A team meeting about diversity

A team meeting about diversity

Listen to a team meeting about diversity to practise and improve your listening skills.

Do the preparation task first. Then listen to the audio and do the exercises.

Preparation

Transcript

Nina: As you know, our team has grown a lot in the past year and we feel we need to address the diversity in the team.

Brenda: How do you mean, 'address the diversity'?

Nina: Well, we all know that diversity in teams is a good thing, but it can also be a challenge for some people to respect and value people's differences. We've got a really diverse team here – people of different nationalities, backgrounds, religions, ages … and sometimes I don't feel we make the most of this.

Stefano: Yes, and even if it isn't specifically challenging, many people are simply unaware of the isolation that some team members may feel because they are different.

Brenda: So, what does this mean? What are we going to do?

Nina: Well, we need to create a workplace charter. You know, one that promotes equality, diversity and inclusion.

Brenda: That sounds like a good idea. But will people just see it as something the management team has created? Maybe they won't even pay attention to it.

Nina: I know. That's why we're going to involve everyone in creating it.

Stefano: That's a good idea. We could run some workshops and get ideas from the employees about how we can create a more inclusive workplace.

Nina: Exactly. I was thinking that before that we could run some team-building sessions so they can experience the value of diversity for themselves.

Brenda: Yes, I like that. Many people see diversity as something negative, often because there are different opinions or ways of doing things.

Nina: Yes, I know, but if there's no diversity, then the risk is that we all work in the same way, think the same and see the world the same. This makes it hard to be creative and to innovate.

Stefano: I completely agree, Nina. OK. So, what do you want us to do?

Nina: Stefano, can you look for a successful trainer who specialises in running workshops and team-building sessions on diversity and inclusion?

Stefano: Sure. I'll be happy to.

Nina: And Brenda, can you find a fun venue? Somewhere that is quite diverse itself. Something that's not the usual seminar-style environment?

Brenda: Sure. That'll be fun.

Nina: And I'm going to do some further research into how other organisations are benefiting from their diversity. I can share this with the whole team.

Task 1

Task 2

Discussion

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Average: 4.1 (129 votes)

Submitted by Miguelitorico1996 on Mon, 10/01/2022 - 20:15

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My workplace is a little bit diversed due to the company has four venues in four differente cities, Ibagué, Villavicencio, Neiva and Bogotá, so we have some things in common and we also have different customs, maybe the isolation because of the seniority at work is the main problem.

Submitted by misty on Sat, 08/01/2022 - 20:29

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In every country we have different races, religions, beliefs, and traditions. This makes every person unique from everyone. In my previous workplace, theres a lot of diversity. We respect each others norms, especially that we are dealing with patients and relatives. Being in a healthcare, makes us broad minded in terms of other peoples beliefs and traditions. Furthermore, we build rapport with our patient and relatives by respecting what they believe. I therefore conclude that diversity is quite important in treating our patient.

Submitted by ANOUAR on Wed, 29/12/2021 - 13:39

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Diversity in the team is a very important thing beacuse it help improve the vreativity of the team and boost productivity.

Submitted by jmajo on Tue, 21/12/2021 - 12:47

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The workplace I work nowadays is a bit diverse, although almost all the people is from the same nationality, we're all from different places and have different ages and ways of thinking, so I think it's quite diverse. We don't have a charter to guide us but we use our common sense and when we have a new member in our team in the workplace we always try to avoid the possibly isolation feelings promoting inclusion and organizing reunions in friendly venues as social clubs or parties. It could be important to pay attention to the little differences that makes us different each other but make the team stronger at the same time.

Thanks for the lesson.
Great site!

Submitted by vuhoap on Mon, 15/11/2021 - 14:13

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In my workplace, everyone is from different countries such as Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, India and Japan. Although we are diverse in culture and customs, we all work towards the same goal, pay attention to promote our product and achieve the biggest revenue for the company.

Submitted by Suraj paliwal on Thu, 07/10/2021 - 15:24

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Yes, diversity is challenging things there are lots of diverse people live in India. They have different ideas, different ways to doing things.

Submitted by plyas on Wed, 06/10/2021 - 18:10

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advocacy is also a workplace with diversity. Many specialists, many versatile tasks ...

Submitted by Rolabaik on Thu, 30/09/2021 - 15:53

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I am working in a more workplace diverse than any other workplace. It's a Hospital.

Submitted by Ruben Murillo on Wed, 01/09/2021 - 03:30

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in Mexico it has been difficult to carry out inclusion because many people don't accept the different ways of thinking and sometimes they seem rediculous.

Submitted by Elías Amitai on Tue, 31/08/2021 - 19:11

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My current work-team is no that diverse. However, I completely agree with Brenda, I think that when there is not diversity, there are not new ideas, new ways of working and of course there is a lack of improvement. So to summarize, In my opinion, diversity is really necessary, especially in a work team, it is useful for finding new ways of solving problems, different points of view and so on. All this, In order to do our best as a team work and in this case, for the company.