Stereotyping in the work place isn’t always about the individual features such as gender or race but sometimes it is as simple as the department you work for within the company. In almost any work environment there is a hierarchy of management and under that, departments. Is one department really that much better than another? I would think not since all departments are necessary to keep the company running but this idea does seem to escape some upper management views when handling conflicts in the workplace and discrimination can happen.
This may seem overly exaggerated but it really can be true and the discrimination of either favoring one department or disliking another can take its toll on the employees involved. It is stated that “prejudice is an attitude toward others based solely on group membership” and it’s fairly sad how it can be that easy to judge or worse treat someone based on their group affiliation (Schneider, Gruman & Coutts, 2012). In some corporations and organizations there seems to be disconnect between sales type employees and service type employees not just between themselves but also how management can treat them as well. This negative stereotype between departments can lead to conflict which can cause employee dissatisfaction, decreased productivity and turnover which can cost a company in many ways. It is as simple as the social identity theory of employees feeling like they are part of the in-group or the out-group and it makes a difference.
There’s no affirmative action or laws to help support you because you work in one department versus another department, as it’s an internal conflict between departments that happens in companies every day and no one sees they need to fix it. Some may be even blind to the idea that this discrimination is actually going on because it’s never been pointed out and those who feel it are often afraid to speak up.
The theory of relative deprivation can help shed some light on this issue. The theory implies “that a person may feel deprived of some desirable thing” and this conflict can be based when a person has compared themselves against this standard and then assumed to be deprived based on their own perception (Schneider, Gruman & Coutts 2012). This could be just a perception of being a part of or not being a part of an inferior perceived department. A perceived idea or feeling is just as real so it can be just as damaging to the morale of personnel.
This type of discrimination leads to department conflict and the “lack of cooperation between work groups is a major problem in organizations” but what can be done to help improve this conflict and move forward (Katcher, 2014). Katcher mentions some suggestions that might be worth bringing up in your place of business such as an employee satisfaction survey, rewarding cooperation between departments or even just recognizing the problem (2014). Please note if you are going to go the employee satisfaction survey route be aware that for it to be effective you must have a plan to share the results with everyone and willing to put effort in the necessary changes or it is a waste of time and money. An idea I set forth at my organization is having joint meetings with a representative from every department to voice all department’s concerns and trying to address the issues at hand as one unit instead of separate departments. Also when we make improvements to a process we take an employee from each department to get different points of view to help understand each other. It is a start in understanding how people feel about their department and other departments in the organization.
What it comes down to is it can be a relative simple problem to solve and get rid of the department discrimination by just calling attention to it in the first place but this step may prove the most difficult. Those who feel deprived of support in the out-group department may not want to speak up and others may not want things to change who benefit from being in the in-group. In my opinion for a company to really thrive this type of discrimination really has to be eliminated. Without everyone’s cooperation it’s just pieces of a puzzle and no one can see the big picture. If you cannot not work to get those pieces to fit and work together the end puzzle picture will not manifest into all it can accomplish. Most have the same goals but different ways we are asked to achieve them in our organization but if we really could all be on the same team just think of the difference in our work place. A shared vision with people working as one organization instead of broken up puzzle pieces of departments could decrease internal conflict issues that many experience. That could be a positive move for any organization.
References:
Katcher, Bruce L., (2014). Improving the Workplace: The Difference between Heaven and Hell</em>. Discovery Surveys, Inc. The Discovery Consulting Group, 2014. Retrieved October 5, 2014 from https://www.discoverysurveys.com/articles/itw-109.html
Schneider, F.W., Gruman, J.A., & Coutts, L.M. (2012). Applied Social Psychology: Understanding and Addressing Social and Practical Problems (Second ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
**Here is the original post published at Penn State:
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