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This chapter reviews previous research on allyship: non-minority individuals who choose to support minorities while working to end discrimination and prejudice. In particular, the focus of this chapter is on how allyship applies to the workplace. We argue that allyship can be a diversity management tool to help reduce workplace discrimination.

To explore this topic, we conducted a literature review on allyship in the workplace and synthesized previous research together. We examined research from both organizational and non-organizational settings.

Our review of previous literature is divided into three sections. First, we discuss what all entails allyship, including knowledge, communication, and, in particular, action. Next, we discuss the many outcomes previous research suggests comes from allyship (including benefits to other individuals, benefits to the overall culture, and benefits to the ally him or herself). Finally, we conclude with a discussion of who is likely to become an ally as well as the journey a person goes through to become a true ally.

This chapter can be useful for practitioners who wish to promote allyship within his or her workplace. Organizations that want to strengthen their diversity and inclusion climate can consider developing ally training programs and promoting ally culture. Additionally, this chapter can be useful for researchers who wish to study the topic. Currently, there is a dearth of research on allyship specifically within the workplace; this chapter can help future researchers identify areas for empirical exploration.

The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of the research presented in this edited volume.

This report is based on 13 chapters, which vary in terms of research approach, design, and method, yet aims to present different types of diversity in organizations.

The chapters shed light on existing practices promulgating the value of diversity, while opening the road toward diverse definitions of diversity. Contributors provide a critical reflection of the current discourse on different types of diversity around the world. Findings indicate that multinational organizations are regularly confronted with the absence of the necessary sensitivity on behalf of their top management team and spokespeople. Empirical studies advocate strategies that could potentially facilitate both organizations and immigrants to overcome a plethora of challenges.

The report summarizes and integrates novel insights on how organizations approach, view, and manage different types of diversity.

The hospitality industry has one of the most diversified workforces. This study aims to examine the effect of employees’ perceptions toward diversity management on the company’s financial performance. The current study also examines the moderating effect of board members’ diversity level on the association between employees’ perceptions and financial outcomes.

From online reviews, the authors identified multi-faucets of diversity management and measured employees’ perceptions of diversity management. Using panel data analysis, the relationships among employees’ perceptions, board members’ diversity level and companies’ financial performance were studied.

This study found that employees’ perceptions of diversity management positively influence the company’s financial performance and the relationship was positively moderated by board members’ diversity level.

Findings show that hospitality employees perceive nine diversity and inclusion categories (age, organizational climate, culture, disability, education, gender, physical differences, policy and practice and race) that companies need to consider when developing and implementing diversity management. Moreover, practitioners need to eliminate the gap between board members and employees when applying diversity management.

Drawing upon service–profit chain theory, this study extends hospitality literature regarding diversity management by demonstrating how employees perceive working environments created by diversity management affects the organizational financial outcome. Moreover, this study emphasizes the exemplary role of board members as policy and practice makers, to provide employees with the legitimacy and responsibilities of diversity management.

Pregnant employees experience considerable interpersonal discrimination. This study explores the range of possible reactions of observers to pregnancy self-disclosure, interpersonal discrimination and various allyship interventions, and the attentional processes that lead to those reactions. Consequently, it uncovers socio-cognitive processes underlying support for and backlash toward pregnancy in the workplace.

This study used a thought-listing technique to explore observers’ spontaneous thoughts related to pregnancy. Working adults were randomly assigned to read through one of the six scenarios depicting pregnancy self-disclosure, interpersonal discrimination and male allyship interventions (i.e. stating the organization’s anti-discrimination policy, confronting the transgressor by calling out sexism, pivoting the conversation to highlight the strengths of the pregnant employee and a hybrid intervention combining highlighting strengths and confrontation) after which participants listed the top three thoughts that came to their mind (1,668 responses). Responses were thematically analyzed to explore spontaneous reactions toward the pregnant employee, transgressor and ally in the scenario.

Surprisingly, across all scenarios, the most sexist thoughts emerged during pregnancy self-disclosure, even in the absence of any transgression. After a transgression occurred, any allyship intervention was better than none in eliciting lesser sexist backlash against the pregnant employee. Stating the organization’s anti-discrimination policy was most beneficial for the pregnant employee in eliciting the least sexist backlash but at the cost of generating unfavorable impressions of the ally. Calling out the transgressor’s bias elicited the most sexist backlash toward the pregnant employee, yet it created favorable impressions of the ally. In contrast, highlighting the strengths of the pregnant employee created the most favorable impression of the ally while eliciting a few sexist thoughts about the pregnant employee. Overall, the hybrid intervention was the most effective at balancing the competing goals of generating support for the pregnant employee, creating favorable impressions of the ally, as well as holding the transgressor accountable.

This study demonstrates that the type of allyship intervention critically redirects the attentional focus of observers to certain aspects of a discrimination episode and relevant schemas which can generate support or backlash toward targets, transgressors and allies, thereby advancing or obstructing equity and inclusion in organizations.