British diversity professionals as change agents – radicals, tempered radicals or liberal reformers?

Understanding diversity managersõ role in organizational change: Towards a conceptual framework

“…Healy and Oikelome (2007), having focused on health services in the UK, illustrated that diversity professionals both compete with and complement the work of trade union actors. On the other hand, Kirton, Greene, and Dean (2007) revealed that the radicalism of diversity professionals is tempered between competing demands of organizational objectives and their commitment to equality. Finally, a recent study based on a national survey of diversity management in the UK identifi ed that diversity managers' agency is constrained by the virtue of their organizational position, access to strategic resources, and organizational support for diversity (Tatlı, Özbilgin, Worman, & Price, 2006).…”

Questioning impact: interconnection between extra-organizational resources and agency of equality and diversity officers

“…The change agency literature, as it relates to human resource management, is replete with taxonomies of change agency in an effort to delineate what change agency means and to identify its boundaries of accountability, alignment and action over specific change tasks (Ottaway 1983;Caldwell 2001;Kirton, Greene and Dean 2007). The typological approach has its benefits, as it underlines the expansive variety of change agents, the substance of the change task in question and how change may be implemented (Alfes et al 2010).…”

“…As organizational actors, on one hand, they are tasked with a diversity role and are supposed to be committed to the business case for diversity management that their organizations have employed; on the other hand, they commonly have a wider personal vision of organizational change and development, including transforming inequalities, with an objective of social justice. This can make them unpopular with many organizational actors and often leaves them on the margins of mainstream strategy and policy-making (Kirton et al 2007). The primary condition for the success of diversity initiatives in organizations is top-level managerial commitment and leadership (Thomas 1990).…”

“…Drawing on an empirical study of E&D officers in a range of British organizations, Kirton et al (2007) reveal the complexity of their positions and orientations. As organizational actors, on one hand, they are tasked with a diversity role and are supposed to be committed to the business case for diversity management that their organizations have employed; on the other hand, they commonly have a wider personal vision of organizational change and development, including transforming inequalities, with an objective of social justice.…”

Which foot first: diversity management and affirmative action in Brazilian business

“…The relatively rapid acceptance of the "diversity management" approach should not however be seen as a rejection of the principles and values of "affirmative action", since amongst practitioners there are those who see the former enabling the latter to be accomplished in practice (Kirton;Greene;Dean, 2007). Indeed, as Tatli (2011) has suggested, most of the time there is a decoupling between the diversity management discourse and practice, with the latter remaining strongly based on affirmative action values present often in a very material way in manuals and procedures (Dobbin, 2009).…”