The Significance of Managing Workforce Cultural Diversity in the Public Transit Workplace

A culturally diverse transit workforce brings a deeper understanding of the communities being served, an ability to overcome language barriers, and a greater sense of comfort for passengers who share cultural backgrounds with transit personnel.

Internally, diverse cultural perspectives among transit workers foster innovation in addressing service delivery challenges and understanding customer needs. The realization of these benefits hinges on adept cultural diversity and equity management.

Importance of Effective Management

In the fast-paced world of public transportation, it is crucial to address and overcome challenges and crises quickly.

One way this is achieved is through a hierarchical line of authority, which has been used for a long time to make decisions efficiently and promote effectiveness in the transit industry.

However, it is important to recognize that hierarchical organizations function best in environments with little cultural, racial, ethnic, and gender diversity. As transit agencies become more culturally diverse, diversity can create challenges, particularly when the hierarchy reflects inequities.

Urban area transit systems tend to be more culturally diverse due to the talent pool from which workers are recruited.

The result is that these face two major cultural diversity and equity challenges. One challenge is the lack of gender diversity.

A recent publication by the Mineta Transportation Institute, titled "Comprehending Workforce Heterogeneity in the Transit Sector: Establishing a Benchmark of Diverse Demographics," sheds light on the significant inequities and disparities faced by diverse workers in the transit industry. The report reveals gender disproportion, with males dominating the transit workforce and the predominance of racial and ethnic diversity dominating the lower-end jobs.

The results indicate a need for targeted interventions to address these disparities, such as implementing family-friendly work schedules, obtaining support from top-tier executives to enhance workforce diversity, and providing continuous professional development opportunities.

The second challenge is that the cultural diversity in most organizations is concentrated in the lower-ranking positions.

This increases sensitivity to unfairness and raises questions about professional mobility opportunities and equity in access within the transit system. Directors, managers, and supervisors need the skills to promote fairness and equity to address the challenges.

The Impact of Inequity on Marginalized Groups

Marginalized groups, including ethnic and racial groups, immigrants, and women, often have a heightened sensitivity to unfairness and discriminatory behaviors in hierarchical organizations.

The lack of mentors or decision-makers who look like them can create a sense of isolation, leading to decreased morale and productivity.

Moreover, this imbalance in representation can contribute to workplace tension, hinder talent retention, reduce innovation, and harm the organization's reputation. When management shows favoritism, doesn’t address employees’ needs, and has uneven employee professional development support, employees become less engaged and satisfied with their workplace.

The Significance of Promoting Equity in the Workplace

A transit agency achieves equity when race, gender, or other group identity does not determine access, opportunity, and mobility within an organization.

As municipal transit agencies embrace increasing workforce and customer cultural diversity, it is imperative to actively promote equitable job progression, impartial disciplinary protocols, and flexible accommodations for all.

Regrettably, numerous urban municipal transit agencies grapple with ensuring that equity in their workforce is uniform to all workplace segments.

For example, job role disparity results in a disproportionate presence of historically marginalized groups in lower-tier roles within municipal transit agencies.

Women and racial and ethnic minority groups often encounter barriers to career advancement and growth opportunities due to barriers.

Conversely, there exists a conspicuous overrepresentation of white male Americans in executive-level positions, potentially fostering sentiments of injustice, partiality, and bias among employees in subordinate roles.

An organization committed to equity focuses on identifying and removing systemic barriers by developing management skills and identifying and removing structural barriers. This requires training, continuous education, and addressing workforce policy, procedure, and practice barriers.

How Racial Equity Training Supports Equity

Diversity Training University International (DTUI.com) conducted a survey at a transit agency workplace in a diverse metropolitan area. The survey aimed to gain insight into the daily difficulties faced by transit operators.

The findings from the survey were then used to create customized training programs focused on improving customer service and promoting racial equity.

The researchers discovered that a challenging work environment was influenced by several factors, including dealing with demanding public members, lack of support from management, and poor relationships among colleagues.

It is important to note that while customer service and conflict resolution training can be beneficial for operators, it is equally important to address internal issues within the organization, such as stressors related to colleagues and management, to improve working conditions.

For instance, the operators expressed feelings of being underappreciated and facing potential dangers, despite playing a crucial part in fulfilling the organization's mission. They believed supervisors and higher-level authorities did not hear or take their concerns seriously.

Additionally, it was observed that most operators were Black, Asian, and Hispanic individuals. This agency, like many others, exhibited a structural inequality where White Americans, who made up a small percentage of the agency, held most of the top-level decision-making positions.

How Racial Equity Training Supports Equity

Public transit plays a vital role in connecting communities and facilitating mobility for all.

However, civil and collegial relationships among transit agency team members are essential to serve the community's diverse needs effectively.

Culturally diverse teams bring varied perspectives, experiences, and competencies that enhance decision-making and improve service delivery. Addressing behaviors such as disparaging racial jokes, interrupting women when sharing their ideas, and ignoring workers with strong English accents can disrupt organizational hierarchies and foster productivity.

Racial equity training helps transit workers understand how inequitable behaviors can undercut their ability to work effectively and civilly with team members.

By examining case studies and real-life examples, the training program highlights the negative consequences of inequity on teamwork, employee morale, and customer satisfaction, motivating participants to create a more equitable workplace. They also feel that there was little recourse when colleagues treated each other unprofessionally or broke conduct rules.

Racial Equity Training Example

The client partnered with DTUI.com to develop organization-wide mandatory racial equity training modules to meet four goals:

• Increase the Ability to Identify Inequitable Behaviors Among Colleagues: The training empowers transit workers to recognize behaviors contributing to inequities within their organizations. By providing participants with knowledge and tools, workers learn they can play an active role in creating a more equitable workplace.
• Understanding the Impact of Inequities: Participants recall and discuss personal experiences with microinequities, relating course content to real-life situations. Discussions demonstrate how these behaviors negatively impact everyone involved.
• Reducing Microinequities with R.E.A.R.: The training introduces the R.E.A.R. technique (Recognize, Empathize, Acknowledge, Respond) to guide workers in responding to inequities they are exposed to in ways that reduce the likelihood of their recurring and reduce the impact on the victims.
• Managing Racial Equity to Promote a Productive, Culturally Diverse Workplace: The training offers supervisors, managers, and executive team members the R.E.A.R. training and the FOCSE (Fair, Open, Cooperative, Supportive, and Empowering) to manage equitably and reduce inequities within the workforce.

Transit Workers’ Evaluation of the Training

DTUI trainers enjoy teaching these courses because the participants are really enthusiastic about them, especially the transit operators.

We received over 400 responses to our anonymous post-training evaluations, and the results all support their positive verbal feedback.

Here are a few key results from the evaluations:

• 87% of the participants agreed that their knowledge, skills, and understanding increased after taking the course.
• 87% of the participants agreed that they gained knowledge and skills directly applicable to their work environment.
• 86% of the participants said they would recommend the course to their colleagues.

These results show that the participants found the course valuable and beneficial to their professional development.

The Path Forward

Cultural diversity in the transit workforce is a fact that will continue in the future as the demographics of inner cities change.

People who use public transportation are also becoming more diverse. Because transit agencies still rely on a hierarchical structure, it is important to manage racial equity to ensure smooth and effective operations.

Transit workers want and expect their workplace to meet their needs, including support in their job duties, opportunities for career advancement, and equitable treatment.

However, achieving these things requires deliberate efforts to make them a part of the organization's culture.

About the Author: Billy Vaughn, Ph. D., is an organizational psychologist and the founder of Diversity Training University International, an accredited continuing education and consulting organization.