Allstate Diversity

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- AWIN (Allstate Women's Information Network)

- PLAN (Professional Latino Allstate Network)

- 3AN (Allstate Asian American Network)

- ANGLES (Allstate Network of Gay and Lesbian Employees and Supporters)

- AAWN (African American Working Network)

- YPO (Young Professionals Organization)

- PWT (Parents Working Together)

- AAN (Allstate Adoption Network)

- AVETS (Allstate Veterans Engagement Team and Supporters) (Inclusive Diversity, 2014).

These groups are purely designed for reducing diversity challenges that pose barriers and ensuring that Allstate takes advantage of diversity benefits.

Diversity is a dynamic factor within a company in any industry. It entails talented workers from various cultures, ethnicities, race, and gender; whether from United States or other countries. Especially, as companies globalize, diversity affects creativity, innovation, and productivity. Diversity is a key ingredient to growing a strong and inclusive economy that’s built to last. In a progressively competitive economy where talent is crucial to improving the bottom line, pooling from the largest and most diverse set of candidates is an increasingly necessity to succeed in the market (Kerby & Burns, 2012). The implementation of diversity within a company provides significant benefits in the economy as well as the workplace.

According to Kerby and Burns, there are significant economic facts of diversity in the workplace. A diverse workplace drives economic growth (Kerby & Burns, 2012). This can include factors such as better management of the impact of globalization and change related to technological advancement.

In an era when flexibility and creativity are keys to competitiveness, diversity is critical for an organization’s success (Green, Lopez, Wysocki, & Kepner, 2013). A company’s success can derive from increasing the market share, which leads to another significant fact. A diverse workforce can capture a greater share of the customer market (Kerby & Burns, 2012). The combination of employees with different ethnic and racial backgrounds will offer valuable experiences for any company. The experience will not only be utilized for individual responsibilities, but working in groups as well. Each employee in a diverse workplace possesses unique strengths and weaknesses derived from their culture in addition to their individuality (Ingram, 2014). This enhances the aspect of companies obtaining individuals that will bring professional skills into the workplace along with various cultures fluent in several languages and are capable of understanding global customers’ everyday needs, thus building an international competitive workforce. When a company is looking to obtain new employees, recruiting from a diverse pool of candidates will produce a more qualified workforce. As more candidates apply for each position, the company enjoys a larger candidate pool, ensuring that the best candidate for the job is far more easily found (Adecco, 2013). This contributes to the growth of the market. In an increasingly competitive economy where talent is crucial to improving the bottom line, pooling from the largest and most diverse set of candidates is gradually more necessary to succeed in the market. Another aspect that contributes to a company’s success is minimizing costs.

According to Kerby and Burns, a diverse and inclusive workforce helps businesses avoid employee turnover costs. Stakeholders are now demanding that any organization they invest in must conform to practices that encourage low employee turnover, provide a healthy work environment that rewards team performance and empowers workers to express themselves with an open mind (McLauren, n.d.). The failure to retain qualified employees results in avoidable turnover-related costs at the expense of a company’s profits (Kerby & Burns, 2012). Also, retaining employees means gained experience and career development for individuals within a company. These employee benefits will contribute to loyalty between employers and employees. People require a feeling of belongingness and security. When they feel supported in their ideas and beliefs they become more productive (McLauren, n.d.). The company will gain from each employee learning from each other’s experiences and applying this new-found knowledge to their work (Adecco, 2013). A diverse company can lead to greater productivity. Included with increased productivity is creativity and innovation.

Diversity fosters a more creative and innovate workforce. Employees from different backgrounds see processes and practices from different perspectives and therefore are able to bring fresh ideas to the table (Adecco, 2013). Creativity and innovation is also needed when it comes to effective problem-solving efficiency. A problem solving sample experiment was conducted by Katherine Phillips, an associate professor of management and organizations at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. The problem solving experiment was made up of two sample sets: one containing a diverse team member, the other made up of homogenous team members. The diverse team made better decisions that led to correctly solving the problem. The group that lacks diversity tend to be more comfortable around each other; however, that is not a benefit for producing complex solutions to problems. The diverse groups came up with better solutions to the problems (Blackman, 2009). Due to experiments and similar research, workplace diversity is being recognized by society as a significant factor in relation to solving problems effectively. Businesses need to adapt to our changing nation to be competitive in the economic market (Kerby & Burns, 2012). While doing so, companies must also be aware of the challenges they face when implementing and managing diversity in the workplace.

The existence of diversity in the workplace will pose various benefits, as mentioned above, as well as several challenges related to implementing and managing diversity. Increasing workplace diversity often includes mandatory diversity training, during which employees, supervisors, and managers receive lessons on how best to interact with customers, clients, and employees who represent diverse populations (Mayhew, 2014). The increased implementation of training can be costly for a company which creates another challenge. Even though there are numerous training methods to choose from, the larger the company, the more training expense occurs. Companies