Inclusion is essential in today's legal workplace, both for individuals and for organisations. The SBS Core Inclusion Program comprises eight self-paced courses designed to provide core skills and knowledge around supporting diversity in the workplace.

The Cultural Diversity course explores concepts such as cultural differences and similarities, and the impact of population trends in Australia. It provides culturally specific knowledge and practical skills that can be used to make the workplace more inclusive.

On completion of the Cultural diversity course, you should be able to:

• Understand what culture is, and recognise that it impacts all aspects of behaviour
• Understand that cultures have similarities and differences, especially with relation to direct / indirect communication, the perception of time, and greetings
• Understand the importance of family across cultures
• Recall Hofstede’s dimensions and how they can be used to measure differences in values across cultures
• Recognise the concept of ‘face’ and examples of how ‘face’ is expressed in some cultural contexts
• Understand how written, verbal and non-verbal expressions might vary across cultures
• Understand how environment and object language vary across cultures
• Identify obstacles to successful cross-cultural communication and measures that can be used to negate differences
• Define the different stages of cultural adaptation, understand how they may impact a person, and identify measures that facilitate a smooth transition through the stages
• Understand historical and current migration trends and the impact on the Australian population and in relation to Australian religious diversity
• Understand historical and current population trends for Indigenous Australians
• Gain an insight into the changing values of Australia

This course consists of five modules:

• Cultural diversity themes
• Dimensions of cultural diversity
• Cross-cultural communication
• Cultural adaptation
• Australia by the numbers 

Robert Bean, Managing Director of Cultural Diversity Services, and the Australian Multicultural Foundation were major contributors to the course.