Ideopolis International

There is considerable talk about the knowledge economy and the information society. At the heart of these soundbites Ideopolis International recognises that people are the key factor that determine the success or failure of the economic community.

Our staff are published widely in both books and journals around equality and diversity issues. They have presented papers on diversity at international conferences, delivered EU and ESF programmes for a range of equality issues including positive action programmes for women, ethnic minorities and labour market reengagement programmes for young people who have dropped out of life long learning.

At Ideopolis International we believe that collaboration and partnership between groups and individuals has the potential to transform the economic community through maximising the potential of the workforce. Whether your interest is academic, educational, research related or driven by economic imperatives, social justice or social enterprise our diversity team would be interested in your views, comments and proposals.

Organisations

Further at the heart of human resource management and development lies equality of opportunity and diversity. In the current ever changing economic climate, 'managing diversity' is rather akin to 'crisis management'. That is, it is an attempt to restore order, logic and direction to a situation where demographic changes, declining birth rates, a reduction in school leavers, skill shortages and increasing global competition, to mention just a few of the factors, are altering the structure of employment and the labour market in a dramatic way never previously envisaged.

Ideopolis International brings together a team of people who have a unique combination of expertise in both diversity in theory and diversity in action. Whether it is theory or practical action that is appropriate in any situation, we believe that it more crucial to recognise that nowadays diversity cannot simply be left to the natural course of events; it must be sought in an organised way, stimulated and directed so that it can be incorporated into a firm quickly, fully and decisively.

Their practical and lived experience of implementing diversity in the workplace provides evidence that some of the core principles of diversity are not new but have simply altered over time, so maybe like you they have had to reinvent themselves on a regular basis, depending on the current policy and funding language. As such they empathise with organisations and individuals, and recognise that dynamic diversity management requires active and creative (rather than reactive) human resource management, research and training solutions.

Diversity in Enterprise

The last 25 years have seen major changes in the nature and patterns of entrepreneurial activity in the UK. Between the late 1970s and the early years of this decade, the number of people engaged in self employment, business ownership and entrepreneurship more than doubled. This largely reflects that changing nature of employment in the UK as larger employers reduce their labour forces and smaller and newer ventures emerge to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse, changing marketplace.

An inclusive, diverse economic community is key to the success of a city, region and country. Ideopolis International has produced recent, ground-breaking research on diversity in enterprise, both highlighting the impact of black and minority ethnic owned business and women and enterprise and potential, perceived and actual barriers holding back these communities from entrepreneurship.