Towards sustainable diversity in organizations: Lessons from good diversity management practices

Abstract

This chapter intends to make a contribution to the diversity management literature by inductively identifying organizational practices leading to ‘sustainable’ diversity. In order to do so, we draw on three ‘best’ cases: a dental clinic in Sweden, a call centre in Belgium, and a wellness company in The Netherlands. We qualify diversity as sustainable to refer to its social and economic viability over a longer time (WCED, 1987). In the context of this paper, successful organizational practices are those which create a diversity-friendly context in the short-term yet avoid achieving this in ways that undermine their capacity to do so in the future.