What Drives the Implementation of Diversity Management Programs? Evidence from Public Organizations

As the diversity of the US workforce continues to increase at a rapid pace, public managers are facing pressure to create organizational cultures that permit employees from different backgrounds to succeed. A typical managerial response to this diversity has been the implementation of a formal diversity management program. Although limited empirical research has considered links between diversity management activity and organizational performance, very little research has examined the factors that influence the implementation of diversity management practices. This article begins with the premise that organizations develop diversity management programs as a means of responding to opportunities and challenges in the internal and external environments. In order to delineate how those environmental phenomena operate, we draw from a specific set of organization theories to formulate three drivers of diversity management implementation: environmental uncertainty, environmental favorability, and institutional isomorphism. We test these drivers empirically using data from public schools, finding that elements of all three forces influence diversity management implementation but in different ways and in varying degrees.