ARE GRANDDAD’S VALUES THE ANSWER TO MANAGE DIVERSITY?

– a study on how one company of recruitment manage diversity1

Maja Eriksson & Jenny Ronnebring

Department of Behavioural, Social and Legal Sciences

Psychology, Örebro University

Many people with competence are today being shut out from the labour market because of their foreign origin. Earlier studies show that people’s prejudice can create discrimination of minority groups. The aim of our report is to exemplify how one of Manpower’s office work to manage diversity. We have used qualitative interviews.

The result shows that the recruiters we interviewed avoid letting prejudice influence when recruiting because of strong values. Instead competence is the determine factor. Our assumption is that they indirectly work after the policy of diversity because it is based on their values. The “interview of granddad” is a method to insure that the values are central and that all the employees have the same values as the company.

Keywords: diversity, discrimination, prejudice, recruitment, values.

1Psychology C, autumn term 2005. Supervisor: Carl Åborg