I organise regular lunch time seminars to raise staff's awareness of Cultural Diversity. I usually invite a couple of external speakers and provide a nice lunch.
However I am running out of ideas of subjects to cover and wondered if anyone could suggest subjects that might be relevant and interesting to people.
We recently explored Islam, Jihad & Terrorism which got people's interest & attention and went down really well.
Any suggestions?
derek hughes
6 Responses
Cultural Diversity
I know a brilliant speaker and trainer who specialises in the subject. Have you tried customer care with a diversity eye? He covered non western body language,protocols,meet and greet -tons of stuff
Equally, the economics-brown/pink pound
The law-participatory jury exercises!
Forthcoming issues
Media observatory
Demographic Time Bomb and other issues linked to social atlas-he gave us a locality qwiz with insights into our postal code areas
And have you read the book Riding the Waves of Culture-brilliant-a Big Mac is a status symbol in Moscow,a throwaway in London
ISBN 1 85788 176 1
Fons Trompenaars
Charles Hampden Turner
£15.00 paperback
Let me know if you need anything else
At least three or four extra sessions above!
Jennifer
What about your own workforce?
How about some topics that get them thinking about their own historical and cultural diversity?
Where were they born?
where were their parents/ grandparents born?
Why did they end up living in the places they settled in? Economics, family ties, events?
What interesting/unusual jobs do they know relatives/ancestors have undertaken? How have our attitudes to these jobs changed?
Has out attitude to leisure changed? Do they remember some ritual/celebration/food they had at home that was different to people around them?
I’ve run this with as little as six people and am always amazed at the richness of other people’s lives. It can spark of some really interesting discussions in all sorts of areas.
Perhaps someone to talk about family trees?
OR most areas of the country have been invaded or have an industry that has brought people in or driven people out. Try the local university for a specialist.
I like to mix focus so this kind of topic doesn’t just become a external exercise. The more we can apply words like diversity and culture to our own lives the better I say.
maybe we can help?
An area we get increasing interest in is understanding more about Chinese culture and society. This is co-delivered by a Chinese facilitator and gets very good feedback. Have you covered anything on this before?
We could also run some cultural simulation exercises – have you tried this? People often get a lot from such experiential activities?
Let me know if you’d like to find out more.
Diversity
Derek hi, just a thought ( sorry with my HR hat on ) is it worth considering a speaker to talk about ageism from their perspective? Topical with legislation changes around the corner. Also worth considering that most interpreteurs and languange tutirs offer cultural introduction sessions too.
Visits into the Community
Instead of asking speakers into the organisation why not arranged visits to community centres and places of worship (temples, mosques, gurdwaras, churches, synagogues)
My
Dear Derek
What I have found to work nicely, and helps to build understanding and tolerance, is to ask each staff member to bring along to the meeting something of their own which represents something about who they are – it can be a photograph, an item of clothing, a favourite snack or food etc. Each person then briefly tells the group why they brought along what they did and the relevance of this item to them. I have found that this can lead to much discussion and often deepens respect and understanding by highlighting why someone does something a certain way or has certain cultural values. Conversely, it also highlights that although we may be different and culturally diverse, we are in fact also very similar in so many ways!