For any organization regardless of the scope of operations or size, success in business involves the recognition of diversity and cultural differences, as well as communicating and functioning in a socially appropriate way.
Approximately 10 percent of business start-ups are initiated by BME entrepreneurs, yet 80 percent of UK BME believe their banking needs are neither recognized nor properly understood. These hard-hitting, but unambiguous facts confronted Lloyds TSB Business Banking. It is also evident that Lloyds TSB had adopted a generic approach to managing diversity, which was devoid of implementation strategies explicitly designed for managing individuals given their vastly different backgrounds, ethnicity, race, and sociocultural contexts.
Lloyds TSB has in the past dealt with diversity issues, more specifically, allegations of racial prejudice in remuneration, career advancement, and job promotion practices, whereby a section of employees expressed feeling discriminated against based on their race. There also were allegations of the ‘glass wall’ and the ‘glass ceiling’ that deterred the BME employees from progressing to the top ranks within the organization.
