STATE BANK OF VIETNAM BANKING ACADEMY FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES ---------- GRADUATION THESIS TOPIC The Effects of Workforce Diversity on Employee Performance A Case Study of Ge Renewable Energy Haiphong Instructor : Nguyen Thi Thu Trang (MA) Student : Pham Thi Kim Student Number : 19A7510108 Class : K19-ATCD Faculty : Foreign Languages Hanoi, June 2020 i DECLARATION Full name: Pham Thi Kim Student Number: 19A7510108 Faculty: Faculty of Foreign Languages I hereby declare that this thesis is a unique product of my own with sincere efforts. It has not been published for any degree or previously submitted to anywhere for any certificate and award. Any information, data, and figures in this study belong to my own research, analysis, and presentation. All the references adopted in this thesis have been acknowledged and demonstrated in the reference section.
Hanoi, 4th June 2020 Signature Pham Thi Kim ii ACKNOWLEDGMENT Hereby I would like to express my sincere thanks to my beloved and enthusiastic instructor Ms. Nguyen Thi Thu Trang (M.A), Faculty of Foreign Language, Banking Academy, for her great inspiration, confidential guidance, and precious support throughout the time I conducting my graduation thesis. Secondly, I would like to convey my heartiest appreciation to my lecturers in the Faculty of Foreign Languages and all lecturers in Banking Academy for their unmeasurable support, dedicated help, and useful guidance during my time studying in Banking Academy as well as the time I writing my graduation thesis. Next, I wish to express my honest appreciation to all colleagues in GE Renewable Energy Haiphong, especially my supervisor Mr.
Doan Huu Bac, my co- workers Mr. Pham Duy Thanh, Ms. Ho Thi Thin, and other beloved colleagues who gave me useful suggestions and dedicated support for my survey and questionnaire. They also helped me to get precious practice knowledge during my internship there.
I could not finish and obtain valuable data for the research, and do my internship successfully without their co-operations, support, and goodwill. Last but not least, from the bottom of my heart, I truly appreciate my family (my darling mother and my brother) and my friends, especially Le Thi Thuy Dung for their unconditional and endless love as well as support. I have received a lot of encouragement from them during my thesis writing process. They gave me strength and a spiritual foundation to fulfill reach that milestone.
Due to time limitations and a restricted capacity of the author, there might be a number of shortcomings in my thesis. Therefore, I would much appreciate receiving feedbacks and contribution to improve and fill in the gap of this thesis. iii ABSTRACT As globalization has become a popular phenomenon, technology is getting advanced at a surprising speed, the world has witnessed the diversity of the workforce, especially the workforce in multi-nation companies. Acknowledging the importance of workforce diversity to organizations, this study shed light on the specific effects of this factor on employee performance.
To achieve that research objective, the researcher applied the descriptive research design with the research method being the survey. Moreover, to obtain data, a well-structured questionnaire was utilized. Four hypotheses were set to verify the relationship between workforce diversity (including sexual diversity, generation diversity, education level diversity, and language background diversity) and employee performance in a manufacturing company. These hypotheses were tested with the Spearman Rank Correlation Coefficient model.
Furthermore, the researcher also made use of the regression model and analysis of variance to verify the relationship and cohesion of independent variable – workforce diversity and dependent variable – employee performance. That the study focused on investigating only four aspects of workforce diversity in a manufacturing company was considered as the limitations as it is hard to assign the findings obtained to other aspects of diversity dimension and to all types of companies. Therefore, it encourages further researches to conduct studies about other factors of diversity and on a larger scale of case studies. Keywords: workforce diversity, gender diversity, age diversity, education background diversity, language background diversity, and employee performance iv TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION.
iv TABLE OF CONTENTS. v LIST OF TABLES. vii LIST OF FIGURES. viii LIST OF APPENDIXS.
ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION. Background of the Study. Objectives of the Study. Significance of the study.
Scope of the Study. Structure of the Study. Limitation of the Study. 5 CHAPTER 2: REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE.
Definition of Workforce Diversity. Dimension of Workforce Diversity. Reasons for Workforce Diversity. The Effects of Workforce Diversity.
The Concept of Gender Diversity. The Concept of Age Diversity. The Concept of Educational Background Diversity. The Concept of Language Background Diversity.
Previous Study Summary. Theoretical and Conceptual Framework. 21 CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY. Locale of the Study.
Sampling size and sampling techniques. Data Collection Methods. Data Analysis Method. Limitation of the Research Methodology.
29 CHAPTER 4: FINDING PRESENTATION. General Data Presentation. Response Rate of Respondents. Demographic Feature of Respondents.
Descriptive Data Presentation. Reliability of the Measurement. Assessment of Respondents on the Effects of Workforce Diversity on Employee Performance. 46 CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION.
