Pradeepa Dahanayake and Diana Rajendran suppliers and contractors who are members of underrepresented groups. Sponsorships are provided to bring about empowerment through education and awareness programs, with programs designed to raise awareness of health concerns providing another example of organisations’ support for community based diversity initiatives. Organisations were also seen to be willingly encouraging the participation of employees and employee groups in diversity driven community activities. Several of the organisations studied had shared their success stories and best practice in diversitymanagement with external entities through seminars, conferences and other efforts aimed at publicizing successes. The organisations had gained recognition externally by winning various awards relating to diversity initiatives. Table 3 in the Appendix, shows a variety of ways in which the multifaceted diversity commitments of global leaders have been recognised.
4. Discussion Overall, our findings reveal that leading organisations place significant emphasis on, and deploy multifaceted diversity-management practices and strategies to address, workforce diversity. Whilst these top 20 organisations acknowledge and focus on dimensions of diversity such as age, physical and mental ability, sexual orientation, and work and family status, greater emphasis is placed on culture and gender than on other dimensions of diversity. Workforce diversity-management is linked to organisational values, corporate responsibility, and business results through factors such as competitive advantage, innovation, productivity, talent acquisition and retention, customer satisfaction, and corporate reputation. Knouse and Dansby (2000) argue that organisations that embrace equal opportunity and diversity gain advantage through increased effectiveness, increased employee satisfaction, and increased employee commitment. All the organisations studied connect diversity with organisational effectiveness by establishing a clear business case for diversity. A positive and value-laden culture, productivity gains through a motivated workforce, lower absenteeism and improved performance, better decision making and problem solving, improved innovation and creativity, an ability to function at a global level and enter into new markets, and positioning as a preferred employer, are all cited by most organisations as positive outcomes of diversitymanagement. Further, the penetration of untapped talent pools and retention of diverse employees that can be achieved through effective diversity-management are seen as vital ingredients for success in the talent war. Many of the organisations studied believe that, with a workforce that reflects the consumer base and communities within which they operate, they will be better positioned to understand the needs of their marketplace. Enhanced corporate reputation and recognition as a responsible and value-laden organisation, were also cited by some organisations as positive outcomes of diversity-management. Our analysis reveals the high priority placed upon workforce diversity within the corporate agendas of global leaders, and the strong commitment in terms of resource allocation, leadership focus, and the strategic priorities of a variety of stakeholders. A multifaceted approach to diversity-management was manifested in a variety of diversity enabling instruments such as diversity policies, diversity value statements, training and development initiatives, talent management, diversity targets and matrices, employee participation in diversity related activities, establishment of roles and forums with accountability, work arrangements and facilities, benchmarking of diversity initiatives, and communication to relevant stakeholders. Our findings lend support to Morrison’s (2001) view that ‘global leaders are those who successfully impact the actions and beliefs of others on a world-wide basis’ (p.67): in this case, actions and practices of managing diversity. Organisational leadership was clearly displayed by the senior-most officials within the organisations studied, including members of Boards of Directors and CEOs. Notably, global leaders attempted to uphold diversity as an organisational value and emphasised the importance of a culture of inclusion in which differences were acknowledged, accommodated and valued. Out of the 20 organisations chosen for the study, 4 found their way to ‘The 2012 DiveristyInc Top 50 Companies for Diversity’ ranking in 4th, 17th, 31st and 39th positions as listed by DiversityInc (2012).
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