Diversity Initiative Effectiveness: A Typological Theory of Unintended Consequences

Abstract

The purpose of diversity initiatives is to help groups that face disadvantage in society achieve better outcomes in organizations, but they do not necessarily work as intended. To advance understanding of the effects of diversity initiatives, I develop a typological theory of their unintended consequences. I propose that diversity initiatives produce four unintended consequence types: backfire (negative diversity goal progress), negative spillover (undesirable effects on outcomes other than diversity goal progress), positive spillover (desirable effects on outcomes other than diversity goal progress), and false progress (improved diversity metrics without true diversity goal progress). I then adopt a signaling perspective to identify mechanisms underlying the four types and the diversity practices most likely to produce them. The resulting typological theory not only provides an organizing framework for prior work on the unintended consequences of diversity initiatives but also specifies new unintended consequence types, identifies signals that serve as their root causes, and suggests that the unintended consequences of diversity initiatives are interrelated and multidetermined. Collectively, these contributions advance a broader conceptualization of diversity initiative effectiveness, in which a wider range of mechanisms and outcomes, as well as the relationships among them, must be considered. More comprehensive theory regarding their unintended consequences provides a foundation for increasing diversity initiative effectiveness.

Reminders of ingroup privilege often threaten identity but rarely change beliefs

“…The opening quotes are a sample of the positive and negative responses we received to our privilege awareness activities. Vitriolic responses to privilege reminders may cause concern that asking people to reflect on their advantages makes them defensive or, even worse, backfires and increases resistance to egalitarianism (Dover, Kaiser, & Major, 2019;Knowles, Lowery, Chow, & Unzueta, 2014;Leslie, 2019). If negative reactions indicate changing attitudes in an unintended direction, then reminders of privilege may be ineffective at addressing inequality.…”

Beyond demographic identities and motivation to learn: The effect of organizational identification on diversity training outcomes

“…It is further differentiated from other forms of training, because it brings social identities (i.e., selfdefinitions tied to membership in social categories, such as race, sex, or ethnic group; Tajfel & Turner, 1979) to the forefront, potentially eliciting strong emotions from participants (Hanover & Cellar, 1998;Rynes & Rosen, 1995). Often, diversity training includes topics that may be uncomfortable for trainees, which may trigger personal trauma (Epstein, 1994), invoke deep emotions around one's own privilege (MacDonald, 1993), threaten valued identities or social status (Dover, Major, & Kaiser, 2016;Rawski, 2017), and increase unintended backfiring effects (Leslie, 2019;Rawski, 2017). These issues make diversity training unique from general diversity-related behaviors that occur outside of a training and development context and from general job-related training.…”

“…Finally, organizational identification may motivate behaviors beyond the traditional training outcomes (e.g., reactions, learning, transfer, and results; Kirkpatrick, 1976;Holton, 1996). These outcomes are focused on meeting intended training objectives, but past research has indicated that training can lead to unintended outcomes too (Leslie, 2019;Rawski, 2017). Past empirical research on unintended training outcomes has mainly focused on negative backlash effects (Rawski, 2017;Tinkler, 2012) (Zhu, 2016).…”

“…Unfortunately, although diversity training is in high demand as organizations try to reduce prejudice and discrimination among employee groups, there is evidence that diversity training is not consistently effective (Bezrukova et al, 2016;King, Gulick, & Avery, 2010), often failing to reach its stated goals of increasing awareness, knowledge, and "engagement in effective intercultural behaviors" (King et al, 2010, p. 894). Recent theorizing has even suggested that diversity training, categorized as a nondiscrimination organizational diversity initiative, is likely to lead to backfire effects such as subtle forms of discrimination (Leslie, 2019). This proposition is supported by findings that although diversity training increases perceptions that the organization itself is bias free, it also decreases trainees' awareness of discrimination (Dover, Major, & Kaiser, 2014).…”

Lithuanian Social Entrepreneurs’ Experiences of Evaluating the Impact of Their Social Businesses

“…Sukurta autorių pagal Clark et al (2004) Vertėtų atkreipti dėmesį, kad nevisais atvejais socialinio verslo poveikis yra teigiamas. Kaip ir bet kurios kitos organizacijos privačiame ar viešajame sektoriuje, socialinis verslas gali sukurti ir neigiamus poveikius (Vanclay, 2002), dažniausiai dėl nenumatytų pasekmių (unintended consequences), nors misija išlieka kilni (Leslie, 2019;Wegrich, 2019). Nors mokslinėje literatūroje neigiami poveikiai nėra nagrinėjami socialinio verslo veiklos kontekste, tačiau tokių pavyzdžių praktikoje aptinkama.…”