Theoretical Findings Discussion. 54 vi LIST OF TABLES TABLE PAGE Table 4.1: Rate of Response 30 Table 4.2: Respondents’ Demographic Feature 31 Table 4.3: The Reliability of Scales 33 Table 4.4: Respondents’ opinion about gender diversity and employee 34 performance Table 4.5: Respondents’ opinion about age diversity and employee 35 performance Table 4.6: Respondents’ opinion about education background diversity 37 and employee performance Table 4.7: Respondents’ opinion about language background diversity and 38 employee performance Table 4.8: Correlation Coefficient Range 40 Table 4.9: Correlation Coefficient for Gender Diversity and Employee 40 Performance Table 4.10: Correlation Coefficient for Age Diversity and Employee 41 Performance Table 4.11: Correlation Coefficient for Education Background Diversity 42 and Employee Performance Table 4.12: Correlation Coefficient for Education Background Diversity 43 and Employee Performance Table 4.13: Regression Model Result for Language Background Diversity 44 and Employee Performance Table 4.14: ANOVA Result for Acceptance of Language Background 45 Diversity and Employee Performance Table 4.15: Coefficientsa 45 vii LIST OF FIGURES FIRGURE PAGE Figure 2.1: Conceptual Framework of the Study 22 Figure 3.1: Sample of the Study 25 viii LIST OF APPENDIXS APPENDIX PAGE APPENDIX I: QUESTIONNAIRE 59 ix CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1. Background of the Study It is worth noting that the world is witnessing the continuous changes in the organizational workforce. Companies have followed the trend by diversifying their employees’ demographics to gain creativity, innovation, and raise companies’ competitive capacity in the global market.
In other words, as the diverse labor force bring some advantages to companies, the trend for having diversity in the workplace is a reality. Therefore, workforce diversity, which refers to the presence of workers from various socio-cultural backgrounds working together in the company, has drawn more attention from business researchers, and Human Resources managers (Kundu, 2001). Workforce diversification happening in companies as their response to the changes of the general labor force driven by globalization and migration, the transformed composition of the labor force, as well as advanced technology. Specification, the first reason for the heterogeneous workforce is that globalization connects countries together and makes multi-national corporations become popular.
Besides, convenient transportation infrastructure also facilitates the migration of workers among countries, and domestic regions. According to Ekot (2017), that the increase of globalization which leads to competition among businesses is the explanation for the workforce diversification of all industrialized companies. Furthermore, in terms of gender diversity in the workplace, women’s awareness of turning economically independent, and the empowerment of women are considered as the factors driving this sexual heterogeneity. In addition, it is witnessed that advanced technology has played an important role in diversifying employees’ demographics.
Ekot (2017) stated that cutting-edge technology and the advent of a global economy have connected people from different parts of the world. People have got more chances to find suitable jobs. Along with the process of diversifying employee demographics, companies can achieve creativity, and innovation, accelerate the decision-making process, broaden human resources as well as raise competitiveness in the global market with a varied customer base. Gumede (2016) also noted that diversity in the workplace is 1 beneficial for companies as it boosts the problem-solving, communication among workers, the adaptation capacity to the market changes, and innovation as well as creativeness.
It is obviously seen that this diversification process affects directly human resources companies which are considered as the most valuable assets of every company. Every change in the workforce can lead to changes in companies’ operations in general and productivity in particular. In specification, which company possessing the diverse staff can speed up the processes of innovating, creating products and services, dealing with problems, as well as making decisions by the varied ideas from its employees. Those benefits help companies raise competitive capacity over their competitors so that they can gain more market share and profit.
As the diversity of the workforce offers those significant value, companies’ managers must have an accurate assessment of how their workforce’ characteristics affect employees’ performance, so that they can acquire the advantages and control disadvantages effects. That concern of business managers and the reality of the increasing diversity in the workforce has made a research requirement for organizational researchers. In the past several years, empirical researches have been conducted in various types of organizations. Through those studies, the diversity of the workforce has been proved to be an important factor which can leave either positive or negative impacts on organization productivity in general, and on labor efficiency in particular.
Objectives of the Study The most important objective of the study was to evaluate the effect of workforce diversity on employee performance with the population being employees of GE Renewable Energy Haiphong. The specific objectives of this study are: To investigate the relationship between gender diversity and employee performance To evaluate the relationship between age diversity and employee performance To examine the relationship between education background diversity and employee performance 2 To assess the relationship between language background diversity and employee performance 1. Research Questions The study’s target is to answer four research questions below: Does gender diversity influence considerably on employee performance? Does age diversity influence considerably on employee performance? Does education background diversity influence considerably on employee performance? Does language background diversity influence considerably on employee performance? 1. Research Hypothesis Hypothesis 1: H0: Gender diversity does not have considerable effects on employee performance.
H1: Gender diversity has considerable effects on employee performance. Hypothesis 2: H0: Age diversity does not have considerable effects on employee performance. H1: Age diversity has considerable effects on employee performance. Hypothesis 3: H0: Education background diversity does not have considerable effects on employee performance.
H1: Education background has considerable effects on employee performance. Hypothesis 4: H0: Language background diversity does not have considerable effects on employee performance. H1: Language background diversity has considerable effects on employee performance. Significance of the study The main purpose of this study is to investigate how the diversity in the labor force affects labor efficiency.
In other words, this study shed light on the 3 relationship between workforce diversity and employee performance in a manufacturing company. In the context of the technology era and the emerging phenomenon of globalization, the importance of workforce diversity has drawn attention for organizations, government, and academia. Firstly, to organizations (especially manufacturing companies), employers as well as managers recognize the level of workforce diversity to implement suitable adjustment and development human resources policies, while employees being beneficial in cooperating with other colleagues regardless of their similarities or dissimilarities. Moreover, the findings of this study together with those of existing researches provide the panorama of the labor force diversity in many regions that helps the government enforce suitable labor law, and have a basis for controlling organizations’ compliance to the law.