Examining Employees’ and Executive Leadership Perceptions on the Impact of Leadership, Organisational Policies, and Demographics on Diversity and Inclusion in Botswana’s Diamond Industry

Mining industry is grappling with demographic disparities, for instance women representation in Australia is 16%, Canada is 19%, Sweden is 20%, United States of America is 20% and Botswana stands at 21%. Debswana which is the leading diamond mining company less than 23% representation of females in senior leadership cadre while less than 24% and 17% of the workforce are females and youths respectively. It is struggling with embedding diversity and inclusion. So, this thesis sought to examine employees’ and executive leadership’s perceptions of inclusive leadership, organizational policies and demographics impact on diversity and inclusion. Accordingly, this study is anchored on Social Identity Theory, Leader Member Exchange (LMX) theory, Optimal Distinctiveness Theory, Social Exchange Theory. A concurrent mixed method research design was adopted with interviews and web-based questionnaires used to collect data. 29 leaders were interviewed while 578 employees completed the questionnaires. Bivariate correlation was adopted for correlation analysis while for hypothesis testing, linear regression method was pursued. Results revealed that inclusive leadership, and organizational policies were significantly linked to perceptions on diversity and inclusion, while age and gender were insignificant. However, males had a positive perception of diversity and inclusion but insignificant. It is recommended that this study be extended to the Directorate of Public Service Management in Botswana given its immense mandate of transforming the public service in Botswana.