Towards well-being: role of diversity and nature of work

Abstract

PurposeLiterature highlights diversity to facilitate cognitive outcomes; nevertheless, there is limited scholarly attention on affective diversity effects. The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of perceived diversity on employee well-being (EWB) and contend different types of diversity to yield differential impact. Further, the authors explore how nature of employee work can moderate these relationships.Design/methodology/approachWith 311 full-time employees representing large manufacturing organizations in India, the authors test the hypothesized relationships using PROCESS macro.FindingsResults indicate perception of surface and knowledge diversity having a significant positive impact on EWB. Further, the authors found nature of employee work to moderate the link between knowledge diversity and well-being such that perception of knowledge diversity under complex tasks enhanced well-being; no impact of work complexity was observed on the link between surface diversity and well-being.Research limitations/implicationsPerceived diversity is malleable lending itself to longitudinal work in this field. Besides nature of work, future research may explore other key contextual factors in diversity dynamics.Practical implicationsContrary to the longstanding theories such as social categorization/similarity attraction, the authors found surface diversity to positively influence EWB. This indicates firms’ effective diversity management strategies in creating inclusive workplace. Further, the authors draw implications around team design and workforce composition.Originality/valueWhile the scholarly attention to perceived diversity is gradually growing, in a first, the authors empirically examine the impact of diversity perceptions on employee affect in the context of Indian manufacturing firms.