Have you ever seen a dog chase its own tail? The dog seems to be enjoying the process of what it is doing yet seems oblivious to the pain it will feel once it catches itself.
It seems our government is doing the same thing. The ideaology of making it legal for employers to discriminate in favour of female or ethnic minority job candidates, is both admirable and has been desired for such a long time yet this very approach seems to have overlooked the most fundamental thing when it comes to equality - simply, that it works both ways! One side primarily faces negativity, the other side primarily misses out on opportunity.
The damaging aspect of inequality is that the negative impacts and reasons for them are often multilayered. Another issue is that many people just dont want to deal with it effectively because doing so will mean taking off the 'game face' and revealing your inadequacies, prejudices or shortcomings.
On the other side, i pledge my full support to the idea that employers should disclose their salary structures (since on average, women are paid 40% less than men) and that age discrimination should be banned across the board - without women, there would be no men and our elders often have the pearls of wisdom to help us create our future so by right, we must celebrate them more, yes sir!
However, employers have been placed in a precarious position, particularly in the areas of recruitment. On the one hand, they are 'encouraged' to positively discriminate (lets not kid ourselves, that is exactly how it will be perceived by the masses!) but if they dont, they will be seen as being totally discriminatory - that is not a nice position to be in.
Can you imagine the possible impacts that employers are bound to feel - divisions within their workforce, lack of both cultural and social understanding, falsehood of management / employee relationships? The impact of change can only grow bigger.
I think their is a solution to this issue but one that challenges us all - Employers need to identify the Individual Value that each person can offer in order to make a firm employment decision i.e what is the amount of added value that this individual can bring to the organisation?.
For example: an employer has two job candidates both with the expected level of skills and experiences needed to do the job. One is black and one is white. Should the employer choose the black candidiate who could bring and offer expertise on their cultural background and ethnic minority knowledge or choose the white candidate who could offer a more traditional and westernised approach and life experiences? Which should they choose and why? Personally, that is a decision that must not be taken lightly and must be explored honestly and practically.
Employers must also committ to taking a more grass roots method of engagement - and i dont mean meetings with self-appointed leaders of local communities. I mean engaging with the old asian lady who likes to buy fabric to make sari's but volunteers at the local nursing home or the old black man who likes to play dominoes with a shot of whiskey but collects the trolleys at Asda or the young teenager whose unemployed mom can only afford to buy beef once every two months but is studying on a home based NVQ - thats who they need to listen too.
Employers need help to adopt a 'casual wear' approach of engagement instead of the 'saville row' approach they are used to.
You see, colour, age, sex, religion, disability or any other factor should never have mattered. What should have always mattered is that the individulality of a person creates a feeling of excitement in the heart and mind of the potential employer.
Thats when the magic really starts to happen!
Joel Graham-Blake is a Diversity Workforce Consultant, advising businesses on how to utilise the value of all people in their workforce, to achieve business growth and personal success.
