Open Access

Im Zuge des in der Einleitung vorgestellten GALA-Projekts wurden vom Konsortialführer, dem FIR e. V. an der RWTH Aachen, Themenworkshops zu den vier definierten Leitthemen ‚Mensch-Maschine-Interaktion‘, ‚Gesundes Arbeiten‘, ‚Digitale Kollaboration‘ sowie ‚Agilität und Innovation‘ durchgeführt. Ziel dieser vier Workshops war es, die Einstellungen, Meinungen, Beurteilungskriterien und Ideen der Anwendungs- und Unternehmenspartner zu den vier Leitthemen zu erfassen und neue Hypothesen und Ideen zu generieren. Im Vorfeld wurde eine umfassende Literaturrecherche zur Aufarbeitung des Forschungsstands innerhalb der vier Leitthemen durchgeführt und es wurden Publikationen ausgewertet, um eine theoretische Basis für die Workshops zu schaffen. In diesem Beitrag werden einige Grundlagen zu den jeweiligen Leitthemen aufbauend auf der Literaturanalyse vorgestellt. Im Anschluss daran werden jeweils die Ergebnisse der einzelnen Themenworkshops genauer beschrieben und in den theoretischen Hintergrund eingebettet. Jene bieten einen ersten Eindruck, wie die vier Leitthemen von Praktiker:innen aus der Gesundheitsbranche der Region Aachen eingeschätzt werden.

This Research Full Paper deals with the institutionalization of diversity management in German universities, which only started after the Bologna Reform at the end of the 1990s, the Excellence Initiative starting in 2006 and the passing of the General Equal Treatment Act (AGG) in 2006. The aim is to explore the motives of universities behind the implementation of diversity management and identify isomorphic mechanisms in the process of the implementation. Further, the paper conducts a first stocktaking of practical anti- discrimination work at German universities carried out through the organizational practice to identify further connecting factors and problematic situations. To answer the research questions, five expert interviews were conducted with diversity officers from two universities and three engineering universities in five different German states. Among other things, it was found that the interviewees rejected the term diversity management due to its underlying economic logic and preferred the more current term diversity policies. Moreover, from a university perspective, a total of eight different motives for implementing diversity policies were identified: Anti-discrimination, external effectiveness, acquisition of external funding, legislation, favorable investment compared to other measures, intrinsic motivation, potential approach, and exemplary function. Thus, universities initially try to appear diverse externally to meet the rationality expectations of their environment and only supplement this external effect with the appropriate measures and structures over time, while the motivation of diversity officers is intrinsic. This is also related to the fact that voting rounds slowed down processes, but universities would have to position themselves on current discourses, such as in the summer of 2020 after the racially motivated murder of George Floyd. Accordingly, it could be highlighted that the motives of diversity officers and their universities are not automatically congruent.