity.

Equality has certainly not come without a fight, and the fighting's certainly not over. But mandating workplace diversity has forced people to interact with others unlike themselves and has helped people to realize that competence in the workplace is not based upon skin color, gender, religious background or sexual preference, but on individual abilities and skills. Although there will always be individuals who hold prejudicial views of those who are unlike themselves, as a whole, promoting workplace diversity is succeeding in ensuring equality for all workers. It's a process, and like all processes, it takes a while.

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