Impact of Workplace Diversity on Employee Performance

Abstract

The authors explore how the milieu of workplace diversity affects the relationship between employee and performance. In particular, we theorize and empirically examine the moderating effects of four (4) categories of diversity context variables: age, gender, ethnicity, and educational background. The authors perform analyses on 175 out of 320 respondents consisting of academic and administrative staff of four selected private universities in Ghana. The results showed, for example, that workplace diversity has an overall influence on employee performance, however, educational diversity has more effect on employee performance in the universities compared to the other competing variables used in this study. Age and educational diversity had a significant impact on employee performance in the universities whilst gender and ethnicity diversity had no influence on their performance. We discuss future research directions regarding diversity, workgroup context, and performance outcomes and outline some recommendations for administrators and university leaders.