Why buyers love diversity

Corporations love a diverse workforce. What’s not to like?

Cross pollinate a firm with diverse resources and watch it become more competitive. The bottom line grows and everyone’s happy. The global company is populated with folks who reflect the world’s changing demographics. Management teams believe that a global and diverse workforce is smart, productive and innovative — the different cultural milieus within one environment motivating inventive thinking.

So it’s no surprise that many corporations, particularly large ones, extend their interest in diversity to the use of diversity staffing suppliers. And our data backs this up. Staffing Industry Analysts’ survey of large buyers of staffing services found that 66 percent of companies had a diversity program in place involving staffing firms.

“People want to win and how you win is you have a more inclusive workforce that looks like what your customers look like,” said Glenda Gill of Rainbow PUSH Coalition, a nonprofit organization founded by the Rev. Jesse Jackson to promote civil rights.

At their end, diversity-owned staffing firms say they see more interest in diversity status among buyers — whether it’s a minority-owned firm, woman-owned firm, veteran-owned firm or LGBT-owned firm.  In addition, having a formal certification of diversity status remains as important as ever.  For more on the topic, come listen to experts discuss the current state of diversity staffing and what the future will bring at the Staffing Industry Executive Forum. I will be moderating the panel on Friday, March 21st. Hope to see you there.

Please see this story on diversity staffing in the Jan. 22 issue of the CWS 3.0 newsletter.