Workplace Diversity Cultural Diversity in Term Paper

.. A series of symbols used to represent things. [and it is] a process of "coding and then decoding these symbols" (Lewis, 2006). And what must never be lost is that both speaker and listener are stakeholders in the process. Moreover, when the peaceful management of culturally diverse workers is pivotal to the success of a company, it's important to remember that "intention is not a necessary condition for communication," and one may try, but one doesn't always communicate what one intends to communicate.

It is also relevant to touch on the work of Gregory Bateson; in researching possible solutions and definitions towards the management of "complex environmental problems" (Tognetti, 1999), Bateson believed, in the paraphrase of Sylvia S. Tognetti, that "one of the major fallacies of the scientific community is the premise that it is possible to have total control over an interactive system of which oneself is a part." Hence, one assumes that removal of key policy-makers and executives from workplace dymanics might help solve issues therin. And futhre, Bateson's emphasis was on "the management of uncertainty," Tognetti writes in Futures; and one of the ways Bateson approached complex problems was from a hierarchical perspective.

He relied heavily on hierarchically arranged "logical types, from members to classes of classes," in terms of his approach to inquiry. It is instructive and germane to discussions of multicultural workplace realities to view his "systems framework." He put forward three levels of logical types in "characterizing resemblances in gross anatomy," Tognetti writes. A first order comparison examines relationships "between parts within the same individual"; the second order comparison might take a close look at "relationships between different but closely related species such as crabs and lobsters"; and a third would be a "comparison of comparisons, e.g. compare a comparison of crab and lob ster to a comparison between a man and a horse." When the comparison is in play, the theme becomes, "What are important are the differences and the resemblances between such differences, which in turn reveal 'the pattern, which connects', and provide the basis for abduction" - which is without doubt a "fundamental process in human thought."

Abduction in this context means "a method of constructing knowledge from consistencies in the evidence from multiple perspectives," Tognetti explains.]

Most of Bateson's later ideas emerged from this hierarchical framework, and he points to errors he found in others' models of examining human dynamics, namely Darwin's "survival of the fittest": Bateson believed it was not so much a struggle between individuals but that "natural selection acts on populations rather than individuals." And in Marx, he found a flaw similar to Darwin's flaw; "...events unfold in a predictable sequence as a result of class structures, regardless of which individual is credited with starting a trend."

Works Cited

Brett, Jeanne, Behfar, Kristin, & Kern, Mary C. "Managing Multicultural Teams." Harvard

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Hampden-Turner, Charles, & Trompenaars, Fons. Riding The Waves of Culture: Understanding

Diversity in Global Business. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1998.

Hofstede, Geert. "Cultural diversity: four dimensions for defining work-related values

Associated with natural culture." Thinkers. (2002).

Kirkman, Bradley L., Lowe, Kevin B., & Gibson, Cristina B. "A quarter century of Culture's

Consequences: A review of empirical research incorporating Hofstede's cultural values

Framework." Journal of International Business Studies 37.3 (2006): 285-321.

Lewis, Chad. "Addressing Communication Issues when Managing Multicultural Teams." All

PM (2006): Retrieved 7 Nov. 2006 at http://www.allpm.com/print/.php?sid=1485.

Tognetti, Sylvia S. "Science in a double-bind: Gregory Bateson and the origins of post-normal

Science. Futures 31.7 (Sept. 1999): p. 689.…