Building diverse and inclusive organizational culture-best practices: A case study of Cisco Co.

In management theory and business practice the dealing with a diverse workforce has played a leading role in recent years. In a globalizing economy companies recognized potential benefits of a multicultural workforce and tried to create more inclusive work environments. Unfortunately many of them have been disappointed with the results they achieved. The reason for this is that too little attention has been paid for the norms, values and behaviors involved. Given the fact that diversity is essentially about cultural norms and values, appropriate reflection work becomes a fundamental task to create a truly inclusive work environment where people coming out from diverse backgrounds feel respected and recognized. The paper focus on the challenge of building an inclusive diversity culture showing that a “culture of inclusion” has to be built on solid grounds. It shed light on the process of developing such a culture in CISCO corporation which serves as an example of a good practice in this respect.