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Zealand), infers that people tend to look after their own needs and put these before
others. In contrast, collectivism, which tends to occur in Eastern societies (e.g.
Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Egypt) is when people put the needs of the group (or
community) above their own. For example, in diverse work teams, collectivists may
communicate openly with each other, yet may shield this from those not within
their group. Likewise, individualists compete against each other and tend to
communicate primarily to better their position over others. When collectivists and
individualists communicate, conflicts can occur. Collectivists may withhold work
information to certain individualists while individualists view collectivists as too
‘clique-ish’, leading to misunderstandings and tension between the groups. In this
scenario, the HR manager should train all members of the group to be open to
perceived dissimilarity and to obtain a better understanding of each other’s culture.
Further, leaders/supervisors should also be trained in the management of mixed
groups (i.e. individualists and collectivists). This would include developing their
cultural intelligence, conflict management skills, emotion management skills and
dissimilarity openness.
Review Question 6.3
What is discrimination? How do direct and indirect discrimination differ?
Give examples for each in your answer.
Discrimination is defined as any difference or preference based on race, gender,
colour, religion, age, ethnicity, nationality, disability, sexual preference,
membership of a trade union, pregnancy or marital status, which results in
disadvantageous or unfair treatment regarding employment, occupation or status.
Direct discrimination (also referred to as overt discrimination) occurs when a policy
or certain behaviour purposely treats one group less favourably than another. For
example, when an employee makes derogatory comments about the culture of
another employee. However, indirect discrimination (also referred to as covert
discrimination) occurs when a policy appears to be non-discriminatory at the
outset, but in practice results in discrimination. For example, if a job advertisement
advertises for people over 180 centimetres, this is indirect discrimination unless the
job could not be performed by people shorter than this height. In this case,
discrimination is based on the grounds of gender or race (as most women and some
ethnic groups would be physically unable to meet this criterion). The latter
discrimination occurs within the similarity attraction paradigm.