While one may not blatantly make another feel unfcomfortable becuse of race, color, age, sex, sexual oreintation, religion or disability. There are many behaviors that fall under the radar of discrimination law. Micro-inequities are the small messages of bias that are sent from one person to another - often without knowing it. These small communications of disrepect and inquity are like small paper cuts. Now you can bleed from just one a day but how about a lot of paper cuts every day. You could bleed to death!!! it is estimated that we send 2,000 - 4,000 a day.
No one is immune from micro-inequities and they canot be elimnated by legal mandates. But these "paper cuts" can be costly to organizations. It is estimated that it cost U.S. employers $64 billion per year. This figure represents cost of losing and replacing employees who quit heir jobs solely due to workplace micro-inequities.
Examples:
Being insensitive to cultural needs
Interrupting someone while they are speaking
Failing to acknowledge someone's presence
Excluding someone from relevant e-mail or conversations
Neglecting someone during introductions
Never bothering to learn the corerct pronuncciation of a name
Stopping a conversation when a person walks into the room
I believe political correctness does not really exsist. We as humans continue to make mistakes but we can be more sensitive and think before we act or don't act. Just doing that can eliminate a lot of these micro-inquities.
Dianne Floyd Sutton is President of Sutton Enterprises, author, trainer, educator, facilitator, expert witness, coach and actor. She has twenty-five years of combined experience in Human Resource Development (HRD) and Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) training. And she has twenty years of business experience as Sutton Enterprises.
