Why is progress toward diverse representation so slow? Contrasting management practice prevalence versus effectiveness for achieving diverse representation

Traci Sitzmann and Shoshana Schwartz

Business Horizons, 2025, vol. 68, issue 3, 263-276

Abstract: While numerous management practices have been implemented in organizations in recent decades to create equitable and high-performing workforces, there has been little to no progress toward diversifying managerial representation during this timeframe. Our review contrasts the effectiveness of management practices for increasing diverse representation in management with how often these practices are utilized in organizations, centrally implicating ineffective management practices for the slow pace of change in diversifying managerial ranks. Specifically, we unveil that organizations predominantly implement ineffective and counterproductive practices that undermine managerial diversity while infrequently implementing practices that increase managerial diversity. For example, paid diversity roles, formal mentoring programs, and DEI-focused recruitment are among the most effective practices but are not consistently implemented in organizations. In contrast, diversity and harassment training and grievance procedures are frequently utilized in organizations but are negatively related to diverse representation. We also provide examples of organizations implementing multiple effective practices and making meaningful progress toward diversifying their workforces.

Keywords: Management practices; DEI; Diversity interventions; Organizational diversity; Diversity in management (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0007681324001782
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:bushor:v:68:y:2025:i:3:p:263-276

DOI: 10.1016/j.bushor.2024.12.003

Access Statistics for this article

Business Horizons is currently edited by C. M. Dalton

More articles in Business Horizons from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().