Walt Disney Companies (2008a, p. 1) described its mission
At the Walt Disney Company we are committed to a standard of excellence in every aspect of our business and in every corner of the world, ethical and responsible conduct in all of our operations respect for the rights of all individuals and respect for the environment.
The Walt Disney Company, together with its subsidiaries, is a diversified worldwide entertainment company with operations in four business segments: Media Networks, Parks and Resorts, Studio Entertainment and Consumer Products.
As a major player in a broad set of sectors, Walt Disney Companies has focused much of its effort on achieving internal diversity, understood by Ivancevich (1998) as encompassing a workforce and suppliers/vendor base that is heterogenous, reflecting the population demographics of the country or service area, and open to individuals from all socio-economic, ethnic, racial, educational, national, linguistic, religious and other background including sexual preferences.
This report will examine how Walt Disney Companies (called the "Company" hereafter) has aggressively worked to achieve true diversity in terms of two key area - internal employees (called "cast members) and supplier relationships. The Company (2008b) noted that it has in recent years begun an aggressive outreach effort to recruit suppliers and vendors representing minority groups as part of its overall strategy to achieve true diversity in a multicultural society. A qualitative, narrative review of relevant literature including company documents (primary sources materials) will be used to argue that Disney has been a leader in the diversity movement in the U.S. and has been widely recognized for its achievement sin this area.
Diversity is an issue tackled in corporate settings under the aegis of human resource management (HRM) departments, acting under the guidance of top-level management a...